It has been 5 days since Zach Snyder's adaptation of Alan Moore's graphic novel Watchmen has been released, and those have been 5 days that I have had to listen to the immature, homophobic viewing public complain about being subjected to "3 hours of giant blue penis. "Grow Up! *Sigh*, I'm sorry, but I can only handle so much disgust at what EVERY MAN ON THIS PLANET sees daily. I really do not see what the difference is between Daniel Radcliffe's willy and Manhattan's love muscle. I was sitting in our local Ma and Pa IMAX on the 6th enjoying a jarring scene in which Manhattan separates himself from all mankind by transporting to the red planet when from out of the depths of the darkness came the singular cry off "Oh, come on guys, really!" This was in response to the large nude blue man exposing himself to us on the screen. I don't understand this trepidation people have when faced with the unclothed human body (and it really isn't just the unclothed human body, the same people had no problem with a little Silk Specter nip). What confuses me even more so is that this isn't the first time that Hollywood has given us a little willy, in fact, there have been quite a few occasions where on screen penile exposure has been used over the years, let us take a glimpse of 5 well known or life altering penis shots:
#1: Boogie Nights
Mark Wahlberg stuns audiences by pulling out his 13" money maker during the finale of this great film. Critics and viewers alike have no gripe with the penis because "it's only made of rubber." So, Dr. Manhattan's penis is more realistic than that of Walhberg's?
#2: Schindler's List
Remains the only time that a penis has been shown, uncensored, on prime time television. The context of this makes it OK? It is still an exposed penis (and more human than that of Manhattan's) Does the fact that it is in a Holocaust movie really make it more tasteful and, in the opinion of the viewing public, more acceptable?
#3: The Simpsons Movie
Young Bart Simpson exposes himself to thousands of viewers, his privates popping through a hole in a fence that until that point acted as a censor. People accept it because it is animated but please people, it's an animated 10 year old's penis. Dunno how animation makes it any less vulgar than that of a full grown demigod's wanker.
#4: 28 Days Later
Jim, a bicycle courier from London, awakes from his coma nude, exposing himself to all who watch, but this is OK, right? Because it'll be eaten off soon anyways...and it's a foreign film too so that makes it justifiable, eh?
#5: Superbad
I don't know how well this fits in with the other films i've chosen but it definitely jumps to mind when you think on screen penis. Jonah Hill's character Seth has been crafting detailed doodles of, well, doodles since early in his school career. We are exposed to many of these beefy, in depth drawings during a montage sequence part way into this film and, if you stick around for the credits, many of the rest of them. They may not be real but they can't be ignored, "veiny triumphant bastards" that they are. They are, in my opinion, more disturbing than anything Snyder could throw at us.
So has our society really become that homophobic, that disgusted by God's gift to us, the one thing that we can grab and shout "I am man!" It saddens me that people are so close minded, so immature that they cannot just let something like a giant blue penis go. In a world where sex sells, in a world where breasts are now mainstream in much of our media, in a world where the nude male body is less accepted (greatly less) than that of a female's; I have to pose the question: Don't we all need a little blue penis in our lives?
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