Hey, all y'all out in LA-la Land . . .

[omorka]

So I was reading Fametracker hunting for, uh, well, half-naked shots of the sweet hobbit boys (*shame, embarrassment*) when I stumbled into a discussion on their Forums about feminism in film. (Hey, decent intellectual content after all! Even if it is about celebrities and Hollywood, I mean . . .)



One person, a woman of size and color, posted that she was essentially drummed out of USC's film school because, well, she had three strikes against her. The movie she was describing making for her senior project was essentially the Boudicea story glammed-up and romanticized a la Gladiator or Braveheart. Her profs said it would never sell because (a) it was automatically a chick flick, since the protagonist was a woman, and (b) there wasn't enough "production value" (in the Tapeheads sense) in the story. Her explanation that it was a gory action film cut no ice with them.

Add that to the fact that Sofia Coppola was only the second American female director ever to be nominated for an Oscar, and we have a pretty sorry state of affairs.

Is it really all that bad? Are there women directors/producers in the indie movie scene who are up-and-coming, maybe? I'd been ticked when I watched all the extras for the two released extended-edition LotR films about how few women were involved in the project - but now, with Fran, Philippa, Richard Taylor's co-head of WETA (who I think is his SO or ex-SO), and the co-head of the art department (who is married to the other co-head) all being women and pretty influential, it's looking like it might be one of the more egalitarian outfits in film these days . . . heck, they even bothered to interview one of the female stuntfolks.

This reminds me that I was impressed that the female characters in The New Guy, while far from strong characters, were at least as well-fleshed-out and assertive as the male characters. The Slut even changes to a Sacred Harlot in the course of the movie, instead of reforming and becoming a Secondhand Virgin. Remarkably egalitarian for a throwaway teen comedy. (For that matter, one of the strongest characters in Drumline is female, although she does go all soft for a guy who isn't worthy of her. No, not the main female character; she shows serious doormat tendencies. I mean the drummer girl.) In contrast, every single female in >Magnolia goes completely to pieces over the course of the film, or is an absolute bitch while at the same time being a doormat. (At least most of the women who fragment aren't doormats.) And where is Stanley's mother? And I didn't even think the film was misogynistic, just that the female characters weren't very strong. Claudia's mother (Rose? Is that her name?) is as close as we get - maybe the interviewer, too, but we don't see much of her. If it weren't for the misogynist asshole clearly being made fun of throughout the movie (man, Cruise was the perfect choice for that role), I'd be worried - but the film's heart is clearly in the right place.

It's hard to find a movie that makes serious money with strong female characters. Again, LotR has Eowyn, so it gets a by from me (also, it's Tolkien's fault, not Jackson's or New Line's, that there are really only three female characters and two of them are elves). The female lead in Lost In Translation is realistic, at least. The women in Big Fish are rewards; they don't move the plot, although they have a certain psychological power within the film. Perhaps criticizing what is clearly a son/father film for not having strong women is unreasonable, but where are the mother/daughter films to fill the other half of that niche? Or, hell, mother/son films? (Does Mary count in Passion? Anybody seen it yet?) We do get a few daughter/daddy films for the teen-girl set, but they're usually not very good - the last good one I saw was Beauty and the Beast.



I can't help but notice that even SmallWorld is short on strong female characters. It only has three - four if you count Help, I suppose. (Oh, wait, the head of Network 23 is female, too. Okay, five.) I suppose my way of making up for that is for one of them to occur over, and over, and over again . . . ;)

Comments

[bassfingers.livejournal.com]

It's hard to find a movie that makes serious money with strong female characters.

Maybe your defininiton of "strong" differs from mine, but I think I could argue that these ten count for something...


(all figures total domestic box office)

There are, of course, many more...

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Yup. Definitely very different definitions. I wouldn't count Titanic (although one could argue that is was remarkably non-sexist for the period it's portraying), Gump (in fact, I find that movie very sexist, although not misogynistic), Pirates (although that's way better than it could have been; also, another Dead Mother film), or Raiders (huh?) as having strong female leads. I haven't seen Mummy, Grease, or Hannibal, but nothing I've read about the last two leads me to suspect that I'd be particularly inclined to count them either.

I think I've already posted my complaint about tokenism and the Star Wars universe a couple of years ago, and Leia is at best the 3rd lead - I'd say 4th in the first movie, after Luke, Ben, and Han. At best, it's in the same league as LotR.

That leaves T2 - definitely a strong female lead, but IIRC portrayed as more or less bugfuck throughout the film, and the main draw is the Terminator himself, not her - and Matrix - again, not the main character and not even the second lead, although certainly a mostly non-sexist universe, which I appreciate. (Well, the Real World is mostly nonsexist. The Matrix world seems to be as sexist as modern times, which is congruent with the background.)

I suppose I should have said "strong female first-lead characters," as that was what I really meant. One could (and probably should) argue that Christina Ricci's character in Ice Storm is a strong female character, and she's probably the least fucked-up person in the movie (not that that's saying much), but she's third or fourth lead at best. I was thinking more along the lines of Sigourney Weaver's Ripley in the first Alien movie (and probably the rest, but I haven't seen them). Or the title character in Amelie, for a nonviolent example.

[bassfingers.livejournal.com]

What, you don't think Kate Winslet giving her fiance the boot was a ballsy move? Jenny in Gump was fucked up, but choosing her own path, most definitely. Ok, Jenny doesn't count as first lead. Thelma & Lousie?

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Giving up one man in favor of another doesn't strike me as particularly "ballsy," no. Giving up the fiance because he was a jerk I might see - but not while there's a "better man" waiting in the wings. That just seems calculating in a femme kinda way, while still reinforcing that whole "you gotta have a man" stereotype.

Jenny also seemed to be bouncing from (bad) man to (worse) man, until Forrest rescues her. Being in flight from something isn't strong, although I grant that she had good in-story reasons to be fleeing. Still, basic damsel-in-distress.

I find T&L to be vaguely problematic. (Also, it's been a long time since I saw it.) Sometimes they're strong, sometimes they're just running, and at the end it's obvious that they've been so bad the movie can't let them live. It's like those movies from the '60s and '70s where even if a gay or lesbian character was presented halfway sympathetically, you knew the movie was going to have to kill them off, or at least have them land in a gutter. Still, better than Gump.

Forrest rescues Jenny?

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

That's funny. I saw it the other way around. In her one selfless act (being with Forrest) in her life she provides an emotional center for Forrest (in the form of a son).

She replaces the other great pillar of strength in his life, his dearly departed mama.

OK. The film is about a guy. But those are powerful women, and powerful roles. I'd rank it up there with Big Fish at least...


Then again, I'm a guy.

Re: Forrest rescues Jenny?

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Well, again, I didn't think the female roles in Big Fish were particularly strong, just that they weren't doormats and were fairly realistic. (As realistic as anything else in that movie, I mean.) It was a father-son story, well-told, in which the women deliberately play only supporting roles. As the Other Woman says, there are really only two women in the movie. (Eve and Lilith, in a sense.)

I don't think our views on Jenny in Gump are ever going to even come close to each other, so there's probably no point in discussing it any farther. Suffice it to say I see her as very much his "reward" in the film, and not really much of a person at all; her whole point is for him to save her from herself. Even if your approach is correct, I wouldn't call someone who commits only one "selfless" act in her entire life a strong character.

[memeslayer.livejournal.com]

It may interest you to know that the Matrix video game(which takes place alongside the latter two movies) has you play Niobe, the captain of one of the other ships(black woman with a funky hairdo played by Jada Pinkett Smith), who is actually one of the few good female characters in video games. She's essentially the "good captain"(as opposed to Morpheus), and aside from one silly joke about women driving(better), gets more respect than most people in the Matrix universe.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Niobe kicks serious butt. Female, of color, and while she's conventionally pretty, at least she's buff rather than skinny. I found it a little strange that the second movie tried to set her up as the prize in a romantic conflict between Morpheus and That Other Guy, but it was obvious that she didn't like that, and in the end she didn't put up with it. Most female movie characters would have preened on the attention. Instead, she eats the tension for lunch and just drives like a motherf**ker.

One of the best things about the second and third Matrix films, and I'm very glad she got to play lead in the video game. (And yeah, I knew about it - I'm a DVD extras junkie, and they talk about the video game on the documentary part of Reloaded.)

[memeslayer.livejournal.com]

Titanic $600,743,440

I don't know if I'd call leaving your arranged marriage for an exciting pretty boy "strong", especially since it's one of the archetypal female actions. Also, said character basically follows the lead of the man for the whole movie. It's not like she made the decision to ditch the marriage *before* she met Leo.

Star Wars $460,935,655

This might work. Leia shows that she's capable of handling herself without having to resort to the "tougher than tough" approach of, say, Vasquez from Aliens. And don't forget Mon Mothma, who is In Charge of the rebellion. The books offer some interesting possibilities too, and thanks to Lucasfilm's licensing restrictions are even considered canon!

How about this for a litmus test:

To determine if a female character is weak, replace her with a male character in as similar a set of circumstances as can be. Would the male character have better handled the situation?

Forrest Gump $329,452,287

Haven't seen it(I know, for shame).

Pirates of the Caribbean $305,411,224

The pirate woman suffers from Vasquez Syndrome. The female lead, maybe.

Raiders of the Lost Ark $242,374,454

After her bar is burned down, she's little more than a damsel in distress. An isolated scene does not a strong character make.

T2 $204,843,345

More Vasquez Syndrome, with OCD attached. Gets point for doing intelligent stuff like taking John Conner to South America for guerilla training offscreen and trying to assasinate the scientist guy.

The Mummy Returns $202,007,640

Haven't seen it.

Grease $181,360,000

High school flashbacks! Not quite sure what to make of this one. Main character not so great, but the others have some potential(say goodbye to Vasquez Syndrome, and say hello to Fushigi Yuugi syndrome!). It's a comedy, so nobody's really allowed to be *that* strong. I guess I'll accept it.

The Matrix $171,383,253

Works for me. Trinity is Leia with fighting skills.

Hannibal $165,091,464

Haven't seen it(gonna read the books).

[bassfingers.livejournal.com]

I don't know if I'd call leaving your arranged marriage for an exciting pretty boy "strong", especially since it's one of the archetypal female actions.

Forgive me, I'll now spend the rest of my life looking for movies with non-archetypal characters that are also big money makers...

[memeslayer.livejournal.com]

Good point.

[omorka.livejournal.com]

. . . And that's part of the problem. There aren't many strong female archetypes, period. And a few of the ones that do exist (like the Sacred Harlot) aren't suitable for most movies.

Many of the ones we do get are Mother Protecting Her Cubs (e.g., T2), in which once the danger's passed she's supposed to become meek again, or the Warrior-Maiden (e.g., Buffy), in which there's usually an assumption that she'll grow out of it and become the Mother at some point.

Not that there aren't powerful female archetypes that do show up - the Empress appears in Lion in Winter in the person of Katharine Hepburn, for example - but the majority of female archetypes in our society aren't strong. And making new ones is (forgive me) a bitch.

[moontyger.livejournal.com]

Well, in the first Star Wars movie, Leia is a more effective fighter than either Han or Luke. She certainly shoots better than Han!

[omorka.livejournal.com]

Leia bounces back and forth between being a damsel in distress and a Warrior-Maiden in the first movie, although she is consistently portrayed as more competent than either Luke or Han. She's pretty consistently strong in Empire, except on Bespin, where she waffles again. In the third movie, all kinds of inconsistent stuff occurs - she fights competently, then she gets separated from the party, then she gets adopted by the Ewoks because she's pretty and shares food (very femmy), then she's a competent fighter/leader again - but that may be less about her character than Lucas not writing anybody consistently at that point.

In other words, she's Better Than One Would Expect For The Time, but still definitely suffers from tokenism. That she's expected to carry almost every female archetype in all three movies doesn't help. (There's been some suggestion from Carrie Fisher in interviews that the character was originally a lot femmier in pretty stereotypical ways, and that some of that changed during filming.)

For what it's worth, it seems to run in the family - the same switching happens to Amidala, who also has the "fashion horse" stereotype running. (At least Leia got to wear practical clothes after the first movie.) Again, I think I'll blame Lucas - several scenes from Attack of the Clones that would have better developed her character got left on the cutting room floor because they didn't advance the action.

Damsel in distress?!!

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

She lead the party to smuggle stolen Death Star plans. Sure she was caught, but she cleverly planted the plans in a robot, giving it detailed instructions to avoid capture and deliver the plans by an alternate route.

Wasn't she standing tall for her cause under extreme torture during her stay in the Death Star? Then she still has choice words for her bubmbling 'rescuers'. Then SHE actually saves THEM by making an escape into the trash system.

The only reason she waffles on Bespin is that she's actually realised that Han is a real hero. She's been figuring him for a total wash-out until Bespin. (IMHO)

Re: Damsel in distress?!!

[omorka.livejournal.com]

One of the things that sticks in my craw about Leia is the message she sends with Artoo. "Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi - you're my only hope." Total damsel in distress, which is why it fascinates Luke. I suspect it's a holdover from an earlier, more sexist version of the script, in which Leia was less competent, but it still makes her look like she's waiting for her Jedi knight in, well, actually, it's not the one in shining armor but anyway. It may be her being deliberately femmy in order to manipulate Obi-Wan - but it doesn't seem like he's terribly manipulable that way (of course, we only know that after the fact).

Okay, the guys who go on about Jedis who kiss their sisters need to think about this one: Darth Vader and the torture droid - with his daughter. Ick, ick, ick. You'd think he'd have noticed, too - he notices Luke pretty fast. Is the Force sexist, too? (She did hold up heroically under torture. I'm not claiming she's not strong most of the time. And she does occasionally use other people's sexism to her advantage - Jabba, bikini, chain, yeah. Just that she's not consistent, she's not the main character, and the scripts shortchange her. If this had been Leia's story rather than Luke's, it would look very different.)

My perception of her waffling on Bespin is that it has more to do with Lando than with Han. At least, that seems the obvious reading. Whether it's because she's attracted to him or repulsed by him is up for grabs . . .

Re: Damsel in distress?!!

[moontyger.livejournal.com]

I admit I always liked Leia because I saw her as strong... even when threatened with the destruction of her entire home planet, she still lies about the location of the Rebel base. The "Help me" message was only part of a longer message that seems less desperate (you see it at the beginning, when she is recording said message).

Amidala's biggest flaw seems to be absolutely horrendous taste in men. What was she thinking?!?

Re: Damsel in distress?!!

[memeslayer.livejournal.com]

To be fair, there's not a whole lot else that Leia *could* do. When Darth Vader decides he wants your lightly armed diplomatic vessel, it's only a matter of time. I can't think of anything that a male character would have done differently leading up to the capture and still have survived(so fighting is probably out). The fact that Leia is able to be saved is a "coincidence" -- Kenobi wasn't looking for her, he was looking for Alderaan.

Hollywood and women

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

Hollywood never invented anything. They steal, and they do it badly. They're just retelling the male dominated action stories that our culture has been collecting for millenia. Add to this the 'good old boy' money involved and you have a formula for terrible roles for women. We should celebrate every 'Red Sonja' we can get out of Hollywood.

Sofia Coppolla only got to be a woman director because her father's name opened doors that remain shut for other women. She has a heavy burden to bear because of that: she's speaking for her whole gender now. That's gotta suck.

James Cameron has done a pretty good job of putting stong women in his films, but he's a guy. His lead in the Abyss worked for me. As did his True Lies leading lady. His best female may be Newt. Which leads me to my fav. alltime leading woman hero:

Ripley!

Depsite being directed by a rogue's gallery of men across the four films, and being in a horror film (a genre infamous for using women as sex object or raw meat, or both at the same time.), the alien films give you a real female hero to root for.

Still, I don't think you CAN tell stories with strong women in them unless you have strong women in your life. Women will have more exposure to that than men. Thus: we need more women directors!

As for Smallworld's lack of XX, I have to plead guilty as charged. As I man I am going to repeat the mistakes that other male storytellers have made in creating good female roles. I have lost sleep over this, but I can't deny that I have trouble writing strong women. Douglas Adams had the same problem, and he can WRITE! I have made some obvious token attempts to fix that:

President of Net23, Laura Smith (later a President of the U.S.)
Dessie Gasahol, hardboiled agent in charge of Villalobos
HELP (based upon the template of grand programmer Laura hayknot, or somesuch)
Alice Borealis, who I partly wrote to address the issue of women in Hollywood. (the system trys to use her, and then she tries to use the system. I'm still not sure who won, but she does get to live to see a female president, and a world of gender neutral bathrooms.)
Veronica (roots stories, former lead of Ant Colony. Runs Blythe Spirits in the end.)
Donna (Assistant to Forresst Enzo. She's not human, so it may not count. Plus, she's a bit of a wembler)
Samantha, head of U.S. Census, section seven, containment team (she shows up in Harbordale to mop up)
Gamma, head of the library at C4H. She leads the counterattacks in the man-machine war. Tough woman.
Ms. Jasper, formerly Mrs. Poe. (Need to work on that. Great potential...)
Laura Hardy, a ghost that haunts Blythe Spirits in 'Roots'. Transforms from doormat to seriously angry ghost during the course of the story.

I could go on, but the problem is that we still follow two guys around in these stories. Two guys who don't ever seem to date real women. Two guys who aren't gay, yet don't seem to date women. Like many comedy teams, they are stuck in a childlike state of faux innocence. They can work with a woman like Dessie and not ever notice her strong yet feminine features. They barely note Dr. B when they encounter her. I've tried to make this part of the gag, but it makes coming up with strong roles for women in the stories harder and harder. Give me some classic roles for women that don't make you want to puke and I'd love to use 'em!

Since I'm playing off of Noir and Sci-fi, I'm severly hampered by the terrible roles women are forced into in these genres. Look at Blade Runner. That film has some serious issues to resolve about women!

Re: Aliens & Cameron

[bibulb.livejournal.com]

It's also worth noting that Aliens was both James Cameron and (his wife at the time, but it's really immaterial in any case considering their individual pedigrees) Gale Anne Hurd, who has had a penchant for strong female characters in her works. Mostly standard archetypes, but still strong women throughout. (I never actually got to see Battle Beyond the Stars, so I can't tell you what the freaky women in that one were like - it was a Corman film, so it could fall either way...)

Re: Aliens & Cameron

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

Battle Beyond the Stars is ALL Corman! The women are worse than decoration, and more painful than amateur dentistry.

Re: Hollywood and women

[omorka.livejournal.com]

"Still, I don't think you CAN tell stories with strong women in them unless you have strong women in your life. Women will have more exposure to that than men."

Is that true? I wouldn't have thought it would be. Will men naturally have more exposure to strong men in their lives than women do? Is it really so much harder for a male director/screenwriter to come up with a strong female role than it would be for a woman in the same position? Female screenwriters don't seem to have difficulty imagining strong male roles.

On the one hand, I find it irritating that someone who got where she did because of obvious nepotism is speaking for my entire gender. On the other hand, Sofia's brother tried his hand at the family business and didn't make it, despite having the same advantages AND a dick, so she's obviously got something going for her above and beyond Daddy's name and money.

I'm not always thrilled at Cameron's idea of a tough gal, but certainly his women-in-action are some of the best I've seen.

I wouldn't have counted Mrs. Poe/Mrs. Jasper as particularly strong, but that's mostly because we don't see much of her, and she's understandably not at her best when we do see her.

"Two guys who don't ever seem to date real women. Two guys who aren't gay, yet don't seem to date women. Like many comedy teams, they are stuck in a childlike state of faux innocence."

And someone's going to write slashfic about them someday. I will try and not let that person be me. :) That "childlike state of faux innocence" always has faint tinges of repressed homoeroticism in it. The scene with Thrie and Pye in the hallway when they're discussing whether or not to take Mrs. Poe's case, for instance . . . . Like so many male/male long-term partnerships - Jagger/Richards, Affleck/Damon - they're so obviously married that whether or not they've ever screwed is irrelevant. No mere woman could ever enter into that partnership without either taking them both on or splitting them up first.

Re: Hollywood and women

[quantumduck.livejournal.com]

Don't get me wrong about Sofia. I think she got where she did on her talent, but I also think others with just as much talent are being crushed by the same system that's telling her she's special.