CineTV Contest #69 - Favorite Inappropriate Movie : There's Something About Mary
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In the film in question there is a pet golden terrier that is drugged, electrocuted, burned and plastered.
Disabled people are used as comic relief, and among them there are some very unpleasant people and even one who fakes his handicap. In addition, the LGBT community is insulted. We laugh at a bad zipper, and at a special hair gel used by the protagonist.
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Women are objectified and there are many men chasing one specific woman who is very good-hearted and good-looking.
Ambulance nurses are inept and drop the stretcher while transporting a sick person, hitchhikers are serial killers, policemen show ignorance and brutality, with allergies they are shown as crazy, fishermen and detectives are caricatured.
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In 1998 the film showed stalking as the ultimate expression of romanticism, its female protagonist is a sexual fantasy, a beauty who does not give importance to her physical appearance, intelligent, kind, funny, and puts her brother before everything else.
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The film jumps from one plot to another, introducing one by one all the crazy characters obsessed with the protagonist until the final scene where they all come together in the final scene where they demand her to decide for one of them.
The film is a satire that ridicules collectives, professions, minorities and toxic masculinity, especially heterosexual white men. All these men assume that they are entitled to sleep with the protagonist because she has been nice to them. They pretend to want to be her friend and resort to aggression when she treats them as such. And they are all to blame for their own misery.
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The film was the fourth highest grossing film of 1998, multiplying its budget by 16 times. Features a large dose of humor and originality, but despite that there are scenes that some people may find distasteful and some others may consider its dialogue to be handled with really foul language.
This comedy starring Cameron Diaz, Ben Stiller and Matt Dillon is called There's Something About Mary. It was directed with a lot of rhythm and humor by Peter and Bobby Farelly.
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It is the typical story of a boy falls in love with a girl when he is a teenager and tries to win her back years later. However, the male protagonist, Ted (Ben Stiller), gets into a mess that makes him look like a stalker when he hires the services of a private detective named Pat (Matt Dillon) to look for Mary (Cameron Diaz), a nice girl he met in high school and that, due to circumstances (and a bad zipper up), he hasn't seen her in years. She lives in Miami with her brother, living a happy life without imagining that she has several men in love with her.
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But throughout the film, no one manages to harm Mary, take advantage of her or corrupt her virtues.
It seems unbelievable that almost 25 years have passed since its release. I confess that I saw the film via VHS copy because at that time I and other co-workers at a bank had a video rental club and this particular film was in great demand due to its absurd humor in terms of the situations it presented.
From the second viewing, since the first time I rolled on the floor because of the laughter that the film provoked in me, I realized how twisted and sour this comedy was because of the perverse and toxic elements it introduced.
The directors manage to turn the American comedy of the 90's on its head, telling the story partly with a Greek chorus, (giving everything a certain air of tragedy); and at the same time they present gags around bad taste and scatological jokes that in many viewers have the effect of making us laugh.
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Through this special type of humor the filmmakers manage to transmit the male selfishness, hypocrisy and the desire to appear that seems to invade both men and women; this prepares us for a scenario dominated by evil, from dangerous psychopaths to unworthy losers, and in general all the characters manipulate, betray or make fun of the rest of the innocent. But the genius of it is that with these elements the filmmakers manage to generate a lot of humor, clashing against logic, morality and the viewer's sensibility.
Mary is a bad luck magnet, in the midst of all the emotional turmoil, yet even she takes a break from her goodness to make fun of Ted.
The film is full of fresh and sparkling dialogue, zany and absurd supporting characters (Lee Evans, Chris Elliott and especially Lin Shaye) and a brutal discourse on a terrifying way of perceiving love. It is a sample of love idealized and taken to crazy limits making the fixation an obsession.
Given how politically correct society wants to be today, this film could not be made in the same way as in 1998, since it would be boycotted by the animal protection society, associations for the disabled, LGBT groups, feminist associations, nurses' unions, and even police forces.
I am aware of all the topics that the film dynamites and perhaps that is why even in the year 2023 I still like it and enjoy it, even though it offends many.
This is my entry in the CineTV Contest #69 - Favorite Inappropriate Movie Link Here. I invite the members of the community to participate, it is a lot of fun and very interesting to read the opinions of movie lovers.
Best wishes to all and good luck to the other participants.