I worked with movie reviewer Kyle Smith for many years at the New York Post and would be the first to concede he's a very intelligent, sharp-witted, funny guy.
But he has written an assessment of Scorsese's Goodfella that has sparked all sorts of outrage and is, well, kind of idiotic.
His first point seems to me rather obvious—Goodfellas is a guy film. This is true simply because all the main characters are male. It is about the rituals of male bonding.
I find Portnoy's Complaint a very compelling novel. I am Jewish. It is about Jews. I would wager that in general Jews find it more engaging that non-Jews. This doesn't mean it doesn't have universal appeal, just that people like to read about characters like themselves in situations they can relate to.
Saying Goodfellas is a guy film is like saying The Remains of the Day appeals to people who like historical films. It merely identifies an audience very likely to enjoy the film.
But Smith takes it a step further by saying Goodfellas, without a doubt a masterpiece, cannot be appreciated by women. You see, women are these uptight, moralizing prigs who will only go see touchy-feely movies where the female characters sit around making each other feel better about themselves--
Women (except silent floozies) cannot be present for ball-busting because women are the sensitivity police: They get offended, protest that someone’s not being fair, refuse to laugh at vicious put-downs. In the male fantasy, all of this is unforgivable — too serious, too boring.
And again:
When the “Sex and the City” girls sit around at brunch, they’re a tightly knit clique — but their rule is to always be sympathetic and supportive as each describes her problems, usually revolving around the men in her life.
This is true of all women? It's inherent to their nature?
The piece reflects a general, ill-defined fear that there are all these women out there waiting to deny men their rightful pleasures. It takes the stereotype of the shrewish, politically-correct feminist and applies it to the entire female population. Yeah, I can understand if you would find this misogynist.
If nothing else, Smith's piece represents a profound misreading of Goodfellas. It is an indictment of male-bonding, exposing its destructive and self-destructive tendencies. Smith portrays the film as this thrill-ride for men who want to celebrate male camaraderie, somehow forgetting that the movie ends in disaster. There are much better male buddy movies he could celebrate if he's looking for positive depictions of men being men.
I hesitated to write about this because the Internet, especially Twitter, has a way of exaggerating the scope of a controversy. A few hundred people tweet about Smith's column, it becomes a big brouhaha. But a few hundred out of millions does not a shitstorm make.
It's only because reporters nowadays spend their days in front of a computer rather than getting off their asses and going out there that this sort of thing becomes a news story (even the Guardian covered it).
I have deep respect for Kyle. I only wonder why he's wasting his talents.
