Female Protagonists – Bitch Flicks

Bluestocking Film Series Showcases Complex Female Protagonists

I had the wonderful opportunity to speak with Kate Kaminski, Bluestocking Film Series Founder and Artistic Director. We talked about the need for more complex female protagonists, ensuring diversity, women’s representation in film, and what she hopes to accomplish with the film series.

I’m forever looking for more women-centric films, especially considering that only 22% of protagonists are women in the top-grossing films. But I don’t want just any female characters; I crave complex, nuanced, and diverse female protagonists in film and television. This is why I’m delighted to attend the Bluestocking Film Series in Portland Maine, running from Thursday, July 14 through Saturday, July 16.

Bluestocking Film Series “is an exclusive showcase for provocative, well-produced films that feature complex female protagonists driving the narrative and leading the action.” All of the narrative short films they screen must have a woman lead and pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test. It’s also the first U.S. film event to receive Sweden’s A-Rating. The team behind Bluestocking “believe that audiences love a good story no matter what the lead character’s gender is.”

Bitch Flicks: Could you talk about the importance of the Bluestocking Film Series? Why did you start the film series?

Kate Kaminski: I started Bluestocking Film Series because something was missing from festival screens in Maine. What had happened to those festivals I’d been part of (as a filmmaker) that celebrated women? And where were the female-driven films I was craving to see as an audience member? I wondered: what if I created a women in film event with the mission of exclusively screening female-driven films that pass the Bechdel-Wallace Test? If I built it … would they come? Well, I built it and people have shown up, each year in greater numbers.

Bitch Flicks: What does Bluestocking Film Series mean for women’s representation in film? Why do you think we need more complex female protagonists?

Kate Kaminski: Every year, Bluestocking Film Series proves that female characters can be (and do) so much more than what we currently see on-screen. Female characters deserve to be portrayed with as much complexity as their male counterparts but that is rarely allowed — or celebrated — whether in the mainstream or in the indie world. Bluestocking exists to amplify diverse female voices and stories because culture can’t evolve or flourish if those voices and stories are missing from cinema, our most popular art.

Bitch Flicks: Why do you think the Bechdel-Wallace Test (where two named female characters talk to each other about something other than a man) matters?

Kate Kaminski: I’m a believer in the power of the Bechdel-Wallace Test (and its other iterations like the Mako Mori and Lauzen-Silverstein) as a jumping off point for initiating conversation about the ways women and girls are portrayed in film. The Bechdel-Wallace Test obviously doesn’t measure quality — and as we all know, is a low bar — but what it does, is point out how, more often than not, female characters are used in film to simply amplify and support the lead male character’s story. If the female characters in a film are only talking about the male characters, what message does that send to young girls and boys? It erases 50% of the population and makes insignificant the reality that we have lives of our own, rich, inner lives and meaningful, complicated relationships with each other.

Bitch Flicks: What steps do you take to ensure that Bluestocking Film Series is diverse in featuring work by women filmmakers and female protagonists who are women of color, LGBTQIA+, older women, and women with disabilities?

Kate Kaminski: Absolutely every step I take as a curator is about #filminclusion. I look far and wide on my own for films from across the globe that feature diverse female characters who embody something new or surprising. I’m drawn to characters who are not entirely knowable, and who are complex, and whose undeniable needs and wants drive the story. I also query my colleagues in the women in film world about what they’ve seen, who is up and coming, and I even have spies who refer films/filmmakers they’ve seen along the way. Social media for a movement like this is absolutely critical. I’d feel lost without the people I’ve met through social media who, like me, see female-driven films not as a niche, but as rightfully taking their place in the marketplace. In a way, I’m committing Bluestocking to being as far out on the cutting edge of what female characters can be by screening filmmakers who are real risk-takers. We need those creative people to enliven what has become so stale and predictable. Do we want to influence the larger world of film? YES.

A huge thank you to Kate Kaminski for taking the time to speak with me. You can find out more about the schedule, filmmakers and special guests attending, and the panels and films screening at Bluestocking Film Series, as well as purchase tickets.

The Evolution of Women in Car Movies

This is a guest post written by Chelsy Ranard.

From Imperator Furiosa to Letty Ortiz, strong and knowledgeable female characters crop up in car movies. The women who used to be relegated to flag girls and objectified as hood ornaments are now being introduced as main characters with their own plot points and story developments. Women have notoriously had a minimal past in the automotive industry (and sadly, women are still underrepresented) and their history in automotive movies is no different. However, much like the evolution of women in film in general, women are evolving from props to leading characters in recent years.

Flag Girls and Hood Ornaments

The stereotypical woman in a car movie has been the woman in tall heels and a short skirt waving the start flag before a race. She’s been the beautiful woman in a bikini lying on top of a hood, washing the car, or standing next to the car in some sort of way.

These women don’t have names, any character development, and tend to be nothing more than gorgeous props, similar to the cars themselves in each scene. Car movies tend to be marketed towards men, so naturally there tend to be beautiful women next to beautiful cars. Even in some movies that portray strong women who know cars and drive them, a few flag girls still remain, but this used to be the only role available for women in car movies — unless you were a love interest; then at least you had a name.

Sexism has been an issue in Hollywood in general, not just movies in the car or action genre. Men are paid more and given more leading roles than women and this continues to be a pervasive issue. Women tend to be props in car movies, but they do in movies in other genres as well. This is an issue evolving and changing, however, and an exceeding amount of actresses speak out against sexism and the gender disparity in Hollywood and are working to change it. Women are still unequal to their male co-stars, especially in male-dominated genres, but the evolution is at an upward slope in car movies and in film and television in general.

Sexualized Characters

The women portrayed in car movies are almost always sexualized; the hyper-sexualized characters are almost always the flag girl type. But even the women taking their roles from props to supporting characters still remain highly sexualized and objectified. Think Megan Fox’s character in Transformers, or Jessica Simpson as Daisy Duke in The Dukes of Hazzard movie. These women are car women, not just flag girls or love interests, and are supporting characters. However, Fox’s character still bends over an engine in a crop-top while tightening a cap and Simpson’s character tricks men with her bikini-clad body.

While car movies now mix together more prominent women full of character development and car knowledge, these women are still sexualized. This is definitely not just a woman problem as Hollywood demands that all their stars be beautiful and men are not strangers to shirtless scenes. But men have a wider range of roles portrayed, as well as more lead roles and speaking lines and women are sexualized and objectified, often for the Male Gaze — in film, television and other media — far more than men.

Strong Female Characters

Fortunately, the role of the strong woman in car movies is not a myth and many movies are beginning to add more complex, intelligent, resilient female characters with agency. While some female characters are still sexualized and some aren’t main characters, the more films that feature strong women, the more upward momentum we see on-screen. Characters mentioned before like Letty, played by Michelle Rodriguez in The Fast and the Furious franchise, or Imperator Furiosa, played by Charlize Theron in Mad Max: Fury Road, are two examples of amazing female characters in car movies who don’t exist as props, who aren’t overly sexualized, and who possess character and story developments.

Some other strong female characters in car movies include Thelma (Geena Davis) and Louise (Susan Sarandon) in Thelma & Louise, Stella (Charlize Theron) in The Italian Job, Mona Lisa Vito (Marisa Tomei) in My Cousin Vinny, and Sway (Angelina Jolie) in Gone in 60 Seconds. Some of these movies walk the line for what is considered a “car movie,” but all of these women drive and represent the strong female characters our car movies need; although we could do with even less sexualization.

Movies That are Breaking Through

The Fast and the Furious franchise is the highest-grossing car movie franchise and has created seven movies so far, all of which feature women in main roles; but all of them also feature flag girls as well. However, the story created for one of the main characters, Letty, in such a big car movie franchise makes it one of the movies causing change as they try to break through the norm. Letty, whose story and character development undergo major plot points throughout the movies, is not sexualized in the way that Fox’s or Simpson’s characters are in their roles. She’s also featured in one of the largest car stunt scenes in film, a feat that not many women in car movies have been able to achieve.

Even in movies like Star Wars: The Force Awakens, the main character is a woman and an amazing pilot. Katniss in The Hunger Games trilogy, Hermione in the Harry Potter series, and Tris in the Divergent series are all strong female leads for whom younger generations can identify. They are all leads or co-leads in their movies; brave, intelligent, and strong who show that women are not just love interests in action-filled franchises.

In such a male-dominated genre, the women who appear in car movies stick out like a sore thumb. With each woman we see on-screen in these movies who exists as more than just a flag girl, who has a name, who isn’t just a love interest, and isn’t sexualized — it’s a huge win for women in car films, and women in general. Reaching equality is about making small changes until they build up into big changes, and each win gets women closer to being represented equally among men. In a genre that used to be all Burt Reynolds and Steve McQueen, it’s nice to see women like Michelle Rodriguez and Charlize Theron become common names in the car genre as well.

Chelsy Ranard is a writer from Montana who is now living in Boise, Idaho. She graduated with her journalism degree from the University of Montana in 2012. She is a passionate feminist, loves listening to talk radio, and prefers her coffee cold. Follow her on Twitter at @Chelsy5.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week – and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

When TV Dramas Give Colonialism a Glamorous Feel by s.e. smith at Bitch Media

Everything I Love Is Problematic by Delilah S. Dawson at The Mary Sue

Watch: Feature Length Documentary ‘CODEGIRL’ Released Online for FREE by Tambay A. Obenson at Shadow and Act

What Scandal’s Civil Rights-Era Critique Says About Contemporary Black Women and Girls by Oneka LaBennett at Ms. blog

Five Awesome Web Series Starring Women of Color by Sara Zia Ebrahimi at Bitch Media

TV tentatively starts talking about abortion by Alyssa Rosenberg at The Washington Post

GLAAD’s ‘Where We Are on TV’ report calls for more diverse, substantive LGBT characters by Megan Townsend at GLAAD

Lexi Alexander on Why More Women Aren’t Directing Superhero Franchises by ReBecca Theodore at Vulture

Research Shows Box-Office Hits with Female Protagonists Outearn Blockbusters With Male Leads by Laura Berger at Women and Hollywood

New Documentary Explores the Tensions of Being Both African and American by Sameer Rao at Colorlines

Drop What You’re Doing and Watch BBC Three’s In t he Flesh by Brooke Bennett at Horror Homeroom

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

‘Thelma and Louise’: Redefining the Female Gaze

The violence may decrease as the movie progresses, but Thelma, Louise – and we – become comfortable about their actions as the film winds down, because they were now tapped into our veins, nourishing our battered spirits with acts that said, “See? We recognize your anger, cause we’re angry – and we’re not going to take it anymore.”

This guest post by Paulette Reynolds appears as part of our theme week on The Female Gaze.

“…the awareness of any object can induce an awareness of also being an object.” –Jacques Lacan

When psychiatrist Lacan formulated his theory of the mirror image in the 1950s, he was referring to the infant’s discovery of themselves as a meaningful object; thus, the Ego was formed.

Film critics applied Lacan to a number of philosophies on cinematic looking, but it took British feminist and film theorist Laura Mulvey to take this concept to the next level in the early 1970s. By giving it a name she also gave it a purpose, minting the phrase “the male gaze” and asserting that essentially men viewed women as sex objects – and that this objectification existed in all films:

“Men do the looking; women are there to be looked at. The cinematic codes of popular films ‘are obsessively subordinated to the neurotic needs of the male ego’” [1]

While Mulvey focused solely on men viewing the female characters on the screen, the females in the audience were left searching these cinematic women for the appropriate visual clues as to how they were were to be objectified in their everyday lives. Or were they?

It would be another 20 years before film theorists decided to consider the female spectator and how she felt about what role models were being offered for viewing. Another British film theorist, Jackie Stacey, devoted an entire book to the subject, Star Gazing, gathering female subjects for a study on viewing American films during the WWII years. She developed a broad examination of how women use their own gaze, both passively and actively:

“… Powerful female stars often play characters in punishing patriarchal narratives, where the woman is either killed off, or married, or both, but the spectators do not seem to select this aspect of their films to write about. Instead, the qualities of confidence and power are remembered as offering female spectators the pleasure of participation qualities they themselves lacked and desired.” [2]

I began this article with a quote about ego identification, which seems like a fitting point to keep in mind about the iconic feminist film statement of Thelma and Louise.

This Oscar-winning film from 1991 chronicled the coming-of-age for two working-class women, Thelma and Louise, as they strike out on the mama of all road trips. Each is running from relationship issues that involve absent men: Louise’s boyfriend Jimmy is gone for long stretches because of work and Thelma’s husband Darryl is absent because he cheats. Thelma’s response to Darryl’s infidelity and control issues is to be the perfect wife, clipping coupons and keeping a tidy house. Louise – a rape survivor – answers Life in general by hiding behind a tough outer shell, which keeps everyone out, including Jimmy and those repressed and unresolved memories. Yet we sense that underneath their poor coping mechanisms is a simmering rage, because – yes – we’ve all been there.

The vacation developes into a lost weekend of murder, crime and acts of revenge (and sweet sex), triggered in part by violence directed at them from a variety of arrogant, entitled men. I say in part because Thelma’s passive-aggressive urges frequently surface, leaving Louise to clean up the mess like a good surrogate big sister.

Thelma and Louise’s acting out allowed the female spectator of 1991 to connect and identify with Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis in an immediate way. This universal understanding – and approval – was instant, after all what woman hasn’t been lied to, disrespected, abused verbally or physically by some man in her lifetime? In a world directed and controlled by men, they did what we often wanted to do. When that truck blew up in a glorious angry ball of fire and heat, that was our exploding anger. The violence may decrease as the movie progresses, but Thelma, Louise – and we – become comfortable about their actions as the film winds down, because they were now tapped into our veins, nourishing our battered spirits with acts that said, “See? We recognize your anger, cause we’re angry – and we’re not going to take it anymore.”

They showed women violently dealing with their anger at patriarchy – perhaps for the first time since the great noir films of the 1940s and 1950s. These were nervous and high-strung working-class women and they weren’t going to sit still anymore. They were going to proactively deal with their situations – and what was more – they weren’t going to apologize for those actions either. This is what ultimately led to their doom, for two women to boldly act like men with unapologetic violence towards their oppressors had to be punished.

And then, cornered like a couple of scared girls, they ran their car off a cliff.

Sitting in that theater, 24 years ago, I felt like I had been victimized. My diffused anger and rage at societal norms of men getting away with gender abuse and violence had suddenly been given a voice. But in a heartbeat, we were all told that those forbidden emotions – those reserved for men to freely express – were not a viable option for us to feel. The lesson was shoved down our throats – abet in a truly melodramatic “chick flick” way – that we would literally careen off a cliff if we explored those feelings too deeply, screamed too loudly. We even had a coach, in the person of Detective Hal Slocumb – a sensitive soul who spent most of the film gently talking to our heroines like they were wild animals, needing to be calmed down before they used the tranquilizing stun gun.

After all, what would have happened if they had been caught or turned themselves in? They might act as role models for other women to reflect upon. What a scary thought to keep millions of men tossing and turning at night – and not in a good way. Some may argue that their suicide was an existentialist “fuck you” to the orderly world that Man had created for Woman, and that they freely chose to die to keep their “dream” of freedom as they went out in a blaze of glory. But such rationalization rings a bit hollow to this reviewer.

If the male gaze finds a “woman’s film” difficult to digest, it might be because the stereotypes they’re familiar with may not be so neatly drawn. Thelma and Louise must have been such a film for many males, who were – no doubt – highly uncomfortable at the images of the female response to discrimination. Even today, most rapes go unpunished, most battered women still live in fear and many women still remain passive in the face of verbal abuse. One can only imagine how vindicated the male audience felt when Thelma and Louise took a nose-dive off the Grand Canyon. The male gaze was once again pacified at the expense of the female audience.

Yet, Thelma and Louise is hailed as a definitive feminist statement by women, film critics, Hollywood, and – oh yes – men. I disagree. A film that spends 128 1/2 minutes making a bold statement, only to cop-out during the last 30 seconds is just that – a film that sold out women with a cautionary ending to satisfy societal expectations – or more importantly – societal fears. The issue of the “male gaze” has less to do with psychologically driven male angst and more to do with propagandizing females to direct our gaze away from empowered images of ourselves, regardless of who writes the script.

Yet something good did come from Thelma and Louise. Remembering that females are “responsible for purchasing 50 percent of all movie tickets” and are “more frequent moviegoers than males in the 18-24 year old demographic ($4.2 million vs. $3.3 million)” [3], movie studios took notice at the 1991 box office receipts for two “feminist statement” films – Thelma and Louise grossed $45 million in the spring and Fried Green Tomatoes followed up with a tidy $119.4 million in December.

And so, the age of the female-centered movie – for the sole pleasure of the female spectators – had arrived. By 1995 Dolores Claiborne was able to get away with murdering her abusive husband and The Quick and the Dead’s Sharon Stone could freely seek revenge for the death of her father.

During the film, Thelma and Louise strike a pose and immortalize themselves in what may be the first screen selfie. The two friends look exactly how they want the world – both female and male – to see them: happy and empowered. They control the camera, and while one level of Thelma and Louise becomes discarded, another stronger image remains fixed within us. It doesn’t matter who writes the scripts – and in many cases, who directs the film – it’s the female spectator of today who has the power to gaze, anyway that she chooses.

Sources

[1] Laura Mulvey. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Screen 16.3 Autumn 1975 pp. 6-18 August 21, 2015.

[2] Stacey, Jackie. Star Gazing: Hollywood Cinema and Female Spectatorship, New York, NY Routledge. 1994. pp.158

[3] Smith, S.L., Granados, A., Choueiti, M., Erickson, S., & Noyes, A. “Changing the Status Quo: Industry Leaders’ Perceptions of Gender in Family Films”

“An Executive Summary.” Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media (2010) August 21, 2015.

Paulette Reynolds is the Editor and Publisher of Cine Mata’s Movie Madness film appreciation blog. Film viewing and theory are her passion, but film noir remains her first love. Paulette breathes the rarified Austin, Texas air and can be seen on Twitter: @CinesMovieBlog.

Totally Radical Girls and the Bitchin’ Burden of Civilization

I mean, she doesn’t wrap her arms around some guy’s waist to hold on for the ride of her life or even jump onto a Vespa or something weak. Nope, she’s a zombie-fightin’ shoulder-padded biker who escapes danger on her own and looks just as feathery-haired good when she gets to her destination as when she put down her attacker in the alley (although this was the early 80s while CFCs were being phased out, so big hair treated with a half-bottle of AquaNet always had some hold).

This guest post by ThoughtPusher appears as part of our theme week on Dystopias.

Uh, like, 30 years ago or something, I was totally into a valley girl end-of-the-world scenario. Even! That’s like exactly what’s going on in Night of the Comet (so 1984) when this total bummer of an apocalypse happens on account of a comet that comes back after a wicked long time, the same one that like ended the dinosaurs and stuff, and so it totally wrecks the world just when these two teenage sisters were like about to grow up and get out from the bogus control their two-timing stepmom.

I remember loving Thom Eberhardt’s 1984 cult classic when I was younger, so I wanted to revisit it in all its glorious 80s post-apocalyptic deserted-downtown-L.A. splendor for this month’s theme week. But then I got a little nervous. (Stephanie Rogers just wrecked my assumption of great 80s movies with her dead-on reevaluation of the now-horrifying themes and language in Sixteen Candles, released in the same year as this flick.) Holy crap, what if my nostalgic adoration was misplaced and this killer zombie flick was really a social or moral nightmare to behold? Well, I watched it again, jaw and most muscles clenched, ready to suffer the pain of shattered dreams… but it really turned out to be OK-ish. Some cringe-worthiness, but not in the way I expected…

So this apocalypse deal could have been righteous. Like, fer sure. Especially for girls like Reg and Sam who got some kind of totally tubular elite kick-ass training from their military dad who wanted sons and treated them like they could grow up into Green Berets or something but then motored to fight some war when they got old enough to want to do girl things.

Regina (Catherine Mary Stewart) and her younger sister Samantha (Kelli Maroney) are a couple of valley girls who survive the initial wave of cosmic radiation emitted from the rare comet’s tail. They are left nearly alone to cope with a zombie apocalypse in downtown L.A. Their mom split after their dad came back from Vietnam, so they are used to taking care of themselves. Their dad did give them some training, though. As indicated by their male nicknames, it looks like their father would have been more interested in having sons. He trained them in weapons and hand-to-hand, but Reg reports that it became painfully obvious around sixth or seventh grade that they wouldn’t be go to Ranger school, so he went off to serve in more wars and conflicts. Even though he’s gone, he has prepared them to survive this kind of world.

Eberhardt’s vision for this dystopian landscape is empty, isolated, and eerily red, but still fully stocked with useful stuff like clothes and cars and radio stations. Yet these girls have been abandoned by both of their parents. Perhaps because of that, they stick together throughout the movie, and even get involved with a guy who has to check in on his mother (so he also doesn’t abandon his family or his new friends) and two kids who they essentially take in as niece and nephew to their little survivor clan.

As one house in a neighborhood party, Sam is pissed that her step-mom, Doris, has ordered her to serve chips and dip. This is just one of about a gazillion parties going on, not to mention a New Year’s Eve vibe on TV with handwritten posters and couples kissing in overcrowded public venues. Sam scoffs at Doris’s overly friendly relationship with a feelsy neighbor guy and sasses her way to calling Doris an asshole, which brings an immediate slap to Sam’s face. Sam slaps her in response, but then Doris wigs out and socks Sam so hard she tumbles over the couch. Like, some ditz can just deck a step-kid she’s supposed to take care of?! Doris sucks, so Sam could be all like, “What’s your damage?” and “Take a chill pill!” but she just jets without a place to go, so she spends the night in the lawn storage shed. That totally barfs me out, but I guess we’ve all gotten “shack” in MASH sometimes.

So the whole world parties in anticipation of this super-rare comet’s passage close to the atmosphere, except a few wary scientists who lock themselves in an underground bunker. Reg calls home and colludes with Sam (who is upholding a sisterly duty but completely unconvincing while doing it) to try to sell a “science trip” to the observatory as a reason to stay out all night. Doris lays out the situation: while the Major is away, she’s in charge. She doesn’t care what the girls do, but doesn’t want to be held responsible in case their dad survives and actually returns home. But as this scene plays out, the public corporal punishment of a teenage girl with a bad attitude seems acceptable.

This might be the most disturbing scene in the movie, even though it is before the apocalyptic crisis or the zombie attacks or the ensuing power-struggles. It just seems so normal, so acceptable, so parental for Doris to punch Sam across the room. There are even neighbors in the doorway who glance over during the domestic altercation but do nothing other than continue their conversation. The dystopian landscape of this horror movie turns out to be the contemporary social conventions and what is deemed permissible in the treatment of children. Of course there are parties everywhere. Of course a few scientists and military men take precautions and later bring unexposed survivors (including kids) back to their bunker to use them for their physical production of healthy blood. But aside from the anticipated decadence and violence and darker side of humanity, this pre-comet event is what takes my breath away for a moment as the corners of my eyes cringe at the abrupt violence. Sam’s encounter with Doris and her behavior during her conversation with Reg the next morning run the gamut of trauma reactions: she is shocked, then saddened, then runs away, then tries to conceal the bruising with makeup, then jokes about it, then angry enough to tell her dad and try to get Doris out of their lives. (But she doesn’t get quite to that stage of the process until Reg comes home the next morning…)

After playing an arcade game for a while and thinking that her projectionist pseudo-boyfriend has ditched her, Reg goes outside and gets locked out of the dive theater. She spazzes out when she runs into this fugly zombie creepazoid in the alley who looks like he could be a Garbage Pail Kid. He’s scabby and oozy and should totally bag his face. Gag me with a spoon! But Reg fights him off and hops on Larry’s motorcycle to book it home. Nobody is around but the stuff from the party is still in the street along with clothes and grosser-than-gross red dust, so she looks for Sam to find out what’s up.

Reg has some hand-to-hand skills (not to mention her later comment that “the mac-10 submachine gun was practically designed for housewives”), so she survives the attack. But the thing that always stood out to me about this was the nonchalance of her ability to hop onto a motorcycle and drive off. Although Eberhardt presents an strangely empty L.A., most post-apocalyptic cities are represented as worlds where abandoned vehicles clutter the roads; if you want to travel from place to place with ease, you should ride a bike… it’s a part of a lot of movies in the genre, but that just seems like a survival skill that most teenage girls lack in traditional portrayals. I mean, she doesn’t wrap her arms around some guy’s waist to hold on for the ride of her life or even jump onto a Vespa or something weak. Nope, she’s a zombie-fightin’ shoulder-padded biker who escapes danger on her own and looks just as feathery-haired good when she gets to her destination as when she put down her attacker in the alley (although this was the early 80s while CFCs were being phased out, so big hair treated with a half-bottle of AquaNet always had some hold). Reg initiates the era of a fashionable, kick-ass heroine with a sharp wit and massive protective instincts. (Can anyone say Buffy, or Zoë, or Buffyverse, or River, or Echo, or any other female leads in forthcoming Joss Whedon projects?) Even later in the movie, Reg sees Sam after being told that she was dead; and their conversation shifts quickly from relieved surprise to “Hey, that’s a great outfit!” / “Thanks. Is that guy in the hallway dead?” It seems to foreshadow the content and mood of the closing sequences of most Buffy episodes.

Reg tries to tell Sam that there is something messed up with the world, but Sam applies some makeup in the mirror to cover up the bruise from the night before. (Dude! It’s all kinds of “I walked into a door again” and stuff.) Instead of dealing with what Reg is saying, Sam carries her boom box from room to room, which is what gives them the idea to go to the local radio station ‘cause the dj’s counting down the weekly top twenty, so he might have the 411 on what happened the night before since he does the news and stuff. When they get to the station, it’s like all automated but a guy with a gun comes at the girls to see if they’re still human. Hector is this trucker just passing through town, but he had the same idea about maybe somebody being at the station. Sam finds the controls and gets to be the new dj, which is totally rad.

(OK, so I get that it’s a plot point to go to the broadcasting source, but having a radio station setting in the course of the movie was so 80s. [sigh…] God I miss 80s movie soundtracks.)

When Hector gets the drop on the girls at the radio station, Reg tries to negotiate Sam’s release. She is the big sister and is going to take care of Sam. But it gets fun when Sam starts broadcasting, choosing what songs to play and talking over them to any audience that might be listening. She proclaims herself to be one-third owner of the station, and then begins changing the world order: all finals are cancelled, and the new drinking age is 10… with ID. She gets a call on the “hit line” and loses the connection, but the broadcast continues and the scientists in the desert compound deduce that the normalcy of the radio station will keep the small group there long enough to retrieve them. After all, the not-so-smart scientists left the vents open in their bunker, so they were partially exposed to the comet’s radiation and they are slowly turning into zombies. (The scientists in this little sci-fi story are not the knowledgeable crowd usually portrayed.)

During a bad dream, Sam is driving and defending herself from the fault of losing the connection with the scientists when she exclaims, “I’m not the phone company… nobody’s the phone company anymore!” She recognizes that no one is responsible for the phone lines, but she also starts to freak out when a cop pulls her over. She doesn’t have her license, so she’s sure she will be in trouble. This is all part of a dream (within a dream to boot), but it demonstrates the inherent assumption of civil authority over personal behavior. And it’s far from Eberhardt’s only reference to traffic violations and rules of the road.

Hector announces that he has to go to San Diego in the morning, and Reg wonders why. Even though Hector has a mother and sister and friends there, she assumes they’re gone. After a bit of getting-to-know-you personal time, Hector jokes, “What will you give me if I come back?” Reg ponders this and offers up Texas. Then Florida and Texas. Hector counters with Florida, Texas, and Hawaii. Territories don’t seem to matter much anymore. But the next morning Hector leaves and later Sam has it out with Reg about the older sister getting every guy Sam ever had her eye on, and now probably has the last guy in the world. After a slight pause, they both start laughing this off. Sibling rivalry takes a back seat to survival, and they have a real heartfelt moment together in their next encounter.

This is a soft conversation between sisters in the midst of a desolate landscape, but Eberhardt chooses a really nice visual presentation: the girls sit on the hood of a police car, Reg in the cop’s jacket twirling a nightstick and Sam still in her cheerleading uniform. Sam talks about a boy she liked who was going to ask her out and a friend who was trying to figure out how to keep her parents from finding out she was flunking algebra. All those problems are completely detached from their present condition. Sam is down and wants to go home to change, but Reg does a big sister job of cheering her up: the stores are open and there’s no need for credit cards! (Cut to an awesome mall-shopping montage set to the recognizable beat but different singer of “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.”) As one of the scientists will later note, they are in the midst of a monument of consumerism. Unlike the lack of resources that lead to the corruption of humanity in many dystopian presentations, this kind of immediate isolation in a wasteland of material bounty provides a wealth of available goods free for all those who want them.

Later at the galleria, these grody-to-the-max half-zombie wastoids are so out there. I mean, they’re like so gross and want to take control of the girls for invading their space where they were stock-boys but now think they’re all kinds of important and stuff. What neo-maxi-zoom-dweebies! But the wannabe henchmen are like total space-cadet hosers and can’t do anything without the gnarly leader guy telling them what to do. Like, I’m sure.

Sam asks for Reg’s fashion advice and then why she chooses one piece of clothing over another. Reg states quite obviously, “Because it’ll stay in style longer.” There’s just stuff going on in this whole movie about social standards that remain intact even after the people in society disappear. And I think that’s pretty cool.

The girls get captured by the stock-boy zombies, but the scientists from the compound have come to town looking for the radio-station survivors. They rescue the girls from the stock boys in time to take Reg back. They wait for Hector to return and they secretly plan to kill Sam because she is exhibiting signs of zombie-onset. (They don’t know that she breaks out in a rash like whenever she’s stressed.) However, one scientist among the group doesn’t think their survival trumps the welfare of healthy survivors. She had a problem with bringing any survivors into the facility for testing, even before two kids arrive in pajamas like they were just pulled from their Saturday morning cartoons.

She saves Sam by dosing her with a sedative that makes her look like she is dead, leaves the rag-tag group some field notes to brief them on the global situation and what is going on in the research facility, and takes her own life before she turns into a zombie. Hector does come back, and Sam joins him to go to the research facility to rescue Reg, along with the two kids that were brought in earlier, Sarah and Brian. The sisters and Hector (who seems to have enough knowledge of explosives to MacGyver some car bombs to avoid chase at the climax) seem like they will get along just fine once this whole zombie problem runs its course.

Night of the Comet doesn’t present typical military fears of the genre (since their dad trained the girls before going back to service), but silhouettes and partial frames of guards in and around the underground compound suggest an armed force aligned with the scientists. The scary factor here might just be the idea that (compared to the rest of the world we’ve seen survive) the group in the bunker seem to have knowledge of the situation and the power to take the measures they deem fit as best for their group, regardless of how many healthy survivors they have to use as their own personal unconscious blood banks. But if they are the smart ones, who the heck left the vents open?

I kid you not: I woulda veged with nobody to tell me what to do, but Reg steps up and takes charge of family life like it’s no biggie at all. She’s like all conventional-o-rama, and seeing it start to play out makes Sam think she’s left with a lame-ass Joanie future. But then Sam is stoked to find a stud of her own who rolls up in a choice ‘Cedes out his fresh-to-death collection of 23 cars. He is totally on board with the rules of the road, so when Sam brings up what could be a downer of a reality, he thinks it’s a bitchin’ prospect to be, like, responsible for the future of civilization. Yar!

The newly formed family unit is all dressed up in their Sunday best, and Reg is taking Polaroids of the kids as they stand for the pictures smiling but rolling their eyes in between shots. Reg moves to fix their clothes and hair, telling them that she needs to take a few more pictures, so “don’t slouch.” To the side, Hector drops their cache of guns in to a trashcan. Sarah asks if she can have a gun since they are going to waste. Reg, shaking the development of another picture, says to Hector, “Don’t look at me. I mean, I don’t know where she gets that stuff.” Reg has taken on the responsibility to raise a proper family, which apparently involves placing blame on external sources for any questionable behavior.

The happy family walks down from a plaza toward a street, and across from them Sam starts ruminating on her possible future, mumbling, “Maybe I could be a nun or something.” The family walks to the crosswalk, and Reg pushes the button for the walk sign. Sam thinks that they look like the Brady Bunch and yells out to ask why they are waiting. Hector says that they are waiting for the light to change. In disbelief, Sam questions their sanity, but Reg replies, “The whole burden of civilization has fallen upon us.” Reg then adds the edict: “It means we do not cross against the light!” Reg recognizes that even in an isolated existence some social standards must be maintained. Sam runs into the middle of the street as she proclaims how stupid it is to wait for the light when there is no one else in their ghost town.

Suddenly, a car turns the corner and speeds down the street, swerving as Sam bolts away. Reg reinforces the lesson as she looks down at Brian to ask rhetorically, “See what happens?” Lesson learned, the boy nods as the car screeches around to return to Sam. The driver circles back to apologize, but also notes, “God, I’m sorry, but you shouldn’t cross against the light like that.” As they both pull up their sunglasses (since they are both wearing cool shades by the standards of any pre- or post-apocalyptic social trends), the guy smartly deduces that they are survivors, too. Sam agrees to go for a ride without any hesitation. Hector asks who this guy is, why they should trust him, and so Sam gets his name. Reg tells them to be back by midnight, and he is shocked at the imposition of a curfew. Sam repeats the reasoning: “The burden of civilization is on us, OK?” They agree that that is a bitchin’ prospect, and they drive off, the family waving them goodbye from the middle of the street.

The whole traffic-law scenario hearkens back to Reg’s initial escape from the theater alley: she drives the motorcycle on the empty streets but comes to a complete stop at a red light and takes a moment to turn on the headlight. Traffic safety might not seem like the first bastion of social order, but the rules of the road set up the foundation of civilized behavior. Even if no one’s around, you don’t run a red light. I really hope Eberhardt intended for that theme to show through in so many scenes.

What would you do to reinforce the social acceptability of some behavior? Would you sweep the leg in obedience? Would you buzz the tower in defiance? Would you beat down your step-kid when she won’t serve hors d’oeuvres at your decadent party? Would you check in on your parents even if all rational hope for their survival is lost? Would you rescue kids being exploited by others and try to teach them life lessons? Would you look both ways and refuse to cross against the light? Yeah, I can see how that one might stand out as somewhat insignificant, but once you start deciding what kind of world order you would choose, the burden of civilization is on you… and that is a totally bitchin’ landscape, dude.

ThoughtPusher might live somewhere near you (especially if you have a neighbor who blasts New Order or Tears for Fears most nights), but certainly is a cinephile who has no interest in being followed or asking to be liked.

Suzanne Stone: Frankenstein of Fame

The would-be news anchor is not only an extraordinarily unlikable–though entertaining–protagonist; she also embodies certain pathological tendencies in the American cultural psyche.

Poster for To Die For — Poster for *To Die For*

Written by Rachael Johnson as part of our theme week on Unlikable Women.

Spoilers galore.

You’ve got to give it to Nicole Kidman. For an archetype of Hollywood movie stardom, she has–for many years now–been quite unafraid of taking on edgy, unsympathetic roles. Her impressive turn in Gus Van Sant’s mockumentary black comedy, To Die For (1995), could, arguably, be considered Kidman’s first truly risky part. In it, she plays a murderously self-interested, fame-obsessed small-town TV personality with the perfectly fitting name of Suzanne Stone. “You’re not anybody in America unless you’re on TV,” Suzanne sermonizes at the start. “On TV is where we learn about who we really are. Because what’s the point of doing anything worthwhile if nobody’s watching? And if people are watching, it makes you a better person.” The would-be news anchor is not only an extraordinarily unlikable–though entertaining–protagonist; she also embodies certain pathological tendencies in the American cultural psyche.

Surfaces seduce and deceive in Van Sant’s satire on American ambition. Suzanne is a vision of beauty and purity for her future husband, Larry Maretto (Matt Dillon), when he first encounters her, and the crimes she commits take place in an ordinary, pretty town in New Hampshire called Little Hope. It’s love at first sight when the laddish, none-too-bright Larry catches her eye while playing with his band at his father’s restaurant. Janice, Larry’s savvy, ice-skating sister (Illeana Douglas), immediately sees through Suzanne but he ignores the ice-maiden cracks and commits to the “the golden girl of my dreams.” The young man surprises everyone by ditching his drums and rock star ambitions for marriage and home-buying. Janice acerbically observes, “he went from Van Halen to Jimmy Vale overnight.” Larry is not only taken by Suzanne’s beauty; he’s also in awe of her go-getting personality. “She’s going places. She’s got goals,” he tells his father, Joe (Dan Hedaya). Larry, by the by, comes from a fiercely loving, old-fashioned Italian-American family; Suzanne’s parents are portraits of smug, airy WASPness.

Suzanne soon gets a job at the local cable TV station as a weather presenter. Her co-workers baptise her “Gangbusters” and she becomes a workaholic member of their tiny outfit. Fancying herself as a future Barbara Walters, she understands that she must start somewhere. Tensions, however, surface on the first anniversary of her marriage. Larry wants a child and more time together but this doesn’t figure in his wife’s plans. She explains to her puzzled mother-in-law, Angela (Maria Tucci), that a baby would prevent her from covering a revolution–or royal wedding. Feeling trapped by his expectations of her, Suzanne determines to bump Larry off. But she does not do the dirty deed herself. She befriends a trio of daft teenagers, subjects of a documentary she’s working on, to set it up and do her bidding. The ultimate plan, of course, is to pin the murder on them. They comprise vulgar Russell (Casey Affleck), impressionable, insecure Lydia (Alison Folland) and sensitive Jimmy (Joaquin Phoenix), who seems permanently stoned. Both Lydia and Jimmy adore Suzanne. She sexually targets Jimmy, all the while him telling tales of marital abuse, and promises Lydia that she will employ her as her secretary when she becomes famous. The besotted Jimmy soon becomes the designated shooter.

But things don’t go to plan for Suzanne when the three luckless teenagers are arrested. Lydia chooses to cooperate with the police, and wears a tape to record a confession by Suzanne but she is acquitted as the authorities took the entrapment route. When Suzanne publicly suggests Larry’s murder was drug-related–her husband, she says, was a coke addict–his family finally crack, and take matters into their own hands. Suzanne just can’t help herself when she is lured to a remote location by the promise of telling and selling her story. Lydia does not see jail and becomes a kind of celebrity but the boys get life.

There are other targets of Van Sant’s satire in To Die For. Suzanne’s family are characterized as unthinking, self-regarding snobs. Her father Earl (Kurtword Smith) thinks his daughter, a junior college graduate with a degree in electronic journalism, is too good for high school Larry. There is even an unsympathetic side to the loving Italian-American in-laws. Apart from arranging a hit on her at the end (!), it’s clear that they want Suzanne to conform to their traditional ideals of womanhood. Even Larry’s cool sister encourages him to “knock her up.” We only really empathize with the teenagers, particularly Jimmy and Lydia. They backgrounds are troubled, and both come from unprivileged homes, but Suzanne mercilessly exploits them. In fact, she not only violates Jimmy’s youth; she also destroys his future. It’s disquieting subject matter. Scripted by Buck Henry, To Die For is actually based on Joyce Maynard’s 1992 book of the same name, a novel inspired by the similar, real-life 1990 Pamela Smart case. Telling the dark, outlandish tabloid tale in blackly amusing faux-documentary style, however, Van Sant maintains a markedly satirical tone. The uniformly pitch-perfect performances serve his vision. Phoenix, incidentally, is superb as the tragic-comic teenager.

Suzanne Stone is a mediagenic monster in pastels. She’s both a perverse creature and a nightmarishly pure ideological product. Entirely indoctrinated by televisual ideals, she’s a kind of Frankenstein of fame. In a more general sense, she is also a wickedly amusing portrait of American ambition, a workaholic who will do anything to get ahead. Suzanne Stone is, what’s more, a thoroughly unoriginal person. Her ideas are pilfered from others as well as, of course, television. To Die For not only sends up the hollowness of fame; it also attacks the manufactured personality. Suzanne believes that the human mind can be fashioned and cultivated by self-motivation books, and, again, television.

There is also that charming personality. The world revolves around Suzanne and she’s entirely indifferent to the feelings of others. A psychopath really. This is amusingly demonstrated at her husband’s funeral when she stands by his grave and slams on “All By Myself” on a tape-recorder. There’s a socio-economic aspect to all of this too. Suzanne Stone is entitled and knows it. She’s, indeed, an extreme product of white, bourgeois privilege. She warns Lydia when threatened with exposure, “I’m a professional person, for Christ’s sake. I come from a good home. Who do you think a jury would believe?”

An obsession with looks is also integral to her ideological make-up. Some of her comments are quite memorable–such as her suggestion that Gorbachev’s political career would have been more successful if he had had his birthmark removed. To Die For targets television and tabloid culture’s role in stimulating and nourishing human narcissism. The movie takes place, of course, in the pre-internet era–TV’s one of many communication platforms now–but the fundamental message about human vanity endures. As everyone reading this knows, social media has proved to be an extremely indulgent parent of self-love.

To Die For does not solely savage celebrity culture; it also takes aim at culturally constructed American femininity. Suzanne Stone has been entirely radicalised by televisual ideals of cosmetic beauty. Although naturally beautiful, she is paranoid about her own appearance and shamelessly advises the attractive Janice to get plastic surgery. Physical descriptions of Suzanne point to a distinct lack of humanity. Janice calls her an unfeeling doll, Lydia considers her a “goddess” while Jimmy is in awe of how clean she is. Suzanne Stone is not a sensual woman. Her very sexuality, it is suggested, is inauthentic. Sex seems to be primarily an exhibitionist or strategic move bound up with the manipulation of others.

Ultimately, Suzanne Stone is not only a uniquely unlikeable protagonist. Representative of much that is wrong with her place and time- the self-interest, addiction to fame, lookism and classism–she is a skillfully drawn object of satire. Kidman cleverly captures her insane single-mindedness and narcissism. With her purple eyeshadow, short skirts, and little dog Walter–named, of course, after Walter Cronkite–her Suzanne Stone deserves a place in cinematic history’s gallery of dazzling grotesques.

What Country’s Film Industry Has the Best Gender Equity?

The study from the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media and a group of partner organizations analyzed 120 films from the 10 countries with the most profitable film industries in the world. On average, women don’t fare much better in films internationally than they do in the United States: only 30 percent of characters with speaking parts or names are women. However, the cinematic gender balance varies greatly between countries. In Korea, for example, 50 percent of leading parts went to women while women played only 10 percent of leading roles in Russian films.

French film "Blue is the Warmest Color" centered on compelling female stories—but behind the camera, men outnumber women in the French industry nine to one. Film still from Sundance. — French film *Blue is the Warmest Color* centered on compelling female stories—but behind the camera, men outnumber women in the French industry nine to one. Film still from Sundance.

This guest post by Sarah Mirk previously appeared at Bitch Media and is cross-posted with permission.

We know that women woefully make up only 30 percent of speaking roles in American films. But a new study looks at how women fare in cinema internationally.

One thing that’s frustrating about this disparity is not just that women aren’t reflected in our media but that films featuring women in speaking roles are often better movies. When a film has few women in speaking roles, that’s usually a red flag to me that it’s a poorly written film. That was backed up by American box office revenues last year: major films that passed the Bechdel test made far more money, overall, than films that failed to have two named female characters who talk to each other about something other than men. I’d be excited about a plan for American theaters to follow the example of a few theaters in Sweden that post whether a film passes the Bechdel test—then I’d be able to know which films to skip.

When thinking about gender representation in media, it’s essential to look at who is making our media. Female directors are more likely to work on projects with more women on screen. There’s no country that has gender balance behind the scenes in the film industry, but some do better than others. At the bottom of the pile is France, where male directors, writers, and producers outnumber women nine to one. Brazil is the most equitable overall, but the UK gets the special distinction of being the only film market where women make up a majority of film writers.

The study also looked at how women are portrayed on screen, including what jobs they hold. Discussions of how women are portrayed in film are endless, but I think the most interesting part of this analysis is its number-crunching on the actual jobs women hold in films. The researchers looked at the number of characters who hold jobs in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields and other male-dominated careers. The results are telling. In the United States for example, women hold 24 percent of jobs in STEM fields. But onscreen, only 12.5 percent of characters with jobs in STEM fields are women. Women are also absent onscreen from high-level political positions: only 9.5 percent of high-ranking politicians in films internationally are women. These onscreen representations are important because they offer role models for the viewer—not always good role models, of course, but even if women are playing nefarious scientists or politicians plotting global domination, people sitting in the audience understand that women are a vital presence in the laboratories and capitol buildings of the world. As the study notes, “Filmmakers make more than just movies, they make choices. Those choices could be for balance, for less sexualization, and for more powerful female roles. The choice could be for gender equality.”

Related Reading: Sweden is Now Rating Films for Gender Bias.

Sarah Mirk is Bitch Media‘s online editor. Right now, she’s really into watching Elisabeth Moss in Top of the Lake.

Bewitched by Bridget: Female Erotic Subjectivity in ‘The Last Seduction’

Female viewers may derive psychological pleasure from watching Bridget’s erotic, self-interested shenanigans. It’s exhilarating to see a female cinematic character take sexual control and outwit her male partners. It makes a refreshing change from watching women suffer the pain of romantic love. We know that Bridget will never be a victim. She will never tolerate domestic drudgery or the compromises marriage brings. In fact, it’s pretty much a given that she will always overcome her opponents. Life is a pitiless yet entertaining Darwinian game in ‘The Last Seduction,’ and Bridget plays it brilliantly.

Written by Rachael Johnson as part of our theme week on Representations of Female Sexual Desire.

Bridget Gregory is one of American cinema’s great anti-heroines. Flawlessly played by Linda Fiorentino, she is the amoral yet captivating protagonist of John Dahl’s 1994 thriller, The Last Seduction. Fiorentino’s Bridget is a lithe, beautiful woman, and her look evokes heroines of post-war noir. Her sleek, dark hair has a Golden Age cut and style, and a cigarette is never far from her perfect lips. But Dahl’s neo-noir offers an original, post-modern female villain. She’s a femme fatale for the 90s. Bridget is, at heart, a tough, lone wolf entirely dedicated to serving her own interests and ensuring her self-preservation. A female lone wolf is rare in American movies and one of the pleasures of The Last Seduction is watching her survive and thrive. Bridget is, also, gender-subversive as well as a desiring and assertive erotic subject. It is her sexual subjectivity that enthralls, amuses, and entertains.

Made crystal clear from the very start of the film, Bridget is a colorful piece of work. She’s the manager of a New York telemarketing company, and we first see her taunting and egging on her subordinates with inspirational insults such as “maggots,” “suckers,” “bastards,” and “eunuchs.” Dahl cuts between this scene and another involving a man meeting two younger guys under a bridge. The man, we will discover shortly, is Bridget’s husband, Clay Gregory (Bill Pullman). A medical resident desperately in need of cash, he is presently selling drugs to pay off a loan shark. The dangerous, nerve-wracking deal scores the couple a handsome sum.

Husband and wife — Clay and Bridget: husband and wife

Clay is also a piece of work. As acquisitive as Bridget, he is also capable of violence. When Bridget later calls Clay an “idiot” back in their apartment for carrying the money around in broad daylight, he strikes her. He makes the cowardly excuse that he was shaken up by the deal, and Bridget fakes forgiveness. When he’s in the shower, however, she runs off with the stash. Before she quits the city, Bridget takes off her wedding ring. The act signifies a rejection of domesticity and traditional coupling as well as a repudiation of age-old ideas of female subservience and sacrifice. It also signals that she will now drive the narrative. Although the act of abuse serves as a trigger, the viewer is, in fact, encouraged to believe that Bridget is motivated by more than vengeance. She wants total mastery of her destiny and will do anything to achieve it.

She flees north. Stopping in a small, characterless town in “cow country,” she drops into a run-of-the-mill bar. A gorgeous, svelte yet foul-mouthed New Yorker, Bridget is perceived as an exotic figure in these parts. A young, attractive man with a pleasant personality and the very ordinary name of Mike, is drawn to her. Mike (Peter Berg) buys her a drink when her ungracious demand for a Manhattan is, quite understandably, ignored by the bartender.

Their first encounter serves as an amusing, outrageous antidote to the saccharine meet-cutes of 90s romantic comedies. Bridget initially refuses Mike’s quite ordinary advances in inimitably impolite fashion: “Go find yourself a nice little cowgirl and make nice little cow babies and leave me alone.” But when Mike good-humoredly makes the claim that he’s “hung like a horse,” Bridget offers him a seat. She proceeds to unzip his pants, fondle his dick, probe him about his sexual history, and, then, smell her fingers. Inspection over, the newly acquainted couple head off to his place and spend the night together. The morning after, she heads off without telling him her name or saying goodbye.

Their next meeting, at Mike’s place of work, is pure coincidence. Deciding to lay low in the town, Bridget secures a managerial position at the same insurance company as her new lover, and takes on the name of Wendy Kroy. She wants distance from Mike at work and warns him: “Don’t fuck with my image.” She is, however, more sociable when she meets him again at the bar.

They soon have sex near the dumpster behind the bar. Bridget directs their love-making and plays the more sexually dynamic part. Hanging onto the rails, in an elevated position, Bridget fucks Mike against a fence. With his pants down to his ankles and knees bent, he looks the more vulnerable partner in this al fresco erotic episode. He is also the emotionally vulnerable lover. “Where do I fit in?” Mike asks Bridget. “You’re my designated fuck,” she replies. She later rides him in her car.

Bridget, for the most part, assumes the traditionally dominant position in her love-making sessions with Mike. The filmmakers’ characterization of their female protagonist’s desire is unusual for American cinema. Bridget’s physical beauty is certainly not obscured, but she cannot be characterized as a classic Hollywood sex object. She is, instead, presented as an assertive, dynamic sexual subject. Intense physical pleasure is not bound up with the self-abandonment of romantic love. Nor does it signify psychic self-annihilation. Reproduction, furthermore, does not play a part in Bridget’s world. She and her husband are childless. Love has an ideological import, and it has often, let’s face it, been a trap for women in patriarchal society. Bridget, however, is not confined by love. Sex, for her, is about control, pleasure and play.

Mike, however, falls in love with Bridget and craves a more emotionally intimate relationship. He is flattered that she has chosen him, as he believes himself to be “bigger than this town.” Although he bemoans, in a somewhat boyish way, her arrogance and dominance. Mike realizes, a little late, that Bridget is a dangerous, amoral woman. He calls her “sick” and “deranged” when she suggests they “sell murder” to people (for example, to women who have been betrayed by their husbands), but he is ultimately ignorant of her true intentions. She becomes increasingly calculating with her lover, and he just can’t keep up. Although Mike is horrified when Bridget (falsely) tells him that she has successfully sold murder, he is eventually manipulated into agreeing to kill Clay. Note that Bridget has lied to him about the identity of his target. Mike is unaware that he has been sent to New York to murder Bridget’s husband; he believes his target to be a man who’s been driving old ladies out of their homes. I will not tell you what happens when Mike encounters Clay.

Bridget’s treatment of people, particularly men, remains consistently appalling throughout the film, but it goes beyond crude invective and exploitation. Bridget admits to Mike that she enjoys “bending the rules, playing with people’s brains.” She exploits both society’s moral codes and prejudices and takes advantage of the kindness of others. She espouses a certain moral relativism. When Mike says, helplessly, “Murder is wrong,” Bridget counters, “Unless the President says to do it.” In fact, Bridget gains an almost sexual pleasure plotting her clever moves. She screws men both literally and metaphorically.

Bridget’s unbound sexuality and gender-subversive behavior make her evil more interesting and radical. She knows how to manipulate the gender order and succeed in a phallocentric world. She is unfailingly resourceful and supernaturally resilient. In a way, this amoral female protagonist functions to strip patriarchy bare. Her cynical, manipulative words and acts serve to expose the weaknesses and wickedness of men: their insecurities, secrets, and vulnerabilities as well as their aggressive, acquisitive traits.

Bridget, as we have seen, does not conform to culturally constructed norms of femininity. She also manipulates and mocks conventional expectations of gender. Her parodic skills are neatly demonstrated in one short, entertaining scene when she offers cookies to a local detective her husband has recruited. Wearing a lace apron and a smile, she delivers the sweet gift to the man watching her movements in his parked car. He does not, however, see her placing a plank of nails by his tires, and he has only himself to blame when she drives off to an unknown destination.

The Last Seduction does not, of course, endorse a reversal of domination, but the movie makes for a playfully, and knowingly, subversive viewing experience. Although Bridget’s actions should not be read in a literal, man-hating way, female viewers may derive psychological pleasure from watching Bridget’s erotic, self-interested shenanigans. It’s exhilarating to see a female cinematic character take sexual control and outwit her male partners. It makes a refreshing change from watching women suffer the pain of romantic love. We know that Bridget will never be a victim. She will never tolerate domestic drudgery or the compromises marriage brings. In fact, it’s pretty much a given that she will always overcome her opponents. Life is a pitiless yet entertaining Darwinian game in The Last Seduction, and Bridget plays it brilliantly.

An in control Bridget — An in-control Bridget

Fiorentino’s interpretation of our deeply sexy, whip-smart anti-heroine is supremely persuasive. The casting is perfect; the actress should have won an Oscar for her performance, but the movie was shut out of the nominations because it was first shown on cable television before being given a cinematic release. Rules may be rules, but it’s nothing less than a sin that both Fiorentino and John Dahl’s smart, stylish film were deemed ineligible.

The Last Seduction is elegantly shot, well-paced and cleverly constructed. Bridget is the dominant sexual and narrative subject. The story is primarily shaped by her sensual, self-interested needs. If she can be characterized as a feminist cultural icon, she’s an amusing, distinctly anti-humanist one. One thing that’s certain is that watching her at work and play is the cinematic equivalent of an empowering Manhattan cocktail.

Q&A: Girlhood Behind and In Front of the Camera

Ten questions between filmmaker Morgan Faust and 13-year-old actress Rachel Resheff.

Morgan: The truth is when I was growing up in the 1980s, the child actresses were often given pretty syrupy roles (with the exception of Journey of Natty Gann and Labyrinth). It was the boys who got to have the cool movies–Goonies, Stand by Me, even The NeverEnding Story and E.T., which did have girls, but the boys were the heroes. That is why I write the movies I do–adventures films for girls–because that’s what I wanted to do when I was a kid, go on adventures, be the hero. I still do want that. I mean, who doesn’t?

This guest post by Morgan Faust appears as part of our theme week on Child and Teenage Girl Protagonists.

In 2010, Morgan Faust, (a 35-year-old female award-winning filmmaker) directed Rachel Resheff (a 13-year-old actress recently seen on Orange is the New Black) in a short film.

They have been friends ever since.

Recently, they asked each other each five questions about young women in the movies.

Here are their answers.

Morgan: Who is your favorite teen girl character and why?

Rachel: One of my favorite teen girl characters is probably Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter movies. She never failed to hold her own in these huge films, and it was so cool to watch Emma Watson grow more and more as an actress and as a character.

Rachel: When you are writing roles for teens, do you consider the current obsessions with social media and the current “hot topics”?

Morgan: Definitely. A recent script I wrote is about a young girl who is on a hunt for her missing sister. Social media plays a huge part. As screwed up as it can be, social media gives young people a huge amount of power through community that they never had before. Since I write about young women, that is especially exciting since I think it is one of the many ways in which we are seeing barriers being torn down through technology. But I am also 35, so as you know from working with me, I spend a lot of time talking with young women to make sure my characters sound like real teenagers, not weird 35-year-old people trying to sound like kids, especially when I am talking about “hot topics”….

Emily Fields from Pretty Little Liars — Emily Fields from *Pretty Little Liars*

Morgan: Which movie character is most like you?

Rachel: I think I am a lot like Emily from Pretty Little Liars (my favorite show). Emily is smart and driven. In the show, she faces many obstacles that can get in the way of her passion for swimming. I can relate to Emily because as I pursue my passion for acting, there are many obstacles that can get in my way and people who can try to put me down. Also, Emily, like me, finds time to still have fun and she stays close to the people who are always there for her.

Rachel: Do you ever write about experiences from your childhood?

Morgan: There is no other young woman I know better than the one still alive and kicking in my head. I often have to remind myself in situations that it is in fact I who is the grown-up. So, yeah, a lot of my personal stories end up in my writing. I grew up a tomboy, playing in the mud and jumping car batteries, and a lot of my characters end up that way. Since I write adventure and fantasy, usually my characters’ experiences are elevated beyond my own, but the feelings and the reactions are the same. I want to fill the screens with self-reliant young women who use their brains to solve problems and learn how to make good decisions, so when I write young women characters, I am often mixing “what I did do” with “what I wished I had done” (I think it’s only fair that my characters get to be cooler than me!).

Morgan: What do you think of the Disney Princesses?

Rachel: I think that the Disney Princesses made my childhood complete and I will forever be grateful for the impact they made on my life… seriously. But, I also feel that they can give little girls a false sense that every girl needs to be a princess with a Prince Charming. So much has changed with the idea of acceptance, and that’s why I think that the Disney Princesses are becoming a little bit different. They are not really the girls who get put into comas and need princes to come and wake them up anymore. Usually now, Disney Princesses are the ones doing the rescuing, which I think is symbolic of a lot of things that young girls should learn. Not that I have lived that long and I am that old, but I definitely have strong opinions about these sort of things.

Rachel: What is your opinion on the child starlets who have ended up in some trouble as young adults?

Morgan: As a woman old enough to be a mom, but without kids, I find myself torn on this issue. As the mom I will one day be, I see these young women expressing themselves often in incredibly sexualized ways and think, they have a responsibility as professional famous people to consider the impact they have on their fans. The unmarried, mom-less me can fully connect to the undeniable pressure they are under, the very real mental toll their lives have taken on them and their desire to just break free! All I can do as an artist is continue to try and create worthy, interesting and cool (which even using that word, I feel I am putting into question my ability to do so) young women on the screen that kids and teens (and grown-ups that like to watch teen movies…) connect with. Stories serve as more than just entertainment, they serve to help us invent our own codes of morality and integrity. I am not looking to make Little House on the Prairie-type characters devoid of darkness and flaws, but I do hope to put a lot more girls and women on the screen that don’t think their looks are the only important thing about them.

Morgan: What do you think of Miley Cyrus?

Rachel: I actually don’t have a problem with all of Miley Cyrus’s recent actions. I looked up to her when I was younger because she was a very positive role model to young girls. Now, in her new phase, she is trying to send a different message by saying that everyone should just be totally comfortable in their own skin and no one should care what anyone else thinks. I completely support her new views but sometimes, like in her VMAs performance or her appearance where she smoked a joint at the EMAs, she goes a little bit overboard. But, the idea of doing what makes her feel happy and comfortable is fine as long as she’s not doing something that can get her in jail or under psychiatric evaluation. Sometimes it seems that with child actors/ actresses who grow up in the public eye, they don’t want to be perceived the way they were when they were kids as sweet and innocent, so they can take it to extremes. I try to keep myself balanced as a child actress, and when I grow up, I will try my best to not let myself go crazy. Personally, “Nobody’s Perfect” by Hannah Montana (Miley Cyrus) will always be my jam no matter what.

Rachel: As a director, what do you look for in teens/young women, when you are casting?

Morgan: Personality, intellect, heart, a good work ethic, and connection. We’re going to be doing a lot of hanging out, so we better get along. They have to be right for the role, but if I connect with someone, I am willing to take a leap of faith that together we can grow the character to be a blend between the person I imagined, and the person they are.

Morgan: Do you think teenage girls are presented as too sexy or pretty normal in the way they dress and behave as compared to you and your friends?

Rachel: I don’t really feel that teens are presented as too sexy or anything like that. Typically, the teens in movies or TV shows usually dress and act similar to how my friends and I act at school or just in general. However, I find a lot of times that writers have the teens use a lot of text-talk and over-exaggerate the current obsession with social media. Sometimes the writing can become unrealistic or unnatural. I often recognize as the actress in the scene when something sounds like it is something a kid in my school could say or if it isn’t.

Jennifer Grey in Dirty Dancing — Jennifer Grey in *Dirty Dancing*

Rachel: Which child actresses from when you were a kid have influenced you as a writer/director and why?

Morgan: OK, she’s not exactly a kid, but definitely Jennifer Grey. Her role in Dirty Dancing was this smart, goofy, fearless, normal looking girl that just felt so real on the screen, and who succeeded through hard work and following her heart. It was sweet. I think about her a lot. She was just the perfect actor for the perfect role.

The truth is when I was growing up in the 1980s, the child actresses were often given pretty syrupy roles (with the exception of Journey of Natty Gann and Labyrinth). It was the boys who got to have the cool movies–Goonies, Stand by Me, even The NeverEnding Story and E.T., which did have girls, but the boys were the heroes. That is why I write the movies I do–adventures films for girls–because that’s what I wanted to do when I was a kid, go on adventures, be the hero. I still do want that. I mean, who doesn’t? It’s exciting to see more Hunger Games (well, at least the idea of Hunger Games, I’d prefer a more active protagonist who makes a decision every once in a while instead of just having a series of gut reactions, but that is a different interview…) and Divergent. Let’s keep ‘em coming on every budget level!

Morgan Faust started working in film as an intern for the Squigglevision classic Dr. Katz and never looked back. A graduate of Columbia University’s MFA program, she now works as half of BroSis, a brother/sister writing and directing team with brother Max Isaacson in Los Angeles, where they are finishing up their first feature script (a female-helmed actioner), and ramping up to direct a pair of films in 2014. Her short film Tick Tock Time Emporium won numerous film festivals and is distributed in the US, India, Greenland, Denmark, the Faroe Islands and is available online at Seed & Spark. Her other credits include Gimme the Loot (Editor), 3 Backyards (Editor) and Mutual Appreciation (Producer).

Rachel Resheff, age 13, began working at age 8 when she appeared in the indie film, 3 Backyards, where she first met Morgan Faust. Since then, Rachel has appeared in four Broadway productions, numerous Off-Broadway plays, films, and television (most recently in Orange is the New Black as Young Alex).

Powerful Realism and Nostalgia in ‘My So-Called Life’

Almost 20 years later, we need more of what My So-Called Life gave us a taste of. We need teenage girl protagonists to be sexual, not sexy. We need honest portrayals of what it is to be a teenager–not only for teenagers who need to see themselves in faithful mirrors, but also for adults who are still trying to figure themselves out.

Written by Leigh Kolb as part of our theme week on Child and Teenage Girl Protagonists.

Our teenage years are often unfulfilled and disappointing. We relentlessly try to find ourselves, to make things good, but those short years are over quickly, and we don’t truly get it until much later.

These years are much like the short-lived My So-Called Life, which aired from 1994 to early 1995, and was canceled after just one season. The protagonist of My So-Called Life, Angela Chase (Claire Danes), is a powerful representation of those short teenage years. She is self-centered, horny, and emotional. She is pulled from every direction, trying to separate from her parents and evolve with new friends. She has high expectations and deep disappointments. Angela and her friends are painfully accurate portrayals of what it is to be a teenager.

As sad and unjust as it is that the show only lasted one season, there’s something poignant about how it was short and open-ended, yet packed such intensity into 19 episodes. My So-Called Life is, essentially, a mirror image of adolescence not only in narrative, but also in format.

My So-Called Life is a gold mine for feminist analysis–the show includes many thoughtful critiques of what it means to be a young woman in our culture, what it means to be a wife and mother, what it means to be a man, and what it means to be gay. Topics typically reserved for superficial after-school specials (sexuality, drug use, abuse, coming out) are treated with an intensely real humanity that many critics have argued completely changed the genre of adolescent and family dramas.

Being a teenage girl in our culture is fraught with cultural expectations and disappointments. Angela–along with girlfriends Rayanne and Sharon–are portrayed not as caricatures, not as virgins or whores, not as good girls or bad girls. They are complex and sexual; they are selfish and confused; they are wonderful and awful.

Teenagers are typically–biologically–self-centered and sexual, and the power of nostalgia drives us to consider and reconsider our teen years (in them and after them). My So-Called Life stands the test of time because it deals with these issues through characters and plot lines that reflect reality.

Self-Centered

Early in the season, the writers frame most episodes with lessons that the students are learning in school. Kafka’s Metamorphosis is juxtaposed with Angela changing her looks (dying her hair red) and feeling misunderstood by her parents. Angela sits in a class about JFK’s assassination, and says she’s “jealous” that she hasn’t had that defining moment in life that she’ll always remember where she was when it happened. Malcolm X’s words are turned into a lament about a zit. Students flirt and make out, ignoring the art on a field trip to the art museum.

On the surface, these woven-together stories seem jarring–we watch Angela turn everything into an insignificant comparison to her own life. But this is exactly what we do in adolescence. We pout that nothing important has happened in our lifetime without understanding the weight of history because we think that we are the center of history. There is scientific proof that teenagers’ brains function differently–it’s important to remind ourselves of that.

My So-Called Life, specifically through Angela’s narrative, portrays that era of life perfectly. Creator/writer/producer Winnie Holzman said, “I just went back to what it was like to be a teenager for me. Sure, Angela’s me. But at the risk of sounding. . . whatever, all the characters were me.” Holzman researched further by teaching at a high school for a couple of days, and realized that teenagers were “exactly the same” as they always had been (which is perhaps why the show still seems so real).

Defining self — The unending journey to define “self”

This selfishness is not presented with judgment or disdain, though. All of the characters–teens and adults alike–have human motivations, which we sometimes like, and sometimes don’t. Their selfishness is examined through the consequences and normality of being self-centered as a teenager, and how that looks and feels different when one is a parent or teacher. Angela worrying about a zit over Malcolm X’s words seems off-putting, but it’s painfully real.

Angela’s relationships with her friends–Rayanne, Rickie, Brian, and Sharon–also highlight the inflated sense of self that navigates us through those formative years.

Horny

One of my favorite aspects of the show is the way young female sexuality is portrayed. Angela is horny as hell. Those fresh, out-of-control adolescent sexual urges are clear and accurate throughout the series, and the writers deal with teenage sexuality with truth and nuance that is too rare in portrayals of teenage sexuality (especially teenage girls’ sexuality). Angela’s inner monologues about–and eventual makeouts with–Jordan Catalano reveal that intensity.

Angela is clearly sexual, but also struggles with the disappointing reality of teenage male sexuality when Jordan tongue-attacks her with a terrible, awkward kiss, or expects sex before she’s ready. She wants him so much, but the expectations and imbalance of sexual power are crushing. Angela is never anti-sex, but she is nervous. She speaks with her doctor about protection, and opens up to Sharon. Her reasons for not being quite ready don’t have to do with her parents or religion–it’s about her. And that’s just how it should be.

Meanwhile, straight-laced Sharon is getting it on constantly. She shares with Angela that the expectations that disregard female agency are problematic, but she enthusiastically enjoys sex. While Sharon seems the most judgmental and prudish, she has a fulfilling and active sex life. Angela realizes–as do we–that sexual acts don’t define a person, but sexuality is an important part of who we are.

Rayanne is known by her peers as promiscuous and “slutty,” but we are also challenged to look beyond that. She wants to define herself, and that’s the label that has stuck–so she decides to be proud of the designation (she and Sharon share sub-plots about their sexual reputations). Her sexual experiences–the drunken night with Jordan being the only time we know she has sex–don’t seem to be healthy or for her. All of the characters needed more seasons to have their stories fully realized, but Rayanne especially needed more than 19 episodes to be explored.

My So-Called Life turns the virgin-whore dichotomy on its head. Young women’s sexuality–the intensity, the confusion, the expectations–is presented realistically, and the message that when it’s good, it’s good, is loud and clear.

Angela and Jordan’s makeout scenes are, well, amazing, and the female gaze is often catered to. When Angela is skipping geometry study sessions to go make out with Jordan in the boiler room, we understand why she’s doing it. That episode has some excellent commentary on young women’s educational motivations, especially mathematics. When an instructor laments that it’s “so sad” when these smart girls don’t try, another instructor says that it’s because of their low self-esteem.

While that’s not an untrue assessment, it’s also important to recognize that in Angela’s case, she was horny as hell. We brush off boys’ behavior–the idea that they can’t stop thinking about sex in their teen years–but girls are right there, too.

As Angela tells a confused Brian, “Boys don’t have the monopoly on thinking about it.”

My So-Called Life reiterates that idea, which is heartbreakingly rare in depictions of teenage girl protagonists.

Commentary on the pressures that teenage girls face are woven throughout the show. — Commentary on the pressures that teenage girls face is woven throughout the show.

Nostalgic

The Greek roots of the word nostalgia are to return (home) with pain. We often think of nostalgia as telling stories with old friends, or looking through old yearbooks as we reminisce. But it’s much more than that.

Angela says, “I mean, this whole thing with yearbook — it’s like, everybody’s in this big hurry to make this book, to supposedly remember what happened. Because if you made a book of what really happened, it’d be a really upsetting book.”

My So-Called Life ends with Angela stepping into a car with Jordan and driving away. Jordan has just met her mother, Patty, and the two sit and visit. Patty has been waiting for her old high-school love interest to stop by for a drink (and a business conversation), but he doesn’t show up. Patty and Jordan share a fairly intimate conversation, and both seem to understand something they hadn’t before.

Jordan comes outside, asks Angela to come along with him, and says that her mom says it’s OK. In understanding her own trajectory from teenager to adult, Patty has released Angela.

It’s sudden, it’s unclear, and it’s vague. It–the show, and adolescence–goes by so quickly, and we can’t fully understand it until we look back at the literal and figurative pictures of our life. Not just the smiling yearbook photos, but those things that remain inside.

We don’t know exactly where Angela is going at the end of My So-Called Life, and neither does she. The restraints and possibilities of adolescence can be overwhelming, and as life changes into adulthood, the restraints and possibilities both tighten and grow. By looking back–in all of its pleasure and pain–into those years of intense growth and confusion, we can better know ourselves.

Angela rides away with Jordan at the end.

When My So-Called Life originally aired, I was in middle school. Our antenna didn’t pick up ABC, so I wasn’t able to watch it in real time. I knew, however, from the occasional Sassy magazine that I wanted to be Angela Chase, and I wanted Jordan Catalano. Years later, after living through almost all of the plot lines of the show, I watched the entire series. And then again, years after that. I’m struck by how much I can still feel what I felt at 15 by listening to Angela’s internal monologue. Good television, like good literature, can do that–take us, through fiction, back to times and places. Whether those times and places are crushing or celebratory, there is a distinct pain in going back–that nostalgia that shapes us and creates our realities.

asdf — Imagine the power in seeing this ad as a teenage girl: “Yes, I DO know how it feels!”

Almost 20 years later, we need more of what My So-Called Life gave us a taste of. We need teenage girl protagonists to be sexual, not sexy. We need honest portrayals of what it is to be a teenager–not only for teenagers who need to see themselves in faithful mirrors, but also for adults who are still trying to figure themselves out.

That season of our lives is fleeting, open-ended, and ends abruptly. It’s meaningful but unfortunate that My So-Called Life so accurately portrayed those particular aspects of adolescence.

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri.