Letters

The Ultimate in Sexism
The mother who felt the sexually explicit wallpaper at Brasil was pornographic does not stand alone ["Sex and Death on the Restroom Wall," by Brad Tyer, March 7]. I was offended when confronted with it in the women's room at the Satellite Lounge, and I voiced my complaints to the proprietor. I am highly suspicious of such graphic images created by a male and forced upon unsuspecting women under the guise of being art. Anyone who dares to object is immediately considered small-minded.

It is the ultimate sexism for a man to assume he must educate the women of this city. The fact that he promotes the use of the female condom adds insult to injury by once again making birth control and disease prevention the responsibility of women.

Dr. Avery said, "The woman who complained was confusing education with pornography." Since when does he know the true definition of pornography? As women are usually the victims of pornography, maybe the mother has some insight Dr. Avery does not. Raising her daughter is her responsibility. Dr. Avery thinks it is a good thing for a ten-year-old girl to know she can put a condom in herself. Get a grip, buddy! Who have you been hanging out with, Huey Meaux?

T.M. Rockwell
Houston

Dire Scenario
With respect to Brad Tyer's Brasil article, I must say that perception too often impedes the purpose of education.

If by chance no cure is found and the child or any other loved one of the paranoid mother contracts the ravaging disease of AIDS, maybe she will reconsider her call to HPD and give Dr. Avery's artistic creation the proper praise.

Shari C. Wright
Houston

Taking a Stand
Although I was sorry to read that Brasil owner Dan Ferguson bowed down to the HPD vice squad and a hysterical suburbanite mom, he did take a pragmatic capitalist stance: stand on your principal rather than your principles. And, of course, there's a lesson to be learned here: kids, keep your parents out of the Montrose.

R.T. Castleberry
Houston

Everybody's Fly
(So Lighten Up)
I think Name withheld by request's reaction [Letters, "Zoot Suits and the Decline of the West, March 14] to Claudia Kolker's "Zoot Me Up" story [February 15] was the joke, and not the apparent embarrassment he found in the story.

It's honorable that he wants his culture to be presented without caricature and stereotype, but his denial and lashing out at a "costume" of his heritage does more harm than good. Whites wore the "leisure suit," and blacks wore "strollers." Everybody was fly, so what's the beef?

If Mr. Coleman had claimed to be the creator of the zoot suit, then I guarantee the response of Nwbr would have been complete outrage. So, dude, in claiming your cultural pride, claim it all. You can't hide what is and make what ain't.

Andrea Matchette
Houston

Tofu Goes Pfffttt...
While I am probably a notch below a full-fledged "film buff," I would like to discuss my viewing experience of a film that seemingly brought so much glee to your Joe Leydon. His review ["Ready for Takeoff," February 22] sprinkled a nice array of fairy dust around the movie Bottle Rocket, prompting me to take a peek at this hidden "gem."

Oh me, oh my.
The review could have been summed up much more accurately with this: a group of guys meets at college, writes an awful movie script, somehow sells its idea to a major studio and makes a film that looks exactly like an awful movie script that was written by some college guys being backed by a studio budget.

While watching helplessly in the theater, desperately waiting for the raves I had read to kick in, I couldn't help but marvel how mysteriously boring this movie was. Dull composition can be somewhat forgiven, but the action, drama, love interest, and meat-and-potatoes plot were all presented with the same tofu blandness.

I might hear the protest of missing the "inner beauty" in this film, but I know better than to squint to the point of being blind. It's not there.

I can understand Mr. Leydon wanting to give a helping hand to a group of guys with local flavor, but not to the point that the paying audience is tricked into seeing this dreadful flick.

The most consistent Tarzan yell about this movie seems to be the term "original."

Really?
Well, first let's remove the things that have been done countless times before -- the slackers searching for identity routine, the inept burglars farce, the language-barrier love relationship, the criminal figure-treated-with-hero-worship angle, to name a few. Still, most annoying of all is the blatant rip-off of the bullying brother, no doubt "created" in the image of the genuinely funny Chet of Weird Science.

Anything that's left over is obviously not worth screaming Eureka! about. Besides, originality is a virtue only if it is of quality, not because it's never been done before.

With all the cute little allegories attached with this movie to the flights of bottle rockets, I offer you this final, unspoken path that they sometimes take. You can call it original. Sometimes the fuse just goes pfffttt... and the bottle rocket goes nowhere.