"Men" Proves Men Aren't Ready to Tackle #MeToo

A24 rehashes familiar territory to socially damaging results.

June 2, 2022

In October 2017, The New York Times published a report alleging that dozens of women had accused entertainment titan Harvey Weinstein of sexual assault. Eventually, over 80 women accused him of sexual misconduct, many of whom suffered professionally and personally. Ashley Judd's career derailed after rejecting Weinstein’s advances; Mira Sorvino, propositioned at the Toronto International Film Festival in 1995, felt “iced out” after she also turned him down. The stories, one more brutal than the next, rocked the movie industry and sent shockwaves throughout the world. At long last, the gross sexual misconduct of powerful men got publicized for the world to see, the seeming first step in undermining generations of exploitative patriarchal power. The truth had rung too true for too long: men can do whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want.

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For women like Harper Marlowe, the leading character of Alex Garland’s new horror film, Men, this reality rings just as loudly on the homefront. Her husband, James, is emotionally unstable and threatens her with suicide when she reveals she wants a divorce. He goads her with the idea that his blood will be on her hands; when she uses this as proof they need to separate instead of buckling under its weight, James is furious. Later on, a flashback concludes the story behind the opening image of Harper looking out the window, face bloodied, as James falls to his death.

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After catching Harper on her phone, James rips it from her hands and reads her texts. She had confided to a friend that his outburst was frightening her, a confession he does not take kindly. He responds with indignance, and when Harper refuses to bend, he punches her in the face.

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The film sides with Harper, as it should. If nothing else, it gets that correct. The facts of her story do not lend any credence to James or his perspective; even if they did on some microscopic level, none of that would justify abuse. Unfortunately, Men does not see itself as a sole contributor to support but as a broad stroke of feminist ideology meant for deeper absorption.

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In this light, it would appear as a show of good faith to women whose experiences with the patriarchy have been so oppressive that even mentioning them could get them blacklisted from their industry or ostracized socially. Questions would arise regarding their credibility and intentions, all to protect the image we held of the men they accused. The attempt to correct course has, as usual, resulted in overcorrection.

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It is the danger of the “Believe Women” movement: that the sliding scale of offenses does not exist, that to employ it diminishes the victimization of a woman ravaged by a lesser offense, and all perpetrators must fall under the umbrella of the #MeToo movement; any who says otherwise is a servant of the oppressive patriarchy, which attaches a litany of stereotypes. The perception is that men are trying to undermine the severity of their actions, which is fair, but courts of law have this sliding scale for a reason, and we have good ones for employing it ourselves.

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It is the same issue with using “pedophile” to describe all child sex abusers. Predators with predilections for pre-pubescents, pre-adolescents, and teenagers get termed differently, with good reason: educating children on the realities of predation require us to approach them based on who they are at that time. One would not groom a 6-year-old as an 11-year-old or a 15-year-old. Even adults can get groomed. If we shy away from the specifics of each case, we cannot help potential or actual victims. The same applies to abuse victims. We cannot simply cry out “patriarchy” and expect the notion to be similarly applicable in every situation, as though all women will see the signs and have clarity. Men fails partly by focusing on generality in specific circumstances.

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Reality is nuanced, though corporations and conglomerates pretend otherwise to divide the populace. There is a valuable distinction between “believing” someone and not dismissing them. We should never disregard a woman claiming she has gotten victimized. We should never deflect blame for her suffering back onto her or undermine her credibility by questioning her handling of abuse. We should never trick a woman into a corner where the only way out is to fall into patriarchal traps; should she respond to resistance too emotionally, she is "crazy."

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However, outright belief is another matter that violates the legitimacy of the judicial system, not to mention ethical correctness. False claims comprise only 5.2% of all sexual assault reports; many use this number as ammunition against perceived naysayers, but we cannot ignore false claims simply because they are inconvenient. Doing so does more harm than good. If we took everything at face value and reacted, there would be no need to go beneath the surface; who knows how much iniquity would go uncovered then?

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It is a thought pondered while watching Men, a half-hearted attempt at chastising the patriarchy for doing something we have spoken about regularly since the Weinstein sexual assault allegations surfaced five years ago. We need to strike down systems that have long denied justice to its victims. We also need to remember that punishing the perpetrators is only one step; seeing it as the entire journey renders us unable to contextualize our actions moving forward. Does punishing one bully make all others stop? Does locking up one offender resolve all the trauma for their victim(s), or every victim of every abuser?

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No, despite the implications of social media. The continued pursuit of justice became perverted, a witch hunt to unearth every perceived misdeed, but that was a fractional percentage of those engaged with the movement. After all, most people are simply living their lives, trying to endure commonplace hardships while maximizing the potential for fulfillment. Bills must get paid, jobs worked, and the unexpected attended to without the proper resources. Children must get played with, dinners must get cooked, friends met up with, and spouses spent time with: most do not have time for crying wolf on the Internet.

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The sect of any community that finds that time is a vocal minority, but they are, in many cases, the only voice, creating a misperception of the group they represent. Most liberals aren’t as narrow-minded and uncompromising as perceived; most conservatives are not as reactionary and unhinged as we think. It is human nature to espouse our principles: that devotion is what makes them principles. It may not be nature to employ moderation, but that does not mean most do not. Allowing the minority to stand for the majority makes Men more of a self-satisfied exercise in choir preaching than a beneficial commentary on the patriarchy.

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According to RAINN (Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network), only 31% of sexual assaults get reported to the police; 16% of those will lead to an arrest, and only half of those arrests lead to incarceration. It is easy to look at statistics and cry out for those who went unheard or refused to speak for fear of being one of the mere 2.5% that see justice.

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Unfortunately, we often settle for that knee-jerk response. In fairness, that response has value: people can gather in massive numbers, united under one cause, and march in honor of that cause; the act itself may not hold any legislative value, but a united front of both survivors and allies carries tremendous healing potential. In equal fairness, Men, though seeking to appear otherwise, is disinterested in healing, only itself.

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As a technical work, Men succumbs to its A24 trappings, like the musical motif begun in an abandoned tunnel or the countless establishing shots of apples and landscapes. Before that, it makes a few effective choices. It allows its initial conversations to breathe without music, refusing to dictate the audience’s sentiments. It shows a brief moment of liberation for a woman weighed down by the tragedy a man inflicted upon her as she basks in the simple pleasure of running from the rain. It doesn’t hint at the abuse or imply its consequences: James punches Harper squarely in the face, sending her flying back into the kitchen counter and drawing blood from her nose. Sadly, that is where the buck stops.

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According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence (NCADV), 1 in 4 women will experience “sexual violence, physical violence, and/or stalking…” by an intimate partner in their lives; that’s nearly 42 million women in the United States. In the UK, where the film takes place, domestic violence reports increased 6% from 2020 to 2021, which ended a trend of consecutive annual decreases. Domestic violence rose during the pandemic and continues to see increases in prevalence: the system is foundationally against women.

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Garland takes on a massive responsibility in embracing this issue and putting it under a cinematic spotlight but shies away from saying anything of substance to use motifs and shock value to trick audiences into thinking his movie means something. And just like any indie filmmaker tackling socio-political themes, he cops out by admitting he had no insight to offer; everyone can interpret Men as they please. In other words, “Take what you will from my movie so that you have no choice but to like it."

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Leaving things to interpretation is the hallmark of artists with nothing to say about the topical issues they exploit. Conviction is the foundation of great art, and answers to questions are more valuable than the questions themselves. Once we ask something, we try to answer it; asking again serves no purpose. Pointing out the obvious to those affected by it does not do what Men wants us to believe it accomplishes.

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We will not always agree with the answer. Artists, who are, by definition, self-conscious, know this. It is more beneficial for them to play it safe and preach to the choir than challenge themselves (or their viewers) to do more than ask a question in an echo chamber. Films are not obligated to mean anything or spark societal upheaval, but they get bound by the same principles as their creators: if you are going to do something, you must actually do it.

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Many movies tackle issues most immediate to society, and the best films establish their goals and pursue them, regardless of reception. They are free to make a point on their terms and flesh it out to the degree they feel necessary, and the more self-aware they are, the more leeway they receive. However, we give none to a movie concerned only with appearances, like Men. It congratulates itself on its perspective and relishes the abstractions it employs to impart it. Doing this exposes its intentions: settle for the broad, ignore specifics, stylize to avoid detection, and collect clout.

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The audience for Men knows everything in its narrative: men gaslight women, holding them responsible for their actions out of some misplaced sense of sexual propriety. Women must endure men’s projections: every article of clothing, expression, movement, and conversational shift is meant to entice them. Refusal to follow through on those advances contradictorily makes them a “slut” or a “whore.” Men feel entitled to women’s time and attention in whatever way they covet it, just as Samuel, the young boy wearing a creepy mask outside a church, demands that Harper play hide and seek with him. If a woman refuses to comply, she’s a “stupid bitch.”

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All is true, but it is also not true; Garland’s interpretation of society is only that vocal minority: an incel population that blames the damnation of all cola-guzzling neckbeards on the “selfish” women who wisely avoid their clutches, a group so lethal to society that the Secret Service has warned us against them. We possess all of the common knowledge Men insists is uncommon, as though it was the first book, television show, song, or film to know it. The lesson now is for us to understand the specifics. If Men wants to earn its self-congratulations, it must ask questions from a systemic perspective, ponder the implications of things beyond the general, and drum up answers to pressing questions.

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In 2017, at the dawn of the #MeToo movement, the FBI published a report on the gender breakdown in full-time law enforcement. The data said 956,941 people were employed by national agencies: 72.8% were male. When counting only actual officers, that number rose to roughly 88%. In 2020, those numbers had changed only slightly: 72.4% of law enforcement employees and 86.2% of officers were male. The people women get forced to disclose their trauma to are predominantly male and by virtue of archaic notions of gender roles. Men are in positions of power, authority, protection, influence, and trust. Unfortunately, this allows them to form their own perceptions of those notions and employ them at their discretion. If a woman dressed, spoke, or behaved "inappropriately," if old-fashioned ideas of female propriety got disregarded, authoritative men deny support.

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The priest in whom Harper confides is a man bestowed with a purity of purpose, his role being the facilitation of healing. He is a safe place for all, regardless of the circumstances, and who creates an unspoken promise of protection after running Samuel off. Alas, he absolves James by unironically questioning Harper. He does not theorize but asserts, even if the assertion gets disguised as a question. Harper's trauma was avoidable. All she had to do was ignore her abuse, allow her husband to take control, and offer a simple apology.

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The boy is a budding misogynist whose perceptions of right and wrong get informed by sexist conditioning. The indecency he inflicts is not his fault, just a matter of being “troubled;" a man can be as he wishes, irrespective of women.

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Geoffrey is the man who initially seems kind, who does and says everything that allows a woman to feel safe but is, as apparently with all men, untrustworthy. The exact reason you cannot trust him is unknown, a device many would likely claim intentional, but considering the film’s lack of insight or understanding of misogyny, none can rationally claim this. Every iteration of male oppression is a cardboard cutout in the way artists and their defenders always pawn off on vision; any critique that can get leveled can get dismissed just as easily: everything was the director’s intent, purpose, or meaning. Unfortunately for Men, we know better.

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Men offers one nugget of human truth it does not pollute: Harper is crouched in the kitchen, hunted by the many incarnations of the patriarchy. The only light comes in from the shattered window; the only noise heard is one Harper cannot bring herself to look in the eye. The movie understands the instinct to keep your head down and run rather than face terror directly. In this moment, Men gets humanity, devoid of smugness. Sadly, the movie is so boastful about understanding basic ideas that deep evaluation is entirely on the audience, not something the film earns. It is the ultimate form of arthouse pandering: float an idea knowing your audience will concoct theories and overanalyze, then reap the fruits of their intellectual labor.

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Men is creepy. As a horror film, it should accomplish at least that. Unfortunately, everything else it sets its sights on flounders under its lack of conviction. It rips us from Harper’s understanding of the world around her to a narrative where she is its sole victim before placing us back from whence we came. The duality is indie fodder and does nothing to establish ideals; it could claim resistance to contrived dialogue, but it constantly embraces such dialogue to make its points.

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It leans on its cinematography, music, and general arthouse air to appease a target audience that prefers to have their perspective (or willingness to deepen it) go unchallenged. Men oppress, gaslight, abuse, and manipulate women; we didn’t need a movie to tell us that. People confront these realities every day, and those with whom Men conjoins itself are that vocal minority, always seeking chances to rejoice in their superiority. In that sense, one could claim it is a success: Men, in this light, is akin to those marches that offer solidarity for survivors. Unfortunately, it wants to appear more substantial than it is; solidarity is not its concern. On any ethical ground, it is impossible to argue otherwise. It would not be difficult to contend that a man should not have made this movie. If one was to, the film should have at least had a female writer, cinematographer, composer, editor, or producer. Of course, those who would combat that argument would say this was intentional, as it always is with such films.

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We continue to allow men the power over abuse, even as we’ve spent the last five years attempting to undermine it. We have made progress, but men are still routinely the first and only line of defense for victims, which affords them more influence over women’s legal and societal resolutions than women themselves. If Men, and its supporters, want to pat themselves on the back for saying something said a million times before, so be it. Unfortunately, Men wants our praise as a valuable slice of societal insight and banks its entire perception on whether or not it earns that praise. Even at film’s end, when Harper’s friend comes to relieve her of her bizarre and misogynistic circumstances, Men cannot understand the implications of what it exploits.

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Harper has denied James her love. She was not guilted or struck into submission. Men says “Fight the Power,” but with no concept of how to fight, what truly allows the power to subjugate its victims, or what they go through under its thumb. It reacts to experiences instead of investigating them, leaving itself open to any who would use that 5.2% of false claims to dictate their perception of women like Harper.

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It only knows the most basic ideas while posing as though it understands much more. Even as it reveals that James is all of the men Harper has confronted in her countryside hideaway, it cannot muster anything of substance. It understands that men can be many things at once, which is true of anyone. It does not dissect, analyze, ask, or answer; it lacks the spine that allows all great art to stand and the one all men need if they expect to tackle societal misogyny and help create the world anew. It reminds us of that principle that determines the socio-political value of virtually anything or anyone:

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If you’re going to do something, you must do it.