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WHEN A PENIS IS TOO BIG TO SEE - Neva Chonin, SF Chron, July 11, 2004
"Gigantic, gigantic, gigantic. A big, big love." - The Pixies, "Gigantic".
Let's talk about equal representation. Scratch that. Let's talk about penises (penes?, penii?).
Heck, let's talk about both. Here's why: According to a recent item in the British newspaper the Sun, nude scenes spotlighting actor Colin Farrell's full-frontal manhood have been cut from his new film, "A Home at the End of the World." Sounds painful, eh? The paper quoted an undisclosed publicist -- sorry, an undisclosed source -- as claiming the dimensions of the offending member disrupted a test screening. "The women were overexcited," said the source, "and the men looked really uncomfortable."
Feh. Cry me a river. Women have been feeling uncomfortable for decades while men whooped and gawked at onscreen female nudity. Now that the sock is on the other foot, it seems the patriarchy is feeling inadequate. Methinks the patriarchy needs to take a tranquilizer. Bring on the penises! Let the women get "overexcited." My God, they've earned it.
Great gossip or public-relations concoction, the kerfuffle over Farrell's cinematic bris points to a real problem in our domestic movie industry. Conventional wisdom and Hollywood sexism decree that women can -- in fact, must -- take it all off while men can't. Methinks most men wouldn't want to. A guy who bares his jewels would have to be willing to face the sort of physical critique usually reserved for girls. He'd have to allow himself to become the sexual object rather than the sexual instigator; he'd have to be willing to feel vulnerable in his own man's world. Oh, and if he doesn't measure up? Well. Masculinity, fare ye well.
As for men in the dark theater gazing up at this fragile icon of virility, consider their terror alert upped to orange. Let us quote the wisdom of one LiveJournal.com wit, writing about the Farrell ruckus: "Some people have an 'Oh my God, it's coming right at me!' reaction when they see a penis on big screen. It's, like, chillax dudes. Nobody is asking you to (expletive) it."
Word. What we have here is a domestic double standard, because naked male bodies have long been acceptable in European films. A Feb. 11 Associated Press article on Bernardo Bertolucci's skin-baring "The Dreamers" noted that in the United States scenes with nude men "usually can be timed with a stopwatch while those with nude women can be measured with a sundial."
The list of mainstream movies showing actors in all their swinging glory is brief. Harvey Keitel famously showed all in "The Piano" and "Bad Lieutenant. " Ewan McGregor is always ready to drop his trousers, but he usually does it in British or indie films like "Trainspotting," "Velvet Goldmine," "The Pillow Book" and "Young Adam." Other miscreants include Kevin Bacon in "Wild Things" and Geoffrey Rush in "Quills" (an art house film; does that count?). So many penes, so little time. Alas. We can only mourn Hollywood's inadequacy in this department.
Not to worry about Farrell's lost member, though. Word has it that the DVD for "Home at the End of the World" will retrieve the excised penis scenes, Bobbitt-style, from the editing-room floor and reinsert them. Nor let us weep for Farrell himself. What actor doesn't want everyone to think he's too big for the big screen? Males stars pray for controversies like this -- though at least one gossip maven has already suggested that the well-endowed actor's assets might have been digitally -- or otherwise -- enhanced. Perhaps we should nickname Farrell "Fluffy."
Phobia of the week: Ithyphallophobia -- fear of seeing, thinking about or having an erect penis.
A big bird of a different feather: boingboing.net brings news of a new album by Hatebeak, the world's only death-metal band with a vocalist who's ... a parrot. A parrot named Waldo, to be precise.
According to the band's Web site, "Hatebeak pecks your eyes out and assaults your ears in a flurry of pummeling riffs and gray feathers that leaves you lying in a pool of blood begging for more." Rock! Some sample song titles: "Beak of Putrefaction" and "God of Empty Nest." Go listen at www.reptilianrecords.com/reptilian/sounds_content.html. Dude, if you can't have Colin Farrell, you know you gotta have this.
"Gigantic, gigantic, gigantic. A big, big love." - The Pixies, "Gigantic".
Let's talk about equal representation. Scratch that. Let's talk about penises (penes?, penii?).
Heck, let's talk about both. Here's why: According to a recent item in the British newspaper the Sun, nude scenes spotlighting actor Colin Farrell's full-frontal manhood have been cut from his new film, "A Home at the End of the World." Sounds painful, eh? The paper quoted an undisclosed publicist -- sorry, an undisclosed source -- as claiming the dimensions of the offending member disrupted a test screening. "The women were overexcited," said the source, "and the men looked really uncomfortable."
Feh. Cry me a river. Women have been feeling uncomfortable for decades while men whooped and gawked at onscreen female nudity. Now that the sock is on the other foot, it seems the patriarchy is feeling inadequate. Methinks the patriarchy needs to take a tranquilizer. Bring on the penises! Let the women get "overexcited." My God, they've earned it.
Great gossip or public-relations concoction, the kerfuffle over Farrell's cinematic bris points to a real problem in our domestic movie industry. Conventional wisdom and Hollywood sexism decree that women can -- in fact, must -- take it all off while men can't. Methinks most men wouldn't want to. A guy who bares his jewels would have to be willing to face the sort of physical critique usually reserved for girls. He'd have to allow himself to become the sexual object rather than the sexual instigator; he'd have to be willing to feel vulnerable in his own man's world. Oh, and if he doesn't measure up? Well. Masculinity, fare ye well.
As for men in the dark theater gazing up at this fragile icon of virility, consider their terror alert upped to orange. Let us quote the wisdom of one LiveJournal.com wit, writing about the Farrell ruckus: "Some people have an 'Oh my God, it's coming right at me!' reaction when they see a penis on big screen. It's, like, chillax dudes. Nobody is asking you to (expletive) it."
Word. What we have here is a domestic double standard, because naked male bodies have long been acceptable in European films. A Feb. 11 Associated Press article on Bernardo Bertolucci's skin-baring "The Dreamers" noted that in the United States scenes with nude men "usually can be timed with a stopwatch while those with nude women can be measured with a sundial."
The list of mainstream movies showing actors in all their swinging glory is brief. Harvey Keitel famously showed all in "The Piano" and "Bad Lieutenant. " Ewan McGregor is always ready to drop his trousers, but he usually does it in British or indie films like "Trainspotting," "Velvet Goldmine," "The Pillow Book" and "Young Adam." Other miscreants include Kevin Bacon in "Wild Things" and Geoffrey Rush in "Quills" (an art house film; does that count?). So many penes, so little time. Alas. We can only mourn Hollywood's inadequacy in this department.
Not to worry about Farrell's lost member, though. Word has it that the DVD for "Home at the End of the World" will retrieve the excised penis scenes, Bobbitt-style, from the editing-room floor and reinsert them. Nor let us weep for Farrell himself. What actor doesn't want everyone to think he's too big for the big screen? Males stars pray for controversies like this -- though at least one gossip maven has already suggested that the well-endowed actor's assets might have been digitally -- or otherwise -- enhanced. Perhaps we should nickname Farrell "Fluffy."
Phobia of the week: Ithyphallophobia -- fear of seeing, thinking about or having an erect penis.
A big bird of a different feather: boingboing.net brings news of a new album by Hatebeak, the world's only death-metal band with a vocalist who's ... a parrot. A parrot named Waldo, to be precise.
According to the band's Web site, "Hatebeak pecks your eyes out and assaults your ears in a flurry of pummeling riffs and gray feathers that leaves you lying in a pool of blood begging for more." Rock! Some sample song titles: "Beak of Putrefaction" and "God of Empty Nest." Go listen at www.reptilianrecords.com/reptilian/sounds_content.html. Dude, if you can't have Colin Farrell, you know you gotta have this.
