Today while I was cleaning out some boxes from my old house I came across a box full of DVDs. As I was searching through them I came across one of the greatest comedies (in my opinion) of all time: Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgandy. I had not seen the movie in about a year, so I started to watch it. Much to my surprise this movie is full of not only sexist remarks, but also racial ones, too.
I was unable to watch the full movie, but I got a basic plot synopsis off of imdb.com. It reads “Ron Burgundy is the top-rated anchorman in San Diego in the '70s. When feminism marches into the newsroom in the form of ambitious newswoman Veronica Corningstone, Ron is willing to play along at first-as long as Veronica stays in her place, covering cat fashion shows, cooking, and other "female" interests.”
After reading that I then remembered the entire movie. This movie is all about how newsrooms were extremely male dominated back in the 1970s. In the first 10 minutes of the movie a female is not shown. The first female is shown while all of the men are in a meeting talking about news content. A modest, thirty something lady meekly walks into the room, hands the news director a note, and quietly walks out. Barely even being seen or noticed. The next female shown is Veronica Corningstone, who is played by the gorgeous Christina Applegate. Corningstone is treated basically like a piece of meat. All of the 4 main characters, who just so happen to be men, all hit on her. They rarely look at her face when speaking to her, and jump at any chance they can to “accidentally” touch her boobs.
Although, this movie was made in 2004, it lets us take a look inside the newsrooms in the 70s. It is weird to think that women were so degraded like that in the newsroom. Corningstone expresses throughout the entire movie that it is hard to be taken seriously. She is never assigned to any of the major news stories. Just like written above, her biggest story was about a cat fashion show. When Corningstone is declared as Burgandy’s new co-anchor, the men are furious. One of them even says that the term is “Anchorman” not “Anchorlady.”
Also, in the scene where 4 news teams get in a rumble, there is a bit of racism. 3 news teams enter, all being white, and all male. The 4th news team to enter has a special entrance. First Spanish music is played, the camera then pans over to a music maker that sounds like a rattlesnake tail. The men then come out and the lead anchor, who just happens to be Ben Stiller and is not of Latino descent, says in a Spanish accent, “¿Como estan bitches?” Now that is a stereotype if I have even heard of one.
I was unable to watch the full movie, but I got a basic plot synopsis off of imdb.com. It reads “Ron Burgundy is the top-rated anchorman in San Diego in the '70s. When feminism marches into the newsroom in the form of ambitious newswoman Veronica Corningstone, Ron is willing to play along at first-as long as Veronica stays in her place, covering cat fashion shows, cooking, and other "female" interests.”
After reading that I then remembered the entire movie. This movie is all about how newsrooms were extremely male dominated back in the 1970s. In the first 10 minutes of the movie a female is not shown. The first female is shown while all of the men are in a meeting talking about news content. A modest, thirty something lady meekly walks into the room, hands the news director a note, and quietly walks out. Barely even being seen or noticed. The next female shown is Veronica Corningstone, who is played by the gorgeous Christina Applegate. Corningstone is treated basically like a piece of meat. All of the 4 main characters, who just so happen to be men, all hit on her. They rarely look at her face when speaking to her, and jump at any chance they can to “accidentally” touch her boobs.
Although, this movie was made in 2004, it lets us take a look inside the newsrooms in the 70s. It is weird to think that women were so degraded like that in the newsroom. Corningstone expresses throughout the entire movie that it is hard to be taken seriously. She is never assigned to any of the major news stories. Just like written above, her biggest story was about a cat fashion show. When Corningstone is declared as Burgandy’s new co-anchor, the men are furious. One of them even says that the term is “Anchorman” not “Anchorlady.”
Also, in the scene where 4 news teams get in a rumble, there is a bit of racism. 3 news teams enter, all being white, and all male. The 4th news team to enter has a special entrance. First Spanish music is played, the camera then pans over to a music maker that sounds like a rattlesnake tail. The men then come out and the lead anchor, who just happens to be Ben Stiller and is not of Latino descent, says in a Spanish accent, “¿Como estan bitches?” Now that is a stereotype if I have even heard of one.
I know that Anchorman is not a good representation of how newsrooms are today. It is horrible to think that just a couple of decades ago women were treated like that in newsrooms.
2 comments:
I to was cleaning and came across Anchorman and my friends and I watched it this past weekend. I first noticed the gender issues you spoke of about a female in the newsroom but also in one of the first scenes at the party. There were women all around the pool and they were playing very sexual roles and they to me were portrayed as the stereotypical “groupie.” The women were at the party to just be with one of the Anchormen and this really proved true when one of the women approached Ron and when Ron ignored her and looked at Veronica she got offended.
Another gender issue I found was when Ron was late and Veronica went on the air by herself and when Ron showed up she was so proud to tell him what had happened. He was so upset and she said her dream was to become a network news anchor he laughed and thought she was joking. By him laughing made me really understand how hard it must have been for women in journalism in the earlier days.
Race is a stereotype found in Anchorman. I to remember the scene you spoke about, the ally rumble. Each news team had an entrance but when it came to the Spanish language theirs was different. There were drums and a maraca being shaken by a member of the Spanish language news team.
I really agree with what you have to say about Anchorman there are lots of stereotypes and gender and races issues packed into this movie. Another thing I just thought about was the diversity in ethnicity. I saw males and females then there was the Spanish language new team but I do not remember seeing African Americans, Asian Americans or Native Americans. Were they absent from the movie? I don’t know but I loved Anchorman since it first came out and it wasn’t until now that I have really taken a notice to the very obvious issues.
Okay, so I wrote on this blog, and then I erased everything. Man, I hate that. Is it just amazing that the movies that we should not like to watch are always the ones that are just so doggone funny. I think I will watch this tonight and relieve some of these politically incorrect images. Will Ferrell spoke about this often and indicates that the images were written to illicit these type of reactions. If you really want to hear or read about newsrooms in the seventies, Try reading about Jessica Savage. She was up and coming at NBC and then died in an accident. She discusses how hard it was, how she had to look a certain way, and the games that were played. My question to LS, is did we find out if it has changed that much since then. I don't recall anyone holding Mr. Hight or Ms. Barlow accountable and asking them for specifics or numbers. They gave great talk, but what about talking about realities. We were knocked of the topic, Shame on us for dropping the ball.
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