The 2012 Judd Apatow movie This Is 40 is a spiritual successor to 2007 film Knocked Up. And though the former isn’t even a decade old, there are things in the film that don’t hold up nearly as well as those involved would have hoped. The movie was the topic of conversation between several actresses over the weekend, with Apatow being called out for the way a character played by Megan Fox was treated in the film.
This Is 40 stars Apatow’s wife, Leslie Mann, and Paul Rudd as a married couple navigating a fairly comfortable life in Los Angeles. Mann, who owns a store with younger female workers. Fox plays a character named Desi, who is sexualized in a number of ways throughout the movie. There’s a lingering scene in the movie, for example, where Fox’s Desi is changing in the store and invites Leslie Mann’s character to touch her breasts while only wearing a bra.
There’s other awkwardness with Desi that’s meant to be played for laughs, too. Men (and women) ogle her, and a competitive co-worker says disparaging things about her and later accuses her of theft. But one person not laughing is Emily Ratajkowski. As Us Weekly detailed, Ratajkowski said “that movie is not aging well” when it came to Desi in particular:
“So that movie is hilarious and very spot-on,” Ratajkowski, 30, explained during a conversation with Schumer, 40, at the Tribeca Film Festival on Saturday, June 12. “I recommend everybody who has a husband or wife and kids to watch it [but] Megan Fox is treated in it so badly.”
Ratajkowski got support from Schumer on stage despite her work with Apatow on Trainwrecked.
“It’s Judd Apatow,” Schumer said. “I don’t care, I’m ready to burn that bridge to the ground tonight.”
Comedies tend to fare worse than other movies in the passage of time, but the way Fox was treated earlier in her career is far from a new topic of concern for herself and others in the industry. As US Weekly notes, Fox has spoken about the way she’d been portrayed in Hollywood, including with the marketing for the Diablo Cody horror comedy Jennifer’s Body. But Ratajkowski pointing it out at Tribeca is another example of how quickly something from even just a few years ago can make viewers cringe when considered in a different light.
[via Us Weekly]