Genre: Comedy | Crime
Starring: Jason Bateman, Charlie Day, Jason Sudeikis
From using the score sheet, Horrible Bosses scored a D with a total
of three points. I did not choose this movie expecting it to score too high on
the representation test. I chose it simply because I enjoy it and was curious
as to see what it would end up being. For this reasoning, its poor score of a D
was not a huge surprise to me. It does however make you think about how little
diversity was put into play within this film. I definitely think it lacks a
vast amount of diversity and does not fairly display minorities.
There is a scene toward the
beginning of the film in which one of the guys’ old friends from high school is
not doing well in the work force. In order to make money, he is offering to
perform homosexual duties to men in exchange for cash. He claims he is not gay,
but is definitely performing gay acts. I was not sure whether or not to check
the box for having a homosexual speaker or not, because he claims he’s not gay.
It does feature women or should I
say woman in a diverse body type. Meaning that it features a woman speaker who
is not the stereotypical perfect body, beautiful woman. This lady is played as
Margie who works for Nick in Pellit’s company. Not only is she not the ideal
model of a woman, but she is also not the “stay at home” housewife. She has a
job (not a great one) and makes her own money. She is only seen in the movie a
couple of times and the main moment is in the beginning right after Mr. Pellit
passes away and his son takes over. She is considered being fired because of
her size, but Nick defends her in saying that she is pregnant. I guess you
could look at this in a stereotypical way, but I don’t believe it is meant to
be taken in that context. Another reasoning for the box checked about women in
different roles would be the role Jennifer Aniston plays. She is a boss in this
film of Dale (one of the four stars) that contains incredible sexual desires
toward Dale. I find this interesting as I feel this is usually the other way
around. I feel as if it is usually the man who is the boss and who is using his
attractive secretary in sexual ways. Therefore, this is definitely a new
representation of women.
I checked the box for “does the
film avoid glorifying violent men?” I checked this because of the reason that
the plot of the movie is about group of four funny, good, honest men attempting
to kill their bosses which are seen to be evil, selfish, greedy people. The way
I see it, the movie looks to push the viewer away from these evil bosses and
put the viewer on the side of the four stars of the show (the protagonists).
All of these bosses represent the stereotypical male boss who wants more money
than he can handle and more power than is ever necessary.
The film definitely includes men in
non-stereotypical roles. This is shown by Dale, who is a dental hygienist and
not an actual doctor. It’s interesting because the actual doctor is a woman. He
also states that he grew up wanting to be a husband and nothing more. That is
the stereotypical response for a woman a couple of decades ago. It is
interesting to see this male position take place in this show and I feel it was
definitely included more for a comedic addition rather than something to be
taken seriously. This is mostly due to the fact that the entire show is a
comedy.
The second disability box is close
to being checked. In the beginning of the show at Pellit Company, Nick is
forced to fire Hank, a crippled employee of the firm. Because he was fired
simply because of the fact that he was disabled removes the opportunity to check
this box as his disability is limiting him from work.
What this movie lacks in diversity
it makes up for in comedy. It is one of the funniest shows of the past decade
and I can watch it over and over without getting exhausted of it. However, the
lacking of diversity could show to be an issue and is something I think they
should have considered further. None of the main characters are of any minority
and they do not do a great job of including them throughout the film. The poor
scoring of this film is once again not surprising. I would say that the scoring
system seems to be fair. It is however, a bit strict and is very specific on
boxes that could potentially be checked.
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