The Associate is the title of a 1996 film starring Whoopi Goldberg, Dianne Wiest, Eli Wallach, Timothy Daly, Bebe Neuwirth, Austin Pendleton and Lainie Kazan. It is a remake of René Gainville's 1979 film L'Associé.
Plot
Laurel Ayres is the smart and single woman trying to make it up the Wall Street corporate ladder, until one day she finds out that she is passed over for a promotion because she is a woman. Unable to face that fact that her less smart and sexist male protege (Frank) has now become her boss, she quits and tries to start up her own company only to find out that the male dominated world of Wall Street is not interested in taking an African American woman seriously, and thus is forced to create a fictional white man (Robert S. Cutty) in order to be judged on her own merits. Ayres financial wisdom is joined by the intelligent and computer-savvy secretary Sally Dugan who also was not properly recognized for her talents, and together they are able to become the most successful independent stock brokers in the world while helping a struggling high tech computer company stay afloat.
However, the ruse eventually runs into problems, as Cutty is still getting credit for Ayres great ideas, and competing firms and tabloid journalists are willing to do anything in order to bring the wealthy and elusive Cutty into the public and on their side. Thus Ayres is forced to get her gay best friend (who works at a nightclub as a female impersonator) to create an effective disguise in the mould of Marlon Brando to try and fool the naysayers; when that fails, she and Dugan decide to kill Cutty only to be charged with his murder. Frank uncovers the ruse and pretends that he is now the front man to world famous Cutty.
Plot
Laurel Ayres is the smart and single woman trying to make it up the Wall Street corporate ladder, until one day she finds out that she is passed over for a promotion because she is a woman. Unable to face that fact that her less smart and sexist male protege (Frank) has now become her boss, she quits and tries to start up her own company only to find out that the male dominated world of Wall Street is not interested in taking an African American woman seriously, and thus is forced to create a fictional white man (Robert S. Cutty) in order to be judged on her own merits. Ayres financial wisdom is joined by the intelligent and computer-savvy secretary Sally Dugan who also was not properly recognized for her talents, and together they are able to become the most successful independent stock brokers in the world while helping a struggling high tech computer company stay afloat.
However, the ruse eventually runs into problems, as Cutty is still getting credit for Ayres great ideas, and competing firms and tabloid journalists are willing to do anything in order to bring the wealthy and elusive Cutty into the public and on their side. Thus Ayres is forced to get her gay best friend (who works at a nightclub as a female impersonator) to create an effective disguise in the mould of Marlon Brando to try and fool the naysayers; when that fails, she and Dugan decide to kill Cutty only to be charged with his murder. Frank uncovers the ruse and pretends that he is now the front man to world famous Cutty.
The film ends with Ayers donning the Cutty disguise one last time to attend a meeting of the exclusive gentlemen's club to accept Cutty's awards and unmasking herself in order to teach the male dominated industry the evils of racial and sexual discrimination. Ayers is finally given credit for her work and creates a huge business empire with her friends at the helm. (wikipedia)
MY THOUGHTS
This movie had similarities to my last blog White Man's Burden but I think this one dealt more with the female vs. male aspect of it then the same white vs. black situation. This movie taught me that sexism and male dominance still exist in the workplace and that women have to go through drastic measures to be heard. I'm sure not to the extent that Whoopi's character did in the movie but we do have to work harder and prove ourselves more in fields thats dominated by men. This movie also related to the Wu article in that women dont really know where they stand sometimes when it comes to working in a white male dominated society, Because like Wu even though he is'nt a black male he isn'r white either so he would still be subjected to racism maybe not as bad a blacks but he still would would be profiled. And that can be said about white women. In the movie Whoopi's assistant who is white is really great at what she does as well but like Whoopi is not taken seriously because she is a woman but like Wu the white woman is still stuck in the middle because she is a woman yet she is the dominant race.
I chose to use this movie because so many aspects of it touches on what we have been discussing in class about racism and sexism and how recently in class we had to talk about if we experienced those things and one girl in class spoke about car shopping and the male car salesman just assumed she couldnt drive a stick because she was a woman. I think this not only brings race in the picture but for the most part this movie is more about sexism and the male vs females aspects just as much as it is about race. I think readings that relates to this movie was the Wright article "The Ethnics of Living Jim Crow" when he was trying to move up in his factory job but once he asked about learning new things to hopefully move up the ladder he was treated horribly and ultimately driven away from the job.
The scene that I love the most is the unveiling scene at the end. I think if anything even though it wasa movie it opened those men's eyes and showed them that put aside the fact that she is a black woman she is incredible at her job and has been over looked all this time. Whoopi character pretty went up to accept an award she got for being accepted in a gentlemens club when she was portraying a man, then unvelied herself and end up taking the award and keeping it which i thought was great. She forced those men to pay attention to her even though they didn’t want to she earned her respect. I also feel that even if they were to try to take her award back and try to discredit her in any way it would reflect badly on them and their politics. I highly recommened this movie its not only funny but it has a good message with a great ending.
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