Sunday 21 November 2010

The Kids Are All Right

I'm just gonna say it: I liked this movie.

Of course I liked it, I have to like it, its about lesbians and it was out at the mainstream cinema.

However, I know there are two main issues with it. (Spoiler Alert) 
1. This is what the director said  "They say, 'Why did she have to stray with a man?' And that just feels very narrow to me. Sexuality is fluid. Not everyone lives on the lesbian reservation." I get that, anyone can fall for anyone, its not the gender its the person blah blah blah. But, I'd hope that more people than just liberal lesbians are seeing this movie, and, I would also hope that some people would see this movie and be enlightened to the fact that lesbians exist and they are actually "normal" people. 

I really liked that this is a lesbian movie that could have been any couple going through the same issue. It is incidental that they are lesbians, rather than it being all about their lesbian issues, it is about their family issues with a few lesbian issues added in. It could quite easily have been a straight couple that used a sperm donor with the same plot line.

HOWEVER. It really pisses me off when it is suggested that what lesbians really just need is a penis and really if given the chance they would take it. I would hate to think that people come out of the movie and think "well of course she slept with him".


2. The sex scene with Julianne Moore and Annette Bening. WHAT?! I refuse to believe that ACTUAL lesbians have sex like that, in front of male gay porn! I get the point they are trying to make: That straight porn is all a bunch of pounding and slapping, "lesbian" porn is just two straight girls who are clearly not into it and only made to fulfill male fantasies but male gay porn is more real because you probably have to be gay to do it and you can tell they are into it because of the obvious signs. 

I know that some lesbians, if they watch porn at all then they would rather watch male gay porn because of above reasons but I really don't think that it was an accurate portrayal of lesbian sex and again I would hate to think that people come away thinking "oh so that's how they do it". They could have easily just had the sex scene without watching the porn.


Other than those two points though, I was glad to see a movie about a lesbian couple at the Cinema, not on a special "gay themed night". I know loads of people have criticised it for so many other reasons but you cant get everything into a film in an hour and a half. Also, if it did represent all average same-sex couples then there probably wouldn't be a film to make as most people lead average lives without film worthy incidents. I just wish they could have made it without so many stereotypes. 

Also Julianne Moore makes a hot lesbian. She looks very cool.

1 comment:

  1. Yeah, I entirely agree with you! Those were the things that bugged me about an otherwise entertaining and pleasing film.

    The sex scene thing: what bugged me about that is that the one lesbian sex scene was all about laughs, whereas there was a lot of time spent with the guy-on-girl shagging. (I guess that was funny sometimes too.) I wish there had been a sweet and passionate reconciliation sex scene between the two women, maybe.

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