why i laugh

I watched a terrific documentary called Why We Laugh: Funny Women on Showtime last week. Tons of witty women are featured, including Kathy Griffin, Whoopi Goldberg, Lily Tomlin, Kim Wayans, Janeane Garofalo, Tig Notaro, Rita Rudner, Kathy Najimy, Sandra Bernhard, Natasha Leggero and Aisha Tyler. Here's the trailer. (NSFW)

I love to laugh, no doubt about it. And I love to make people laugh. I find that if I have to speak in front of a group, and I get that nauseous feeling in my stomach, it goes away as soon as I can get the first laugh from the audience.

So, yes, a bunch of funny people are featured, and they will make you laugh. But the best part about this documentary is how insightful it is into what it's like to be in a male-dominated profession. Actually, that's kind of an understatement. Not only are women the overwhelming minority in stand-up comedy, but they are also criminally underestimated. The comedians respond to Adam Carolla's recent claims in the New York Post that women aren't as funny as men. As you can imagine, they take Carolla to task for his comments. You remember Carolla, right? He co-hosted "The Man Show," which was so cutting-edge in its humor, it included video of women on trampolines each week. High-brow hilariousness, huh?

And that's the other excellent point made in film. It's something I suppose I never thought about, but it's so true, it's almost an epiphany. Women tend to be more discerning when it comes to comedy. For guys, all you need is a fart noise and a joke about poop, and they're rolling on the floor laughing. It's a total generalization, yes, I understand that. But each day since I saw the film, I've found another example to prove that belief is true.

That shit makes me laugh, too, sometimes, but I think I know why there are far too many low-brow, raunchy, male-dominated movies in the theater - because men are running the movie houses and keep green-lighting those pictures. Every once in a while you get a guy who understands that you need more to attract women to those types of films. Judd Apatow, you genius, I'm talking to you. His films have their share of potty humor, but there's a lot more going on in his movies, and I know, personally, that's why I tune in.

what the kids know

I visited the movie theater twice this weekend for very fine flicks that had a very important theme in common. Saturday night was Julianne Moore and Alexander Skarsgard in What Maisie Knew, and tonight I returned for Sarah Polley's documentary, Stories We Tell.

I heard Polley and her dad on NPR's Fresh Air, and I knew I wanted to catch her doc. It's about her own life and a story that began as a family joke and turned out to be a secret Polley's mother took to the grave. I promise I'm not giving too much away when I explain that Polley directs her family members and friends of her mother to tell the story of "her mum," who died when Polley was about 11, I think. Each tells the truth but different stories surface that tell a surprising story of love, marriage and infidelity. It turns out, Polley's dad was not her biological father.

How does Polley react? How does her father react? How does the man with whom her mother had an affair react? How do all of them come to terms with the truth, and whose truth is it?

Stories We Tell feels very personal, which of course, it is, and oftentimes, you can hear Polley offscreen reacting to what's being said by the brother, friend or father she's interviewing.

The emotional ties that fill our tummies with butterflies are not what drew me to see What Maisie Knew. Of course, it was Skarsgard, and Julianne Moore, whom I love. But really, it was the incredibly sexy Skarsgard and my desire to see him in roles that truly allow him to show off his acting skills. And he does very well in this film, as do all the actors, especially the very young Onata Aprile, who appears in virtually every scene with her gigantic haunting doe eyes.

Maisie is a 6-year-old daughter of rock star and art dealer parents who hate each other and fight constantly and loudly. With no concern for what Maisie hears or sees, these self-absorbed adults create what years of therapy will need to heal in Maisie.

Both of these films made me think about marriage and family and how just about anyone can be a husband, a father, a wife or a mother. Although it is the most difficult and important roles we play in life, we get absolutely no training for it, and rarely do we really see the lifelong impacts of our actions. Maisie's parents don't hit her, they don't force her to live a life homeless or hungry, and they don't tell her she's worthless. Still, they are horrible parents, using people to get what they want and taking no responsibility for their own child, who I believe they both love but not as much as they love themselves.

In Stories We Tell, the parents seem to be good people who love their families. But how far can you go in getting what you want and what you rightfully deserve - in this case, true love - without impacting the lives of those around you?

It can't be helped. The older we get, the more our decisions impact the lives of people we love.