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Five Problems With Chick Flicks
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Katherine Heigl’s new romp, The Ugly Truth, is the latest in a string of brainless romantic comedies. Marisa Meltzer on five things the genre can do to make us fall in love with it again.
In The Ugly Truth, which comes out today, Katherine Heigl plays Abby, a beautiful, single, thirtysomething producer on a ratings-challenged Sacramento morning show. Her standards in men are so high that potential dates can be dismissed just minutes into dinner based on the wrong choice of tap versus bottled water. When her boss decides to hire Mike (Gerard Butler), the Howard Stern of local public-access cable, to spice up the show, there’s no question of whether opposites will attract.
The lack of suspense shouldn’t be an impediment to the box office gross; no one buys tickets to romantic comedies because they want to be surprised by the ending. At their best—Annie Hall, His Girl Friday, When Harry Met Sally, the John Hughes oeuvre, to name just a few—they can be intelligent, hilarious, and genuinely romantic. But the last few years have produced a series of Stepford romcoms, like The Ugly Truth, that feel like they were written by committee and cater to the lowest common denominator.
In honor of the genre’s staying power, The Daily Beast picked five ways romantic comedies can change for the better.
1) Clumsiness doesn’t count as a character trait.
Heigl’s character Abby is supposed to be uptight in The Ugly Truth, but her control-freak character is supposed to show a more vulnerable side in a scene where she climbs a tree half-naked after her runaway cat. After enjoying the view of a new, hot neighbor emerging from the shower, she falls and ends up hanging from a branch, upside-down in her underwear. In case that’s not enough humiliation for one movie, there’s a scene involving Abby wearing remote-controlled vibrating panties during a business dinner.
The cute girl who makes a fool of herself isn’t Heigl’s territory alone—Sandra Bullock is also guilty of playing the hot klutz in Two Weeks' Notice and the Miss Congeniality movies. Renée Zellweger’s Bridget Jones was prone to both verbal and physical clumsiness. Jessica Alba’s Cam in Good Luck Chuck takes it to new heights, bumping into waiters who spill glasses of water down her (whoops!) cleavage; falling into a pond for penguins; enduring all manner of mishaps in a dental office; walking into a pole; and getting her skirt caught in a car door. We get it! Being accident-prone is a way to humanize a hot actress, but do their characters have to be so poorly conceived that their one defining trait is their ability to fall—into the arms of the right guy?
2) They promote industries that aren’t exactly booming.
It’s true—girls in romantic comedies don’t have to be ditzy klutzes. But if they’re capable, they’re probably iron-lady shrews who need to be tamed by the right guy. Case in point: Bullock’s The Proposal, in which she plays a successful-but-scary book editor. While we’re on the topic, why must so many romantic comedies feature characters who work in media jobs? Besides The Proposal, there’s Confessions of a Shopaholic, Bridget Jones’s Diary, 13 Going on 30, and The Devil Wears Prada. Making the female lead work in a recession-friendly job like a registered nurse or a bankruptcy lawyer or a pharmacist might shake up the genre and give young fans some ideas for future career paths. Don’t actuaries need love, too?
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Jacob Bernstein is a senior reporter at The Daily Beast. Previously, he was a features writer at WWD and W Magazine. He has also written for New York magazine, Paper, and The Huffington Post.
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Lloyd Grove is editor at large for The Daily Beast. He is also a frequent contributor to New York magazine and was a contributing editor for Condé Nast Portfolio. He wrote a gossip column for the New York Daily News from 2003 to 2006. Prior to that, he wrote the Reliable Source column for the Washington Post, where he spent 23 years covering politics, the media, and other subjects.
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Jeff Madrick is a contributor to the New York Review of Books and a former economics columnist for the New York Times. He is editor of Challenge Magazine, visiting professor of humanities at Cooper Union, and senior fellow at the New School's Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis. He is the author of Taking America, The End of Affluence (Random House) and The Case for Big Government.
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Marisa Meltzer is coauthor of How Sassy Changed My Life. Her next book Girl Power will be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in February.
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Marisa Meltzer is coauthor of How Sassy Changed My Life. Her next book Girl Power will be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in February.
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Marisa Meltzer is coauthor of How Sassy Changed My Life. Her next book Girl Power will be published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in February.
Couple of suggestions...
* Please, let's everyone stop saying 'romcom'; and
* Go see "(500) Days of Summer" if you want a good romantic comedy. It's more of a coming-of-age story... about love.
Thanks, for voicing my thoughts exactly! Am quite tired of the same old same old and would welcome an interesting movie the likes of When Harry Met Sally where ALL of the characters had character!
Another thing that you said really strikes home and that was your comment about this obsession with only media type jobs? They all work in TV or magazines or some such. Do they know that there is a world of other occupations out there? Also find this to be true about glam mags so stopped reading them about a decade ago. The same trend is going on in the movies and didn't realize it until now, but am not really going to those lately either...
I've always said to my girl friends - kind of kidding, but kind of not - that chick flicks are basically emotional porn for females. Guys look at idealized girls who are physically perfect and set unattainable standards for real women. Chick flicks do the same, but emotionally.
So why is it okay for women when porn is socially foul for men?
Strange that you lump Annie Hall into the romantic comedy category when it's a movie that does exactly what you complain the genre doesn't - i.e., examine a relationship from start to finish.
The fact is, the sexual revolution killed the romantic (or screwball) comedy because the genre was built on strict sexual mores that have long since broken down. When remaining a virgin until marriage was part of our societal fantasy, much conflict could be made of sexual tension.
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The last good chick flick was "Thelma and Louise" - nothing else even comes close.
Right on!
The last good AMERICAN chick flick was probably Thelma & Lousie. I really dug the little Irish indie film Once.
Virginia Woolf wrote "love is a story we tell ourselves about someone else."
Ergo, Movies, and relationships, are not based on reality, facts, or even the truth. By their very definition, they demand a disproportionate amount of "wool-gathering", which is why the majority end in dissolution and divorce.
We walk out of bad relationships and say "it was like a bad movie"... Maybe, our relationships and movies will improve when we start telling ourselves "better stories" on both sides of the screen.
Perfectly stated.
Thank you!!!!!! I hate Heigl but moreover I hate chick flicks for the exact reasons you describe. And you are so on the mark about the media jobs thing. Another to add to the list is that one with Goldie Hawn's daughter, what's her face and Matthew McConahoo "How to lose a guy in some inordinate amount of time". If it weren't for Sex in the City the genre would be long dead. Thanks for voicing the opinion of many women out there who just want a good movie with romance and BRAINS!!!
As much as I love Goldie Hawn, there is nothing special about her daughter-she looks like every other 20-30 something bleached blond starlet. I feel that she got her positions due to my famous parents.
Goldie on the other hand, is actually someone special that stands out both for looks and talent.
This analysis right in it's points, but far too light.
The movies are appalling, and seem to be getting worse. I am in awe that our society, at this juncture, would even allow something like "The Ugly Truth" to be shown on our screens. These types of movies, Paris Hilton, etc, and constant girl-on-girl scenes on TV and in movies are some of the major contributors to what I call "The Stupid B**ch Conundrum." Women are only for sexual degradation viewed through the male eye or lens. Women are raging shrews who just need to get drilled by a pig who can knock them down to where they deserve to be. Women deserve to have pigs and idiots tell them they have to lower their standards. You get the idea. What is amazing to me is that we have fallen this far. I can't imagine any of this extreme degradation happening in the Eighties. It's like we progressed to a certain point, and then went crashing backwards in the most perverse of ways.
God help us all.
God, I couldn't agree more! I watch my daughters cringe at the trailer for "The Ugly Truth" with the "You slept with the pillow twins, giggle giggle, tee hee" and make it unequivocally clear if these types of guys and these types of girls want each other, let em have at it. It's endemic. My sis-in-law puts Victoria's Secret and Maxim in her hubby's bathroom so she can be the "cool wife". The Daily Show has Girls Gone Wild ads, so it's embarrassing for my 15 year old to watch the more intelligent shows. I see full grown women talking like stupid toddlers and twirling their hair at my daughter's junior high. What are these girls learning? You get the guy by being super-sexually experimental and playing dumb? What keeps his attention after you're bored at the role-playing? Why do you want that kind of guys attention? I'm not prudish or anti-sexual. I want my kids to have good sexual experiences and a lively youth, as you never get that time back, but I think it's freakishly f*cked up that my 7th grader's peers have bikini waxes.
Thanks so much for adding all your real-life experience, it is exactly as I feared from my observation.
I am also in no way anti-sexual, and believe firmly in everyone's right to be satisfied in that arena of life. But that's just it- it seems like all of these demeaning and overly sexual inputs young ladies are bombarded by are leading not to their own ownership and satisfaction from sex but to their own self-hatred and endangerment.
First off while some movies migth inspire and set good examples, the lions share are worth nothing more than a laugh. It falls on parents to teach their children the difference between reality and fiction, not some hollywood trash comedy.
I can definitly say that your view of the 80's is warped having grown up in the 80's and having watched entirely to much t.v. I can attest that degredation was alive and well.
Instill proper beliefs and morals and shitty t.v. isn't a problem. But bikini waxed 7th graders WTF?
You hit the nail on the head, but I would like to add a few more cliches that need to go:
1) The Last Minute Sprint (Love Actually, Sleepless In Seattle, both Bridget Jones movies)
2) Michevious Pets (The Truth About Cats And Dogs, Must Love Dogs, As Good As It Gets)
3) Mr. or Ms. Right In Front Of You (Win A Date With Tad Hamilton, Made Of Honor, Someone Like You)
4) Blooming Wallflowers (She's All That, Miss Congeniality, The Mirror Has Two Faces)
5) The Lonely Montage (Notting Hill, Clueless)
6) Bad Influence Buddies (Knocked Up, What Happens In Vegas, The Break-Up)
7) Shlubby Guy, Pretty Girl (Hitch, Knocked Up)
8) Fake IDs (Made In Manhattan, Just One Of The Guys)
9) PDA (Never Been Kissed, Fever Pitch)
10 The Top Of The Stairs Moment a.k.a. The Ta-Dah Moment (She's All That, Pretty Woman)
11) Eating For Two Or Three (Two Weeks Notice)
12) Kissing In The Rain (Four Weddings And A Funeral, Breakfest At Tiffany's)
13) Wardrobe Montage (27 Dresses, Pretty Woman, Sex And The City)
14) Singing Into Objects (P.S. I Love You, Bridget Jones' Diary)
15) Quirky BFF (Working Girl, Sleepless In Seattle, The Wedding Planner)
I wouldn't lump the Break-Up in on a list of romcoms, as it was exactly about what happens after the first date/first kiss/How-I-Met-You scenario.
Great work jezoebel!!!
Right on re: blooming wallflowers. As if anyone wouldn't notice the hottie just because she has glasses and hasn't combed her hair. They're always just like the "beautiful girls" in terms of face and body type, just a little "quirky," with dyed hair, piercings, or the like. How about a movie where a fat or genuinely average looking girl actually finds that she's not worthless and is deserving of love too?
You could only find 5 things wrong with chick flicks; seriously?
1. the primary character is white 99.9% of the time. Women of all cultures/races have problem with men.
2. the primary character is between 20-35 and weighs a buck05
3. it's getting old and tired; what happened to the creative writers
4. $$$$$ = boring
So many people compare women's use of romance movies and novels to men's use of porn. I think a more accurate comparison is to action movies and books. Both provide socially acceptable fantasies either of finding the love of a lifetime or saving the world. And I think we can all agree that for every chick flick that has the female lead walk into the sunset hand-in-hand with Mr. Right, there is a corresponding action flick where the male lead single-handedly defeats the bad guys (and often gets the girl, while he's at it!)
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I would rather watch these movies than the dam Lifetime channel.
The movie may be brainless but, Lord help us, she is absolutely gorgeous. If we have to see brainless movies to see her, then so be it. I'm in the ticket line.
This article hit the nail on the head. I'm tired of the same plot lines. When I saw the preview for the new Katherine Heigl movie I immediately could predict the ending. "Hmm what do you be they end up liking each other after a series of events that lead her to see his soft side and she reveals her vuneralbe side?"
My favorite chick flick is Romy and Michelle's Highschool reunion, and I could watch the Notebook every day of my life!
Yes to all points. Each gender's side tells the same story, but with different actors/settings, ad nauseum. Lately, the attempts to create a box-office success have severely compromised the quality of stories.
It is the moment when this art imitating life gives way to movie production's formulaic scripts -- we lose exactly the reason of why anyone goes to cinema.
Wonder how different films would be if we never had dvd's/vhs...
Brendino - You hit the nail on the head! Chick flicks are porn for females. Like porn for men, they have hardly anything to do with real life, and train us to have unrealistic, superficial expectations. I've always hated romantic comedies. I was probably the only female I know who thought Sleepless in Seattle was sappy. The only ones that are slightly tolerable are the comedies, but I agree that they portray the female lead as obnoxious, and she has to be "saved" by the man. Romances are only good when they show the leads on equal footing. I also much prefer tragedies, "Romeo and Juliet," Age of Innocence," and yes, even "Bridges of Madison County" syrupy as it was, at least it showed normal people in a normal situation.
If John Cusack stood outside your bedroom, as he famously did in Say Anything, and blasted a Peter Gabriel song that is supposed to represent his feelings to you, would that be even remotely enjoyable?
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Actually yes, I love that scene and I WOULD love it in real life. Agree with you on the rest of your points, but no picking on John Cusack!
John Cusack could do pretty much anything outside my window, and I would be pleased as punch. Cuz he's John Cusack.
I was just about to write this EXACT comment. Yeah, you can count me in on this, too.
...And maybe I'm not post-fem enough, but romcoms are exactly what they say they're going to be. I don't know anyone who goes into watching them without knowing that they're going to be brainless, gushy, unrealistic movies.
While a John Cusack fan, for different reasons. I agree these movies are nothing more than meets the eye. You don't go watch The Ugly Truth hoping for some mind opening revelation.
Romantic love stinks. Why shouldn't the movies about it stink as well? Friendship on the other hand, that can be OK. Which is why I think friendship movies are better.
Katherine Heigl is in the movie because she is willing to be filmed in underwear. No one watches not expecting T and A and frontal nudity.
Only 5? They all cater to the palylife mentality of neurotics who can't figure out their role.
It does not mean their is a pigeonhole role, just that some women were programmed to raise a family, and some to drive trucks. But sorting out the myriad messages that they are bombarded with keeps them from searching within and doing what they want, not what others want.
Interesting! I like this article.
Signed,
Niccy
Romcoms are like sitcoms.....the people that watch them expect certain situations and characters, because they find that familiar and comforting. I suppose that accounts for the television actresses who appear in romcoms, such as Heigl or Anniston. Bland is comfortable. As for why do romcoms tend to feature media jobs, "glamour" jobs are part of the fantasy of romcoms, and easy to romanticize. If you make the heroine a surgical nurse, all of a sudden you are surrounded by hard reality, which in romcoms is a real buzz kill.
Please don't change romantic comedies, they're easy as hell to talk about and sound like I actually payed attention to the movie.
Thank you.
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