Film

Concessions

Go Smurf Yourselves, Smurfs

by Lindy West

This new live-action Smurfs movie does a smart thing: It preempts all potential mockery of the Smurfs' inherent creepiness and logical dead ends by making fun of itself nonstop. Like, in an opening scene, right after I eagerly scribbled "WHY IS GARGAMEL SO FUCKING OBSESSED WITH SMURFS" in my notes (that's the kind of shit I can milk two whole paragraphs out of), Gargamel in the movie goes, "I AM NOT OBSESSED WITH SMURFS. I JUST CAN'T STOP THINKING ABOUT THEM." Hhhhhhhh. FINE. And later, when I was feeling smug about how stupid the Smurf naming system is, Neil Patrick Harris goes, "So all of you are named after your personalities? Do you get your names when you're born or after you've exhibited certain traits?" and the Smurfs are like, "Yeah! Whatever!" YEAH. WHATEVER. The movie makes fun of Smurf language ("You just say 'Smurf' for everything?"); it makes fun of that horrible fucking song ("None of you find that song just the tiniest bit annoying?"); it makes fun of the strange sexual dynamics of Smurf Village ("So you live in a village with your 99 sons and one daughter. Nothing weird about that"). And that's why I HATE THIS NEW LIVE-ACTION SMURFS MOVIE SOOOOOOO MUCH.

How am I supposed to write a hahahaha-larious column making fun of your goddamn Smurfs movie when (1) you did a preemptive strike on ALL of my best jokes, and (2) YOUR STUPID SMURFS MOVIE IS ACTUALLY KIND OF ENJOYABLE (THANKS A LOT, HANK AZARIA)??? Fuck you, Smurfs. Seriously.

Luckily, I am good at my job. I can make fun of anything. Let's do this shit.

Okay, so the plot of Smurfs is that these pointless blue things live in a mushroom village in a magical land (or "The Middle Ages" if you're whatever stupid person edited the Smurf Wikipedia page) where they get all hopped up on magic berries and dance jigs for 20 hours a day, and are eternally being chased by a bald guy in a dress named Gargamel (Azaria) who wants to "extract" their "essence" (I WILL GIVE YOU $500 IF YOU CAN PROVE THAT ISN'T A WEIRD SEXUAL THING). But, apparently, once in a "blue moon" (not a thing), a watery butt-tunnel opens up to New York City. So of COURSE the stupid Smurfs (plus Gargamel) fall through the magic hole and have to go live with Neil Patrick Harris and learn/teach a few lessons about the importance of family and believing in yourself and gardening and whatever.

There's Clumsy Smurf, whose "personality" is fucking everything up. There's Gutsy Smurf, who wears a kilt and is constantly throwing himself off of tall buildings for no reason ("SMURFABUNGA" IS NOT A WORD. ALSO, WHY ARE YOU SCOTTISH?). There's Papa Smurf, who is condescending. There's Brainy Smurf, who wears glasses. There's Grouchy Smurf, who is apparently Mexican (again, WHY???) and hates everything. And then there's Smurfette, who at one point stands on a grate and it blows her skirt up and then all the other Smurfs look at each other and go, "Are you thinking what I'm thinking?????"

Uhhh, what—GANG-RAPE???

Oh, excuse me. They call it gang-smurf.

See, Smurf movie? This is what you've driven me to! A rape joke. Assholes.