Even the most sexed up man in all of history knew that taking advantage of women was never ok.
Author: chris
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Best, ah, cosplay uh, uh award.
Everything about this is amazing
wonderful!
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nakedsasquatch it’s ya man
Okay but seriously folks – as often as I joke about this movie stirs my loins and as weirdly popular as this text post got a while back, I wanna rap with you all about why the George of the Jungle remake is a pretty important piece of cinema.
It’s literally the only movie I can think of that is based completely around the unheard of “FEMALE gaze.” Granted, while I’m a huge movie buff I’ve not seen every movie ever made. But even so, even if there’s another example of the “female gaze” in cinema that has escaped me it’s still damn impressive that a kids movie from 1997 based on a Jay Ward cartoon from the 60’s managed to turn gender representation in media on it’s fucking ass!
First things first, let’s look at our leading lady and love interest – Ursula, played by Leslie Mann.
Let me just say that while Leslie Mann is adorable and a talented actress, she does look a little less conventional and a little more plain compared to the bombshells that Hollywood likes to churn out. Leslie, in comparison, looks much more like a real women you’d meet on the street. She dresses pretty conservatively and plain throughout the film ; Wearing outfits that are more functional than fashionable for trekking through the jungle, pulling her hair back and so forth. Not that if she was dolled up and more scantily clad it would give her character any less integrity, but can we appreciate how RARE that is in the male dominated industry of film? Just think about all the roads a film about a woman in the jungle COULD have taken but didn’t – no scenes with her clothes strategically ripped or anything! You can say this is a kids movie, intended for children and that’s why the sensuality of the female lead is so downplayed but there are PLENTY of kids movies that handle women in a very objectifying and sexualized manner despite the target audience is pre-pubescent. Like, a disgusting amount. So I don’t think “it’s a kids movie” is why the film doesn’t take ANY, let alone EVERY, opportunity to showcase the main female character’s sex appeal…
…especially considering the sex appeal of the film rests squarely on the well defined shoulders of our male lead, George of the Jungle played by Brendan Fraser in the best god damn shape of his life!
*Homer Simpson Drooling Noises*
Whenever members of the reddit community try to compare the sexualization of women in fiction to the design of characters such as Batman and Superman, I always want to just sit them down and show them this movie. Because THIS is what the female sexual fantasy looks like, and Batman and Superman are male power-fantasies. Look at him – his big blue eyes, his soft hair, his lean, chiseled physique built for dexterity rather than power. He’s wild and free, but gentle. It’s like he fell right out of that steamy romance novel your mom tried to hide from you growing up.
Hell, the whole plot seems to be designed around how damn hot he is! First, for the majority of the film, he wears only a small strip of cloth to cover the dick balls and ass. Everything else is FAIR GAME to drool over for 40 minutes. Then, after he meets Ursula she takes him with her to San Francisco just so we can enjoy him in a well-tailored suit (as seen in the gif set), running around in an open and billowy shirt along side horses while Ursula and all of her friends literally crowd around and make sexual comments about him, and my personal favorite, ditch the loincloth entirely and have him walk around naked while covering his man-bits with various objects while one of Ursula’s very lucky friends oogles him and makes a joke along the lines of “So THAT’S why they call him the ‘KING of the Jungle’…”
And yes, it’s also a very cute and funny little movie. Out of all the movies based on Jay Ward cartoons, it was the most faithful to the fast-paced humor and wit of the original source material (yes even the new Peabody and Sherman movie which honestly I thought was too cutesy-poo.) But that’s not why this movie is popular with the gay community or why we all became women in 1997. It’s just really cool that there’s a film out there where the sensuality of the female form takes a back seat for the oiled up, chiseled, physique of Brendan Fraser (in his prime that is)
One thing to add: in the scene mentioned above where the ladies are watching him in the billowy shirt running with the horses, it pans back to about 50 feet away to two guys in suits at this party looking at the women and one of the guys says, “Man, what is it with women and horses?” So not only does this movie highlight the female gaze, but it blatantly points out that western male sensibilities don’t have a clue what actually appeals to women.
Can I just reblog this a thousand times?!
O.o
I guess I need to get my suit tailored.
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Wait what
Hold on a second what
Good morning, there is no fear.
I keep telling everyone, “walk without rhythm…” But do they listen? No!
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Lisa Simpson at Stuff-n-Hug
This really says a LOT
simpsons is so next level
I took my girls shopping for some summer clothes Saturday. T-shirts, jeans, shorts. They both love Marvel and superheroes and transformers and Hogwarts and stuff like that. Not so much pink and pretty stuff. They’ve both grown so much that this was the first time we were shopping in the grown up women’s section. Boring selections when it comes to t-shirts. Flowers and zebras and butterflies.
But what was making it near impossible was that all the t-shirts, the few they kinda-sorta liked, had either low/wide cut necklines or were extremely tailored for nipped in waists with little cap sleeves and short hemlines. Showing way too much skin for their ages as far as we all were concerned. So we headed over to the men’s section. A whole WALL full of properly cut tees with great designs on them!
They ran over and started hunting up things they liked. Two women were stocking shelves.
“You know these are MEN’S shirts.”
“The girl’s section is over there.”
“There’s not gonna be any Princesses over here, darlin’.”
“These shirts are for the boys.”
“This isn’t going to fit you right, honey.”
I ignored the first time one of them said anything. Just told the girls what sizes they needed to look for and that they could each pick five shirts. But the women kept interrupting me. I tried to stay polite. “Yes, I know this is the men’s department.” But they kept making comments.
Finally I was getting mad. I told them we didn’t need any help. My girls were allowed to wear whatever they liked and they didn’t like the shirt designs in the women’s section and I didn’t like how low the necklines were.
Instead of just noticing that I was getting fed up with their “help”, they started arguing with me! One of them told my oldest, who is conventionally cute and skinny and starting to fill out (but still only 12), that “Oh that’s just because he’s your daddy. He doesn’t understand that a girl wants to show off for the boys!”
That was the last straw. I’m afraid I totally lost my temper. I told them (amongst a few other choice words) that they’d better walk away and come back to finish restocking the shelves once we’d left the area or I’d get the manager.
I try hard not to be rude to sales people and people in the service industry. That’s a difficult and thankless job. But for fuck’s sake! The first few comments were bad enough, but trying to undermine my moral authority with my kids? All in the name of gender and sexuality policing. They couldn’t get past the idea that my girls might prefer t-shirts that had “boy” designs on them and that didn’t hyper-sexualize them. The idea was abhorrent to them and they had to interfere and then KEEP interfering.
Once our sales “help” was gone, the girls found a bunch of shirts. Captain America, Minecraft, Doctor Who, Batman, Avengers. All the stuff they’re into. I mean, they also like MLP and Littlest Pet Shop and soft fluffy stuffed animals and Monster High dolls. We hit the toy section too for some of that stuff cos they brought their saved-up allowances with them.
At least we didn’t get any “help” in the shoe section. They’d’ve had a cow again cos while the youngest found a cute pair of pink and purple sneakers, I ‘let’ the oldest go to the men’s section and find a cool pair of dark blue and grey ones. (and omg their feet are huge! youngest wears a women’s size 9.5 and oldest wars a men’s 8. FFS, I wear a men’s 8.5. Their feet are almost as big as mine! How’d that happen?)
I hate this gender policing shit and won’t put up with it at all. I always feel for kids whose parents enforce this shit. I see it at stores when a girl or boy strays outside the lines, too often the parents are the one who pull them back into their place and it makes me sad.
Like, their friends who are boys, when they’re over at our house, they sit there and play with the girl toys as much as the boy toys. One of the boys loves playing LPS with my youngest, making up stories and stuff. The first time I walked out into the playroom and saw, he got so nervous and tried to say that he was just doing it to be nice to her. I told him that it was fine. He could play with whatever he wanted to and I wouldn’t tell anyone. Word got around to the other boys I guess cos now they all play whatever and don’t stop if I “catch” them.
I get shit from my mom about it too. I’m trying to make them into little boys. I shouldn’t have bought them trucks and toy swords when they were little. The oldest needs to learn to start wearing dresses now not just blue jeans. Why did I ‘let’ her get her hair cut short? I need to put the youngest on a diet and make her wear training bras. Why do I let them play with boys? etc etc etc.
*eyeroll.gif*
I just find it so hard to believe that it’s the 21st century and people are still getting their knickers in a twist over this kind of thing.
^^^^ This man deserves a dad of the year award. ^^^^
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