David Edelstein is one of the better-known film critics in the country. He’s been a critic for decades and is currently the chief film critic for New York magazine, as well as the film critic for NPR’s Fresh Air and CBS’s Sunday Morning. Like everyone else in his position, he recently wrote a review of Wonder Woman. The review itself is competent and witty but not especially remarkable.
Edelstein made the grave mistake, however, of writing a review that was more concerned with the film’s mythical Amazon warrior than the all too real social justice warriors who make writing anything fun or provocative on the internet a de facto crime. Edelstein initially responded to the criticisms, somewhat understandably, with a defensive Facebook post that noted he did not think “describing the appearance of the leading actress would be off limits.” Alas, the Council of Wrongthink was not appeased, and so today we have a grand apologia from Edelstein that is both unneeded and an exercise in Maoist compliance:
Calling Wonder Woman star Gal Gadot a “babe,” in any context seems nothing less than playful and accurate. Is it offensive to state the obvious? Edelstein calls the movie a star turn for Gadot and praises her performance, but we can’t be so delusional as to think she wasn’t also cast because she’s hot? (I don’t see “Dame Judi Dench as Wonder Woman” opening to $220 million.)
Eventually Edelstein quotes a female colleague who apparently helped him see the error of his testosterone-impaired ways. And she rather unintentionally gives up the game here:
So in sum, Edelstein reviewed Wonder Woman as an escapist popcorn film rather than as a “feminist statement,” and didn’t overlook the film’s artistic flaws for the sake of it’s potential political merits. Forgive me for thinking that the true feminist statement here is treating Wonder Woman, directed by a very capable female director, as no different on the merits as any other film directed by a man.
But before Edelstein can end this struggle session, he has to knuckle under and answer the question we’ve all been asking about the Wonder Woman movie: WHAT ABOUT TRUMP? “Moreover, if Wonder Woman will empower women at this moment in history — in which reproductive rights are imperiled, and an admitted groper is working to undo decades of gains for women — then some of the criticisms of my review are just,” Edelstein writes. Indeed, the aforementioned Wonder Woman partisans are basically indistinguishable from that of the Democratic party, and we’re not even going to pretend that this is an unhealthy development for cinema as an art form or civil society writ large.
It’s not surprising that a New York film critic is so incredibly myopic that he regards championing abortion as a universal good for women, to say nothing of shaming men for a relatively benign indulgence of their own desires. (Remember, you can still be a feminist in good standing so long as you’re only patronizing and disrespectful to the opinions of conservative and religious women.) But I can’t believe Edelstein, a writer I have long enjoyed and respected, has been forced to surrender his dignity this way. It’s insulting to everyone involved.
