I remember watching this when I was little, like 12 or so, and I thought it was fun and entertaining.
Now, 35 years later... not so much.
It starts with this guy coming to the pajama factory to get a job, and he gets hired. As the superintendent. So far we know nothing about what he knows about making pajamas, and the secretary has more pondus and knowledge than he does. But he's A Man. He's not only A Man, he is The Man. We have already been made aware of that, when he walks through the sewing room and ALL the ladies are drooling over him, just by him walking by. He doesn't work for me. Too pudgy and mushy. (And I'm not referring to his physique here.)
I had also forgotten that it's a musical. And the cast singing... well... er...
Apparently the superintendent in this factory is the mechanic.
The first meet with the female lead is... uh. He sees she's a woman and his whole demeanor changes into "oh, just a gal, this will be easy". And he gets her name wrong. Her name is "Babe Williams", and it was said very clearly twice in the last minute before he calls her "Wilson". One of the committee members points out this, and is rudely interrupted by Babe ("it doesn't matter"). Yes, it does matter. How come a superintendent doesn't know the name of the head of the grievance committee?
And then he calls her "cute". Puke.
Later the factory girls - and Babe - are a backdrop to some union activity. Of course, women aren't even interested in such important man stuff.
Then Babe has her first song. "I'm Not at All in Love". Because of course a female cannot have a professional relationship to a man, especially not an attractive man, because everyone knows women only work until they get married, and that's the goal of every woman alive. Or at least every NATURAL, NORMAL, SANE woman.
And no-one believes her. Of course.
Then we have the relationship of Vernon Hines (Heinzy) and Gladys Hotchkiss. He's sickly jealous of her and argues with her for every little reason. *sigh*
But it's a pleasure to watch Eddie Foy's footwork :-D
"What kind of a girl is this Babe Williams?"
"Oh, she's peppy."
"I can see that."
"Full of life."
Then he calls her into his office under false premise, and sexually harasses her, and tries to manipulate her into a date with him. What a hero. When she says "no", because he's the supervisor and she's the grievance committee, he has a pity party. "Her with her nose in the air".
Comes the picnic.
One woman is apparently assaulted. Her dress and hair is disheveled, and she says to the woman helping her to fix her dress "Stay out in the open, honey, don't get down in them woods".
They have a knife throwing exhibition... the knife thrower is apparently an idiot.
Some fat shaming
So, Babe stands in for the knife throwing, the hero tries to physically stop her from doing it, she pulls herself off, and goes to stand in front of the plank. Everyone is certain of that she's going to die, but nothing happens. She walks away and the "hero" tells her "my, but you're an impetuous girl".
Girl. She's over 30.
And then he comes on to her. Pretty heavily. He pushes her against a tree and tells her "let's quit fighting". They haven't fought at all. In any way, mode or manner. She has been kind and friendly, open, honest, proper and professional. So, then he kisses her. No consent is asked or given. And he pushes it, pushes it, pushes it, and then - actually - asks if she wants to be his girlfriend, and she says yes. Enter a dance number. Which basically starts with some sort of dance off where participants are forced to enter. Weird. But hey, it's Carol Haney, so she can dance, so no problems. I suppose it would have been a comical relief if she was a bad dancer. And then they have sort of dance "follow the leader" with a bit more fat shaming. Yay. It ends with everyone rolling in the dirt. So lovely.
Anyway, so they start dating, and she takes him home to meet her dad. They are oh so lovey dovey, but she is a stout union member and thinks it's not right that this pajama factory pays less to its workers than every other pajama factory in the US. She tells the lover boy, and he just ignores it.
So when the going gets tough, she sabotages the factory and he fires her, and she is such a stuck up bitch that she gets upset about it, and doesn't want to be with him any longer. He doesn't understand at all. Because he LUUUUUUVS her, and that should make everything all right.
Now, I was expecting him to join the union, if he really loves her, but no.
This is the best thing in the movie. Ignore the rest. (Oh, and the dresses are wonderful. So Barbie.)
So, the a-hole takes Gladys to a club to get her drunk so that he can steal her key to the boss's books. And Gladys gives him the key anyway, but Heinzy is violently jealous and tries to kill her at work next day. And that's supposed to be funny.
So - how do they solve the union problem? It turns out the boss has been stealing money all the time, the board has agreed to give the workers a raise already half a year ago. So while the union workers sing about how much more money they'll have in 10 years if they'll get the 7 1/2 cent raise, the "hero" let's the boss take honor for giving them the raise he's been stealing for half a year, and continue taking advantage of the situation... *sigh*
And, again, Mae is there right on the situation, and not letting the a-holes trick them, Babe hushes her down again and says "we won!" and everyone cheers. I would have said "Retroactive payment? They owe us? WE GIVE UP NOTHING, YOU BASTARDS!!!" Will Babe pay them the 78 dollars they gave up for having "won"? Sure...
And then we have a "party" at the pajama factory where everyone is wearing pajamas and it's SO FUNNY I'M GOING TO DIE LAUGHING HAHA. Yeah. Sure. Haha.
No.
V Sexy Lamp Test
X The Crystal Gems Test
X F-Rating
X Sphinx Test
A woman has a primary role, but is she driving the action? No. Is she active rather than reactive? Sort of. Stereotypical? Well... Compelling? Not really. Complex? No. Multidimensional? Not really. She is pretty bland and flat. We really don't know much about her.
XThe Feldman Score: 0
X Furiosa Test
X The Roxane Gay Test
It is not a woman's story.
The women are basically all sidekicks, bit players and romantic interests.
There are a lot of women with a lot to say, but no-one's asking. Gladys is amazing, Mabel is amazing, Mae is amazing. I think it would be wonderful to hear Babe's story as well. (And why is she Babe and not Kit, Kate or another form of Catherine, which is her real name?)
The romantic storyline? Oh, he fired her, didn't rehire her, so now they can get married, and she can become the housewife any 50s man deserves.
Absolutely no nothing but straight, white, Anglo-saxon protestants as far as eyes can see here.
Gender Balance - Gender Representation:
X The Uphold Test
X The White Test
X The Hagen Test
V The Koeze-Dottle Test
Mae is very tomboyish. She loves beer, and wears trousers quite a lot.
Babe is an authority who makes her own decisions and carries the consequences.
Gladys... there's the Steam song where she is dancing as one of they boys. They are all three dressed the same way, have short cut hair, the same choreography, flat shoes... but she sings with an obviously female voice. I really enjoyed that number.
But it's males who solve problems and cause trouble and create action.
X the MacGyver Test
Frankly, I don't think it passes, even though there is an honest, hard-working man in leadership position, and successful, and the problem isn't solved using violence.
Well... the characters being either flat or underutilized, it's really hard to say anything of substance about this, but Babe has her own story, and she exists authentically with needs and desires that she pursues, and the audience can empathize with or understand the female lead’s desires and actions
V The Villarreal Test
The lead female character isn't introduced as sexualized, hardened, expressionless, soulless, matriarch, tired, older nor overworked. In fact, she is introduced as a competent superior and quite sympathetic. Even though it's at cost of Mae and fairness.
V The Landau Test
No female characters end up dead, pregnant, or as a plot problem.
V The Tauriel Test
Babe is good at her job, competent, demonstrated and recognized by everyone in the movie. She is the grievance committee lead and a union leader kind of.
X The Willis Test
Nope. Men couldn't be saying what women say and vice versa.
Gender Safety:
Well... this is another difficult thing. On one hand, people aren't oversexualized, and there is no sexualization of children, objectification, etc. but it's full of sexual abuse. Which I spoke about earlier. Among others unwanted touching, forced kissing, comments, advances, insinuations... at the same time, people are in some way respected... I suppose in the 50s it was considered totally normal and acceptable.
Doris Day 35
John Raitt 40
Ralph Dunn 55 (the boss)
Carol Haney 33 (boss' secretary)
Eddie Foy jr 52 (Carol's boyfriend)
Reta Shaw 45 (John's secretary, "old woman")
X Social Justice and Equality:
C The Representation Test
four points. Women are represented as more than objects, it passes the Bechdel test, doesn't glorify violent men (but kind of excuses them), and doesn't perpetuate extreme/unhealthy body ideals for men nor women.
X The Vito Russo test
X Aila test
X The Waithe Test
X The Ko Test
X The Villalobos Test
X The Deggans Test
X The Shukla Test
X The Latif Test
