Bouncing off of Abby's post, I began to think about comedy as a genre. The Full Monty and Calendar Girls share, besides normal-looking people stripping, overt moments of melancholy.
The whole premise of Calendar Girls begins over raising money in the name of a recently deceased cancer victim: a main character's husband. Furthermore, his death does not take place off-screen, an alluded to tragedy. We, the audience, see this man; we get to know him; we feel the pain of his death. For me, that pain was very pronounced throughout the film watching the wife's character react at different points. Her cry that "he didn't drink beer" struck me as very tender and sincere. When she breaks down in Hollywood, I was very touched.
This is the most overt sign of drama in this "comedy," but it was certainly not alone. Chris's son's reaction to her stripping is very dramatic and serious. One woman's dissolving marriage is shown in realistic (and not very humorous) ways. The fight between Chris and her best friend over the calendar is painful to watch.
The Full Monty seems a little more balanced in its humor and drama, but it still has some very serious scenes. Suicide attempts. A funeral. A man unable to deal with his insecurities at risk of losing his wife. A man unable to provide for child support at risk of losing his son.
This is not the stuff of comedy, at least, not in the way its displayed.
There are, of course, comedies that deal with serious subjects. In Tommy Boy, an entire town is about to lose their jobs, but I don't think there's much that is "serious" in this film. In Knocked Up, a woman deals with an unexpected pregnancy and the thought of single-motherhood, but there are very few serious moments that address this issue (although, admittedly, there are a few more than the previews would suggest). Weekend at Bernie's is all about a man dying, but we're not particularly sympathetic to that death.
What then, makes something a comedy and something a drama? I think back to some definition I was given in middle school (I think it was connected to the Greek definitions): if the characters are worse off at the end, its a tragedy/drama, if they're better off, it's a comedy.
This doesn't seem to hold up in our contemporary viewings, however--at least not for me.
The connection this had to Abby's post (for me) is that I couldn't think of any female-driven comedies that didn't revolve around men/love/marriage that weren't of this "dramedy" category. I thought of A League of Their Own, but there are very serious moments in that movie. Fried Green Tomatoes has a lot of funny moments, but I'm not sure what side of the divide I'd palce it on. Does this connect back to the stereotype that women can't be funny? In order to display humor, does female comedy have to a) revolve around men or b) revolve around drama?
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I've been thinking about your last point. Are there any (or at least many) movies with main female character that don't have to do with men or romantic relationships? There are entire genres of "male" movies that completely leave out the existence or influence of women. I'm thinking of war movies, plenty or westerns, or business movies like _Glengarry Glen Ross_. Women cannot seem to escape the influence of men, but men can completely avoid the existence of women and it is still "believable." I suppose the argument is that there is no market for entirely female movies, that women never do anything equivalent to _Band of Brothers_, and they do not warrant their own genres. But I hate the idea that men can be their individual selves, while women are constrained to a world containing men.
ReplyDeleteOhh, The Women! There are no men in the entire movie--but it doesn't really fit because the whole plot revolves around marriages, cheating spouses, etc. Plus, in my opinion, it's pretty bad.
ReplyDeleteMen, in order to get this womanless reality, have to leave some sort of more established society (at least in war movies and Westerns). There doesn't really seem to be a setting that women can go to--that just made me think of Mo'Nique's stand up from prison. I guess there are no men there.
I came to the same conclusion about Calendar Girls as you did in that I categorized it as "dramedy", but you bring up a very good point that I didn't consider. I did not connect the fact that it was motivated by drama with the fact that it was centralized on women. The creators could have done this intentionally to make a point about the stereotype you referenced, or it could have been entirely unintentional which would be even more ironic.
ReplyDeleteThough muted (or at least shifted to a more "manly" mode of emotion) Full Monty contains the same combination of pathos and humor. Anyone who makes a living as a humorist will tell you that the two are not so far apart as we might like to think. Think of the "comic relief" characters like Dogberry and Falstaff in the Shakespeare histories and tragedies...their presence enhances the pathos through the contrast. Full Monty's humor all draws from the original premise that these men are out of work and down on their luck, with no relief in sight for them at the Job Club. They are losing their children and/or respect for themselves due to the situation, and this choice is a method of reclaiming them.
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