Remember The Ladies

Ah, the boys of the New Yorker. You’ve gotta love ’em. Wait, do I? Do I have to love them?

I have been increasingly irritated by the New Yorker, my all-time favorite publication, and its admirably staunch refusal to feature more than a couple token female writers every third issue or so (there have been several issues where not a single lady’s voice appeared, in fact, not even, like, authoring one of the poems, and not even one of Patricia Marx’s sort of painful shopping reviews). There is apparently a Facebook page afoot wherein people agree to send back all issues of the NYer that do not contain at least 15% writing by women or something–some heart-breakingly small percentage that still is all-too-rarely met. Like, not even asking for 50%. Just like, could there maybe be one or two articles by women? Maybe? Is there such a thing as a woman writer?

And of course there’s your standard universalizing statements made blithely by various basically decent dudes, which, you know, almost don’t even bother me anymore, I’m so constantly surrounded by them, as are we all, unless we are lucky enough to live on lesbian separatist land:

In American writing, there are three perfect books, which seem to speak to every reader and condition: ‘Huckleberry Fin,’ ‘The Great Gatsby,’ and ‘The Catcher in the Rye.’

Ah yes, Adam Gopnik my old pal–whose writing I genuinely enjoy and who seems like a great dude–the universal books that speak to every possible condition, so long as that condition involves being a disaffected white man. My vision of a young Maya Angelou reading The Great Gatsby and being all “My god! It’s like he’s known me all my life” still cracks me up, if I do say so. Thank you.

But whatever, right? This is just the world we live in. “He” as the generic pronoun and what-not. Men are people and women are female men. And we (the female men) have to get our kicks where we can–we have to enjoy Scorcese films and Infinite Jest and find them “universal” even though they aren’t, but that’s as it’s always been, female protagonists speak to women and male protagonists speak to people, ho-hum, I guess. (To say nothing of race and racial issues, who “has race” and who does not, what counts as “universal” and what counts as “uniquely articulating the [insert non-white race] experience.” I mean, damn, don’t even get me started, right?)

Still, sometimes a girl just gets fed up. So, fed up and bored at work, I dipped my toes into the great Google pool in order to find some of the more hilarious things Anthony Lane has written w/r/t gender and/or ladies (although only women have gender, as we all know).

David Denby’s crimes against womanhood are legendary and almost don’t really bear going into, unless it’s to make another hilarious joke about how many times he mentions Katharine Hepburn when talking about how women in film these days just fucking suck so much. Denby is such a grouchy old out-of-touch Boomer. What are these kids talking about, with their emoticons and their “snark”? Remember when he got mad at Jezebel for mis-quoting something and then mis-quoted them in his rant? And Jezebel was like “we never printed that”? Cool your jets, fella. He also has that annoying Boomer trait where he pretends like he’s all “aware” of women or minorities but then reveals such weird old-timey thinking on the subject, like Stephen King and his magical negroes. Denby’s just so sad they don’t make ’em like they used to, except for “the Social Network,” which, because it’s about male genius, warrants the most insane critical blowjob I’ve probably ever seen in my life, Denby’s review of it so grandiose and enormous it spread its wings and flew out of the actual movie review section of that week’s New Yorker and colonized an immense spread in the actual real part of the magazine. I truly could not believe what I was reading. It was like James Lipton interviewing Robert DeNiro. BRILLIANCE! MEN! GENIUS! MODERN MACHISMO!! COMPUUUUUUTERS!!!!!

But what of Mr. Anthony Lane? Lane always gets more of a pass than Denby, because he’s sort of urbane and charming where Denby is a lumbering, glowering old crank. Lane can be very, very funny–like for example when he said, of his viewing of the “Sex and the City” movie, that he went into it expecting a good time but came out of it “a raving Marxist.” That’s a good line! (Although it must also be pointed out that Denby has some great lines too, like when he called Michael Bay “stunningly, almost viciously untalented.” That is a truly epic burn, also very funny (and true)).

Anyway, but, so, Lane seems sort of gently condescending and faintly British (who knows how long he’s been living over there! Maybe 100 years), so much more old and honest about being old than Denby, who thinks he’s going to provide a fresh insight into, like, “Knocked Up” (“KATHARINE HEPBURN KATHARINE HEPBURN”) but instead just sort of reveals he doesn’t know what jokes are. I mean, this is a man (Denby) who wrote an entire (negative) review of “Burn After Reading” without even mentioning “the Big Lebowski.” This is the man who called “Inglorious Basterds” “insufferable.” He said that. I feel like we are so prepped to hate Denby, for good reason(s), that we forget about Lane. But then when you actually look at the facts, Lane is way more insidiously misogynist and basically awful. He goes places Denby would never dare to dream of going. After some studious googling of Lane I find myself relaxing my famous hatred of Denby in comparison, and acknowledging that the man has some finer points. Can you imagine? Lets take a look!

We know how many times Lane waxes philosophical, wondering about female directors and how hard it must be for them (because movies are a man’s world, obvi), and how obvious it is when they direct a movie because…well, lets hear what he has to say about it in his review of “Father of my Children”:

“It takes a female director, I think, to catch children, young and old, at these fragile hours, and also to trace a residue of something childlike in their elders.”

omg SO TRUE RIGHT? Ah, motherhood…womanhood…something something children…because of vaginas and stuff. To quote my friend Chris: “Any movie review that doesn’t follow the phrase ‘it takes a female director to…’ with ‘…give birth to a child’ IS BULLSHIT” (“Chris” is a man, so you know you can take that quotation seriously).

I was recently chortling over his review of “the Kids are All Right,” in which he not only bemoans the fact that Annette Bening is unwisely playing someone who isn’t sexy, he also manages one of his endless little attempts at a kind of thoughtless smug feminism no doubt inspired by the multitude of rude blog posts populating the interwebs about what a chauvinist pig he is. Denby and Lane are both chronically guilty of these little throwaway faux-feminist asides and they always irk, because they are almost always didactic and, like, scolding. Kind of like when Charles Rosen scolds us for trying to say that Clara Schumann is important, because it’s hard on the little lady, to compare her to men who are just so naturally superior, it’s really not fair, poor dear Clara, we really do HER an anti-feminist injustice when we pretend like we can compare her to a boy, how dare we force her dainty shoulders to bear that burden. Whenever Denby or Lane attempts to chastise me (the audience) for some fictional bugbear I’m supposedly being prejudiced by w/r/t women on screen, I want to shriek, because hardly anyone perpetuates these very bugbears more than Lane and Denby, in spite of all their Boomer-style squawking about “bravery” and “serious roles for women” and “Katharine Hepburn.” It’s even worse, with them, because they HIDE their prejudice behind being smart and sensitive and progressive. But deep down, they make all those asshole studio execs quoted in that Anna Farris article look like Gloria Fucking Steinem. At least those guys had the decency to follow up many of their remarks by saying “actually that sounds really stupid, now that I say it out loud.” Would that Lane would say something similar! Instead we get stuff like this:

The drought of intelligent roles for women in middle age is so severe that you have to applaud Bening for seeking out these movies and making them her own [<--awkward token half-assed feminist gesture...wait for it...], yet it would be disingenuous not to be taken aback by the harsh purpose with which so accomplished a seductress—think of her in “The Grifters” and “Bugsy”—has peeled away any trace of glamour in favor of a saturnine frown and a pursed mouth […direct destruction of half-assed gesture!].

totally! I hate when 55 year old mothers are so stressed out by their crumbling marriages and disturbed teenagers that they forget to be sexy! And I hate even MORE when actresses drawn to those roles because they are interesting and showcase a wide range of acting abilities fail to realize that the role won’t allow them to show their boobs and be hot! What can Bening be THINKING. It’s almost like she’s interested in the craft of acting or something, rather than in giving Anthony Lane the boner he so richly deserves.

To say nothing of the way he shames Tina Fey for daring to wear a short skirt in “Baby Mama” when she’s not that pretty. TINA FEY! Don’t you know you aren’t a supermodel?! Whoa, has no one told you that one thousand times before???? He embarks on this totally bizarre flight of fancy in which he’s talking about all the different ways female comedians use their bodies–Bette Midler’s a great big fat person, so she does lots of big girl stuff or something, which is funny AND sexy, so it’s okay, whereas Lucille Ball is SO FOXY but she worked really hard to make herself into an oaf–and how Fey must not have figured out how to use her body appropriately yet because she’s so used to being on television (? Unlike Lucille Ball?) or something. He specifically seems disturbed by Tina Fey’s thighs. You guys, I don’t even know anymore.

I was so scared one of them would review Bridesmaids and shame all the girls for not looking pretty, but so far they have ignored it, and now I don’t know what makes me madder. Especially you, David Denby, always sanctimoniously harping on how women in movies aren’t funny! WHERE ARE YOU NOW, HUH? WHERE ARE YOU NOW? (<--"Cool Hand Luke" reference) Lane's review of "Marie Antoinette" has gained a certain level of notoriety among loudmouthed ugly-thighed feminists like me, and with good reason. Salon.com's Sam Adams calls this review "one of the most sexist pieces of criticism I've ever read," which, while it just can't possibly be true, unless Sam Adams has led an unbelievably sheltered life, is still a pretty cool thing to say. Lets check it out!:

Coppola films Versailles with a flat acceptance, quickening at times into eager montage, and declares, in her notes on the film, that she sought to capture her heroine’s “inner experience.” Her what? This is like a manicurist claiming to capture the inner experience of your pinkie.

Don’t totally know what to say about that one. And:

I spent long periods of “Marie Antoinette” under the growing illusion that it was actually made by Paris Hilton. The exploits of Madame du Barry (Asia Argento), the old King’s mistress, are unpeeled with a schoolgirl’s sneer. “That is so Du Barry,” one of Marie’s pals says. Snuff is snorted like coke. There are hilarious attempts at landscape, but the fountains and parterres of Versailles are grabbed by the camera and pasted into the action, as if the whole thing were being shot on a cell phone and sent to friends. The young Queen builds a faux-pastoral paradise in the grounds, where she and her little daughter sport like shepherdesses, but, rather than raise an eyebrow at this make-believe, the director treats it as just another white-linen moment, like an outtake from “The Virgin Suicides,” and, for good measure, tosses in a few shots of nodding flowers and ickle bouncy lambs.

Um.

What are your favorite Anthony Lane quotes? He has a great one recently that I CAN NOT FIND, wherein he starts musing at length about “How can we tell this film was directed by a woman?” Then TELLS US. Like, it’s tricky, because it’s not about vaginas squeezing babies out, but if you are an educated film critic like him you can see the having-of-gender that oozes subtly out of certain scenes. Thank god! I was almost afraid for a second that I would accidentally value the film as real art!

I wish he would review Jodie Foster’s new movie, “THE BEAVER,” in which Mel Gibson plays a man who only speaks through a beaver hand puppet he wears constantly. It’s depicted as sweet and touching (he’s childlike! because of puppets), which is how you know a woman directed it, I guess. Also, “THE BEAVER.” That is the title. “THE BEAVER.” Here is what The Hollywood Reporter has to say about it:

A risky bet that pays off solidly, Jodie Foster’s much-delayed “The Beaver” survives its life/art parallels — thanks to its star, Mel Gibson — to deliver a hopeful portrait of mental illness that is quirky, serious and sensitive.

“a risky bet that pays off solidly”

“thanks to its star, Mel Gibson” (“much-delayed”…ummm…)

“mental illness”…”quirky”………”beaver puppet”

WOULD THAT THE ANGEL OF DEATH WOULD TAKE ME SOON