Why do people hate Betty Draper?

For all the talk about Mad Men - the duplicitous and daper Don/Dick, the return of a curvacous female body to our screens in the form of Joan (Christina Hendricks is a former model, might I add....still pretty unattainably stunning for an 'attainable' representation of women...!), the fashion, the nostalgia for a by-gone era - there is one conversation that irks me. Why does everyone hate Betty Draper? Don's icy, sad, beautiful caged bird of an (ex)wife. Ultimately, it is her treatment of her children that has everyone up in arms.

Betty is not always nice to her children. But why are we so hard on her about this? Being anything less than an adoring and doting mother seems abhorrent to many people - mostly women. Where is our loyalty, where is our understanding and compassion? I can empathise with Betty, and see her parenting as an inevitable product of the following:

Firstly Betty is from a wealthy middle class family, she is university educated, she has travelled the world, she has earned an independant living as a succesful model. Yet, she is supposed to be miraculously fulfilled by childrearing in the suburbs - alone, unsuported, devalued and trivialised.

Secondly, Don and the other Mad(ison Avenue Advertising) Men - are responsible for her shackles. They invented the mythology of the contented housewife, ostensibly to sell products, but also to protect their turf - to keep women at home, out of the workforce, and distracted with the attainment of a perpetually unattainable lifestyle. With womens' time, energy and brain power thus occupied - they are unable to focus on pursuits like entering, and working their way up, the workforce.

Thirdly, we are talking about 60's America. Betty is a first-wave feminist - in some ways. She is sad but doesn't quite have the insight to understand what her sadness is about. It is about the lie she was sold by her own mother. That looking good was the only important thing - then the husband, house and children all follow. But do they in themselves provide fulfillment or happiness? It turns out they do not. The husband cheats, the suburb is tedious, child rearing is relentless and thankless.

Of course, I feel bad for little Bobby and Sally, they are treated as inconveniences, they experience little warmth from their parents - but blaming, and hating, Betty for this is a bit like blaming the victim. Betty rears her children they way she was raised, and she has improved upon it. Just as her daughter will probably go on to do the same thing. Getting a divorce from her misogynist husband was a pretty gutsy and progressive step.

People just want Bets to be nicer to her kids. They say, "Yeah, but...(she could be a better parent)". My final question is: What is a better parent? There are specific instances we could pick apart of Betty's treatment of her kids, but I could pick apart nearly everyone I know's treatment of their kids (and they could of mine). Who is to say what is valid maternal love? I know people who hug and kiss, but who have no honesty or emotional intimacy with their children...

So, I don't hate Betty Draper. I love her more - she deserves more of our love and compassion - not less.

The King's Speech

So, as part of my new no-pencil, laissez-faire approach to writing, the mistakes I spotted in my last post I must leave and move on (synposis anyone?). However, perhaps a spell check wouldn't go astray ... and ditch the funny post titles. Although I did have a good one for Black Swan .... Hommus! And now you see why it's probably best for everyone if I just stick to the actual names of things.

I was wrong, it wasn't my last visit to the crying room. This time, Andrew and I took Ave to see The King's Speech. Who I am kidding, I'll probably be trying to take Ave to movies for months to come.

Synopsis
Soon-to-be King George VI (Colin Firth) is the awkward, knock-kneed, left-handed, stuttering second child of King George V. When his brother abdicates to marry a divorced American (he wot?!), Firth ascends the throne and must deliver a speech to his people concerning the imminent war with Hitler's Nazi Germany.

Opps, forgot to mention the actual story... Two middle aged blokes - one an Aussie, the other a Prince - develop a lasting friendship when the Aussie fixes the Brits crippling stutter. Geoffrey Rush stars as Lionel Logue (seriously - you couldn't make this shit up), the Aussie speech therapist.

What did you think about the movie, Em?
I'm glad you asked. I thought it was a lovely movie. A simple story that was beautifully executed via effortless acting, and easy-on-the-eye directing. Classy. Rush and Firth conveyed an engaging chemistry and believability, and they were beautifully bolstered by all the supporting players. It was an understated film, which is exactly as it needed to be.

The story was as much an insight into the particular conundrums posed by a Royal (do I need to Capitalise this? Seems to be a continuing problem for me...) life, as it was the developing relationship between the two leads - stubborn, angry and defensive against cheeky, patient and encouraging. It was particularly interesting for the context of what the Royal family has now become. This was the beginning of the media (or a new incarnation of it) and it's powerful influence on public perception.

Like The Queen, it plays more on the similarities between the Royals and the rest of us, rather than the differences. At the end of the day, we are all people - in this case, a father, brother, son, husband - negotiating familial responsibility with our professional duties. And unlike The Young Victoria this movie is actually worth watching. Emily Blunt is pretty nice looking, but I'm not sure 2 hours of her in slo-mo wearing costumes actually constitutes a movie?

Sorry, back to this movie. Can a stereotype be subtle? Certainly Rush is a straight talking, loyal, somewhat laconic sort of fellow - treating, and ribbing, Firth as an equal. While Firth is for his part stuffy, defensive and priggish - with this cold exterior melting under Rush's open warmth and honesty. Same old, same old ... but not quite. There is subtlety in their rendering of these 'types'. I put this down to the no-nonsense way the film was directed, allowing the actors to relate together within their rather defined characters, without any winks or nudges to the audience. There is a real, and easy, chemistry between the leads.

I certainly felt the burden of the monarchy - his daughters curtsying to him after his coronation as opposed to rolling on the floor hugging and kissing before bedtime (I did say it was subtle, right?!), and also knowing the context of his eldest little girl - who herself takes the throne at age 25. But do I buy into this? The whole woe is me of the Royal family - conveying them as real people with real problems. It's a little "The lady doth protest too much, methinks." ... or "you keep trying to tell us how difficult and stressful your job is, but we still don't know what you actually do (or why we should care, & why you get paid a fortune?)".

I do understand what they are trying to communicate (we're all people, as I said earlier). And I definitely understand the cult of celebrity. Does a person only exist if they can be seen or heard? Does the tree only make a sound if felled in a magazine pictorial (or in this instance, does the King only have a voice - or matter - if he can be heard on the radio?). Hmm, interesting...

Trivia
Jennifer Ehle played Myrtle Logue, the wife of Lionel. Not only does she do a great Aussie accent, but ... well ... it's Elizabeth Bennet!!! Mr Darcy and Miss Bennet (BBC TV Miniseries Pride and Prejudice) - together again! I'm a sucker for this sort of stuff. And did you know that Col and Jen (we're good mates) used to go out together?! You know, going steady. Awesome.

No Brain, I mean Strings, Attached

Synposis
Natalie and Ashton decide they'll be friends with benefits (sex partners, without the relationship part), mainly because Natalie is a high-achieving commitment phobe. She realises this is a crummy way to go through life, and to my utter amazement and shock .... they finally decide they'll actually be a couple and go out together. Truely genre-bending.

What I thought
This may be the last time I can go to the crying room at Victoria Gardens, Ave is getting a bit too old to be cuddled or breastfed to sleep, and unfortunately this was the only thing showing...

I'm not sure about Natalie Portman as a rom-com lead, even if she is playing a (believable) Doctor. She is very straight. She doesn't really 'do' emotions or exhuberance - she keeps everything in check. And even though these were traits of the character she was playing, they also seem to be her own traits. Ashton Kutcher seems to be playing himself - a slightly thick, handsome guy, with about as much charisma as a piece of cardboard. I get the feeling he thinks he's totally hot, which makes him (for me anyway) totally not...

A rom-com is always going to be predictable. But this was beyond predictable. It was boring. I think a good rom-com has to have some sort of larger than life characters - and these guys are just so tediously normal. Think Meg Ryan, Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Hugh Grant, Drew Barrymore - even Kate Hudson and Matthew McConaughey ("alright, alright, alright") though I'm loathe to admit it - these guys are all 'more', not less. It kind of doesn't work if you aren't 'over emoting'. It is a pretty fine line to balance though - go watch any JLo or Cameron Diaz movie - and you will see how over emoting can go horribly wrong.... The Wedding Planner, What Happens in Vegas.... say no more.

Cons
Trying a bit too hard with the whole 'wacky' friend routine. It's like they decided to go with all the wacky friends, instead of just committing to one good solid wack-job - like Philip Seymour Hoffman in Along Came Polly.

Zero charisma between the 'opposites attract' leads.

Pros
It was pretty awesome to see Cary Elwes (Wesley from The Princess Bride) pop up as a Doctor in the hospital where Nat works. Now he's hot.

Black Swan

So, you guessed it. This review is about The King's Speech. Only joking.

Synopsis
Natalie Portman is a member of a New York ballet company. She lives at home with her somewhat controlling mother - herself a former ballerina. Natalie is cast by Vincent Cassel as the lead in Swan Lake, a role that requires her to play both the White (pure), and the Black (sensual), Swan. As she rehearses, and is pushed by Vincent to lose herself in the part, and also comes to grips with her possible usurpment by Mila Kunis, and her overbearing mother, her psychotic episodes and hallucinations increase. The film culminates with Natalie pushed over the edge of sanity. Does sanity have an edge? Whatever. She goes crazy.

Analysis
As you would expect from an Aronofsky film, this is a beautiful and intelligent whole film. I say 'whole' because as much care is taken with the score (Tchaikovsky beautifully reinterpreted by Clint Mansell), the costuming, the cast, the lighting, the sound design.... each piece is as vital to the film as what he frames and how he shoots it.

This is no new story. A young woman with talent is brought under the wing of an exacting/controlling/charismatic/experienced ....usually all of the above.... man who challenges her to extend herself. He pushes. She is pushed. Her professional achievement or breakthrough inevitably results in her personal destruction - in a true Hollywood movie, it may only be momentary destruction, before the resolved and happy ending. The Red Shoes, Million Dollar Baby, My Fair Lady, Romeo & Juliet, Pretty Woman, The Phantom of the Opera, nearly every movie ever made, etc. Okay, so maybe it's a bit much, to reduce the output of an entire industry into such a simplistic synopsis. But it is certainly a theme of film, of all art really. More philosophically, that fulfillment is in the yearning and the striving, and in the 'having' lies the destruction of that which was yearned for/strived for. It has become tarnished and no longer pure or perfect.

Perfection and the attainment of it, is certainly an instrinsic theme of the Black Swan. Vincent has a conversation with Natalie at the start of the film, explaining why she wouldn't get the part (and hasn't got parts in the past) something along the lines of 'nothing is perfect or you can't be perfect'. And Natalie's last words are 'I was, or it was? perfect'. Furthermore, ballet is certainly the embodiment of perfection, bodies doing physically superhuman things under the guise of ease and grace. Ballet is fundamentally a dichotomous world.

My main issue is, is there a way to reimagine the story of girls becoming women, of sexual awakening, of women becoming themselves that doesn't involve death and destruction of the newly awakened woman?? Perhaps not. Perhaps it is like wanting the Titanic not to sink at the end. Perhaps what makes these stories so timeless, is that intrinsically, regardless of social or political movements and modes of thinking, the world continues to see virginal women as pure, and the sexualised woman as destroyed and broken.

Perhaps also it is the women pushing Natalie - her mother, and Lily her competition? But pulling the strings behind these relationships is the somewhat fatherly (albeit an incestuous father) relationship with the artistic director. Where is her father and what of him? Is it the lack of men in her life that has resulted in a such an emotionally stunted woman.

In the case of Black Swan, is it Vincent or Mila who drives Natalie to the inevitable conclusion? I see Lily as more of an enabling vessel - through her, Nina is able to become herself - but it is Thomas who she 'becomes herself' for. Him that she fears is in a relationship with Lily, him that she kisses exhultantly as the Black Swan.

Also, a few people have talked about whether she really died in the end. I think she did. I don't believe there were any 'twists' as such - I think it was a fairly clear parallel story (with Swan Lake). I also think her madness was played out in a very literal way...she scratches her back (self harms), she breaks her mothers fingers in the door, she sees her rival in a romantic clinch, she sees Winona as a broken and nothing woman, she looks in the mirror and sees herself as the Black Swan...

And Finally:
These are some of the things that make this a great film for me:
The somewhat sea-sicky handheld lurking over Natalie's shoulder - rather than a POV, it is perhaps the POV of Nina's black swan waiting to emerge? Swirling with her as she dances. The camera work communicates a truly visceral mood of foreboding, of tension.

The incredible sound design - her rosined pointe shoes on stage, her measured breathing as she exerts herself. Behind the scenes of the effortless ballet!

The performance of Barbara Hershey - controlling and overbearing, or loving and protective? ... and obviously Natalie Portman is incredible.

More Ground Rules - NO PENCIL

Okay - so I'll never hit the 'publish post' button to anything if I continue down this all too familiar path... it's the "scared of failure" path, or in my world, the "do your homework in pencil" path.

Let me explain. All through school I would do my homework in pencil. I told myself that I could always rub it out, nothing was permanent, I was making no mistakes - because, 'what this? this was just my rough copy, my first try, my draft'. Except it wasn't any of those things. It was either slapped together the night before, or 2 months late - but either way, it was it. Pencil or no pencil. So I guess the first issue is, I'm not fooling anybody - what you produce is what you produce, put it out there and let it be. I definitely need to consciously work on the second issue, which would be that there are no bad ideas and that 'perfection' (whatever that means?) is unattainable.

Let me apologise for the somewhat excessive use of talking marks. And for that matter, dashes, ellipsis, commas, brackets, strokes - look, I just use a lot of punctuation, okay? and preferably in the one sentence if I can...

Abridged Rules:
1. Write it then post it.
2. Beware of spoilers, and an overabundance of punctuation.

Welcome

I have re-entered the world of internet brain farting, inspired by my sister in law's awesome blog theclosetdiet.blogspot.com. But what is my schtick, I hear you ask? Well, I will be reviewing anything and everything - movies, books, TV shows...

But first, some ground rules. Well there's just one. Prepare to be spoiled. No, I won't be buying you chocolates and roses - but I will be discussing plot, and potentially even giving away endings. Personally, I hate having an experience - going to a gallery, watching a movie, reading a book - wrecked, destroyed or otherwise utterly spoiled by some know-it-all who lets slip about details of said experienced. However benign these 'slips' might seem - they lodge there in my brain. Before I know it, I have completely written the experience in my mind. I like to have as little information as possible beforehand, I don't want anything interfering or exerting an influence over my interaction with the film or whatever. That said, I devour reviews after the event. And that is what I intend this to be - the conversation you have after the movie/book/ whatever has been seen.

So, sit back, relax and enjoy - and let me Emtertain you. Or rather, other people will entertain you.... and then I'll just rain on their parade, I mean, review it.