Screw Seth Rogen, Date Rape Isn't Funny

Posted by Peter Rothberg, The Nation at 5:02 AM on April 11, 2009.

Is date rape funny? Seth Rogen and his crew apparently think so. Watch this video from Feministing.com for the far-from-comic story.

Even actress Anna Faris, Rogen's fictional date rape victim, was shocked with the film's treatment of this criminal act, as she told the AVclub website:

"I'm so grateful I was cast, but when I read the script, I thought, 'Well, this is Warner Brothers. This is a studio movie, so this is all gonna be softened up. It's a comedy, right?' So when we were shooting it, even the date-rape scene--or as I refer to it, 'The Tender Love-Making Scene'--I just thought, 'We'll shoot it, but it's not gonna be in the movie. I don't have to worry about that one.' And yet there it is."

I don't think I'm particularly censorious and I've sat through numerous movies of poor taste and far worse. But I completely accept the rationale for boycotting this film as articulated by, where else these days, the "We Won't See Observe and Report Because It Is Flippant About Rape" Facebook page, in an open letter to Rogen and the film's producers:

"We are not going to see Observe and Report, and we want to make things clear. We are not refusing to see it because it isn't our type of movie, or because we are people of delicate sensibilities who cannot handle 'edgy' humor. We are refusing to see it because after reading numerous reviews and interviews with all of you it is clear that NOT EVEN ONE OF YOU thought very carefully or even, hell, at all about the issues involved in making a scene in which someone not only screws an unconscious person, but such act is 'made okay' (per Mr. Rogen) because she drunkenly murmured something in the middle of the act."

Here's the trailer if you're curious. Don't spend a dime on the movie.

Tagged as: movies, date rape, seth rogen