Captain Marvel Takes A Literal Shot At 'Sexist' True Lies
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Isn't there a rule where you shouldn't reference better movies in your crappy movies?
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MovieChat Forums > True Lies (1994) Discussion > Captain Marvel Takes A Literal Shot At '...
True Lies was celebrated in its time for its depiction of female empowerment. The fact that JLC was no damsel in distress waiting to be rescued but instead an everyday woman stepping up and taking care of business in a tough situation was a huge part of the promotion.
shareOh yeah i definitely remember it was praised for Jamie Lee Curtis who breaks out from being a repressed 1950's type wife into a strong Independent 90's woman capable of keeping up with her husband. I think truth be told they are upset the Villians are Muslim Terrorists as if that is so far removed from reality so they try to bring the whole movie down because God Forbid anybody see a movie where anybody but White Men are unlikable Villians
shareI look back on this now, and the talk of celebration of this movie is bogus.
It was not a good movie, and what the lead character did to his wife was
only acceptable if you maintain a totally comedic view about the movie.
I agree with the criticism and am sorry I paid to see this when it came
out, and would not recommend it now.
The wife was not a strong independent woman, she was manipulated as
a joke by her husband in a very cold way ... maybe you should watch it
again, or maybe I should because that is how I remember it.
The reality is alot and i mean alot of women are cheating on their spouses and boyfriends and the spouses and boyfriends are trying to find ways to spy on them with the technology available to them today especially in this cell phone and social media age so you can imagine what one of these guys would do if they secretly worked for the C.I.A. in that way this movie is ahead of it's time as back then you had to be a CIA Agent to pull something like that off. It might make you feel uncomfortable but it's reality. If you can't handle reality you should watch movies like well Captain Marvel
shareI agree that the film is quite misogynist, particularly the mid-section. It seems to delight in Arnie's character humiliating his wife for entertaining thoughts of an affair (never mind that she never truly goes through with it), by having her thrown in a cell, and then making her do a striptease for his gratification (whilst he poses as a strange man).
It's worth bearing in mind that this is a remake of a French film, La Totale!, so it's not entirely from the mind of James Cameron, although it's hard to justify why they kept this section, since it only serves to display the lead character's misogyny and it arguably drags down the narrative for a good twenty minutes or so.
Still, I don't agree that it's a bad film. I'm not sure that James Cameron is capable of making a truly bad film (we'll ignore Piranha 2 since that was his first movie and he had little control over the final cut). It's probably his worst film, bar the aforementioned Piranha 2, but it's still leagues above most action movies, and whilst it felt egregiously sexist and Islamophobic even back in 1994, from this era's perspective I have to say that there's something almost refreshing about a big tentpole movie that doesn't feel beholden to politically correct norms and cookie-cutter liberal niceties. Yes, stupid and politically tin-eared blockbusters are still being made (like the second Transformers film and its awful African-American stereotypes) but it's usually an unintentional display of a filmmaker's lack of awareness (see also The Phantom Menace) whereas there's no way Cameron and co couldn't have been conscious of how blatantly anti-PC its thuggish Arab villains and lead character's cheerful sexism were.
That's not to say I approve of the film's politics, but it is to say that I almost have a begrudging admiration for the filmmakers' refusal to pander to special interest groups and hand-wringing pop culture writers, although I suspect they couldn't get away with it today.