You know, for all the bitching about Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, we’re just gonna leave Oklahoma! out of the problematic musicals discourse? Cause hoooooly shit, this movie is so much worse.
Look, I don’t need every piece of media I consume to pass the bechdel test, but this movie is egregiously annoying. All the men in it are abusive horndogs and all the women are obsessed with marrying them. Also, Oklahoma! involved way more pornography than I thought it would? Thinking about it now, have any of the movies I’ve watched on this list so far involved pornography? This might be the first (and only?) one.
Curly is a cowboy in his 30s who wants to bang an immature teenage girl, Laurey, who thinks it’s cute to pretend she doesn’t like Curly even though she does. He invites her to a box social being held to raise money for a new schoolhouse, but she refuses to go with him because he doesn’t have a fringe-decorated whip. Instead, she tries to make him jealous by asking her employee, Jud, to escort her. She immediately regrets this decision when Jud starts giving off real menacing incel vibes, and her attempts to rescind her offer are either ignored or outright refused.
Curly decides to convince Jud he has dibs on Laurey, and when that doesn’t work, he tries to persuade Jud to kill himself. No, I’m not kidding. Jud refuses to take his own life and give up Laurey because he’s sick of looking at pornography and he wants to stick his peen into a real, live woman instead of jerking it all the time. This argument devolves into them comparing each other’s dick sizes and Aunt Eller intervenes, allowing the peddler to try and distract them with more pictures of naked ladies.
Laurey still can’t decide which man she wants, so she takes an unknown substance the peddler sold her and trips balls for an unnecessary 20-minute dance sequence. Even though she hallucinates that Jud will kill Curly, she still allows Jud to escort her to the box social. On the way to the dance, Jud tries to sexually assault Laurey, and she kicks him out of the wagon, leaving him to hoof it on his own.
When she arrives at the party, Jud somehow shows up shortly afterward, even though he presumably walked the entire way there. He immediately gets into a bidding war with Curly for Laurey’s box… lunch, and instead of telling Jud to fuck off, Aunt Eller uses it as an opportunity to drive up the bidding price on Laurey’s goodies. After Curly sells all his belongings to get $50 for a tart, Jud removes his bid and tries to get revenge on Curly by tricking him into using a knife-rigged porn kaleidoscope. Aunt Eller prevents Curley from losing an eye, which only succeeds in directing Jud’s rage to Laurey, whom he starts threatening physical violence against because she has refused to be with him.
Laurey is so shaken up by this interaction that she runs into Curly’s arms. Instead of approaching her with compassion, he leverages her fear into a kiss or two. When he starts to get too aroused by the situation, he physically distances himself from Laurey in order to actually listen to her concerns. Curly then proposes marriage as a solution for whatever reason, and Laurey agrees because she’s an idiot with no other options for protection against a violent misogynist.
Curly and Laurey get hitched and Jud immediately tries to set them on fire. Curly “accidentally” stabs Jud in self-defense, and the townsfolk are just OK with it because they don’t want to ruin their honeymoon. The movie ends with Curly and Laurey belting out a happy tune in their fringe-trimmed surrey, as if Curly didn’t just murder a guy. The end.
Oh, there’s also a side-plot where one of Laurey’s friends is framed as a dumb whore because she likes to kiss boys. Her father tries to solve this problem by selling her off to the highest bidder – either an untrustworthy merchant who only wants to fuck her, or a dim-witted, pornography-loving, strip joint-visiting cowboy who is irresponsible with money. Very cool, very chill. Inadvertently, Ado Annie is my favorite character in this film.
Besides the super boring and slightly disturbing plot, the music in this is alright. All the actors are wonderful singers, and there are a few dance numbers that are fairly entertaining, albeit a thinly veiled way to bloat the runtime of a story devoid of any substance. I watched this several months ago while experiencing fun vaccine side-effects, and it made the movie feel like 5 hours instead of 2 and a half. I know Oklahoma! recently got a revival on Broadway a few years ago, and I honestly want to know who is a fan of this musical, and why? Is it just because of the songs? The fact Ali Stoker is an absolute boss? I can’t imagine this being appealing to anybody in 2021 without some big story changes.