The Full Monty

The Full Monty was/is a great film, I have not watched a movie in a long time that made me laugh so hard. It was both a comedy and a drama that kept my attention throughout the entire two hours. It was about 6 men who were unemployed because as former steel workers the industry was not doing so well, so they were unable to seek employment. The men tried to keep their pride by not taking jobs such as cashiers and security guards and instead decided to form a striptease act. Many of the women enjoyed going to watch young men strip so when Gaz had the idea not everyone was willing to join, there were a few old man, a chubby man (Dave), and two homosexual men that formed the group. Throughout the movie the men practiced over and over to the same song and tried to get all of the steps in sync but were unsuccessful until their last show when Gaz finally got in with the beat. The movie’s use of music was excellent, the music was upbeat the entire movie and I often caught myself tapping my foot with the beat of the music. I thought it was especially funny when the men decided to give up before the big show and go back to the unemployment office but had a change of mind when their song came on and all of them started to dance. I laughed so hard! The music also led us into and out of scenes by the beat and loudness of each note. In many older films I think that the music is overdone but I enjoyed the music in this movie, it flowed with the scenes very well.
The film was in color and the costumes for the performance were red which lead me to believe it would be a great performance. Through most of the film the colors were harsh and not very uplifting but during happy scenes the colors were brighter and much softer.
During scenes that were supposed to be happy there were shades of yellow in the background and the cover of the movie is actually yellow too which gives off the “come watch me” vibe.
In the article about the Full Monty the author voiced her opinion on the men’s self-esteem and also about the women’s place in society at that time. She commented on one part of the movie in which the men snuck into the club to find Dave’s wife and three woman entered the men’s bathroom. One of the woman decided it would be funny to use the men’s urinal and the ladies shared quite a laugh. I thought it was funny but Gaz and Dave said that they felt men were useless and felt women were taking over their positions. Dave struggled with feeling inferior to his wife throughout most of the film but the problem resolved in the end.
I think that this movie told many different things to the audience. The first lesson that jumped out at me was that every one is beautiful in his/her own way and that not every one has to look like a model to feel sexy. I think that this was Dave’s biggest challenge because as he said many times “I’m just a fat bastard, no one will want to look at me”. It took until the last few scenes for Dave’s wife to convince him that she thought he was sexy and that she was actually proud of him. I liked that the two were able to have a happy ending! Also I think an important lesson was about self-esteem. The six men’s self-esteem was severely diminished because they felt ashamed and worthless because they were unable to find “decent” work. Gaz was trying to prove to his ex-wife that he was suitable to take care of his son and that he could provide a good home and I think that his son helped him to achieve this. In the final scene Gaz did not want to go out and perform but his son encourages him and he found the self-esteem to perform the full monty!
The movie was great!