History YMMV / Norbit

* RootingForTheEmpire: Kate is a sweet and friendly woman played by Thandie Newton, but Rasputia is a cartoonish villain who devours all her scenes.

** Some viewers think that the premise of this movie about an abusive marriage where the wife is the villain and the husband is the victim could have yielded an interesting horror movie instead of a ridiculous comedy, to the point that several people edited fake trailers on Youtube, selling it as a horror movie.

** Some viewers think that the premise of this movie about an abusive marriage where the wife is the villain and the husband is the victim could have yielded an interesting drama or thriller movie instead of a ridiculous comedy, to the point that several people edited fake trailers of the movie on Youtube, selling it as a horror movie.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot: Rasputia lies to Norbit that she's pregnant with him to force him to stay married to her... and then, exactly five minutes into the movie, she reveals to him that it was all a lie. The brief existence of this plot is made even more inexplicable by the fact that Norbit continues to live with Rasputia after learning the truth.

** The whole premise of the movie: a weak, shy, insecure man being forced to marry a crazy, monstrous woman who can kill him if he refuses. She constantly humiliates him, brutally beats him, publicly and privately, and even forces him to have sex with her against his will. It's all [[PlayedForLaughs played for laughs]] because of [[DoubleStandardRapeFemaleOnMale the concept of a man being dominated by a woman]], but it is nonetheless disturbing and even depressing after a while. [[UnfortunateImplications And if the genders were reversed...]]

* UnfortunateImplications: [[https://film.avclub.com/norbit-1798202397 Many]] [[https://www.cinemablend.com/reviews/Norbit-2114.html critics]] [[https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2007-feb-08-wk-norbit8-story.html and]] [[http://www.mtv.com/news/2754815/weekend-wrap-up-audiences-love-norbit-millennial-minstrel-show/ viewers]] immediately made a point of pointing out that the film's premise encourages offensive stereotypes.

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: After literally being thrown out of the house by Rasputia, Norbit imagines Lloyd (voiced by Eddie Murphy's late brother Charlie Murphy) talking to him, telling him to kill Rasputia.

* WhatAnIdiot: Norbit, who's trying to protect Kate from Rasputia's wrath, could not, for some odd reason, bring himself to say, "You need to get out of here before Rasputia kills you!" Instead, he had to go with, "I don't care about the orphanage or you, and Rasputia's the only woman I'll ever need!" He could have just said something else, like "I can't talk right now at the moment."

* AudienceAlienatingPremise: Watching two hours of a man being physically, psychologically, and sexually abused by his wife is not exactly what most people find funny.

** Which are Rasputia's feelings for Norbit, after all? Did she really fall in love for him in childhood, and did the years of marriage destroy all the pleasure and happiness she had with him, making her more abusive than she already was? Or did she always see him only as her slave? When Rasputia realizes that Norbit is falling in love with Kate and becomes jealous, is she just interested in keeping her husband a slave, or does she really realize that she loves Norbit (in her distorted way)?

* DarknessInducedAudienceApathy: Norbit's life is hell: abandoned as a baby by his parents in an orphanage, forced to see his great love leave the city, and then he is forced to marry a monstrous woman who abuses him physically, psychologically and even sexually. And the movie tries to portray it all as a comedy. For many viewers, it's more depressing and disturbing than funny.

** The whole premise of the movie: a weak, shy, insecure man being forced to marry a crazy, monstrous woman who can kill him if he refuses. She constantly humiliates him, brutally beats him, publicly and privately, and even forces him to have sex with her against his will. It's all [[PlayedForLaughs played for laughs]] because of the concept of a man being dominated by a woman, but it is nonetheless disturbing and even depressing after a while. And if the genders were reversed...

* CrossTheLineTwice: The sex montage, consisting of Rasputia, wearing embarassing sexual costumes, jumping on Norbit (who is clearly doing so against his will), breaking the bed and smashing her husband, who reacts with screams of pain. It should be disturbing, but the way these scenes are filmed and written is so exaggerated that it makes everything hilarious.

%%* ValuesDissonance:
* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: For all the problems this movie has (and they are many), no one can deny that the makeup of Rick Baker to make Eddie Murphy on the Chinese Mr. Wong and the morbidly obese Rasputia are impressive. Especially in scenes where Rasputia wears lingerie, bikinis and shorts, with her body being absurdly realistic. Fat suits are known for being extremely difficult to make look convincing, so showing convincing, prolonged scenes of Rasputia’s exposed, obese body is definitely a technical achievement and you can see why Baker earned an Academy Award nomination for his work.