Amy Schumer’s “I Feel Pretty:” Actually Pretty Ugly

Amy Schumer's new movie, "I Feel Pretty," follows the story of an overweight woman who accidentally gains confidence.

Mario Santoro / PR Photos

Amy Schumer’s new movie, “I Feel Pretty,” follows the story of an overweight woman who accidentally gains confidence.

By Ella Ilg, Staff Writer

I walked into the new Amy Schumer movie with low expectations, initially because it’s an Amy Schumer movie, and then because it received a 34% on Rotten Tomatoes. I decided to watch it with my friend because we missed the movie time for “A Quiet Place.” I was hoping this movie would at least be a “so bad it’s good” movie, but I was surprised when it was a just regular good movie.

The plot follows Renee, played by Schumer, who’s an insecure, chubby girl lacking confidence. She embarrasses herself trying to work out and ends up falling off the SoulCycle bike and running home. She works in a dank basement office and despite trying to appear beautiful, she’s disgusted with what she sees in the mirror. A few scenes later she wishes to be beautiful and then falls off the SoulCycle bike again, banging her head. When she regains consciousness, she’s shocked at the woman she sees in the mirror, seeing herself as a gorgeous model. This newfound confidence lands her a boyfriend and her dream job, but it gets to her head and her friends ditch her. She bangs her head again and undoes the spell over her, making her lose all confidence and isolate herself.

The movie ends happily, of course, but the whole thing left me feeling weird. My friend and I have both struggled with our weight for most of our lives, and seeing our inner thoughts and emotions laid out in front of us was difficult to watch.

We both ended up crying by the end, because it was so familiar to watch Schumer cry when she sees her real reflection, after the spell breaks. To cry at the sight of your own reflection is depressing enough, but when you’ve been in that position before, it’s awfully relatable. I walked into the movie expecting to laugh over how bad it was, but instead I laughed genuinely, and I felt for Schumer’s character.

Ignoring my personal feelings, it was objectively pretty bad. The cinematography was lazy, the soundtrack was cringe-worthy 2015 pop music, and Schumer wore almost the exact same outfit in three different scenes. The world’s hate for fat people was way over-exaggerated, and people’s reaction to a confident fat girl were cartoonishly cruel.

The issue with body dysmorphia, the mental issue many overweight people struggle from, is all in your head. Making it seem like the world is actually that cruel is just inaccurate. I know people probably tease me behind my back for my weight, but that doesn’t mean that they’d come up to me and call me fat and gross. This movie has serious world-building problems because it’s just unbelievable. I live in the world as a fat girl, and that is not how the world treats me in reality, so it was more clear to me that it was overdone. To a skinny girl however, she may think this is seriously how the word treats overweight women, and she’d be thinking something inaccurate.

Another issue with the movie is the underlining joke. Fat girls are supposed to hate themselves, right? When this character is ugly but actually chooses to love herself, it’s framed as weird and funny. That’s the whole joke of the movie, and it also happens to be a seriously damaging idea.

The final issue I have with the film is how after Renee has been confident for awhile, her friends ditch her because she’s “changed,” painting her self confidence as arrogance and self obsession. At the end of the movie, she wins them back because they’re her “real friends.” Real friends do not ditch you because you’ve stopped hating yourself, and self love and confidence are not the same as being arrogant. The movie’s attempted message isĀ , “be more confident,” but ironically, confidence makes your friends hate you and call you arrogant. It has such a twisted message and leaves the audience feeling confused about the point of the movie.

It’s not a piece of art, and I would be hesitant to call it a film even, but “I Feel Pretty” is relatable in a way what few movies are. So, if you’re a guy or girl, have a history of body issues and are looking to cry, that’s probably the only situation in which I’d recommend it. 4/10.