ART Goes to Hollywood

I suppose the time has come to weigh in on all of the hype over the new, weirdly successful, movie Baby Mama. I must be missing something. I have even seen this movie billed as the ultimate in Hollywood feminism. Is that perspective some kind of joke or has feminism gone so far astray that having a successful movie with two female leads has become a coup, despite the male screen writer and wickedly misogynistic content? Clearly, the feminism question is worthy of its own attention, so let’s just have a very brief go at the movie.

The title. Reproductive technologies are available, largely, to white, upper-class Americans. The idea of co-opting traditionally disparaging terminology from another social and ethnic group to whom that technology is generally not available in order to nab the appropriate “blue collar” (read: white trash) portrayal of one of the leads is something of a pc nightmare.

And more generally, does the idea of a middle-aged, single, career-oriented woman looking for another woman - younger, dumber, poorer - to act as a surrogate in order that the successful woman have the pinnacle female trophy -- a child -- sound any alarms? It should.

When feminism starts recognizing the dilemma it has created for women to see either maternity or modernity as a trap -- maybe it will be able to reconcile the two rather than insist that we accept both.

~Postscript: I'm not the only one. When Chick Flicks Get Knocked-Up, Alissa Quart.