TMS Discussion: Can Toxic Masculinity Successfully be Satirized?

(20th Century Fox / Lionsgate Films)

I have a co-worker who loves movies just as much as I do. During breaks and on slow days we’ll sometimes talk about film as well as the fanbases surrounding popular movies. I find his opinions interesting because he’s a straight male in his early 20s, and most male movie fans in that age group have a bad reputation for not being self-aware with their enjoyment of testosterone heavy films and take them too seriously. When I was in film school, ‘film bros’ idolized and obsessed the most over David Fincher’s Fight Club (1999) and Mary Harron’s American Psycho (2000). I think every male classmate I had called referred to Fight Club or Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction (1994) as their favorite movie until around graduation, and I started noticing young guys naming Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive (2011) as their favorite film. I can even vividly remember vintage YouTube comments from over a decade ago unironically calling Robert De Niro’s Travis Bickle in Martin Scorsese’s Taxi Driver (1976) ‘relatable,’ pre-dating the ‘Literally Me’ meme. Fortunately, my co-worker seems very aware that while these are all good, classic films, they are literally just fiction and nothing to aspire to in real life. During a career retrospective for GQ last year, Christian Bale mentions when he was caught off guard while talking to a couple of fans who seemed to legitimately love his American Psycho character, Patrick Bateman as a person. They didn’t seem to catch that Christian and Mary made the horror-thriller as a satire on toxic masculinity in the work place [unlike Bret Easton Ellis’ original 1991 novel, which satirized yuppie culture in 1980s Manhattan].

Fight Club’s satire is a little greyer than American Psycho’s. David Fincher is a masculine friendly filmmaker behind Seven (1995), The Game (1997), Zodiac (2007), The Social Network (2010), as well as producing Netflix’s “House of Cards” (2013-18) and “Mindhunter” (2017-19). Chuck Palahniuk, author of the 1996 novel also called Fight Club, has a transgressive, anti-establishment theme to his writing. While both the book and movie are enjoyable and entertaining, I think taking the nihilistic actions of The Narrator [Edward Norton] and Tyler Durden [Brad Pitt] at face value is a bit ridiculous. The execution of the ‘sticking it to the man’ theme is a bit of a late 1990s time capsule too, not really resonating the same in contemporary times. Yet the film’s fandom got so rampant by the late 2000s, even David had to suggest to his own daughter not going on dates with guys who love Fight Club. [It’s also ironic to me Fight Club and American Psycho are each associated with the macho stereotype while both Chuck and BEE are openly gay.]

A film that instantly comes to mind when I think of the term ‘toxic masculinity’ and viewers missing the point of the feature is James Foley’s Glengarry Glen Ross (1992). The most famous part from this ensemble drama is Alec Baldwin’s Blake appearing in one scene to chew out three salesmen at a real estate company so they can feel intimidated enough to up their game. Amusingly, this whole 8 minute sequence was nowhere to be found in David Mamet’s initial 1984 Broadway play of the same name, and only added by David as an excuse for Alec to be cast, since he was a fan of the actor. Like fellow playwright and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, David has a very recognizable style of dialogue. ‘Mamet speak’ as it’s referred to, is usually biting, aggressive and confrontational, with a lot of NYC or Chicago slang and plenty of F-bombs. Glengarry Glen Ross had more uses of the word ‘f*ck’ than the average R-rated movie at the time of release. I remember learning from the trivia section of the movie’s IMDb page back when I was in school about how real business managers use the famous GGGR scene as a motivational tool for new sales employees. Movie quotes like “always be closing” and “coffee is for closers” are legitimate catchphrases in business offices. For some reason, I used to be under the impression this was just a thing that happened in the ‘90s. A phase when the movie was most popular. But I only recently learned Glengarry Glen Ross is still just as common among the sales communities. This is…a little alarming. Before he was a steady working writer, David Mamet spent time as a local Chicago salesman, and found his experience with his colleagues and clients to be rather miserable. GGGR is supposed to reflect this and show that your job shouldn’t be toxic or rule your life. So the fact that businessmen are intentionally using this film as legitimate inspiration is jarring. Glengarry Glen Ross should be regarded for the powerhouse performances by Alec, Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Ed Harris and Alan Arkin, and not as a how-to guide.

(Universal Pictures / Paramount Pictures)

Two movies I’ve always found structured similarly are Brian De Palma’s Scarface (1983) and Martin Scorsese’s The Wolf of Wall Street (2013). Both well executed rise-and-fall tragedies that also make being an a*shole seem like fun if you’re always getting hammered, getting laid and making a lot of money illegally. Now, if you have enough media literacy, it can be obvious the scripts are condemning Tony Montana [Al Pacino] and Jordan Belfort [Leonardo DiCaprio]. But because the films’ visual art direction, cinematography, costumes and performances are so flashy and glamorous, some fans are still left thinking: “these guys are bad…but still look cool.” There is something to be said about Hollywood incidentally glorifying their anti-heroes as much as they are dissecting them as criminals. Still, the filmmakers aren’t responsible for every single reaction to their art, and it’s not their fault if someone takes the objectively wrong message from a film. Even when people started joking about how villainous characters like Gaston [Richard White] in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast (1991) or Cal [Billy Zane] in James Cameron’s Titanic (1997) “did nothing wrong;” there came a point where it was like, “Wait…people are still only joking about this, right?”

From what I’ve seen in public and on the Internet, a lot of young male movie fans these days do seem to think it’s loser-ish to model yourself after fictional men like Tony Montana, Travis Bickle, Tyler Durden and Patrick Bateman. Not only because these guys are blatant degenerates, but also because it’s just kind of cringe inducing the same way a middle schooler feels ‘badass’ using foul language for the first time. Movies, TV and books can be inspiring, but let’s not get carried away with mistaking all character motives as messaging we want to see in real life.