Bridesmaids: A Meaningful Step for Women or Just a Funny Movie?

A	Bridesmaids represents a new take on women in film -- I think there is some social responsibility here

B	I don't care about the feminist conversation surrounding Bridesmaids

The new film Bridesmaids, written by Kristen Wiig and her writing partner Amy Mumolo, directed by Paul Feig and produced by Judd Apatow, has prompted a conversation about women in film. Salon went so far as to post an article titled "Seeing "Bridesmaids" is a Social Responsibility." Judd Apatow has done a great job with male-centric films, including The Forty-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up, and Bridesmaids represents the female side of that comedy coin for some viewers and critics.

At Bitch Media, an organization dedicated to pop culture analysis through a feminist lens, an article expresses two takes on the potential of Bridesmaids to break ground in female comedy. One viewer said, "I hate that THIS is the movie women are supposed to throw their money behind at the box office in order for more women-in-mainstream movies to be made." The critic arguing the opposite point wrote, "I think it could mean great things for the movie industry and for women working in a sea of bromances."

Of course, the writers at Bitch would analyze the film this way whether or not there existed a larger conversation about what the movie means for women in comedy. At the AV Club, though, one reviewer objects to the whole conversation, saying, "We don’t need to apply this overblown—and, frankly, patronizing—idea of “social responsibility” to Bridesmaids. It’s a funny, audience-pleasing movie that generated enough word of mouth to succeed without some manufactured bigger-picture ideal...We need to stop thinking of female entertainment as something that needs to be saved and allow the cream to rise to the top naturally."

What do you think? Do you enjoy this kind of critique, and do you have high hopes for the film as a feminist statement? Or would you just as soon ignore any academic hype and enjoy it for what it is: a funny, occasionally gross comedy that happens to star women?

Eleanor Brown

Bridesmaids: A Meaningful Step for Women or Just a Funny Movie?

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