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The Stepford Wives (1975)

 
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Sun Apr 12, 2015 5:36 pm    Post subject: The Stepford Wives (1975) Reply with quote



Katherine Ross stars in this chilling tale about a wife and mother who reluctantly moves to a snobbish subdivision and stumbles upon a conspiracy by a group of husbands in the area.

An automation genius (Patrick O'Neal) is supplying the men with robot duplicates of their wives; the women are being murdered and replaced by the totally obedient robots.

Paula Prentiss is a delight as Ms. Ross' witty friend. Director Bryan Forbes does a good job of conveying the strange atmosphere intended by William Goldman's screenplay. Makeup man Dick Smith supplied the enlarged body parts displayed by Katherine Ross' robot double.

Also starring Nanette Newman and Tina Louise ("Gilligan's Island") as ersatz housewives. The film inspired two sequels: "Revenge of the Stepford Wives (1980 made-for-TV), and "The Stepford Children" (1987 made-for-TV), and a comedy remake by director Frank Oz in 2004.

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Tue Sep 20, 2022 11:20 am; edited 3 times in total
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 02, 2016 12:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

__________________________________

Not the greatest movie I've ever seen, but strangely memorable. Enjoy the trailer.


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_ THE STEPFORD WIVES (Theatrical Trailer/1975)


_________

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 04, 2020 3:21 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Thinking Outside the "Plot"!
________________________________

~ A Question for the Members: If the android wives managed to increase their intelligence and change their programing so they could think independently, could they change the pecking order and somehow make the men better husbands?

~ My Theory: First of all, The Revenge of the Stepford Wives and The Stepford Husbands have completely different concepts for what I've suggested. Both made-for-TV movies involved the use of mind-altering drugs to control the members of the opposite sex.

Frankly, I'm amazed by that! Rolling Eyes

I mean, seriously . . . Hollywood never saw the beauty in a story about tragically oppressed AI android women who figured out how to turn their slave-master husbands into caring, loving soul-mates? Shocked

Well, okay, admittedly they sort-of did do this in the remake of The Stepford Wives (2004), which has the husbands placing microchips into their wives' brains. But the leader of the community, retired brain surgeon Glen Close, reveals that she murdered her cheating husband (Christopher Walken) and replaced him with a cyborg!

Miss Close's long-range plan was to turn everybody in Stepford, Connecticut, into happy cyborgs and make it an idyllic community of blissfully happy married couples!

Obviously that's NOT what I'm suggesting. Rolling Eyes

I want an imaginative, uplifting tail in which a group of hi-tech robotic women convert their sexist, selfish husbands into intelligent, sensitive, and passionate men! Together these strange miss-matched couples succeed in doing what real men and women often don't accomplish!

And before somebody rains on the parade of my clever concept by saying "Bud, that could never happen!" — just STUFF it guys! This is science fiction, where anything the author wants to be true . . . IS true! Shocked

Ask your wives what they think of my idea. I'll bet they love it! Cool

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)


Last edited by Bud Brewster on Tue Nov 08, 2022 12:36 pm; edited 3 times in total
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Tue Aug 04, 2020 4:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

That wouldn't be SCIENCE FICTION, it would be sheer FANTASY!
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Last edited by Gord Green on Thu Aug 06, 2020 12:13 am; edited 1 time in total
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 06, 2020 12:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Bud, unfamiliar with "sotto voce"?

"sotto voce" is basically a whisper...a low voiced aside. Expressed using a lower size font it signifies quiet comment, an aside or a whisper to a close friend.

In this case it was to aknowledge what I thought was an ingenious double intendre play on words by you in the context of the Stepford Wives, but if it was JUST an accidental typo..... Well....Never mind. I quess I was mistaken, it was far from genius...just an accident of posting.

As the master of spelling errors I'm hardly one to comment. I've never claimed great accuman in posting technique.

I suppose I'll have to retire to contemplate my "formatting".

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There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 06, 2020 8:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

Damn, I actually managed to be ignorant, rude, and stupid — all in one post! I think that's a record for me. Embarassed

I deleted my dumb remarks. Please accept my apology. I don't know what I was thinking. Sad


Gord Green wrote:
As the master of spelling errors I'm hardly one to comment. I've never claimed great accuman in posting technique.

Hey, wait a minute! You'll never replace me as The Typo King of All Sci-Fi! Shocked

PS: By the way, the word acumen only has one C and one A . . . but I had to look it up, because I didn't know what THAT word meant either. Rolling Eyes

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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Gord Green
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 06, 2020 3:40 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I must apologize too. I tend toward sarcasm that becomes much more nasty than I intend it to be.

Friends again?

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There comes a time, thief, when gold loses its lustre, and the gems cease to sparkle, and the throne room becomes a prison; and all that is left is a father's love for his child.
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Bud Brewster
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PostPosted: Thu Aug 06, 2020 4:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Gord Green wrote:
Friends again?

Again? When did we stop? Cool

Phamtom is trying to find a good Western for our upcoming Saturday chat. He's looking for suggestions that are available on YouTube so we'll have a common source!

Send him PMs of titles you find there that we might like. I'm sure you two will select a winner! Very Happy

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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Krel
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PostPosted: Fri Dec 18, 2020 12:02 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

There will be a spoiler in this.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

There was a TV movie sequel, which I don't remember much of, and have no desire to track down. But in the TV movie, the women are drugged, not replaced by robots. And it of course has a happy ending for the heroine.

David.
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Bud Brewster
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Location: North Carolina

PostPosted: Sat Jan 20, 2024 1:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

________________________________

IMDB has several interesting trivia items for this production. Very Happy
________________________________

~ Author Ira Levin was originally going to write this as a stage play, until he realized there were too many characters and opted to turn it into a novel instead, which the film was based on.

Note from me: I'd love to read that novel! Very Happy

~ After the movie was released, there was a feminist demonstration against it, decrying it as being sexist. One of the protesters hit director Bryan Forbes over the head with her umbrella. Katharine Ross commented on the incident in the documentary The Stepford Life (2001) about the making of the movie, stating that this was a powerful testimony to how the movie affected the protesters.

Note from me: Boy, did those ladies miss the point! Sexism is defined as "prejudice, stereotyping, or discrimination against females".

In this film, the husbands are depicted as sick, egotistical fools, and the wives are all admirable, victimized women! This movies has a powerful anti-sexism message!

~ Neither film version of The Stepford Wives was very successful at the box office, although the 1975 version was well-reviewed and continues to develop a cult following. The 2004 version was pummeled by the critics and roundly despised by everyone, even some of the people who made it.

Note from me: Yes indeed, comparing the 1975 and the 2004 version is a case of apples-and-oranges. The remake is a spoof of the original, and it actually succeeds in being amusing while indulging in bad taste [i]and[/u] by making light of an important social issue.

Women's rights.

~ Jordan Peele's social thriller, Get Out (2017), which has become one of the most successful debut movies by a director, was directly influenced by The Stepford Wives. Peele has openly acknowledged as much in interviews, citing The Stepford Wives and Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968) (both based on books by Ira Levin) as two of his favorite movies.

Note from me: Well, well . . . that guy really DID get it! Very Happy

~ The original draft of the screenplay called for the women to wear miniskirts. Supposedly, once director Bryan Forbes cast his wife, Nanette Newman, as one of the wives, this changed. Ms. Newman did not have the figure for such revealing clothing, and the women were dressed instead in feminine but modest wardrobe. The remake, The Stepford Wives (2004), attempted to correct this design problem.

Note from me: I'm a bit puzzled. The ladies in the 2004 versions where presented in modest and elegant dresses with hemlines well below the knees.

So . . . what is the guy who wrote the comment above talking about! Shocked


____________ The Stepford Wives Movie Trailer


__________



~ Joanna Cassidy was cast in the role of Bobbie by producer Edgar J. Scherick, and actually shot a few scenes, but was abruptly fired and replaced by Paula Prentiss, who had recently given birth to her first child.

Note from me: I'm a big fan of Paula Prentiss, and she was perfect for the role she played in this movie.

~ Casting directors used actresses Mary Tyler Moore and Valerie Harper (aka Mary Richards and Rhoda Morganstern) as prototypes for the Joanna and Bobbie characters.

Note from me: That's an interesting idea, but I'm glad they went with Katharine Ross and Paula Prentiss,

~ In the novel, Second Wave feminist and "Feminine Mystique" author Betty Friedan comes to Stepford and makes an appearance at a Women's Club meeting. This is ironic since the real Friedan did see "The Stepford Wives", but she didn't like it, saying it was anti-woman and anti-human.

Note from me: Maybe the novel was "anti-woman and anti-human", but the movie championed the idea that men who just wanted hi-tech sex dolls were the ones who should be reviled! Very Happy

~ Roger Ebert gave it a bad if lukewarm review, saying the director took it too seriously and that there could have been some Woody Allen style ironical humor thrown in to fit within the parody of how men view women.

Note from me: Mr. Ebert did NOT get this movie. Men who kill their wives and replace them with robotic sex machines are NOT funny! Sad

The redeeming value of the 2004 remake is that the victimized wives succeeded in discovering the terrible plot, and they conspire with one noble husband (Matthew Broderick) to defeat the husbands and reverse the brain-programing used on the poor ladies!

In other words, the woman are triumphant and send the bastards to jail — a much better fate than having the ladies murdered and replaced by robotic Barbie Dolls! Shocked

~ In the 2004 remake, the wives' brains have a controlling computer chip inserted, and are then placed in robotic bodies. Although they're not actually killed, as in the original, they're not really themselves again when the chips short out. They're still inside robot bodies. This was the problem many people had with that version -- the fact that the internal logic didn't add up.

Note from me: I could be wrong, but I think this is bullshit. The "internal logic didn't add up" because the author of the above comment is wrong.

The 2004 remake only presents one "robot body" — the husband of Glenn Close, Christopher Walken — whom she replaced with a robot after she discovered that her beloved husband had cheated on her!

The problem with this movie (in addition to several silly comic elements) is that it presents such a complex plot that the audience becomes confused.

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Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
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