Disturbing
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Charmed02 — 15 years ago(April 27, 2010 01:37 PM)
This is on the TV at the moment - I think this is a really fun film. Didn't Demi Moore's character mean she had a crush on the father of the other girl - she wasnt saying "me too" about her own father.
Michael Caine has been utterly gorgeous for years. I've fancied him from Alfie onwards. Shows how old I am now! -
sigold999 — 15 years ago(April 27, 2010 06:11 PM)
This is a film - nothing is taboo, I believe, in film-making. Having said that this is a very innocent comedy romp. Maybe your disgust is more within your own mind. These things happen and is fair game to the scriptwriter etc. What must you think of Lolita! Anyway each to is own and personally I really like the film.
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mjz688 — 14 years ago(March 15, 2012 02:12 PM)
I think the point being missed by the naysayers (like the one above) is that BIOR treats a very problematic subject (a middle-aged man having sex with his best friend's under-aged daughter and his own daughter's best friend) as broad humor. That's what was disturbing about it in 1984, and was still disturbing when I watched it again the other night on cable. Lolita, for those who like to cite it without understanding it, was a drama in which the older man's life was ruined by his obsession with a teenage girl. A woman in her early 20's hooking up with an old guy fine. But 17? Such a relationship is fitting material for dramatizing on screen, but not as slapstick.
There are so many creepy moments in BIOR, many mentioned above (such as when the fathers leer at their topless daughters at the beach). One not cited was the scene where Balogna's daughter crawls into bed with him in the morning and snuggles with him. I mean, c'mon. I raised three girls, and once they were in their teens, that sort of behavior was not on the board. -
Howlin Wolf — 13 years ago(May 29, 2012 04:56 AM)
1984 wasn't as politically correct as we are now. It's not all that different to other films made in a ten year span from it's release ("10", "Woman in Red" ) It's saucy seaside postcard humour that was very "Carry on " in style, just with more bare flesh, and very few people complain about that series. It's really not like it was the first film to be bawdy about sex. We don't get a lot of movies like it these days, that's true, but there were quite a lot of them back then.
The fathers weren't actually leering; the audience might well have been, but don't impose a possible viewer reaction on the characters They are two separate things.
Some father and daughter relationships are tactile, and it's really only a problem if you already have inappropriate thoughts in your head.
Born when she kissed me, died when she left me, lived whilst she loved me -
ginda2000 — 13 years ago(November 25, 2012 02:47 AM)
The film is disturbing not due to the premise (which could be deemed digestable had it been done in a different way), but subtle other points which are added in along the way. For example she calls him 'Uncle Matthew' which has overtones of the creepy, he then makes references to his kissing her bottom when she was a baby and various things like that. I think had Matthew not seen Jennifer for many years and then she appeared and he didn't know who she was - it may have been a different scenario. However (for me) the film relies too much on the 'Uncle' aspect and references to their previous platonic relationship to feel comfortable. There is a clear difference to when a couple are attracted to each other (regardless of age) and see each other for who they are now, to an attraction which was born from a childs crush on her 'Uncle' and then this man making references to her as that child. It's icky and unsavoury.
What helps the film is the fact Michael Caine is playing the lead. Caine doesn't have anything sinister about him which ultimately helps make the film somewhat more acceptable. However - with that exact same script, had an actor like George Segal or even someone such as Gene Wilder or Alan Alda played the part it wouldn't have got this liberty at all. The irony is, Michael Caine is so miscast in the role that it distracts from the overall script and much of the dialogue they are saying.
Also, Michael Caine is famous for choosing films due to the locations (as he likes spending several months in warm weather), this would have been the only reason he took this job (as he did Jaws 4). I can promise you a lot of other actors were offered this part before him, simply because Caine would have been the last person you would have thought for that role. I'm guessing all those other actors turned it down due to the content! -
odd_duck06 — 12 years ago(May 09, 2013 12:34 AM)
I don't find this movie disturbing at all. That kind of thingolder man/younger woman relationshipshappen a lot. Yes, Jennifer was 17, but honestly, she's an adult. Maybe not legally, but she had a grown up body. Now, if she had had a body of a twelve year old and Matthew was still interested in her, that would be weird. But she was verywell developed. He was attracted to her because he viewed her as a woman, not as a child.
What I find weird was that Matthew loved Jennifer, romantically, that is. She didn't really seem like his type. She was very, very airheaded and childish in her behavior. I could see him being attracted to her, but love? No. That part is the only creepy part; why would he love someone with that has basically the mentality of a child? However, this still doesn't particularly weird me out because I am convinced he loved her with his dicknot just literally.
Also, I found Michael Caine extremely attractive in the movie. I truly believe women are more attracted to older men more for their intellect and maturity than their bodieskind of like Jennifer was attracted to Matthew in the movie "because he was a man and she didn't like boys."
Ever since I was a child, (think, 5 years old or younger) I have been attracted to men. Yes, full grown men, and I wanted to 'marry' aka 'get together' with them at that age, even though I didn't really understand what that meant. Justlike Jennifer did. Huh. So to the people who said that doesn't happenhaha, right.
Make her yours forever -
lazarillo — 12 years ago(October 13, 2013 08:25 AM)
I don't find THIS movie at all disturbing because I first saw it when I was a teenager myself. It's a remake of a French movie and the French made A LOT of movies like this at that time (check out the work of David Hamilton sometime).
We are WAY too PC these days, but I am not entirely disappointed that they don't make movies like this today (even in France too much). This is a common middle-age male fantasy, but it should definitely STAY a fantasy (even if there probably are SOME teenage girls interested in accommodating it). All heterosexual men become strongly attracted to teenage girls when they are teenagers and THAT never really goes away (even probably when you're 80), but the prospect of doing anything about it gets more and more ridiculous (and in some states illegal).
I don't feel the least bit bad about drooling over teenage girl in a MOVIE (especially with someone like Michelle Johnson who is older than I am). And, besides, most "teenage" girls in movies are usually much older in real-life. But that certainly doesn't translate to real life. Fantasy is fantasy; reality is something else entirely. -
timlin-4 — 12 years ago(October 25, 2013 04:08 PM)
Ridiculous by whose standards? You see an old guy with a young girl and you laugh? You're not laughing, my friend, you are crying for your wasted life. A man interested in a middle-aged women, now there is a spectacle for ridicule.
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andromache3 — 12 years ago(February 24, 2014 10:57 PM)
WTF are you talking about???? You sound like one of those creeps who masturbates over pictures of teenage girls. Not everyone likes young girls. Real men like women who are actual grown ups. What a douchebag.
Don't let anyone ever make you feel like you don't deserve what you want.