#871 The Men’s Club (1986)
The Men’s Club focuses on a group of middle aged men who gather together to give lengthy monologues — disguised as conversations — about their contempt for life and love. The movie lowers every male included as a bunch of drooling animals, dwelling in their pigpen of misogyny and self loathe. The only women we see in the movie are either wives or prostitutes, both represented as mother figures nurturing the needy babies that are the men.
The movie is theatrical, taking place in two acts and the actors sounding out their lines with premeditated speech patterns, which contributes to the weirdness of the movie. On top of obvious symbolism, there are also a lot of elements so vague it’s easy to perceive them just as self-sufficient, artsy touches.
The Men’s Club has since received almost unanimous hate from the reviewers and it sure makes a hard case to love, but then again that probably isn’t the point here. Personally I never care in the way the movie tries to make a bold social commentary and then leaves it all open ended and without obvious point, but it did offer some uneasy food for a thought. And in that sense I’d call it a success.
80s-o-meter: 54%
Total: 64%