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Remember of any recent movie with good male representation?
- Thread starter Hugare
- Start date
Hugare
Member
It's almost 30 years old lol
Mr Reasonable
Completely Unreasonable
I watched The League of Ungentlemanly Warfare this week - that's got Henry Cavill shooting guns in order to save the world so probably is enough to get some people hot under the collar around here.
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Chuck Berry
Gold Member
Sound of Freedom
Rran
Member
It's true, Calvin & Hobbes commented on this way back in '95.
Puscifer
Member
In the case of the substance that was literally the point of the movie.
That being said there's plenty good male representation through films both past and present. Dune, Tenet, The Northman, Past Lives, Strange Darling and Hereditary are ones that come off the top of my head that have strong or mature male leads.
Hugare
Member
I guess I wasnt being clear with the OP
I meant realistic, good representation of men. Roles of men just being sometimes flawed, but good, relatable guys. Not jackasses for women to step on or hollow vessels for action movies.
Like, tons of rom coms from back in the day used to have flawed but good male representation: Notting Hill, Sweet November, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, You've got Mail, The Family Man etc.
We had roles where women and men were alike. We didnt have to diminish one side to make the other one shine.
Maybe this is why I miss decent romcoms so much, and the reason why its a dead genre nowadays (not counting Netflix shit like The Kissing Booth and etc.)
Rewatched it the other day, ...everyone is an asshole, not just the men, the main point of the movie is the main characters decent into even being an asshole to herself withy the two sides fighting each other and thinking they "deserve" to be the better one. I know what you're going with thread wise but reading this back it was a bad first example, I can't think how anyone could watch The Substance and think ANY character in it was good and nice.
Puscifer
Member
Well what about Past Lives? It ended up being my favorite movie of all time for various reasons. But one was because of the maturity of Arthur to not be an emotional wreck with his Wife and handling the situation with a lot of emotional maturity from his side.
Doom85
Member
How to Lose a Guy and You’ve Got Mail had leads who were good and relatable?
note: for real, don’t watch this unless you want How to Lose a Guy and You’ve Got Mail ruined for you. Maybe the leads in the other films you listed aren’t horrible people, they aren’t brought up in the video, but they definitely also go hard on most of John Cusack’s rom coms.
Like, I know they’re supposed to be comedies, so one can still laugh from them, but it’s like the characters of Seinfeld, they’re hilarious but hardly “good and relatable” as people. In fact, it’s their lack of much morality that often makes them hilarious to follow.
Hugare
Member
How to Lose a Guy and You’ve Got Mail had leads who were good and relatable?
note: for real, don’t watch this unless you want How to Lose a Guy and You’ve Got Mail ruined for you. Maybe the leads in the other films you listed aren’t horrible people, they aren’t brought up in the video, but they definitely also go hard on most of John Cusack’s rom coms.
Like, I know they’re supposed to be comedies, so one can still laugh from them, but it’s like the characters of Seinfeld, they’re hilarious but hardly “good and relatable” as people. In fact, it’s their lack of much morality that often makes them hilarious to follow.
Yeah, nostalgia was probably making me remember some of those with rose tinted glasses lol
But I mean, at least they've also had terrible women in them, so its fair game.
They also arent cartoon characters. All of those criticized in the video made mistakes, but eventually realized that they were being assholes and changed over the movie. Thats character development.
And tho not "good", at least they were relatable enough, 'cause you probably knew someone like that in your life (if not yourself). People aint perfect or one note in real life.
Can't say the same about a Marvel character, John Wick or Paul Atreides
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Doom85
Member
Hugare
Member
I can 100% say that male characters from rom com movies from the 90-00 were much more influential to my personality and how to deal with women than Paul Atreides or Thor
But yeah, agree to disagree then
Doom85
Member
Oh, I thought you were accusing those particular action characters of being one note and perfect which didn’t add up at all. I mean, Thor’s first movie has him banished to Earth by his father for most of the film because he was being arrogant and refused to entertain the notion of looking for a peaceful resolution like his father suggested.
Well, yeah, obviously romance-focused movies will more likely influence one’s methods in romance than action movies would, just like horror movies will be more likely to help one overcome their fears than drama movies would. That should be a given.
Hugare
Member
Yeah, comic book movies can have some good messages, on a surface level.
But I'm looking for examples of movies showing men acting like real men.
Movies that you could show your kid and it would teach him values about being a good man.
Stuff like "The Pursuit of Happyness", "Seven Pounds", "Good Will Hunting", "Coach Carter", "Saving Private Ryan"
Feels like we dont have movies like those anymore
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ValiantTraveler
Member
Top Gun: Maverick.
Men_in_Boxes
Snake Oil Salesman
The Terminal List was pretty solid. A number of non baffoon male representation in that show. Chris Pratts character was the most intelligent / competent figure through the whole experience.
Me right now
CompleteGlobalSaturation
Member
The Beekeeper
What's the lesson there though..."Son, if you get killed, I'm gonna avenge your death!"
I'm happy just seeing a show where the men can solve issues and interact with each other without becoming total chimp buffoons. Or relate to women in a way that isn't just a set up for an eye roll "that's my dolt husband, can't even pour milk into cereal without screwing it up!" moment.
The new Frasier is pretty good. The characters make mistakes, but they also own up to them, talk about why they did what they did, and there is a lot of guys just having fun with other guys. The women are written...ok. The ep with Roz coming back was pretty silly because she just dumps the baby on the 3 guys as if ANY of these totally unrelated dudes has any real obligation for it. It's the set up for the show and I hope they NEVER have Freddy get with Eve (assuming that "firefighters don't get with their dead partners widows" thing still exists [...guess not
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-203173/NY-firefighters-leave-families-9-11-widows.html) but it was a hamfisted attempt to make womens lives seem harder than mens. Though I have had rando women thank me for taking my kids out so the wife could relax at home, so maybe that is a big deal in ladies circles. Or a bunch of them are just bitter they chose to have kids with a guy that didn't want to deal with kids?