from a feminist perspective
Here’s the trailer for The Runaways. I found it interesting that this one focuses heavily on Dakota Fanning and her character.
Film opens next Friday, March 19. Writer/director Floria Sigismondi will be our next guest on In Conversation- Women & Hollywood’s online radio show next Tuesday, March 16th at 1pm EST. Listen here.
What do you think? Does the trailer make you want to see the film?
March is Women’s History Month, but we should be celebrating all year. Women artists’ perceptions and stories offer a valuable contribution to society, but statistics show a lowly percentage of plays and films produced by and about women. Just to make you aware: Only 17 % of plays produced on national non-profit stages are written by women. (Wilner, Jordan, The Dramatist,Sept.-Oct.2009)
It’s not that women aren’t writing plays and trying to get them produced. It’s impossible without an agent, and agents rudely ignore your query or send your letter back with a note scribbled, “Not interested without a professional recommendation.” There are a lot of closed doors.
As a person who believes fervently in equality, I’ve been working with advocacy groups through the Dramatists Guild and with 50/50 in 2020 to improve opportunities for women to have our work produced in theater and in films. We need your support. Here’s how you can help:
What about women and films?
24% of women work in a key behind-the-scenes role (directors, writers, producers, cinematographers, and editors) on independent festival films, compared with 16% for high budget studio films. YET WE ARE IN THE MAJORITY IN THE POPULATION. The first step to change is awareness. Here are some things you can do:
Be aware, be indignant, be pro-active. Onward and upward.
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Barbara Sutton Masry is a playwright, screenwriter, producer, and activist whose independent feature film, “A Wake-up Call” is in development.
The women at the Fusion Film Festival at NYU invited me to their screening last week of The Runaways. I’ll talk more about the movie when it opens but I really enjoyed being exposed to a slice of women’s history that I never knew about. My relationship to Joan Jett began in the 80s when she came out with I Love Rock and Roll. Never even knew she was in a breakthrough girl band in the 70s.
Joan attended the screening and talked a little bit about what it was like to have created the first all girl rock band.
Here are some of the bits that Joan shared:
She is very proud of the Runaways and believes they did something important.
The Runaways were more successful in Japan and Europe and she believes that they were popular in Japan because of how women were treated there at that time.
When they got off the plane in Scandinavia they were greeted by thousands of blonde girls sucking on pacifiers but she never knew why.
People were really dismissive of the band in America because they were threatening. She got such hate for trying to make art.
She doesn’t believe much has changed in the last 30 years.
It’s got to be the same in the film business- getting taken seriously. It’s any area you get into. I don’t think it’s just in the music business, it’s pervasive. For some reason people are afraid of powerful women. I don’t really get it.
I was away for a couple of days and tried to come back with a new, positive attitude. You know how hard that is for a New Yorker in February?
But my mood was so ruined this morning by several different descriptions of some new films that literally made me scream out loud. Me thinks that films for women are going further and further downhill.
Number 1
Bad Teacher- starring Cameron Diaz – written by Lee Eisenberg and Gene Stupnitsky. Will be directed by Jake Kasdan.
Description: Story centers on a foulmouthed, gold-digging middle-school teacher who, after getting dumped by her boyfriend, competes with a colleague for the affections of the school’s model teacher.
Please tell me how going after another teacher makes you a gold-digger which is by the way such a sexist term?
Number 2
The Undomestic Goddess to be directed by Tom Bezucha (The Family Stone)
Based on the Sophie Kinsella novel
Description: The book centers on a workaholic female attorney who, believing she wrecked her chances of being named partner at her London firm, has a meltdown and ends up in the English countryside. After stopping at a large house to ask directions, she is mistaken as a candidate for a maid position and takes a housekeeping job.
I’ve never read the books but my question is, is she mistaken for a maid because she is a woman? Because she is driving a certain car? And what by the way does a housekeeper exactly look like?
Number 3
Bachelorette Party written by Karen Lutz (based on her novel)
Description: unlucky-in-love high school teacher facing the prospect of throwing a bachelorette party for her uptight cousin, who is marrying the teacher’s best male friend. But during the alcohol-fuelled event, the cousin cheats on her fiancé, leading our heroine to decide who she supports. Bet she secretly fancies her male buddy as well.
Film will star Anna Faris and Jennifer Garner.
I can usually take one of these in a day, but three? Do you hear me screaming out where you live?
Talk about girl power! The film has its world premiere this weekend at Sundance with Joan Jett in attendance (and I read they rocked out afterwards.) Here’s a description (from fandango):
The story of the groundbreaking ’70s female rock group the Runaways is recounted in this River Road Entertainment production focusing on the duo of guitarist/vocalist Joan Jett (portrayed by Twilight’s Kristen Stewart) and lead vocalist/keyboardist Cherie Currie (Dakota Fanning) as they navigate a rocky road of touring and record label woes under the malevolent eye of abusive manager Kim Fowley (Michael Shannon) during their teen years. Acclaimed video artist Floria Sigismondi directs from her own script, with Scout Taylor-Compton co-starring as guitarist Lita Ford.
This movie looks so great. Looks like Dakota Fanning is officially grown up and Kristen Stewart gets back to her indie roots. The one important point is that Apparition who releases the film on March 19th, needs to figure out how to avoid what happened to Whip-It to make this one a success.
Some reviews
Sundance Review: The Runaways (Cinematical) -- positive
Sundance: Kristen Stewart and Dakota Fanning rock out in ‘The Runaways,’ but the movie itself is no knockout (EW) -- mixed
What I love about Andrea Arnold is that she is not afraid to show the grit and grime in everyday life. In her Cannes Jury Prize winning film Fish Tank (opening today in limited release), Arnold tells the story of Mia, a 15-year-old girl fighting to find her place in the world. She lives in the “fish tank” which is the low-income high rise of Essex with her mom and younger sister. They are a family in crisis. Mom is struggling just to get by, has a bad history of boyfriends, and Mia spend lots of time on her own getting into trouble. So much trouble that she has been kicked out of school and needs to go off to some kind of reformatory. Her dream is to dance her way to a new life. She finds vacant apartments, plugs in her music and dances for hours creating routines. When mom brings home a new boyfriend (Michael Fassbender) who shows affection for Mia and her family, Mia misinterprets that affection in her desperation to be loved.
The film is raw and exciting to watch. You see the uninhibited energy of newcomer Katie Jarvis as she struggles to find her place in the world without any adult guidance. It’s a sad portrait of a girl who is way too alone, but finds sanity in her dancing. From the film notes I learned that Arnold did not give the script to the actors before filming began. She didn’t want them to over prepare. If you haven’t seen her first film, Red Road, you should. She is a great talent, telling hard stories about women. Fish Tank should be seen by anyone interested in seeing a very talented woman director at work.
The best thing I can say about Leap Year is that it was not as bad as I expected it to be. Films that open in early January are usually really, bad. Remember Bride Wars? That being said I still found the movie at times to be infuriating, especially the first 20 minutes when I literally wanted to drop kick Amy Adams’ character Anna across the room.
Adams plays a Type A apartment stager – meaning she pretties apartments about to go on the market so they get better offers. On a side note I am sick and tired of these female romantic comedy characters who start off as high strung control freaks and through the love of a man they defrost and start to let go and live life one day at a time. Enough.
Anna lives with — but is not engaged to — a cardiologist jerk who gives her status which she needs since grew up with a loser dad who lost their house. (Of course there is no mention of her mother, but I’m not going to get into that one.)
Her best friend tells her one day while trying on dresses that she saw Mr. cardiologist jerk leaving a high- brow jewelry store with a package in his hand. You know what that means! But poor Anna jumped the gun and in the package were only beautiful diamond earrings not her expected engagement ring. Whoops.
But Anna won’t be deterred. She decides to fly to Dublin where Mr. Cardiology jerk is at a conference and propose to him, because on Leap Day a woman can do that. Once every four years a woman can propose to a man. It’s beyond insulting.
Suffice it to say her journey to Dublin is fraught with turbulence — literally and figuratively — and when the plane is diverted due to a storm the one thought that crosses her mind (which unfortunately for us she says out loud) when it feels like the plane might go down is “I can’t die without getting engaged. “ My thought at that moment was please save me.
The film improves with the introduction of Matthew Goode (one of my favs) as a pub owner from a small Irish town who Anna hires to drive her to Dublin in time to make her proposal. Thus begins the typical romantic comedy relationship — they first loath each other, then only hate each other, then they discover the other one isn’t so bad, then of course, they fall head over heels for each other. Been there, done that. But it made me think that the time has come for Mr. Goode to be the lead in a film.
So watching Leap Year made me come up with my first new year’s wish to Hollywood: stop making stupid formulaic romantic comedies. People are smarter than you give us credit for.
Mabel Normand
In 1989 Congress created the National Film Registry which “spotlights the importance of protecting America’s matchless film heritage and cinematic creativity.” Here’s what it does:
Under the terms of the National Film Preservation Act, each year the Librarian of Congress names 25 films to the registry that are “culturally, historically or aesthetically” significant, to be preserved for all time. These films are not selected as the “best” American films of all time; rather, they are chosen as works of enduring importance to American culture.
Here are the list of women directed films that made it to the list. Most seem quite small, obscure and old that I have no idea if they can be seen anywhere.
(All descriptions from the Library of Congress web site)
Mabel’s Blunder (1914)
Mabel Normand, who wrote, directed and starred in “Mabel’s Blunder,” was the most successful of the early silent screen comediennes. The film tells the tale of a young woman who is secretly engaged to the boss’ son. When a new employee catches the young man’s eye, a jealous Mabel dresses up as a chauffeur to spy on them, which leads to a series of mistaken identities. The film showcases Normand’s spontaneous and intuitive playfulness and her ability to be both romantically appealing and boisterously funny.
Quasi at the Quackadero (1975)
“Quasi at the Quackadero” has earned the term “unique.” Once described as a “mixture of 1930s Van Beuren cartoons and 1960s R. Crumb comics with a dash of Sam Flax,” and a descendent of the “Depression-era funny animal cartoon,” Sally Cruikshank’s wildly imaginative tale of odd creatures visiting a psychedelic amusement park careens creatively from strange to truly wacky scenes. It became a favorite of the Midnight Movie circuit in the 1970s. Cruikshank later created animation sequences for “Sesame Street,” the 1986 film “Ruthless People” and the “Cartoon Land” sequence in the 1983 film “Twilight Zone: The Movie.”
The Red Book (1994)
Renowned experimental filmmaker and theater/installation artist Janie Geiser’s work is known for its ambiguity, explorations of memory and emotional states and exceptional design. She describes “The Red Book” as “an elliptical, pictographic animated film that uses flat, painted figures and collage elements in both two and three dimensional settings to explore the realms of memory, language and identity from the point of view of a woman amnesiac.”
Scratch and Crow (1995)
Helen Hill’s student film was made at the California Institute of the Arts. Consistent with the short films she made from age 11 until her death at 36, this animated short work is filled with vivid color and a light sense of humor. It is also a poetic and spiritual homage to animals and the human soul.
A Study in Reds (1932)
This polished amateur film by Miriam Bennett spoofs women’s clubs and the Soviet menace in the 1930s. While listening to a tedious lecture on the Soviet threat, Wisconsin Dells’ Tuesday Club members fall asleep and find themselves laboring in an all-women collective in Russia under the unflinching eye of the Soviet special police.
And two women centric films Jezebel and Mrs. Miniver were also included.
Full list here
I totally LOVED Avatar. It was a great forward thinking film with tons of passion and made me excited to be in a movie theatre. I can’t wait to see it again (my friend and I tried several times last weekend but were sold out.) Next time I am seeing it in 3-D. I loved the fact that it was basically an anti-corporate movie paid for by one of the biggest corporations in the world – Fox Corp. This kind of makes me laugh.
For those of you under a rock for the last several weeks the story is basically a revisiting of American history when the white European settlers wiped out the native Americans. But it’s been updated to the moon Pandora and the army wants a valuable resource and they are willing to destroy the natives who are blue and huge and called Na’vi to get what they want.
The thing I love about Sci-fi is that it affords creative people like James Cameron to be forward thinking about gender. Just like in Battlestar Galactica, gender doesn’t matter in Avatar. There was nothing in the film that gave any indication of the bullshit gender constraints that usually populate Hollywood flicks. The women were everywhere and they were strong, smart and bold (thank you Girls Inc.)
Let’s start with Sigourney Weaver as Dr. Grace Augustine. Grace is the person who created the way to communicate with the Na’vi. She has dedicated her life to trying to gain the Na’vi’s trust and from what I can tell she is the one who created the technology for the Avatars.
Zoe Saldana — who we never see as a human — plays Neytiri the daughter of the leaders of the Na’vi. She is charged with showing the ropes to soldier, Jake Sully and is a kick ass warrior on her own. She is one of the few who has tamed a mangoose (did I get that right?) and is clearly a leader among her people.
Michelle Rodriguez plays a kick ass (I know I repeated that description but it is appropriate) helicopter pilot who questions authority and will not shoot and kill just because she is told. She sees the bigger picture and is willing to die for it.
And I can’t forget CCH Pounder as the queen Moat, Neytiri’s mother who becomes the leader after the death of her husband.
So I give props to James Cameron a man who has been married to several of the strongest women in Hollywood including Gale Ann Hurd, Kathryn Bigelow and Linda Hamilton. While none of those marriages worked out something clearly rubbed off on him.
I don’t really think too often about Tennessee Williams’ women, but in the last couple of weeks I have seen a movie, The Loss of the Teardrop Diamond and a play A Streetcar Named Desire so his women have been on my mind. In anticipation of seeing Cate Blanchett in Streetcar (which by the way was one of the BEST performance on stage EVER) I pulled out my old copy of the play off the shelf and on the cover was a picture of Marlon Brando. But then I saw the play and I was reminded — it is all about Blanche.
It made me think more about Williams and his women. He seriously had a knack for writing these southern women who just couldn’t fit into the culture, who were stultified and driven mad when the constrictions of their world closed in on them. Bryce Dallas Howard is Fisher Willow (love that name) the latest Williams incarnation in the newly discovered script that Williams wrote directly for the screen, The Loss of the Teardrop Diamond. The script was found by actress Jodie Markell who fell in love with it and set about making this film her directorial debut.
Howard is very interesting as a young woman who tries to play by a lot of the rules of her stature in 1920s New Orleans but at the same time chafes at those same rules. She just doesn’t fit in and wants to get the hell out, but at the same time knows she’s stuck.
Film also includes performance by Ellen Burstyn as a woman who wants to die with dignity, Mamie Gummer and a brief cameo by Ann Margaret.
Film opens today in NY and LA.
Check out my appearance on a year end movie segment on GRITtv hosted by Laura Flanders.
I didn’t think I could love Manohla Dargis anymore after her awesome piece in the NY Times this weekend, but this honest and angry interview with Jezebel made me swoon with excitement.
We never, ever see a person of Dargis’ stature standing up for women in the film business in this public manner. I really hope that she is the first to speak out, not the last. But more importantly, we need to figure out how to get things to change so we have more good women’s films and opportunities for women directors.
But this is an awesome start.
Kudos to the women from Jezebel, in particular Irin Camron for getting this interview. It totally rocks!
Some choice quotes:
On why women in Hollywood aren’t faring any better: This business is really about clubby relationships. If you buy Variety or go online and look at the deals, you see one guy after another smiling in a baseball cap. It’s all guys making deals with other guys. I had a female studio chief a couple of years ago tell me point blank that she wasn’t hiring a woman to do an action movie because women are good at certain things and not others. If you have women buying that bullshit how can we expect men to be better?
Working within the system has not worked. It has not helped women filmmakers or, even more important, you and me, women audiences, to have women in the studio system. … I think the studio system as it exists now is a no-win situation for women filmmakers.
You can be a male filmmaker and if you’re perceived as a genius – a boy genius or a fully-formed adult genius – that you are allowed to fail in a way that a woman is not allowed to fail.
On women being taken seriously as moviegoers: It’s a vicious cycle. We’re not going to movies because there aren’t movies for us. Therefore we’re not seen as a loyal moviegoing audience. My point is that if there are stories about women, women will come out for that…
That’s why [women] go to a movie like The Devil Wears Prada and make huge hits. They want to see women in movies. People in the trade press constantly frame that as a surprise. This, gee whiz, Sex and the City’s a hit, Twilight, hmm, wonder what’s going on here. Maybe they should not be so surprised. In the trade press, women audiences are considered a niche. How is that even possible? We’re 51 percent of the audience.
I don’t want to be the woman critic. I don’t want to be the feminist critic. I don’t want to be the shrew. What I want to do is talk about the art that I love and point out, every so often, inequities….It’s a weird balancing act and I’m not saying there aren’t contradictions.
Re-reading the piece again this morning is actually making me cry with relief. Finally. It’s like the rose color glasses are off and the boxing gloves are on.
Game on Hollywood!
You must read the whole piece: “Fuck Them”: Times Critic On Hollywood, Women, & Why Romantic Comedies Suck (Jezebel)
Now that we are about to enter 2010 everyone is looking back on the last decade and compiling lists upon lists. Here’s a list that caught my attention, The Hollywood Reporter’s Top Ten Movies of the Decade and not surprisingly, there is not a single female directed film on the list. You can tell from the list that it was not a US based list so that opens is up much wider. I seriously cannot believe that a single woman directed film in the last decade is not worthy of being on this list.
Here’s the list that was published (FYI- there is no information on how the list was compiled)
1- Letters from Iwo Jima
2-United 93
3- No Country for Old Men
4- The Fog of War
5- 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days
6- Far From Heaven
7- Divine Intervention
8- Cache
9- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
10- The White Ribbon
So my question is, what women directed films do you think should be included on this list?
As New Moon descends on the world today I asked a couple of colleagues who write and think about film from different cities to answer some questions about the global phenomenon.
The questions I posed are followed by the answers by the different women. Some of the participants requested anonymity. The participants are: Jen Yamato, Cinematical/FEARnet Contributor; Candice Frederick, Reel Talk; Erin Donovan, Steady Diet of Film; Shannon Ridler, The Movie Moxie; Karen Gilmore, Reel Artsy; Jessica Barnes, Cinematical; Sasha Stone, managing editor, Awards Daily; MaryAnn Johanson, FlickFilosopher.com and Jenni Miller, Cinematical.
You should add them all to your regular reading.
1- The studio is trying to hold down box office expectations but based on many indicators New Moon could make $100 million dollars this weekend and it has the potential to even break the record for highest weekend gross of the year (the record is now held by Transformers at $109). Do you think the movie business is taking this film seriously as a potential game changer or is it looked at as a fluke?
JEN YAMATO: I think the power of female ticket buyers has been noticed by Hollywood, thanks to Twilight, but its perceived success still comes from pre-determined factors: namely, the huge worldwide following of Stephenie Meyer’s source novels. And so to replicate the success of the Twilight films, a studio may still think a pre-sold audience is necessary. But if anything, New Moon seems to prove the potency of female audiences’ appetite for romantic stories and hunky male bodies – especially when its actors have tabloid-worthy private lives to devour off-screen. The Twilight phenomenon is not simply a film movement, but a multi-headed entity with tentacles in merchandising, books, music, the currency of celebrity, live events, and beyond. In that regards, it is unusual.
CANDICE FREDERICK: I think it is probably viewed for what it is, a cult phenomenon, like others have been in the past. They’ll harp on this until the next one comes around.
ERIN DONOVAN: Everything is a fluke until someone figures out how to reliably monetize it.
SHANNON RIDLER: I think the movie business did not take Twilight seriously and it’s too soon to say with New Moon as just being released today. I think it is a potential game changer which proves that women and girls will go to the theatre if there is something they really want to see. It also has proven that this particular audience can, will and plans to see what they like numerous times in the theatre – which is not something we see often. I don’t think it’s fair to call it a fluke considering it was a 4 book series and at least a 3 film series, I think it’s fairer to call it a perfect storm of timing to get this content to its audience. Very likely it will be imitated but I can’t imagine any results being anywhere near as strong as we’ve already seen.
KAREN GILMORE: Summit is taking this film seriously, that’s for sure! And right now don’t you think that every studio is secretly wishing that they had New Moon on their roster? Twilight is a juggernaut whether people chose to embrace it or poke fun at it. Team Edward apparel has taken over Hot Topic and several other stores. If you walk into Target’s entertainment section Twilight merchandise is front and center. Hollywood wants movies that go beyond the movie and the Twilight Saga does that. It’s already a game changer, look at how many vampire (and werewolf) related stories are popping up in film and TV. Do you think The CW would have been so eager to push Vampire Diaries if not for Twilight’s success? No way!
JESSICA BARNES: I think Hollywood has been taking the teens pretty seriously for some time now, and while there are adult fans of the series, teens are the bread and butter of the franchise. The film reminded studios that women of all ages are still a viable market for box-office returns.
SASHA STONE: I think they have to play it close to the vest or else risk losing the fan base. If Twilight became as big as Harry Potter in conceptual advertising, it would lose its fake edge. Since it appeals to goths and outsiders (or wanna be goths and outsiders) it has to hold on to its cred. It can’t ever to have appeared to have sold out. All of this is smoke and mirrors as they ride this thing out to its conclusion. The stories are ultimately vacuous — it’s all about the romance and that is what makes it irresistable but also temporary.
MARYANN JOHANSON: If it does really well, it’ll be considered a fluke. If it flops — which seems unlikely — it will be seen as evidence that movies aimed at girls and women don’t succeed. We cannot win here.
JENNI MILLER: I don’t know much about box office stuff, but I do think that it is both a fluke (after all, MTV passed on the book rights) and a wake-up call for Hollywood that teens and women of all ages can and will blow your BO out of the water. Of course, the cult surrounding it is what makes that possible. Without the books, the hype, the constant press and touring and gossip, this movie wouldn’t have been that big.
2- Do you think the franchise gets enough respect in the Hollywood establishment or the film blogosphere? If not, why do you think that’s the case?
JEN YAMATO: There is no doubt that the Twilight franchise is dominated by female fans. It doesn’t get a fair shake in the film blogosphere because, simply put, the blogosphere is itself dominated by male voices. To say the appreciation is divided by gender seems reductive, but it’s true; men and non-fans (i.e. those who have not read and loved the books) just don’t connect to the stuff that Twilight fans, mostly female, find potent. The difference in attitudes in the film blogosphere is one of respect vs. attention; the majority of online writers can’t ignore that Twilight is a phenomenon, one which most importantly, drives traffic from a heretofore untapped online demographic. But respect for Twilight – the books, the films, their fans, and the reasons why fans like Twilight to begin with — is something that is severely lacking at the moment.
That’s partially why it’s so impressive to me that the Twilight phenomenon has borne an entirely new segment of bloggers: Twilight fan sites, created and run by fans themselves. The fan site community has become its own self-contained space, and they’re doing just fine for themselves.
CANDICE FREDERICK: I’m not sure if respect is the right word, but I do think the vampire phenomenon has folks taking notice and have even jumped on the bandwagon with other vampire spinoffs like the show “Vampire Diaries.” People will most likely hop on anything that is selling money for the moment until the next biggest thing comes around.
ERIN DONOVAN: Teenage girls aren’t really the film blogosphere demographic, so it’s not surprising that films catered to them will not be respected by bloggers.
SHANNON RIDLER: I don’t think the franchise gets enough respect in the Hollywood establishment or the film blogosphere. The Hollywood establishment overall seems to report on it as they do most things that are very popular, talk about it while it’s hear and then on to the next thing when it’s gone. The film blogosphere is a different story there seems to be two streams: The TwiHards who talk about anything and everything to do with the Twilight and other film sites that talk about it just because it’s big news even though they don’t care about the series at all. I’ve noticed this specifically with horror film websites where Twilight be something their audience is in yet they report on it all the same. I think when Twilight is reported on but the writers obviously don’t care they just do it to hits on their site.
KAREN GILMORE: Twilight is one of those subjects that quickly became polarized in the blogosphere. Either people love it or hate it and there isn’t much middle ground. Why? Because that’s probably what draws the most hits to a website. Fandoms and over critical gossip/trash sites seem to be beacons on the Internet. They entertain people with their avid devotion or snark.
JESSICA BARNES: No, I don’t think it is all that respected. Partly, because just as a film there were some major problems with the first installment of the franchise, and in spite of Hardwicke’s efforts most of the film was pretty stilted – it was almost as if the plot didn’t show up until half way through. But mainly I think most of the derision comes from my belief that women’s taste isn’t all that respected in pop culture discussions. So-called chick flicks are considered to be low-brow and sentimental at best and at worst, just crappy films. I was stunned to see how Twilight fans were treated at ComiCon with accusations of how they ‘ruining everything’, as if somehow those fans weren’t legitimate followers of a fantasy franchise, they were just boy crazy.
SASHA STONE: I think it is probably snickered about because it is aimed at tweener girls, the least respected group, no doubt. But money talks so they’ll eventually have to bow down. No one really giggles when young boys are shelling out their allowance to watch Megan Fox bend over a car because, on some level, Hollywood and the blogosphere is run by and dominated by young men and boys — even older men who run things are secretly young boys underneath it all.
Girls are a whole different animal. Because less money is spent on entertainment aimed at them, and because they aren’t as reliable in terms of box office, it remains a mystery as to what really draws girls in droves.
MARYANN JOHANSON: Well, it’s absurd, and ridiculous, and offers a terrible role model in Bella, who is passive and whiny and extra super annoying. As movies, these are awful, and don’t deserve any more respect than, say, the oeuvre of Michael Bay. However, if adolescent male sexuality — for boys of all ages! — can be catered to on a regular basis by Hollywood, it must be seen as a measure of progress, if of a depressing sort, that adolescent female sexuality is being catered to, if only in this one franchise.
I would be marginally happier if Hollywood actually acted the way everyone says it acts — it’s a business! it’s all about the money! — if that held true when it came to movies aimed at women, even if they’re awful. *Twilight* made a crapload of money; *New Moon* will make even more. Will that result in more movies like these? I’m guessing not, because “everyone knows” that women don’t go to the movies, and movies aimed at women don’t make money. Even though they clearly do.
JENNI MILLER: It gets no respect in the blogosphere except as a traffic-driver — in the past, I’ve been just as guilty as courting that audience for numbers, even going so far as to email the people who run fansites. Because they are rabid for info on Twilight, and it WORKS! The movie — I haven’t seen the second — isn’t actually THAT bad, but I think everything around it is what pisses online journos off. It’s for fanGIRLS (of all ages), as someone awesome at Cinematical pointed out — the comic book people (like myself) are just as nerdy and screaming but on the inside! I literally squealed going into the Tim Burton Q&A yesterday. I stayed to shake his hand. People like him are my Twilight. So that is why I think Twilight is easy to make fun of; I’m guilty of it myself. So the people who do pander to that audience to get traffic get no respect, even though it’s for THEIR audience, and they get no respect, no matter what. Which is unfair, because you do have to give your audience what they want.
Continue reading ‘Women Writers Talk New Moon’
This is just another reason why I have such trouble with the NY Times reviews. A.O. Scott put his subjective look at the “great” films from 2000 to now, and not surprisingly, only a lone female filmmaker (Claire Denis), and not one female centric film are mentioned in his list.
Sigh.
Women get no respect in Hollywood and from the NY Times, as Scott mentions at the end of his piece:
Movies seem to be, increasingly, for and about men and (mostly male) kids, with adult women in the marginal roles of wives and mothers, there to be avenged, resented or run to when things get too scary.
The piece had a lot of opportunities to include women. While he talked about comedies he could have mentioned Nicole Holofcener’s films which have true and original womens voices in them. I also think that Kelly Reichardt has a very original and interesting voice. And that’s just off the top of my head.
What movies by women over the last decade would you include?
It is incumbent upon the NY Times to see the bigger picture beyond the typical names that we always here or else they are dooming us to fulfilling the prophecy of having fewer and fewer woman on screen, and quite frankly that would be a full-fledged cultural disaster.
Screen Memories (NY Times)
I love when I get my Entertainment Weekly preview issues. Just love them. This year’s holiday movie preview just arrived and lo and behold it looks like it could be a pretty decent season for us women.
The season has already begun with Oscar frontrunner Precious, but when the cover gives me a picture of Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin in a Nancy Meyers flick, I am happy. It’s Complicated opens on December 25 and I for one cannot wait to see it. It’s looks to be Something’s Gotta Give but even better.
I am also psyched for Sandra Bullock’s new film (she has been busy this year) The Blind Side based on the Michael Lewis book. It’s about a white couple from Memphis who take in a homeless very large African-American teenager and makes him a part of their family. Here’s the description: “A cross-pollination of heart warming family film and rousing sports movie, with a little Erin Brockovich social consciousness thrown in…” My kind of movie. Sounds like this film can get the guys and the girls.
The whispers are starting about Bullock’s performance (haven’t seen it yet) as Oscar material but she shuns that kind of conversation.
“People who do what I do don’t do award winning films…which is kind of a relief…I’d rather roll home, put on the jeans, go outside, pick up dog poop, or go for a run or something.”
Another reason why I love her. She’d rather pick up dog poop than wear a fancy dress.
Then of course there is juggernaut of Twilight- New Moon which opens opposite The Blind Side and this movie will be HUGE. (working on a separate post about this.) I think it will beat Twilight’s 68 million opening weekend numbers.
I’m about to see The Private Lives of Pippa Lee written and directed by Rebecca Miller based on her own novel starring Robin Wright. Wright who has shed soon to be ex Sean’s last name feels like she has finally gotten a juicy role and she is psyched:
Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore, and the Kates have all gotten great roles, and were so good in them, and now I got one…I finally got one.
Here’s a little shout out to the adorable Anna Kendrick who at 24 really holds her own opposite George Clooney in Up in the Air. Here’s what she said that got me loving her:
My character is so rare. She doesn’t have sex with anybody. She doesn’t revolve around the boy. She’s smart and complicated and really messed up.
She knows the it may be a while because she gets another character like this, which incidentally writer/director Jason Reitman wrote with her in mind.
I’m going to have to deal with a lot of characters that revolve around a guy or just aren’t that well-rounded.
Isn’t it sad that a 24 year old knows that she may have already have gotten the best part of her career already? Hopefully, that’s not true since based on her performance and the Oscar buzz, she’s going to be around a long, long time.
Other movies (including some that star guys) I am looking forward to over these next couple of months include: Avatar; A Single Man; The Lovely Bones; Nine; Invictus; Brothers; The Last Station; Serious Moonlight; Did You Hear About the Morgans?; The Young Victoria and The Loss of a Teardrop Diamond.
What movies are you looking forward to?
I have not stopped thinking about Precious since I saw it almost a week ago. This is a movie that unleashed many emotions many that have been hard to articulate properly. Here are some of the things I’ve been pondering (more on the film’s content to come tomorrow.)
Could this film win the Best Picture Oscar? Now, I’m no Oscar expert but this film has basically won every award at the film festivals it has been a part of since the premiere at Sundance last January. It wins audience and critics awards. It gets standing ovations. (It was however shut out of the Gotham nominations) It seems that lots of folks (at least those who go to film festivals) love the film. The film rolls out this weekend in Atlanta, Chicago, NY and LA and will then expand in the coming weeks.
The question is, can Precious become this year’s Slumdog Millionaire? It’s the same type of hopeful movie that can make people feel good about themselves when things around them are still pretty shitty. But keep in mind Slumdog was about kids from another country. What they went through is something we can’t, and don’t imagine happening here.
But Precious is about US. It is about this country. It is about people here left behind. Even though it is based on the novel by Sapphire and set in 1987 NYC, it still feels real and present. That’s why it is breaking hearts everywhere. You look at Precious and see Hurricane Katrina all over again. You look at Precious and you see things you don’t necessarily want to see but need to see.
We might be a year into this Obama experiment but the reality of women’s lives – of women who could be like Precious have not changed.
This is not an easy movie to watch. And that’s one of my big concerns. It hammers at you and then it hammers again. It may end hopeful, but it is a tough and brutal slog. You need to come in with the right mind set and I am just wondering if the Oprah watching minions are going to take the leap to see this film. Are they (we) ready to confront the racism and classism and abuse that happens here every day? I just don’t know.
This film needs women to see it to be successful. I think it will even harder to get men in the door because of the Oprah endorsement. Oprah = women. This is not a slam dunk by any means.
Let’s also remember that the writer (Geoffrey Fletcher) and director (Lee Daniels) of this film are men. That still so bothers me. It wouldn’t bother me as much if the film’s roll out had not become the Lee Daniels show. So much of the press has been about him (especially the NY Times Magazine piece called the Audacity of Precious which should have been called the “Audacity of Lee Daniels.”) Granted, the film would not have gotten made without his vision and fortitude, so congrats to him. But in lots of the press he comes of as this Svengali-like character who orchestrated these women into his perfect picture. It just leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I wonder what the whole roll out would be like with a female director. He got the chance to direct because he secured the financing and got Sapphire to trust him. That’s a big deal, especially for someone with only one awful film Shadowboxer under his belt. The good news is that the press folks have realized that Gabourey Sidibe is a secret weapon for them and now she is doing some great press.
The thing about Precious that is important to note is the conversation that it has created and will hopefully create in all over the country in the coming weeks. This is a movie about an obese, black, illiterate, abused, pregnant young woman who refuses to count herself out even though many people have already written her off. The fact that this is getting a mainstream release and is also seriously in the Oscar hunt makes me hopeful for a business where so much of the talk is usually about how much money the latest crapfest made the previous weekend. So while Precious’ story is a hopeful tale for all of us, the fact that Precious even exists is a hopeful tale for the movie business.
Sandra Laing and Sophie Okonedo
Skin is the heartbreaking true story of Sandra Laing (played by Sophie Okonedo) as a woman with black skin born to white parents in apartheid S. Africa. She is a white girl who looked black. As a young girl she knew she looked different but her biggest problems began when she showed up to school. They couldn’t and wouldn’t believe she was white, and were of course convinced that her mother (Alice Krige) had an affair with a black man instead of the fact that maybe somewhere in her family’s past there was actually mixed race blood. This poor girl was just torn between two very different worlds. The place she felt safest and most comfortable was amongst people who looked like her, so she left her family to live in the black community. Her family then broke all ties with her because they just couldn’t believe their white daughter would rather live with black people. The whole thing just broke my heart. This is a small film that makes you really think about race and how much racism hurts. Skin opens today in NY and LA.
Sandra Laing is an very quiet woman (now I understand Okonedo’s understated performance) and she answered some questions about her life and the film.
Women & Hollywood: How did the film come about?
Sandra Laing: Tony Fabian the director of the film phoned me in 2000 that he wanted to meet me and told me that he wanted to make a film about my life. I agreed because other people — newspaper and tv people — always came to me and they just took the story and went, and in Tony’s case I felt that he was the one who would change my life. He did but it took 7 years to make the film.
W&H: Did he change your life?
SL: Yes, I was staying in a small rented house wasn’t working and couldn’t support my children, but now I am in a bigger house and my life is much better.
W&H: What was the hardest part for you to watch in the film?
SL: The time when I called my mother from my cousin’s house which was the first time I spoke with her after 10 or 15 years since I left home but I still didn’t know where she was staying she didn’t tell me. And then the time when I found her in the old age home.
W&H: Why do you feel it was important for your story to get out there?
SL: I wanted to let the world know what apartheid did to a person in S. Africa and to let people know that if something happens to you long ago and you are scared to talk you must talk about it and let it out and you can then go on with your life.
W&H: In the press notes you say that this is a story of family, forgiveness and the triumph of the human spirit. Have you forgiven your family?
SL: Yes, I have forgiven my family. I didn’t get a chance to ask forgiveness from my father but I did see my mother before she died and now just my brothers are left.
W&H: Have you spoken with them?
SL: They don’t want to speak to me. They are still angry with me from when I left home and when I chose black people over them.
W&H: It is so hard to rationalize what you must have felt — you were white but had black skin. What can your experience teach people about racial issues?
SL: I think you mustn’t see a person through color whether she is black or white or brown. We are all the same. We all have the same blood. Inside we are all the same.
W&H: Were you ever on the set? What did you thnk about Sophie Okonedo playing you?
SL: Sophie is a brilliant actor. I do see me in her acting. She is doing the same things that happened to me.
W&H: Anything else you would like to add?
SL: Ask people to pray for me so that my brothers will one day come and see me.
W&H: Will this film open in S. Africa?
SL: It will it open in S. Africa on January 22, 2010.
This was originally posted on the CA NOW site
Disney is releasing a new film this Winter, The Princess and the Frog, which features the first ever African-American Disney princess, Tiana. There has been some controversy over the development of the character and story, with some important changes from Disney along the way.
As a feminist, a woman of color, and a mother, I find myself torn on this movie. It’s easy to say that the princess idea is always negative for girls. We know that focusing on girls’ looks as a measure of their value is harmful to self image and self-esteem. We know media that promotes a single type of look as the only way to be attractive is damaging too. But not seeing yourself in media is just as damaging.
Yes, I can look at The Princess and the Frog and wonder if giving girls another princess role model is really the best idea, but I’m not that little Black girl who wants to be able to see herself as a princess. I’m not her mom or dad, who have to explain why all the princesses are white. Let’s face it, Mulan, Jasmine, and Pocahontas get short shrift in the princess line, and Esmeralda doesn’t get to be part of it at all. (Why can’t she be a Romany princess?) How wonderful for that little girl to be able to look up at the screen and finally see a princess who, at least on some levels, looks like she does. And how great for me to be able to have a movie in our collection to show my daughter that being a princess, or being pretty, isn’t limited to certain skin tones.
Can equality of objectification ever be empowerment? This is where intersectionality comes into play. Is it more important for Black girls to see themselves as equally beautiful and princess-like, or more important for them not to be presented with stereotypes based on how women should look? In this case, does race trump gender, or gender trump race? Guess what, that’s not my call to make.
My ability to object to the princess image comes from my own privilege, in that I can (sort of) see myself in these princess characters already. Society already tells me that I’m attractive, or at least that I’m supposed to be. For women with darker skin tones, the message is relentless that their skin alone makes them unattractive. Women of color are shown as having masculine traits, or as promiscuous, but rarely simply as beautiful. Look at the reaction to Serena William’s ESPN magazine cover where she appeared nude (please also note ESPN featured disabled runner Sarah Reinertsen, another blow at what we define as beautiful (or able, for that matter)). Compare that to the reaction to the GQ cover that Jennifer Aniston did where she appeared in only a tie. And if Penelope Cruz and Halle Berry aren’t pretty enough for a fashion magazine cover unless their skin is lightened (thanks, Photoshop!), who is?
The point is that I, a light-skinned Latina, don’t get to tell a darker-skinned woman that she shouldn’t desire the societal acceptance and presence that a Disney princess provides. (Although I’m waiting for our first Latina princess too!) There is plenty of critique of this movie and of the princess genre in general already coming from the women who are most impacted by it. And ultimately, these women are the ones who will be able to evaluate the positive or negative impact of the movie on themselves, their daughters and sons, and the society around them. For everyone else making assumptions, predictions, and judgement calls on this movie, it’s time to sit back, shut up, and listen.
I attempted several times to make contact with a Disney representative to get their input on how the story had been developed and how decision-making was done around issues of race on the movie, but was unable to get a response. I would still love to be able to provide an interview with Disney which allows the company to respond to these questions.
There must be something in the water because over the last week there have been several substantive pieces and one panel (which I will blog about later) discussing women and film. These discussions are not new, they happen all the time, but having two pieces come out in major newspapers like the Washington Post and the NY Times on the same day makes one take note. Why now? Who knows? Maybe it’s because there are several women’s names at play for best director. Maybe it has to do with the release of the Shriver Report on the state of women. I don’t care about the reason, I’m just glad we are talking.
What I like about these conversations is the anger they are inciting. People are pissed. Why are women still being marginalized? We are over 50% of the population, we buy 50% of the tickets. We spend money. We want to see movies by and about women, as well as seeing movies by and about men. I’m not asking for special treatment, just decent treatment. That shouldn’t be too much to ask.
In Ann Hornaday’s piece Women & Film: With female characters, why does Hollywood fear that the stronger they are, the harder they fail? in the Washington Post (which I am quoted in) she makes the argument that strong women are out at the movies. I agree with Ann but I will add that you can still see strong women in smaller dramas released by indies that will never make it to the multiplex near you. So if you want to see a strong woman on film, you need to probably live in NY or LA or another major city if you are lucky. Most other people (which is basically everyone) can only find these women on netflix (if they know what they are looking for.) That totally sucks. Here’s what producer Lynda Obst said:
Dramas are dead, Some of the greatest parts for women — the Academy Award parts for women — are often in dramas, and this is the worst time for dramas since I’ve been in the business for the last 10,000 years.
Lynda Obst knows what’s going on. She’s in the business of producing dramas and I would imagine she’s thinking about how she’s going to make a living in the future.
And according to Manohla Dargis in her piece Now Starring at the Movies: Famous Dead Women in the NY Times this past Sunday, if you are going to be seen at all on screen as a woman you need to be dead. That’s such a wonderful feeling for all of us out there.
You can’t blame filmmakers (or actresses) for raiding crypts. It’s rarely been more difficult to be a woman in the movies than now, particularly in the United States, where for the past few decades most blockbusters and microbudgeted D.I.Y. enterprises have been overwhelmingly male.
Dargis who is not known (at least by me) as a champion for women takes it even a step further:
Female stories have become so marginalized on American movie screens, we should be grateful filmmakers are raiding the history books…A woman has to have been legitimized by history, ruled a country, inspired a poet, or ignited a revolution in fashion or cooking to have a shot at some serious screen time. It also helps if she’s played by Meryl Streep.
I do like a historical biopic, but this devaluing of women’s lives and experiences makes me want to hurl. It’s seems to me that the more power and confidence women gain in real life it is slowly and surely being stripped away on the big screen. It’s like we are all being punished. Strong women have been disappearing from movies for some time (not that there were ever that many to begin with) so when we see one like Amelia we all get so excited because it’s like finding water in the desert. We are starved for these images. And when they disappoint, they hurt so much worse. I knew that I would have issues with Amelia. That didn’t make it hurt any less. I take my strong women onscreen very seriously cause I know that when they fail, I (and all other women) get screwed.
As Obst said most dramas are now on TV, but I don’t see TV making films like Amelia. The closest one I’ve seen recently is the Lifetime Georgia O’Keeffe film, and that was just ok.. We see women in dramas on TV shows. But movies are different. Even Cate Blanchett’s latest endeavor, a period piece where she was to play Lady Edwina Mountbatten in Indian Summer directed by Joe Wright was shelved. I’m not going to pretend it’s only women suffering. When Brad Pitt movies get canceled, things are bad, really bad.
Many people want to escape when they see movies. But not everyone. There has to be a diversity of offerings. At the rate we are going the only films that will be seen are the Transformers type films. That would be such a shame.
Women & film – With female characters, why does Hollywood fear that the stronger they are, the harder they fail? (Washington Post)
Now Starring at the Movies: Famous Dead Women (NY Times)
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