After finishing the movie and doing some thinking, I really wanted to make a post about the characters and why I can associate with the protagonist so much.
I can’t say this is a perfect depiction, or that these are the only types of people, but I’ve identified two personalities that come up in the film. The first is Annie, the main character. Throughout the film she’s plagued by Helen, the Bride’s apparently “new best friend” who basically does her best to cut in on Annie’s longtime friendship with the Bride and outdo Annie in every way.
Annie is clearly not much of a people person, nor a wedding organizer, and Helen basically takes over the job behind her back. While the audience is intended to relate with Annie’s response, I found it particularly relevant.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0gHAvB1X9k
In an earlier scene Annie told the other bridesmaids she was planning a French bridal shower because she knows the Bride has always wanted to visit Paris. When Helen takes over and throws a ridiculously posh French shower, and tops it off with an actual trip to Paris, Annie…well, goes crazy.
This is the point where the two personalities diverge. Annie came up with the shower idea, it was her sort of acknowledgement of the Bride’s longtime dream. Instead, Helen gets all of the credit, completely showing up Annie. As the Bride herself points out – why can’t Annie just be like a normal person and be happy she’s going to Paris?
“Normal people” as Lilian puts it, would just be happy for her, then go home and talk behind her back. In fact, in a lot of ways the whole bridal shower and the trip to Paris is a blessing. She didn’t have to stress about organizing the shower, and someone filthy rich is paying for all of it. In another scene at the end of the film, Helen invites Annie and Lilian’s favourite childhood band to sing at the wedding. Though resentful, Annie comes to realize the flip side of things – someone else payed for her favourite band to play at her best friend’s wedding.
My question is, why doesn’t Annie just see this flip side from the start? I know some people who’d have hoped for just such a shower and wedding, and would have been trying to get Helen to take over and manage all of it (ans would have been happy for the Bride, too). Mostly, I’m curious because though I can see both sides, my gut reaction is just like Annie’s. Are you fucking kidding me?! Even after the fact, I typically don’t consider the “good side” of such events.
Particularly, there’s a line in the scene above where Lilian says, ” This is supposed to be about my time. You’ve managed to ruin every event of my wedding, thank you very much.” Helen’s response is so characteristic: “It’s all her fault, not mine!” Not only has she failed to acknowledge Lilian’s happiness at her own wedding, she maintains an overblown sense of what is right and wrong, and assigns the blame of her own actions to others. This is her fault – me trashing this shower, yeah.
Why can I relate to that? Another of my roommate’s said she didn’t like the movie, simply because Annie is the main character. I can totally understand, Annie is a self-centered douche. So why is she still the way she is? Here’s another scene of the film.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XoHbmCJJcSo
Apologies for the broken quality. Anywho, this is another interesting scene. Megan, who up until now has been an eccentric “outsider” character in the group of bridesmaids, comes to comfort Annie, whom she barely knows. Another characteristic scene. Not something I’d like to relate to either, because it really is a pity party. And yet? Megan is completely right.
I guess I’m just amazed because I can almost never relate to a character, and then a movie like Bridesmaids comes along and the main character sees things in exactly the same way as me. And the movie kind of points out why that’s stupid, which it is. Take home lesson perhaps? You don’t always have to be right and you don’t always have to take credit and you should definitely think about other people more and yourself less. Otherwise you’ll end up stuck on a couch feeling sorry for yourself.
BUT HOW. Maybe it’s how I was brought up, or maybe I just developed weird priorities on my own. Why does right and wrong matter so much, and why is thinking about others so secondary to my gut reaction? I dunno.
Escape! Escape! 