THE MISADVENTURES OF A FILIPINA: AS A MAIL ORDER BRIDE SPITTING PINGPONG BALLS vs THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA: QUEEN OF THE DESERT

The Adventures of Priscilla: Queen of the Desert

My Criticism 

In my previous post, I mentioned about my abject confusion with the films Priscilla and To Wong Foo.  This should not be the case though, because Priscilla is definitely a superior film in terms of character presentation and storyline.  But then, I chose not to like this film, because there is a particular issue in the film that degrades the Filipino community.   The film was too harsh in presenting that Filipina mail to order Bride.   As if the Filipino image needs more assault from the Australian movie industry.

It is something that is so disturbing as being a gay film, it is supposed to veer away from stereotyping, racism and sexism.   

One of the characters in the film is Bob who became a friend of Bernadette (the main transvestite character).  Bob has a Filipino wife Cynthia, played by Julia Cortez, as the stereotypical mail-order bride.   Watching the film three times without reading reviews and feedbacks,  I took that issue objectively and yet I still came to the same thoughts and feeling that there is a malicious intent in presenting the Filipina mail order bride as an asshole character in order to show the drag queens or gay characters in a much better light.   The following review shares and expresses my views correctly: 

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“Priscilla has also been criticized for being overtly misogynistic and racist.  The film plays on many stereotypes for comedic effect.  Tick, Adam, and Bernadette are involved in three hilarious scenes which have also been characterized as being offensive, underneath all the jokes and laughter.  The film includes three extremely stereotypical characters (aside from the drag queens): the butch woman at the Palace Hotel bar, a Filipino stripper (Bob’s mail-order-bride), and a small group of Aboriginal people.  At the Palace Hotel, the queens are approached by an older butch woman, played by June Marie Bennet, wearing a mans undershirt who tells them coldly,  “We’ve got nothing here for people like you.”  Bernadette, very calmly retorts, “Listen here you mullet, why don’t you just light your tampon and blow your box a part because its the only bang you’re ever gonna get sweetheart” (The Adventures).  After a brief silence, the bar erupts in laughter.  By insulting this woman publicly, the queens have gained acceptance and are able to “bond homosocially with the male redneck population” (Robertson 34).

Bob’s Filipino wife Cynthia, played by Julia Cortez, is the stereotypical mail-order bride.  In a flashback, it is revealed that on Bob’s trip to the Philippines, she got him drunk, seduced him, and married him in order to get a free-ticket to Sydney.  In one of the films most bizarre scenes, Cynthia, who has an alcohol problem and seems a tad crazy, gets quite drunk and comes to the bar, where she interrupts the drag queens performance to do a striptease of her own.  Her show is much more popular with the locals, as she shoots ping pong balls out of her G-string.  “Cynthia, castrating, foreign, manipulative, and perversely sexualized, is thus characterized as a sort of madwoman”.

Usually I am not a politically-correct guy. As a matter of fact, I detest bandwagon mentality of political correctness. However, enough is enough, let portrays Asian in other lights than the typical molds of nerdy scientists with broken accents, dragon ladies, and mail-order brides with exotic sexual appetites.

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And so to correct myself for forgetting,  I am sooo not looking forward to see that film made into musical again.  I dread seeing that Filipina mail order bride spitting Pingpong balls.  And honestly, woe to the actress who would be playing that role!