Despicable Me 2
July 3, 2013
Gru is a single father of three girls whom he adopted in the first movie. At the start of this movie Gru had turned away from a life of crime, (Only males were mastermind criminals in these movies.) and tried to have a "normal" family life with his girls, but that did not last.
At Agnes' birthday party Gru is trying to be set up on a date. This woman is portrayed as not very attractive and a little overweight, to the point that when she leans on a table she breaks it. This is sending the message to girls that if you are overweight you wont look pretty and you'll break things because you are heavy and not graceful.
When Gru is set up on a date with Shannon, a tall, thin woman who wears a skimpy dress. She’s a ‘Dumb Blonde’ stereotype who talks about physical fitness and ‘phonies’. When the date starts to go south after Shannon becomes angry at Gru, his partner Lucy shoots Shannon with a tranquilizer dart.
What comes next is such a great amount of violence against women.
Lucy explains to the waiter that the unconscious Shannon had too much to drink, and then she and Gru decide to take Shannon home. The carry Shannon out the door, except the door keeps slamming against her head and they take no care to refrain from dropping her or knocking her into things. Then three people is too large for the vehicle, so they take Shannon out and tie her to the roof like a deer carcass. When Lucy slams on the brakes, Shannon flies off and crashes.
This was all meant to be funny. A woman who dresses the way Shannon did, and the way she talked. Why wouldn't she deserve all this violence and disrespect? This is a stereotype that says it is okay to treat women who dress and talk the way Shannon did with such disrespect. That is exactly the message that is being sent out.
All of Gru's minions are portrayed as males. Some minions dress as female, but there are no female minions. Why even put the male minions in stereotypical female clothing?
The filmmakers added a wig and facial hair to make one of the Minions appear to be African America, but did not change the coloring of the Minion's skin.
Some of the things that I noticed while watching the film was a lot of judgement put upon people just by their looks. The evil villain has the stereotypical largeness to him. I also noticed that Gru told Agnes that she does not need a mom, and she is sad about it. Then at the end when Gru and Lucy get married Agnes is happy because now she has a mom. So all she needed for her happiness was a mom, what message is that sending out to kids without a mom? I saw a lot of Spanish culture in this movie, but I did not see much of any other culture. I believe I only saw one African American woman in the movie two different times, but that was the extent of what I noticed.
I believe that children are absorbing how to be decietful and brag when you win something. They also learn that evil villain's can have a soft spot. If someone annoys you, spray them with a hose. Guard chickens are just as good as guard dogs. When someone is happy they do good things, and when they are not they do not so good things. Children also learn how to work with someone even though they prefer to work alone.
My twelve year old son had these things to say about what he picked up from the movie.
"All the houses on the block look the same, Why would they do that?"
"When you get older you need to have a relationship."
"Parents flip out when their kid goes on a date, geez they were just hanging out. Then the parent gets all mad and accuses the kids of dating."
"Making a phone call to make a date is so stressful they can start fires!"
"Even though you're a villain, you can still turn into a Super Hero!"
When I was watching this movie with my son I noticed so many little things that I never noticed before. When Gru gets annoyed he pretends to shoot himself in the head. Gru asks his youngest daughter to lie for him. So many acts of violence that is portrayed as funny, and I bet thousands of people miss it every time they watch it. Do not get me wrong, I really like the movie for many reasons, but I do see it in a new light now.
** http://hesahero.blogspot.com/2013/07/despicable-microaggressions-sexism.html
I used part of this blog in mine because Niki M did such a thorough job analyzing this movie that I wanted to make some of the same points that she made. Although I did not agree with everything that was in her blog, I agreed with the majority of her assessment of this movie.
**All photos were found on Google images
I have seen this movie before, and I remember the little bits and pieces about the date with Shannon, and can now only begin to imagine what young children might be understanding from these scenes. Shooting someone with a tranquilizer dart and not caring for her as you return her home? In a sense it gives children the idea that if you aren't happy with the way things are going, you need to take action and physically do something instead of using your words to discuss.
ReplyDeleteI have always not understood the reasoning by having the minions be male but some dress as female. Somehow I missed the one intended to be African-American, and really start to question what the thought process behind it was.
Great analysis points!
Wow, I did not know of all of the sexism in the film. Now that I see it, it makes me sad especially the part where Gru goes on a date with Shannon. I do not think I can watch the film without getting angry about the evidence of sexism. I really like all of the pictures that you added because it gave me a better visual to what you were describing.
ReplyDeleteI have seen this movie before and totally LOVED minons! haha I also realized that there are some judgments put upon people by their looking. But I did not know all of the sexism from this movie. I also loved the statements of your son about this movie. He has great perspectives to realize all of the controversial points. I really enjoyed your analysis, great work!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your write up. I have seen this movie and thought it was a very funny movie because of all the stereotyping. I as an adult know that it is wrong and people should not be viewed this way. The problem I have is that I don't thin children know the difference so I don't think this is a good movie for children/teens to watch.
ReplyDeleteI must be the only one who hasn't seen this! I could not finish the first one, because I did not like Gru. I felt that he was mean and manipulating those girls. So, reading your review on the second installment, makes me definitely not want to watch it! The blatant sexism and violence against women is awful. The fact that the heavier woman was ignored and the scandalous one somewhat deserved the violence and awful treatment sends a horrible message to children about beauty and self-worth.
ReplyDeleteI've watched this movie dozens of times and this was really helpful for me to read. I love the movie, but have never even noticed the acts of violence especially portrayed against women. Nice job on this!
ReplyDeleteThis movie has to be one of my favorite animated movies, and now I don't really know if I like it at all! I never caught on to the idea of violence and the multiple stereotypes against women. You are 100% true that it was all meant to be funny, which it is. So the humor of someone flying off a car easily distracts a young child from the thought that the person flying off a car is a women and she shouldn't have been tied up their in the first place. You did a really nice job bringing all these stereotypes within such a loveable movie to light.
ReplyDeleteI like your assumption about the stereotypes based on woman's appearance or the way like she talks. People should treat her in negative way or disrespect her because she looks different. I also, noticed that all minions were males that is strange for me too .Generally, you did a great job.
ReplyDeleteHey there! I don't know if I fully agree with your statement that "children are absorbing how to be decietful and brag when you win something," I think that if anything children are looking at this and thinking that it may be a bad idea, and it sounds like your son may have picked up on that idea too. The idea that he picked up that you have to be in a relationship when you are older is concerning to me, because in watching this with younger children 8 years old and 5 years old, they didn't pick up on any of those things. Instead they actually thought that it was pretty gross that adults wanted to be in a relationship. All in all though great post and I loved how visually pleasing it was. You were spot on about some of those stereotypes by the way! Good Job.
ReplyDeleteI never thought about Shannon being portrayed in such a stereotypical way before, I think that's an interesting perspective and I wouldn't have thought about that. I don't completely agree with your This is a stereotype that says it is okay to treat women who dress and talk the way saying that:"This is a stereotype that says it is okay to treat women who dress and talk the way Shannon did with such disrespect. That is exactly the message that is being sent out." I've watched this movie over a dozen times with children (4-14) and after reading this I went and watched it with them again and ask each one individually if they thought that it was ok to treat a women dressed like this or any women and they each said no and the older ones also commented that this scene was just meant to be funny and nothing else.
ReplyDeleteBut I really appreciate you pointing out this scene! I wouldn't have thought this way about this scene without you mentioning it!
- Abigail Baird