Welcome to the seventh installment of Razzie Contenders: 2009 Edition! In this special series of mini-recaps, the Agony Booth staff takes a long, unflinching look at the awful movies that got nominated (or should have been nominated) for Razzie Awards in 2009!
So. Let's briefly summarize what we know, shall we? We got our Major Epic Fail. We got the narcissistic Beauty and the Beast. We can now recognize Uwe Boll's name outside of crossword puzzle clues. (Quick—what's a 7-letter word for "suck"?) Which leads us to The Women, nominated for the 2008 Razzie for Worst Actress. By which I mean, the entire cast is nominated for Worst Actress.
I've seen the original 1939 version with Joan Crawford and Norma Shearer, and I've seen the 2002 Broadway version featuring Kirsten Johnston and Jennifer Tilly (it also had "Pepsi Girl" Hallie Kate Eisenberg, back when she was in her "cute little girl" phase). So, naturally, I had to see how the 2008 version measured up. After watching the DVD, I have to say that... um... well...
It's not all that bad.
This puts me in a pickle, seeing as how this is The Agonizer. I'm not supposed to be enjoying myself. Then again, after being subjected to the mating habits of SUVs, I bet any movie I watch from here on out will be a sheer delight. But I think that of all the 2009 Razzie nominees covered on this site so far, I got the easiest and least painful movie to watch.
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Now, don't get me wrong—The Women is not a great movie. It's not even a good movie. But the people who nominated it for a Razzie probably never saw it. Most likely, they saw the trailer and thought, "A movie where the entire cast is women? Weepy, clingy women? Sounds like the Chick Flick from the depths of Hell. Hey! Let's nominate them all for Worst Actress!"
Reviewers pretty much agreed—it only got a 13% "fresh" on Rotten Tomatoes. And yet, it made a decent showing at the box office, grossing $26.9 million, which means somebody went out to see it anyway.
Having seen it myself, I can honestly say that nearly all of "the women" do a good job, considering what they had to work with (with the exception of Jada Pinkett Smith, who spends most of the movie looking sort of pissed off. But I can't even blame her—I'd be pissed, too, if my character was obviously tacked onto the script, and a "lesbian" tack-on, at that.)
Really, it's all Diane English's fault.
A quick run-down on her: Diane English was behind the hit show Murphy Brown. In the movie's production notes, English said she always wanted to do an updated version of the classic film The Women, because a movie with no male actors intrigued her.
"But I also remembered that the movie had very old-fashioned ideas that were in great need of updating," English writes. "I wanted to celebrate women, but still try to preserve the hallmarks of the original, which included the biting wit." In other words, she invoked Klaatu's Law, thereby dooming the movie to be forever mocked by fans of the original movie.
To help carry out her evil plan, she enlisted Mick Jagger—yes, that Mick Jagger—to produce the movie. Because Mick Jagger's name is synonymous with women everywhere. She also got Dove as a sponsor, since Dove at the time was running their "Campaign for Real Beauty" marketing blitz. Then she got together Meg Ryan, Annette Bening, Debra Messing, Eva Mendes, Jada Pinkett Smith—you know, actresses who are good at staring into the camera with weepy, reddened eyes, and somehow still look good doing it. And then she "updated" their roles so that instead of being bored, well-to-do women with nothing to do but talk about their men, she made them bored, well-to-do women with careers. And then she...
Eh, why should I tell you how she ruined the movie, when I could show you, with a Screencap Recap?
How to Screw Up the Remake of a Classic Movie, the Diane English Way, in 15 Easy Steps:
| Step 1: Set up the movie's intro so that it mirrors the original film's dog-snarling sequence. Then have the dog's owner utter the same line that Joan Crawford's character did at the end of the original movie, since it won't make any sense anywhere else. That way, the Original Movie Fans (hereby known as OMFs) get warned in advance that everything they hold near and dear about the original will get bitch-slapped silly, then sent to the corner to be mocked by the Updated Remake, who's wearing a trashy dress and has makeup smeared all over her face, and yet still considers herself to be the "prettier" one. |
| Step 2: Bring on Annette Bening as Sylvia Fowler, a hard-edged, snarky magazine editor who wouldn't think twice about bitching about a customer's outfit on the phone right in front of her. Balance her out with a gentle, slightly naïve clothes designer who's down-to-earth (literally). Stick Meg Ryan in this role, and you've got your Mary Haines. |
| Step 3: Further piss off the OMFs by splitting the supporting character of Edith into two extraneous roles: Debra Messing as Edie, a stay-at-home artistic baby-maker, and Jada Pinkett Smith as Alex, a lesbian. Because you can't have an affirming, positive, self-empowering, all-female movie without lesbians. You just can't. Since Alex isn't in the original, make her a writer, then don't ever bring it up again. Because it's far more useful to show Alex as a lesbian than, you know, have her writing anything. |
| Step 4: Have Sylvia learn about Mary's husband's affair from a manicurist (Debi Mazar), who lives way too vicariously through "her best friend". Remember, Sylvia is supposed to be a hard-ass, snarky gossiper who takes great delight in cutting others down to size. So have her tell the news to Edie and Alex, then rip her character a new one by making her feel awful about it. Then, by absolute, sheer coincidence, have Mary visit the same spa and get the same manicurist who tells her the exact same story. |
| Step 5: Stick Candice Bergman in as Mary's mother, then have her offer absolutely no useful advice whatsoever. It wouldn't be self-empowering if the mother didn't tell Mary to do nothing about the affair. And it definitely wouldn't be life-affirming unless the mother told Mary to not trust her girlfriends. |
| Step 6: Introduce the slut—no, no, gotta be positive—other woman, Crystal Allen, played by Eva Mendes. Since Eva is arguably more curvaceous than Joan Crawford, balance it out by giving her the verbal wit of a wet lump of oatmeal. |
| In fact, make the whole scene of Sylvia and company checking out Crystal one giant steaming pile of bland oatmeal. Be sure to have Edie bring her children along for that extra OMF-teeth-grinding sweetness! |
| Step 7: Bring Mary and Crystal together for the pivotal confrontation in a high-class dressing room. Update Mary and Crystal's "dressing gowns" from the original, but make sure they look as dumpy and unattractive as possible, because this is supposed to be a self-empowering scene—not sexy. For added affirmation fun, have Mary and Crystal give off a strange, uncomfortable vibe that they don't really want to be mean to each other. In fact, if it weren't for the whole affair thing, they might even be—gasp—friends! |
| Step 8: Destroy any lingering trace of Sylvia's character by having her succumb to blackmail, and blab the affair to a reporter for the Globe. Because you can't have her backstabbing Mary for fun, oh, no no no no noooooooooo! Complete Sylvia's descent into wussiness by having her confess to Mary with lots and lots and lots of tears. |
| Oh, and make sure this scene happens in a lesbian bar. Because Jada's a lesbian, remember? |
| Step 9: Throw in a subplot about Mary's maids, played by Cloris Leachman and Tilly Scott Pedersen, because you've got to give Dove their product placement somewhere. What, too blatant? Um, okay... Put them in the movie because... they're women, and they... deserve to receive recognition for what they do. Yeah. That works. |
| Step 10: Now really bring on the hurting by revealing that Mary's preteen daughter, Molly, is an anorexic, makeup-wearing tramp wannabe who likes to burn tampons to cope with her parents' breakup. Use this for redeeming the wussified Sylvia, who gives Molly an affirming heart-to-heart talk about loving oneself, and seeing the beauty within. I suppose it is more realistic than Molly just biting her knuckles and weeping, "Mother Darling! Daddy Dear!" into a bathroom towel. |
| Step 11: Inject a little levity into all this afterschool special angst by having Mary run off to a spa retreat and encounter "The Countess", played by Bette Midler. Seeing as how this was a great role in the original, supply Midler with the best line in the entire movie ("I just broke up with husband number four... no, five—I keep blocking one of them out because he tried to kill me.") Then have her give Mary the worst advice ever: "Don't give a shit about anybody. Be selfish." Yes, ladies, this is positive, affirming, self-empowerment at its best! |
| Step 12: Show Mary's transformation as she straightens out her unruly, bitter hair, straightens out her unruly, bitter daughter, and straightens out her relationship with her I-suck-so-much BFF Sylvia. And do it all to the tune of tears and hugs—lather, rinse, repeat. |
| Step 13: Suddenly realize, "Crap! Crystal! Forgot about her!" Then dredge up a scene of Crystal Allen scheming in her bathtub while on the phone with—oh riiiight, that entire subplot was cut when the Countess only appeared in this movie for five whole minutes. Which means that ending in the original where Crystal Allen gets her comeuppance? Ain't gonna happen. Well, at least there's still her interaction with Molly, but after that whole tampon-burning thing, who cares? So having rendered Crystal pretty much useless, have her look pensive in her less-than-glamorous bathtub, then don't show her again for the rest of the movie. |
| Step 14: With the "evil other woman" gone, celebrate by throwing a fashion show that rocks the original, in that it isn't an hour long, and the fashions actually look good. Then blow it all to hell by having Mary smiling beatifically, knowing that all is right with Sylvia and her daughter, and no one's getting into fights and biting into bare thighs or locking each other in closets and what-not. Finally, to give the story that last, affirming edge, have Edie, by sheer coincidence, go into labor right after the fashion show is over, which means that the movie ends, naturally and predictably, with... |
| Step 15: An intensive labor and birth scene! Because this is what being a woman is POSITIVELY, AFFRIMATIVELY, AND SELF-EMPOWERMENTALLY ALL ABOUT! |
Not that I don't appreciate what Diane English is trying to do. Some scenes in the movie are genuinely hilarious—including, yes, the clichéd birthing scene at the end. And all blubbering aside, the trouble between Mary and Sylvia did hold my interest. In fact, if English had stripped out the whole subplot about the affair, the weirdness with Mary's daughter, and the two maids, and just focused on Mary and Sylvia, it would have made for a much stronger story.
But English's problem is that she wanted to remake The Women into a story that glorified women, and took the whole thing way too seriously. The point of the 1939 version is that women are fickle, and the actresses took great delight at poking fun at each other. The 2008 version fights so hard to be positive and affirming that it sucks all the life out the script and reduces the women to teary-eyed stereotypes. And the actresses definitely don't look like they're having fun.
Does this movie deserve a Razzie? Maybe. What kind of Razzie does it deserve? I'm... not entirely sure. Frankly, I really don't care; I'm happy being a woman, and I don't need a sappy tearjerker to remind me of that. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go pop open a can of beer, slouch on the couch, stick my hand down my pants, and watch reruns of Maximum Exposure. Because that, my friends, is what being a woman is really about.
Stay tuned for more Razzie Contenders, coming soon!
Other recaps in the Razzie Contenders: 2009 Edition series:
Other Screencap Recaps:
