blowfish

Last night, some channel was showing "Some Girls," which was reviewed here on DVD Reviews. After deciding I wasted 2 hours of my life on the movie and realizing that there isn't a review out there that actually mentions the messages behind the film, I thought I'd do that for the benefit of posterity. Perhaps they won't waste their time.

My problem is that the messages underlying the film don't become evident till nearly the end. Bottom line: women are from another universe and men are idiots. The point of the picture is summarized by the father's monologue at the end in which he admits to the young Patrick Demsey character that he is clueless about all the women in his family who are 'great mysteries.' These women are creatures of intuition that are in touch with some underlying supernatural reality captured in some part by Catholicism. Granny comes back from the grave to give Demsey's character a kiss. Jennifer Connelly's character intuits that Demsey needs to be at their house for Christmas, even though she does not love him any more, probably because something from the beyond has let her know that he needs to be there to seal the real love story of the movie, between Demsey and granny. Granny sees real potential in the kid, an atheistic man fool who at least could develop the capacity to see the deeper reality denied to rational scholars such as the father. Throw in a bunch of art work and images from Catholicism and you have a perfect anti-Enlightenment message that is deeply conservative.

Give me a break! Throw away the cheap supernaturalism and what emerges is a litany of moronic stupendousness. The father is stumped that his wife, who deeply loved granny, can be so happy now that she is dead. Dad is supposed to be a genius biographer, albeit an atheistic lefty. Exactly what's so hard about figuring out that, given his wife's obsessive belief in Catholicism, that she thinks granny is alive, well, and kickin' with her loved ones in heaven? Even this atheistic lefty can intuit that, and I'm no genius biographer.

And what about that mysterious Jen Connelly character, who runs hot and cold with love for Demsey throughout the flick? Again, it's not too hard to figure out: She and Demsey are dumb teens who haven't got a clue about themselves or what they want but are nonetheless at an age brimming with sex hormones. She's brewed in a culture of passion and love that doesn't see a need to understand some of the rational underpinnings of love. So, she depends on her intuition, which is no guide at all. Big surprise she can't make up her mind and that she teases Demsey mercilessly. By the end of the movie, she's decided not to go to college--after all, why should someone from the parallel universe of intuition bother with reason? Wow, what a feminist message! Her dad, if had half a brain, would kick her butt to college whether she wanted to or not.

Her sister Irenka (Sheila Kelley) is another sad case stuck in the parallel universe of intuition. She runs through one loser boyfriend after another and, feeling she's getting old after granny dies, decides she has to do Demsey. She's insecure and in need of self-validation in part because she doesn't have a career plan and can't seem to land a husband. Again, a smart dad would put his foot down, send the dumb lost soul to college, and hopefully she'll discover that she can feel good about being more than a sex toy for men.

This movie is perfect for people who have been unfortunately born in modernity when all they really wanted was to grow up with Medieval certainties: Catholicism, the proper place for women, and the guarantee of a better life in heaven once this shitty existence comes to an end. For those of us who would rather not waste our lives in misery waiting for a fairyland exit, this movie is little more than teen sexual titillation gussied up as art.