Dude Looks Like A Lady

lol...watch this....
* i nearly died at the 2:50 mark...i'm silly*





i wonder, do you see something wrong with this? does it bother you to see men dressed as women playing stereotypical roles time and time again? like martin, tyler perry, ricky smiley & eddie murphy...or those who do voice jobs like steve harvey and his sister o'dell impression...


i've heard both sides of the argument about why when they do dress as women, the always seem to portray these loud, inappropriate, most times unfit and usually overly sassy broads? then i've heard thats its all in good fun, just something for laughs.


eddie murphy as rasputia in "norbit"





martin lawrence as big mama in "big mama's house"





tyler perry as madea in "diary of a mad black woman"




but what's your take? do you just see this as humor or are you offended?

I Met The Browns...And I Wish I Hadn't

THE PRETTY UGLY SPOTLIGHT: MEET THE BROWNS

so you could probably tell by the title that i recently saw tyler perry's "meet the browns" and was really disappointed. i don't even know why i expected something great...maybe it's because it pulled in 20 million on it's opening weekend...maybe it's because some part of me really wants tyler perry to be successful. maybe i just was happy to get out of the house without baby tied to my hip. regardless, this movie has to be his worst-BY FAR!!!

so for those who have seen it, let's go thru it, bit by bit. if you haven't, please do not let me deter you. anyhoo, all of tyler's madea-laden plots are all the same - down and out, weary and worn black woman (usually abused in some way)....dashingly handsome man comes in on shiny white horse...he saves the day...they fall in love...madea makes you laugh...all is well in the world.

and i was willing to roll with this....but with "meet the browns," the goal of realism wasn't even attempted. and that made me mad! angela bassett played (i forgot her name) with 3 kids and 3 baby daddies. (what's up with this theme of sad black mums and trifling black dads?) in the first movie, the main character didn't have any children, but her husband fathered 2 secret kids outside of their marriage with his mistress. in the second, that chick had 2 kids by 2 men and was so down on her luck, she had to live with madea. now in this one, there are 3....and of course, they are dirt poor living in chicago projects alongside her very loud and inappropriately dressed, bi-polar latina friend. this friend was so streotypically wack, it was painful, in every outfit, her breasts were spilling out...and she hardly ever matched. she was crazy too...i mean coo-coo for coco puffs crazy! angela loses her job and the lights get cut off. they barely have any food to eat.

by chance, angela's father dies and someone sends her some bus tickets to come down to georgia for his funeral. when she gets there, she is greeted by her 'family', most of who are sweet...but jenifer lewis (vera) is a spitfire. *unrealistic item # 1* angela's uncle picks them up from the bus station with his daughter. once everyone is back at the house, vera looks at this woman (her neice) and asks who she is and who her mother is. she replies madea. you mean to tell me that a woman doesn't know her very grown neice OR who her mother is? how does your brother have a child and you don't bother to inquire about this until she's about 35? nonetheless, everyone discovers that their father used to be a pimp. (again, with the crappy black man image) also, the uncle has a knack for dressing in really nutzy colors and patterns, presumably from another era. i found myself literally frowning at him when he was on screen...feeling kinda like...

enter rick fox. he's so handsome, he's un-handsome - if that makes sense. his looks are too nice. nonetheless, he automatically falls for angela and wants to help her basketball playing son make the most of his sporting ability for the sheer joy of helping in abnormally grandiose ways. long story short, the pimp father leaves angela an old, beaten-down house. the house is so unlivable, angela discards it like trash. fast forward, angela and her kids go back to chicago with a fist full of cash from madea's daughter. *unrealistic iten # 2* she never seems to get another job....or steadily trying to achieve some type of stability. obviously, the money wasn't going to last too long, because she goes crawling to her son's father begging for money. he refuses her. then later, he randomly shows up at her door being very nice. he offers to give her some money in exchange for sex. the son walks in and is angered. after baby-daddy # 1 leaves, the son vows to pull his family out of the bowels of poverty by................you guessed it, running with the wrong crowd to sell drugs. but wait, handsome chases him down in the street to warn him of the bad choice he is making.

SIDEBAR::::: i have an issue with sons feeling like they have to rescue their mothers and siblings from destitution. it is not a child's place to have to worry about how to survive and drag his family along. this came up on eb the celeb's relationship week forum. it bothers me because some of these men-children get locked into that 'gotta-save-them' mentality and it causes problems in future relationships for lack of the ability to let go. and of course, this child's desire to 'save them' ends up getting him shot.

*unrealistic item #3* as i said the son realized he made a bad choice, and when he went to tell his drug dealing friend he was out, some tough guy rolls up and just starts shooting. well, miraculously, he's not critically injured....but the next time you see him after being released from the hospital...was on the basketball court. WTH!?!?! could he at least have struggled thru some rehab? maybe limped around for a bit?

well, handsome comes lurking around again and he and angela begin dating. then out of nowhere (and during ledisi's song "alright') they move back to georgia, where handsome has managed to restore her beat up house into a fabulous new work of beauty, along with some donations from the church. *unrealistic item # 4* she stills has no job or monetary assistance, yet sustains this fabulous new life. handsome and angela have a spat and stop speaking. son gets drafted into the basketball league AND gets to take college courses. angela realizes her and handsome's spat was just a misunderstanding....they literally kiis and make up....next and last scene is their wedding. *unrealistic items # 5, until....* handsome mentioned having 3 kids, they never appear. madea makes a cameo on the news as she's trying to elude the cops in a high speed chase.....what was the point? it was so "out of nowhere." and that daughter of hers had the worst fake emotion when madea was seemingly being captured by the police. and i'm still trying to figure out WHAT MAN on this green earth would pay to have a woman's house completely refurbished when they are not even in a committed relationship? i mean he took that house from death and turned it into a house suited for "better homes & gardens.". all of this went on while she was in chicago before and during they even started semi-dating. then they "broke up" he just tucks his tail in between his legs and goes on about his business until she realized they fought over something dumb?

the movie was a M-E-S-S!!!!! i am so bothered because i know tyler perry has made a skillion dollars off of his creation madea. and once he proved he could dish out some entertaining stuff, he was just handed opportunity after opportunity, but the quality has gone into the toilet (please don't get me started on the atrocity of "house of payne" on tbs)

i want him to be successful...but at what expense? the parallel images he's portraying are offensive and they're not even funny. i can personally overlook SOME offensive stuff if i can charge it to humor (a la dave chappelle) but this mess never made me crack a smile...at least not when i was supposed to. i found myself laughing at all the wrong times, like when son miraculously recovered, or when angela and handsome got married. i'm sure other movie patrons thought i was nuts.....but i am really upset at this.

******WHAT ARE OUR THOUGHTS? IF YOU'VE SEEN THE MOVIE, WHAT DID YOU THINK? IF YOU HAVEN'T, WHAT DO YOU THINK OF TYLER PERRY'S MATERIAL PRIOR TO THIS? SPEAK ON IT..........*********