By The Butcher
You love ’em, he hates ’em! The Butcher carves up your favourite films, and this week, he applies his sharpened cleaver to much-loved era-defining 1997 British comedy-drama The Full Monty.
The computer, the industrial revolution, The Beatles and, of course, the bouncing bomb. A great many wondrous things have come from the small island of Great Britain, of that there is little doubt…so why they can’t scrape together a decent big screen comedy is quite beyond me. If you think Aussie comedies are middle of the road, just consider this list – Four Weddings And A Funeral, Notting Hill, Love Actually, The Boat That Rocked. And with that, we’ve only covered the career of writer/director Richard Curtis.
It isn’t a Richard Curtis “comedy”, however, that The Butcher wants to slam this week. It’s a film equally, if not more so, annoying. The Full Monty is one of the highest-grossing UK films in history. It amassed a total of US$250 million, and was nominated for four Oscars in 1998. It starred popular actors, such as Robert Carlyle and Tom Wilkinson, and it was penned by Simon Beaufoy, the screenwriter responsible for the god-awful Slumdog Millionaire. Ladies and gentlemen, The Full Monty is shit. I hate it. And yes, I use the word “hate”. HATE it!
In a nutshell, the story is based around a bunch of ugly, unemployed steel workers trying to make a living by stripping for the rough, scruffy women of Sheffield, England. Just as Aussies like to portray themselves as either small-town simpletons or wide-eyed bush hunters, the British like to portray themselves as either bumbling, upper class toffs, or out-of-shape, coarse, loudmouths. Whilst these stereotypes undoubtedly have some basis in truth, why can’t filmmakers find a way to make entertaining movies without being so bloody obvious?
To list everything that stinks with this pitiful misuse of celluloid (poor acting, basic cinematography, etc) would demand more space than this website can offer, but perhaps more ominous than its smaller faults are the film’s lack of any big-picture positives. The Full Monty has a weak story with holes that you could park a bus in; a damning lack of moral or social enquiry; and an awful, stone-obvious soundtrack. There is just nothing of merit in this film…literally nothing.
Britain can send us its clever TV comedies (The Office, Peep Show etc) and its sunstroke-happy tourists by the boat load, but that’s where our cultural exchange should end. Oh, and we’ll take the Ashes too, thank you very much.
Want to read more from The Butcher? Check out his angry missives against There Will Be Blood, Les Miserables, The King’s Speech, Picnic At Hanging Rock, The Magnificent Seven, Gone With The Wind, The Right Stuff, 81/2, Pulp Fiction, Easy Rider, The Shawshank Redemption, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Wizard Of Oz, Jaws, Black Swan, Gladiator, Chopper, I’m Not There, Interstellar, Marvel Studios and Citizen Kane.
