Jeremy Blachman's Weblog: 2012: My Grandma Reviews: "Made of Honor"

"They're crazy. Making movies like this, that aren't about normal people. It was a fairy tale. That's all it was. It's so unnatural. He's in love with her, but it's so stupid, he won't just tell her, and then right at the end, he hurries and goes over these mountains in his car just to get there right at the moment before the priest says she's married to this other. And he gets there right in the nick of time, and of course she turns to him, right as he's going to pronounce them married, and she walks away from this other guy and into his arms. A happy ending that everyone in the theater knew was coming and was so contrived and silly. And the way everyone in this movie talks, like all of these movies for young people. They're kissing each other constantly. In public, in a crowd, all the time. People don't act that way. They're unreal. Like plastic dolls. I'd love to hear some reviews of this, what the critics say."

"Okay, sure. Well, 86% of the reviews were negative."

"Hallelujah! I thought I was the only one, the way some of these people laugh at the stupidest things in the theater!"

"Okay, here's some of the review quotes: 'Made of Dreck is more like it.'"

"Ha, exactly. You know, "dreck" is Jewish for "shit." Did you know that? They use a word like that in the newspaper? I didn't think they were allowed to use words like that. But, yes, that describes the movie perfectly. What else?"

"[from Rotten Tomatoes:] 'This is silly stuff, made of cardboard, with one of those Gordian-knot plots that could easily be cut through by one person's simply being honest with another person for 30 whole seconds. There's not much more to say.' 'Pretty awful and awfully predictable ... it's a sappy and stupid romance about characters who feel about as real as plastic action figures.' 'It’s hard to sympathize with characters who bear no resemblance to any existing member of the human species.' 'It's offensive because it's so incredibly, almost supernaturally, stupid.'"

"Yes! Is your grandma right, or what? At least the reviews agree with me. I know they don't always. But if they didn't for this one, I swear, I would give up. I would stop going to the movies. I want to see something in depth. Not like there where they're unreal, completely. Caricatures. People in the ladies room said it was cute. Why don't these people recognize how fake it all is, why don't these people have any standards? Not just the people in the ladies room, but the people who make these things? So many people expect so little. They're so shallow. And they don't remember what real entertainment used to be like. People say, oh, it was cute. What was cute about it? It was a waste of time. And why was it set in Scotland anyway? Just for the scenery, not for the reality of it. Ooh, mountains. Ooh, trees. This is what they think people need. Just put some pretty people in a pretty place and no one will care about the plot or the characters or anything that's going on, like they're mesmerized by the mere fact it's in Scotland. How easy it must be to put something like this together. Just take a pretty person, why not put them on the moon? You don't even need any dialogue, just have her stand there and smile, on the moon, for two hours. [One of my friends] didn't like it, thank God. Except she liked that garbage we saw last time, that Sarah Marshall thing. Which, again, people say, oh, it was cute. No, it was vulgar and sexual and offensive. [My other friend] is very stubborn -- and yet we keep listening to her. It's like she has to defend these things. If she recommends it, she'll fight to the death insisting she was right and it was funny. All these terrible pictures she recommends, and then she tries to defend them. I watch her in the theater, and she'll laugh, all the time, while I'm looking at it in disgust. I think it's an act. I think she laughs because she knows if she doesn't laugh, the two of us will tell her, see, you picked a bad movie, and then she'll feel bad. I don't think she has good values, some of the things she finds funny. I don't know. I'm glad you read me these reviews, I assumed this movie had all good reviews and there was something wrong with me."

"Nope, mostly bad reviews."

"And one more thing. And I usually don't care about this, but I happened to notice. I'll tell you -- there was one older person in the movie, I guess she was the bride's grandmother. The only old person in the movie, and all she was there for was so that they could make fun of her. They make such fun of her, they ridicule her. They make her look helpless and stupid, and she's wearing some ridiculous thing around her neck, and it's like they think she's an animal at the zoo, and all they do is ridicule her. This is what young people think of older people these days. I'm afraid for it. These stupid young people think oh, an old person, she must be incompetent. Never, in any of these movies, do you ever see older people in any other role except to be laughed at. And there are so many wonderful things someone could write about, things that are true to life, real drama that happens to real people. Instead, all they wanted to do here is show off the figures of these young women -- and they did have beautiful figures -- but they think that's enough to get an audience, people come to view a sexy little thing in a slinky dress. And it's so stupid. She's kissing both of these guys before she gets married, and then he has this phony little dilemma right at the end, he's going to leave and then, no, he has to turn around and stop the wedding at the very last minute, as if the whole point was to wait until the very very last minute just so they had a movie long enough to put in the theater. There was a nice-looking, intelligent-looking girl who sat in front of us, and then she was in the seafood restaurant afterwards, where we go, across from the movie theater, and I looked at her and asked how she liked the movie, and she said it was very cute. Ugh. She had lobster. Twenty-three dollars. I don't know how people spend all that money on themselves. I mean, if you go to a good restaurant I know you have to spend $25 on a dish for yourself. But as an every day thing? Twenty-five dollars used to be real money. And she cut the lobster up very small and boy was she enjoying it -- she really was. And how I used to love lobster, I really did. But I don't want to spend $23 on myself. It's silly to feel that way, probably. But that's how I feel. It's stupid in a way, I know. But what can I do?"