Hairspray Review: Big Girls Finish Last
I really want to like this film. At times, I even do.
It feels as though it's been years since I saw a movie which celebrated
women of all sizes and shapes. I do appreciate that element of the
story of hairspray, but I have to say, this movie only purports to do
that. Tracy, the titular character, is at times ostentatiously sexy and
at others irritatingly naive. She is one of those perennial dreamers
who never seems to notice let alone to react to others' ill treatment
of her. The movie portrays her, yes, as someone with a miraculously
positive image of herself and her distinctly overweight body. It also
portrays her as someone who refuses to allow herself to eat like a
normal human being. She is someone who allows herself to be stepped on
by those around her and whose only friend until she meets some black
friends through a shared love of dancing.
Her dreams may be big, but in actuality she spends her time obsessing
over the television show she eventually lands a role on while skipping
classes and skimping on the studying that would actually let her have
the freedom to make her own choices and have control over her own life.
She's a sweet girl, but completely self-absorbed and totally incapable
of fighting those who denigrate or oppress her. She acts on behalf of
the African-American friends she's just recently made in the movie, but
she seems woefully ignorant of the oppression that leaves her only
choices for enjoying her life either in finding a fun boyfriend, or
landing a spot on daytime television.
At no point does she gain confidence in her ability to fight on her own
behalf, only on behalf of others.
She is in many ways representative of the typical white suburban
liberals' daughter today--cognizant of others' oppression, not her own.
She spends her life "rescuing" other people from their unhappiness
while remaining unaware that her own might perhaps be related to the
fact that at no point does she learn how to feel 'worthy' of being fed.
Meanwhile, the movie cast John Travolta as the tremulous and fearful
agoraphobic mother of its star. To cast a male in a female role,
particularly as an older overweight female, is becoming a familiar
tactic of comedy writers with no faith in their originality and little
in their skill for comedic timing. To cast a man in a woman's role in
this rather heartfelt musical clearly shows that the true progress and
genuine emotions of the main character are played for laughs rather
than out of a desire to empathize with or support her struggle.
Clearly those who made this movie are of the mind that overweight
people are not worthy of being empathized with, let alone having movies
created around their struggles that do not simply poke fun at them.
As this bent is clear in the movie, I personally feel it should never
have been made. These characters, particularly the lead, 'Tracy',
deserve to be treated with respect. Instead, the writer and director of
this movie--primarily the writers, really--have used her story as yet
one more opportunity to poke fun at women this society so silences that
those who bully them can be certain they will be safe from rebuttal.
If there were a way to seek that retribution that is just other than to
post reviews expressing precisely how accursedly awful this movie is on
boards like this one I would gladly take it. As there is
not--deliberately so--I will have to settle for what I can find.