Thank you, Amy Schumer, I don't just feel pretty I feel fantastic!
Updated: Nov 19, 2018
This won't be a review of the film but just a praise of how great I felt after watching it. A gal who feels insecure about her body? Does not feel pretty enough? You don't say! Visually the montage of beauty mags and beauty products inundating Renee Barrett's apartment gave me a sense of Renee's desperation to feel pretty, but knowing deep down inside she could never measure up to the unrealistic beauty standards society bombards us with on a daily basis. As a woman, I can relate to Renee Barrett. Confident? Not really. Why even bother as women in western societies we will never measure up to the cookie-cut out, plastic surgery disaster, Kardashian Frankenstein's our media darlings and collective selves have created. Since the dawn of the industrial revolution and advertising, women are force fed to buy into the dream! That dream of youth, beauty, and a very flat stomach only about 5% of the population will ever be able to have without some type of plastic surgery is not just unattainable but downright unrealistic.
Our protagonist Renee gets so caught up in her make-believe confidence that when she comes down to earth and finally realizes she was never "hot" to begin with she does what all smart, brave, and courageous women do, she challenges the system! I Feel Pretty (2018) written and directed by Marc Silverstein and Abby Kohn asks the fundamental question we all have to once and for all ask ourselves. How is it we all start at a level playing field as children full of optimism and energy engaged in curiosity and our imaginations only to become insecure self-loathing, unable to say thank you after a compliment kind of ladies? Little girls can be anything or anyone they want to be- the sky is the limit and then after about 5 to 10 years old it just starts to go downhill from there. Boys and girls become separated, media ideologies become seeped into our subconsciousness and from there we just start to believe things we would have never for one second cared about when we were free to just play and imagine all the possibilities that existed for us.
The truth is we all have insecurities, and I Feel Pretty shows that in all of their characters. Confidence is something you gain once you can shed the preconceived notions that you are never good enough. It's when you stop caring what other people think and live your life in the most authentic way you know how that is when you really start to live baby! Privilege from mainstream beauty does exist and people who have had doors open for them from white privilege, wealth or a number of circumstances the rest of us will never know is always going to exist. But they are fewer and far between than the majority of us. This film made me rethink my fears of what holds me back and to remember when you feel good about yourself the rest will follow. It is time for the marginalized many to start walking with our heads up and feel pretty confident in our uniqueness. I dare you to take a compliment and just say thank you instead of back peddling into an insult for yourself. Take a risk and apply for that job you think you would never get, and never ever forget your worth. Thank you, Amy Schumer! You make me laugh and think deeply about what it really means to be pretty and for that, I will be eternally grateful.