fifty frenchmen can't be wrong (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
some_stars) wrote2012-07-02 03:52 pm
some_stars) wrote2012-07-02 03:52 pm
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Well, I finally saw Brave. It was a colossal fucking disappointment on every level, another bait-and-switch just like Tangled, and it really drove home to me the extent to which Pixar--and this entire industry--literally cannot conceive of a female heroine, even when they're supposed to be making a movie specifically about that very thing. Can you imagine if How To Train Your Dragon had ended with Hiccup's dad defeating the dragon? That was what I was hoping for, really, something like HTTYD but with any use at all for women besides as ~tough~ but ultimately breathless and yielding emotional support dolls with no interior life. Or dead.
I mean, for fuck's sake, it wasn't even a good movie. The structure is just--the story never actually happens. I kept waiting for it to start and then suddenly it was almost over. And Merida and her mom never actually have their big breakthrough moment, and Merida never actually triumphs over anything, and--god, it's just such terrible, terrible writing. Even if it had been about a boy and his dad, it would still have been a mostly-passable first draft in need of a major plot rewrite; it was just not good.
But they'd never have made that movie about a boy, because boys get to star in their own stories and do the things that animated children's adventure heroes get to do. Merida doesn't. And of course Pixar and their apologists are going to wave this around until the end of time like it means something--but we made a girl movie! You're not allowed to complain anymore!
God, it was just such bullshit. And this is what we're expected to lap up so gratefully, and I gather men are already panicking because omgggg it doesn't have enough BOYS being HEROES what about the BOYS. They can relax--aside from being nominally about a girl and her mother, Brave presents no threat to the patriarchy whatsoever. Strong work, Pixar and Disney; I am sure you did what you intended.
I mean, for fuck's sake, it wasn't even a good movie. The structure is just--the story never actually happens. I kept waiting for it to start and then suddenly it was almost over. And Merida and her mom never actually have their big breakthrough moment, and Merida never actually triumphs over anything, and--god, it's just such terrible, terrible writing. Even if it had been about a boy and his dad, it would still have been a mostly-passable first draft in need of a major plot rewrite; it was just not good.
But they'd never have made that movie about a boy, because boys get to star in their own stories and do the things that animated children's adventure heroes get to do. Merida doesn't. And of course Pixar and their apologists are going to wave this around until the end of time like it means something--but we made a girl movie! You're not allowed to complain anymore!
God, it was just such bullshit. And this is what we're expected to lap up so gratefully, and I gather men are already panicking because omgggg it doesn't have enough BOYS being HEROES what about the BOYS. They can relax--aside from being nominally about a girl and her mother, Brave presents no threat to the patriarchy whatsoever. Strong work, Pixar and Disney; I am sure you did what you intended.
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