Thank you very much for posting this message.
A long time ago I came to the conclusion that all straight males (however they may appear on the surface) are self-centered thugs and morons, but you've proved me wrong. You are ONE exception, and if there's one there may be others too, somewhere. I know now that it's at least possible for a man to be both straight and decent. Thanks again.
For what it's worth, I think you were right in not associating machismo with France, but you may have been wrong in thinking of machismo as a good thing.
And although many terrible wars (including both World Wars) were fought to a significant extent IN France, in most cases they have been rescued from total destruction by other countries. Their last impressive military successes came 200+ years ago under Napoleon.
Their recent tendency seems to be surrender. They surrendered to the Nazis in 1940, very early in WWII, long before the US had even entered that war. They had suffered so disproportionately and so severely only 22 years earlier in WWI that their easy surrender may be understandable, but it's hardly heroic.
Heroism doesn't appeal to me much, though. Seeing the French as not heroic doesn't lower them in my estimation. If anything, it raises them. They enjoy life too much to be heroic.
And they've experienced the devastating brutality of war far more than most nations have, so they don't toy with it the way we relatively war-free Americans do. Especially after we (as we see it, with some justification) won World War II, we've been itching to stick our bazooka anywhere in the world we can stick it. We may finally be backing off from that super-macho mentality, but white-hat cowboy heroism is a hard drug to kick.
So I love France, and I love the French people (and I LOVE French movies - they're the best in the world). Just like us Americans, many of them fit the strongly negative stereotypes outsiders have of them, but many don't. However, in general I do think the French enjoy life more than most peoples do; and (unlike many Americans) they don't enjoy violence. Machismo is a sort of barely-controlled violence, and it doesn't harmonize well with the innate French love of beauty and pleasure.
On another point, I greatly admire you for seriously considering how this movie might affect gays, Jews and Finns - people unlike yourself and who (I assume) in no way benefit you personally. That genuine compassion for people wholly unlike yourself is what most clearly sets you apart from every other straight man I know about.
I'm gay, but I'm neither Jewish nor Finnish. Although at least one post on this board was by a gay man who WAS offended (although, unfortunately, he quit watching early in the movie, as you did, but didn't return to it), I can't believe that many gays would be. The movie is SO gentle, and SO sweet, and SO funny, that it's hard to imagine how anybody could be offended by it.
But human beings are strange and unpredictable creatures, and just as you've proved there's at least ONE decent straight male on earth, there probably is at least one other gay, and one Jew, and one Finn who would be offended by this movie.
There may also be people who are repulsed by gentleness and sweetness, people who don't enjoying laughing as much as you and your wife do. I'm sorry if it offends anybody, but I love this movie anyway. I'm very glad you do too, and I'm grateful that you took the time to tell us about it.
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