MovieChat Forums > An Officer and a Gentleman (1982) Discussion > Some BAD Moral messages...and sexism in ...

Some BAD Moral messages...and sexism in this movie.


First one: It's ok for cool guys to cheat.
Sids character was portrayed very positively overall. He was everyone's good ol' buddy. Top of the class, best leader, best friend, best chum etc. But the fact is he was cheating on his girl back home. A girl he was going to marry. That's pretty awful. And he was totally using Lynette. But when Lynette lies, to trap him, all the judgement lands on her and she is depicted as an evil, scheming witch. And then the audience is encouraged to feel a tragic loss at the following suicide of the innocent and lovable Sid? There is something very unbalanced and hypocritical about that.

Second message: If you wanna get a guy for good....make him jealous.
After they graduate, Richard Gere brushes off Paula without even a a phone call. And Paula is in tears over it. Then he goes to the bar and sees her there with another guy. Which clearly made him very jealous. And at the end of the movie we all get to see how this act bore fruits, as he goes back to whisk her away from her mundane life. So it's being suggested that jealousy is a good method to make a guy re-think his decision, to break up with a girl.

I wonder how many couples in the 80's were influenced by these messages?

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Bit of a simplistic reading, in my opinion. Sid had a girl back home; but, it seemed, like everything else, she was what was "expected" of him, by his family; not that he loved her. As he says to Lynette later, he was doing everything for them, and not himself. He truly felt he was in love with Lynette. Getting involved, in the first place, may be seen as a moral lapse; but, he grew close to her and came to realize she was more of what he wanted. Or, at least, that's what he thought. Then, when Lynette reveals that it wasn't true and that she was only interested in him if he was a pilot, his world was shattered. He felt betrayed and destroyed. That is why Lynette gets the venom, not Sid. Sid is true to the people in his life, often at the loss of his own self. Lynnete was only in the relationship for the perceived glamour of being a pilot's wife, in some exotic port of call, preferably stationed in a good location, like Hawaii.

The Zack and Paula scene was hardly about jealousy, from my reading. He was becoming aware of what he was letting slip away. Jealousy was more of a reaction to his own stupidity.

As for sexism, you can certainly read that into it, though it is a pretty accurate reflection of the time. Segar gets a lot of crap; but, women in the military did, especially if they wanted to be a pilot, or something similar. Segar keeps fighting, which is a positive role. Now, you can say it is a cop-out that she is ready to finally give up, until Mayo motivates her to get over the wall. I think it is, though the scene is there to depict Mayo's realization that it isn't about him and a friend needs his help. It's to demonstrate his growth, though at the expense of Segar's independence. She does get her triumph, but it isn't a solo one. However, the reality of a military environment is that teamwork helps you get past your own perceived limitations.

Paula and Lynette are shown to be after a good time and escape; but, you can contrast their journies. Lynette never rises beyond; Paula walks away from doing the same thing, determined to go on with her life and be true to herself and finds a reward. Certainly, she is "rescued by her prince;" but, that's Hollywood. It would have been bold to have the film end with Paula leaving her job to go off to do other things elsewhere; but, that isn't the ending audiences wanted. The film didn't have Mayo coming back to Paula, originally and audiences hated it. When Mayo comes for her, audiences loved it.

Sexism I will grant you; amorality I refute.

Fortunately, Ah keep mah feathers numbered for just such an emergency!

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Sid got what he deserved. You don't screw around on your fiance and then act a victim when you get someone pregnant. It was poetic justice. Lynette was no saint either, but it was wrong of the movie to overplay her scheming and pettiness while downplaying Sid's philandering. In fact, he didn't display any qualities you could call lovable until the last 20 minutes of the movie, but his sh!tty treatment of treatment of women had already been established by that point.

And Zack's response was disgusting. He deserved a punch in the face.

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Everyone has flaws. Watch Sideways (2005) and you'll see that in the same light. Two women, two men - both have good and bad intentions.

In this film, you have some flawed characters with their own intentions. Paula wants to escape but has a higher moral compass than the "little cunt". Zack had a shit life, his mother killed herself and he puts up the "I don't need anyone" front as a protection. Sid was a douchebag for banging the "little cunt" when he was plowing his dead brother's woman's patch back home in shitkicking country. It's part of making the characters a bit more interesting. I mean, SeeeeGar moved to Beverley Hills to work in Victor Maitland's art gallery.

Oh, and Paula is a little cunt.

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First one: It's ok for cool guys to cheat.


Sid ended up getting shafted by the trash debutante he was boinking and ended up taking his own life as a result. If he stayed true to his girl back home he would have been a naval officer and married to "the best girl in the world". His cheating became his downfall. So that message didn't happen..

And yes, judgement does land on Lynette. She targeted a man she didn't love to marry only for the opportunities he could provide by lying to him. Considering her prospects, she should have just married some Okie from Muskogee.

Second message: If you wanna get a guy for good....make him jealous.


That was hardly a message the movie was trying to make, but still, nothing new there. Many women try to make men jealous and vice versa. Sometimes it works, sometimes it backfires, but this is a common scenario that has been taking place in reality and in all kinds of stories since folks started telling stories. I don't think women were taking notes while watching.

But Zack *did* love Paula. At some level he knew it but was trying to keep to his loner plan of love them and leave them and "get jets", but that plan was beginning to crumble. The real message of this movie is that Zack was a changed man for his interaction with Foley and the discipline of the Navy training. The old Zack could be a narcissistic loaner and be quite happy, but "reformed" Zack now allowed himself to bond with someone, maybe for the first time since his mother killed himself. Jealousy is only a thing if the person targeted has feelings, and Zack did.

For all we know, he would have come back for Paula after flight training.

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Just the Clintons.

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