Call For Writers: Sisterhood

Despite what the multitude of Bechdel-test-failing media would have us believe, relationships among women can be complex and about much, much more than men. The sibling relationships of sisters, in fact, can be particularly rich, nuanced, and worth contemplation. Sibling rivalry, as it appears in ‘A League of Their Own’ and ‘Sixteen Candles,’ examines competition for recognition, birth order conflict, and self-doubt when faced with perceptions of sibling superiority.

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Our theme week for August 2016 will be Sisterhood.

Despite what the multitude of Bechdel-test-failing media would have us believe, relationships among women can be complex and about much, much more than men. The sibling relationships of sisters, in fact, can be particularly rich, nuanced, and worth contemplation. Sibling rivalry, as it appears in A League of Their Own and Sixteen Candles, examines competition for recognition, birth order conflict, and self-doubt when faced with perceptions of sibling superiority.

Twinness is a fascinating trope that is often part of popular consciousness. Sister, Sister and The Parent Trap (along with all of its sequels and remake) explore the mirroring of twinness in a lighthearted, fun way. Orphan Black, on the other hand, delves into the dark, science fiction realm of the uncanny with questions surrounding cloning. All these examples ponder the nature versus nurture debate, dissecting the differences and similarities between twins.

Some stories highlight themes of sacrifice, like Frozen and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, where the love between sisters is depicted as something pure, righteous, and good. On the other hand, some stories focus on the mysterious unknowableness of the sister bond like in Beloved and The Virgin Suicides, where the bond seems to transcend this life and this reality.

What is so fascinating about the relationship between siblings? What are your favorite depictions of sisters? While there are fewer depictions of sibling women of color and even fewer depictions of trans sisterhood, are there examples that really stand out as excellent or problematic?

We’d like to avoid as much overlap as possible for this theme, so please get your proposals in early if you know which topic you would like to write about. We accept both original pieces and cross-posts, and we respond to queries within a week.

Most of our pieces are between 1,000 and 2,000 words, and include links and images. Please send your piece as a Microsoft Word document to btchflcks[at]gmail[dot]com, including links to all images, and include a 2- to 3-sentence bio.

If you have written for us before, please indicate that in your proposal, and if not, send a writing sample if possible.

Please be familiar with our publication and look over recent and popular posts to get an idea of Bitch Flicks’ style and purpose. We encourage writers to use our search function to see if your topic has been written about before, and link when appropriate (hyperlinks to sources are welcome, as well).

The final due date for these submissions is Friday, August 26, 2016 by midnight Eastern Time.


Here are some possible topic ideas:

Frozen

Sisters

Beloved

Transparent

Sister, Sister

A League of Their Own

The Virgin Suicides

Bride and Prejudice

Ugly Betty

Sunshine Cleaning

Pariah

Rachel Getting Married

Sixteen Candles

The Secret Life of Bees

Orphan Black

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

The Cosby Show

Ginger Snaps

Mustang

Parent Trap

Little Women

The Color Purple

Sense and Sensibility

Jem & the Holograms

Practical Magic

My Neighbor Totoro

Middle of Nowhere

Charmed

Half & Half

Full House

Lilo and Stitch

Daughters of the Dust

Grey’s Anatomy

Call for Writers: Ladies of the 1980s

There is a deep nostalgia for the 1980s, especially the pop culture of the decade. … Stories with iconic women at their heart flourished in the 80s (‘Working Girl,’ ‘Sixteen Candles,’ ‘The Legend of Billie Jean’). The emerging breed of action heroine born in the 70s came into her own in the 80s (Sarah Connor from ‘The Terminator,’ Ellen Ripley from ‘Aliens,’ Leia Organa of ‘Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back’).

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Our theme week for June 2016 will be Ladies of the 1980s.

There is a deep nostalgia for the 1980s, especially the pop culture of the decade. The teen narrative reigned supreme. Tales of disaffected youth and romantic comedies were changed forever once John Hughes put his personal stamp on them in the 80s. The fashion of the era is still famous/infamous, known for hefty shoulder pads and big, stiff bangs. Stories with iconic women at their heart flourished in the 80s (Working Girl, Sixteen Candles, The Legend of Billie Jean). The emerging breed of action heroine born in the 70s came into her own in the 80s (Sarah Connor from The Terminator, Ellen Ripley from Aliens, Leia Organa of Star Wars: Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back).

The ladies of the 80s inspired self-identification in female audience members, from the oft-bespectacled Andie of Pretty in Pink who must make her own prom dress because she can’t afford to buy one to the androgynous car-fixing, drum-playing tomboy, Watts, who is overlooked by her best friend and love interest in Some Kind of Wonderful. Women in the 80s were allowed to be quirky, awkward, nerdy, and unsexualized, while still maintaining the lead role and/or the love interest role.

Television series Golden Girls, Murder, She Wrote, and Designing Women featured all-women casts and older women characters, as well as focused on women’s careers and female friendships. TV series The Cosby Show (now with a “tainted legacy” due to the rape/sexual assault survivors who have come forward accusing Bill Cosby) and A Different World featured a range of Black women characters.

What makes the ladies of the 1980s so iconic, so beloved, so well-remembered? Who are your favorite ladies of the 80s? Looking back with our 2016 lens, were things really so great for women in the 80s? Women in the 80s were usually love interests and even love objects (literally in Mannequin). While white women were frequently leads, women of color didn’t fare so well in the 80s, as they were often completely unrepresented or tokenized. Classic 80s films like Revenge of the Nerds and Sixteen Candles are now being critiqued for their racism and participation in rape culture.

We’d like to avoid as much overlap as possible for this theme, so please get your proposals in early if you know which topic you would like to write about. We accept both original pieces and cross-posts, and we respond to queries within a week.

Most of our pieces are between 1,000 and 2,000 words, and include links and images. Please send your piece as a Microsoft Word document to btchflcks[at]gmail[dot]com, including links to all images, and include a 2- to 3-sentence bio.

If you have written for us before, please indicate that in your proposal, and if not, send a writing sample if possible.

Please be familiar with our publication and look over recent and popular posts to get an idea of Bitch Flicks’ style and purpose. We encourage writers to use our search function to see if your topic has been written about before, and link when appropriate (hyperlinks to sources are welcome, as well).

The final due date for these submissions is Friday, June 24, 2016 by midnight Eastern Time.


Here are some possible topic ideas:

The Terminator

Jumpin’ Jack Flash

Full House

Aliens

The Cosby Show

Sixteen Candles

Mannequin

She-Ra: Princess of Power

The Secret of the Sword

A Different Image

The Breakfast Club

Punky Brewster

Drylongso

Heathers

The Legend of Billie Jean

Working Girl

Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back

The Women of Brewster Place

Teen Witch

Stakeout

Gleaming the Cube

 

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.

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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.

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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.

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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.

 

 

The Brat Pack: The Roundup

Check out all of the posts for our Brat Pack Theme Week here.

Mannequin: A Dummy’s Guide to True and Everlasting Love by Karina Wilson

By any regular standards, even the 1980s, Mannequin is a TERRIBLE movie.  It never should have been green lit, let alone hit wide release.  It’s often lumped in with other Brat Pack pics, thanks to the presence of Andrew McCarthy and James Spader, but it really should be categorized separately, as a romcom gone wrong. Showroom dummies that come to life after hours should be the stuff of horror movies, or episodes of Doctor Who, not fluffy fantasies starring a nearly naked Kim Cattrall.  John Hughes wouldn’t have touched this material with a ten-foot pole.


Sixteen Candles, Rape Culture, and the Anti-Woman Politics of 2013 by Stephanie Rogers

Holy fuck this movie. I started watching it like OH YEAH MY CHILDHOOD MOLLY RINGWALD ADOLESCENCE IS SO HARD and after two scenes, I put that shit on pause like, WHEN DID SOMEONE WRITE ALL THESE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY PARTS THAT WEREN’T HERE BEFORE I WOULD’VE REMEMBERED THEM.

Nostalgia is a sneaky bitch.


A Brain, an Athlete, a Basket Case, a Princess, and a Criminal: How The Breakfast Club Archetypes Set Standards for High School in Brat Pack Cinema and Beyond by Kylie Sparks

While today’s entertainment sources a lot of inspiration from Brat Pack Cinema, especially the high school-coming-of-age era of Brat Pack Cinema, we have to be very aware that we do not fall into the trap of embracing multifaceted male characters and yet only providing a Princess/Oddball dynamic with female characters. Not all of us fall into The Brain, The Athlete, The Basket Case, The Princess, and The Criminal, and while we can look to Brat Pack Cinema for inspiration to create new projects for our generation and generations to come, archetypes are suggestions, not the end-all be-all for characters in entertainment.


After The Brat Pack: Ally Sheedy in High Art by Ren Jender

Although a few who had fallen under the brat pack sobriquet (like Demi Moore) continued in mainstream star-vehicles well into the 90s (and Rob Lowe, dismissed as another pretty face in the ’80s, was able to sustain a TV career into the present), most had faded from the public view by then, including Ally Sheedy (after starring in 1987’s Maid to Order, her own Weekend At  Bernie’s) –though earlier in her career she, of the whole “Pack,” received some of the best reviews for her work. Sheedy went on to reinvent herself–and make good on her earlier promise–in a series of meaty roles in independent films in the late 90s: the most well known one (for which she won several awards) was Lucy Berliner in writer-director Lisa Cholodenko’s 1998 feature debut High Art.


What They’re Going Through: The Brat Pack Gave Teens a Voice by Caroline Madden

Whatever the Brat Pack actors did with their fame in real life does not reflect the impact they ingrained on our culture. They helped put a face and a voice to teen struggles. These talented young actors gave teenagers an identity and platform for their problems that will stand the test of time. We will always thank the Brat Pack for that.

‘Sixteen Candles,’ Rape Culture, and Anti-Woman Politics

Holy fuck this movie. I started watching it like OH YEAH MY CHILDHOOD MOLLY RINGWALD ADOLESCENCE IS SO HARD and after two scenes, I put that shit on pause like, WHEN DID SOMEONE WRITE ALL THESE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY PARTS THAT WEREN’T HERE BEFORE I WOULD’VE REMEMBERED THEM.

Nostalgia is a sneaky bitch.

Movie posters for Sixteen Candles

This post by Stephanie Rogers appears as part of our theme week on The Brat Pack. 

Holy fuck this movie. I started watching it like OH YEAH MY CHILDHOOD MOLLY RINGWALD ADOLESCENCE IS SO HARD and after two scenes, I put that shit on pause like, WHEN DID SOMEONE WRITE ALL THESE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY PARTS THAT WEREN’T HERE BEFORE I WOULD’VE REMEMBERED THEM.

Nostalgia is a sneaky bitch.
I wanted to write about all the wonderful things I thought I remembered about Sixteen Candles: a sympathetic and complex female protagonist, the awkwardness of adolescence, the embarrassing interactions with parents and grandparents who JUST DON’T GET IT, crushing hard on older boys—and yes, all that stuff is still there. And of course, there’s that absolutely fantastic final wedding scene in which a woman consents to marry a dude while under the influence of a fuckload of muscle relaxers. OH WAIT WHUT.
Ginny Baker getting married while super high

 

Turns out, that shit ain’t so funny once feminism becomes a thing in your life.
The kind of adorable premise of Sixteen Candles is that Molly Ringwald (Samantha Baker) wakes up one morning as a sixteen-year-old woman who still hasn’t yet grown the breasts she wants. Her family, however, forgets her birthday because of the chaos surrounding her older sister Ginny’s upcoming wedding; relatives drive into town, future in-laws set up dinner dates, and poor Samantha gets the cold shoulder. It reminded me of the time my parents handed me an unwrapped Stephen King novel on my sixteenth birthday like a couple of emotionally neglectful and shitty assholes, but, you know, at least they REMEMBERED it.
Anyway, she rides the bus to school (with all the LOSERS), and in her Independent Study “class” the hot senior she likes, Jake Ryan, intercepts a note meant for her friend Randy. And—wouldn’t you know it—the note says, I WOULD TOTALLY DO IT WITH JAKE RYAN BUT HE DOESN’T KNOW I’M ALIVE. Well he sure as fuck knows NOW, Samantha.
Samantha and Randy, totally grossed out, ride the bus to school

 

So, these are the important things in Sixteen Candles: Samantha’s family forgets her birthday; she’s in love with a hot senior who’s dating Caroline (the most popular girl in school); and there’s a big ol’ geek (Farmer Ted) from Sam’s daily bus rides who won’t stop stalking her. Oh, and Long Duk Dong exists [insert racist gong sound here]. Seriously, every time Long Duk Dong appears on screen, a fucking GONG GOES OFF on the soundtrack. I suppose that lines up quite nicely with the scene where he falls out of a tree yelling, “BONSAI.”
Since the entire movie is like a machine gun firing of RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY parts, the only way I know how to effectively talk about it is to look at the very problematic screenplay. So, fasten your seatbelts and heed your trigger warnings.
The 80s were quite possibly a nightmare.
Long Duk Dong falls out of a tree (BONSAI) after a drunken night at the homecoming dance
The first few scenes do a decent job of showing the forgotten-birthday slash upcoming-wedding fiasco occurring in the Baker household. Sam stands in front of her bedroom mirror before school, analyzing her brand new sixteen-year-old self and says, “You need four inches of bod and a great birthday.” I can get behind that idea; growing up comes with all kinds of stresses and confusion, especially for women in high school who’ve begun to feel even more insecure about their bodies (having had sufficient time to fully absorb the toxic beauty culture).
“Chronologically, you’re 16 today. Physically? You’re still 15.” –Samantha Baker, looking in the mirror

 

While Samantha laments the lack of changes in her physical appearance, her little brother Mike pretends to almost-punch their younger sister. When he gets in trouble for it, he says, “Dad, I didn’t hit her. I’d like to very much and probably will later, but give me a break. You know my method. I don’t hit her when you’re just down the hall.” It’s easy to laugh this off—I chuckled when I first heard it. But after five seconds of thinking about my reaction, I realized my brain gave Mike a pass because of that whole “boys will be boys” thing, and then I got pissed at myself.
The problem with eye-rolling away the “harmless” offenses of young boys is that it gives boys (and later, men) a license to act like fuckers with no actual repercussions. The “boys will be boys” mantra is one of the most insidious manifestations of rape culture because it conditions both boys and girls at a young age to believe boys just can’t help themselves; violence in boys is inherent and not worth trying to control. And people today—including political “leaders”—often use that excuse to justify the violent actions of men toward women.
Mike Baker explains to his dad that he hasn’t hit his younger sister … yet

 

Unfortunately, Sixteen Candles continues to reinforce this idea throughout the film.
The Geek, aka Farmer Ted—a freshman who’s obsessed with Samantha—represents this more than any other character. The film presents his stalking behavior as endearing, which means that all his interactions with Samantha (and with the popular kids at school) end with a silent, “Poor guy!” exclamation. Things just really aren’t going his way! And look how hard he’s trying! (Poor guy.) He first appears on the bus home from school and sits next to Samantha, even though she makes it quite clear—with a bunch of comments about getting dudes to kick his ass who “lust wimp blood”—that she wants him to leave her alone. Then this interaction takes place:

Ted: You know, I’m getting input here that I’m reading as relatively hostile.

Samantha: Go to hell.

Ted: Come on, what’s the problem here? I’m a boy, you’re a girl. Is there anything wrong with me trying to put together some kind of relationship between us?

[The bus stops.]

Ted: Look, I know you have to go. Just answer one question.

Samantha: Yes, you’re a total fag.

Ted: That’s not the question … Am I turning you on?

[Samantha rolls her eyes and exits the bus.]

POOR GUY! Also homophobia. Like, all over the place in this movie. The words “fag” and “faggot” flood the script and always refer to men who lack conventional masculine traits or who haven’t yet “bagged a babe.” And the emphasis on “Man-Up Already!” puts women in harm’s way more than once.
Samantha looks irritated when her stalker, Farmer Ted, refuses to leave her alone. Also Joan Cusack for no reason.

 

The most terrifying instance of this happens toward the end of the film when Ted ends up at Jake’s party after the school homecoming dance, and the two of them bond by objectifying women together (and subsequently creating a nice little movie template to last for generations). The atrocities involve a very drunk, passed-out Caroline (which reminded me so much of what happened in Steubenville that I had to turn off the movie for a while and regroup) and a pair of Samantha’s underwear.
This is how we get to that point: After Jake snags Samantha’s unintentional declaration of love during Independent Study, he becomes interested in her. He tells a jock friend of his (while they do chin-ups together in gym class), “It’s kinda cool, the way she’s always looking at me.” His friend responds—amid all that hot testosterone—that “maybe she’s retarded.” (This statement sounds even worse within the context of a film that includes a possibly disabled character, played by Joan Cusack, who lacks mobility and “hilariously” spends five minutes trying to drink from a water fountain. Her role exists as nothing more than a punch line; she literally says nothing.)
Joan Cusack drinking water (queue laughter)
Joan Cusack drinking a beer (queue laughter)
Jake’s girlfriend, Caroline, picks up on his waning interest in her and says to him at the school dance, “You’ve been acting weird all night. Are you screwing around?” He immediately gaslights her with, “Me? Are you crazy?” to which she responds, “I don’t know, Jake. I’m getting strange signals.” Yup, Caroline—IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD NOT REALLY.
Meanwhile, in an abandoned car somewhere on school premises (perhaps a shop lab/classroom), Samantha sits alone, lamenting Jake’s probable hatred of her after their interaction in the gym where he said, “Hi!” and she freaked out and ran away. Farmer Ted stalk-finds her and climbs into the passenger seat. Some words happen, blah blah blah, and a potentially interesting commentary on the culture of masculinity gets undercut by Ted asking Samantha (who Ted referred to lovingly as “fully-aged sophomore meat” to his dude-bros earlier in the film) if he can borrow her underwear to use as proof that they banged. Of course she gives her underwear to him because.
Ted holds up Samantha’s underwear to a group of dude-bros who each paid a buck to see them

 

Cut to Jake’s after-party: everyone is finally gone; his house is a mess; Caroline is passed out drunk as fuck in his bedroom; and he finds Ted trapped inside a glass coffee table (a product of bullying). Then, at last, after Jake confesses to Ted that he thinks Samantha hates him (because she ran away from him in the gym), we’re treated to a true Male Bonding Moment:

Ted: You see, [girls] know guys are, like, in perpetual heat, right? They know this shit. And they enjoy pumping us up. It’s pure power politics, I’m telling you … You know how many times a week I go without lunch because some bitch borrows my lunch money? Any halfway decent girl can rob me blind because I’m too torqued up to say no.

Jake: I can get a piece of ass anytime I want. Shit, I got Caroline in my bedroom right now, passed out cold. I could violate her ten different ways if I wanted to.

Ted: What are you waiting for?

C’MON JAKE WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR GO RAPE YOUR GIRLFRIEND. Or wait, no, maybe let’s let Ted rape her?

Jake: I’ll make a deal with you. Let me keep these [Samantha’s underwear, duh]. I’ll let you take Caroline home … She’s so blitzed she won’t know the difference.

Ted carrying a drunk Caroline to the car

And then Ted throws a passed-out Caroline over his shoulder and puts her in the passenger seat of a convertible. This scene took me immediately back to the horrific images of two men carrying around a drunk woman in Steubenville who they later raped—and were convicted of raping (thanks largely to social media). This scene, undoubtedly “funny” in the 80s and certainly still funny to people who like to claim this shit is harmless, helped lay the groundwork for Steubenville, and for Cleveland, and for Richmond, where as many as 20 witnesses watched men beat and gang rape a woman for over two hours without reporting it. On their high school campus. During their homecoming dance.

Jake and Ted talk about how to fool Caroline

People who claim to believe films and TV and pop culture moments like this are somehow disconnected from perpetuating rape need to take a step back and really think about the message this sends. I refuse to accept that a person could watch this scene from an iconic John Hughes film—where, after a party, a drunk woman is literally passed around by two men and photographed—and not see the connection between the Steubenville rape—where, after a party, a woman was literally passed around by two men and photographed.

Caroline looks drunk and confused while Ted’s friends take a photo as proof that he hooked up with her

 

And it only gets worse. Caroline wakes up out of nowhere and puts a birth control pill in Ted’s mouth. Once he realizes what he’s swallowed, he says, “You have any idea what that’ll do to a guy my age?” Caroline responds, “I know exactly what it’ll do to a girl my age. It makes it okay to be really super careless!”
It makes it okay to be really super careless. 
IT MAKES IT OKAY TO BE REALLY SUPER CARELESS.
So I guess the current anti-choice, anti-contraception, anti-woman Republicans found a John Hughes screenplay from 30 years ago and decided to use this cautionary tale as their entire fucking platform. See what happens when women have access to birth control? It makes it okay to be really super careless! And get drunk! And allow dudes to rape them!
Of course, believing that Caroline is raped in Sixteen Candles requires believing that a woman can’t consent to sex when she’s too “blitzed to know the difference” between her actual boyfriend and a random freshman geek. I mean, there’s forcible rape, and there’s not-really rape, right? And this obviously isn’t REAL rape since Ted and Caroline actually have THIS FUCKING CONVERSATION when they wake up in a church parking lot the next morning:

Ted: Did we, uh …

Caroline: Yeah. I’m pretty sure.

Ted: Of course I enjoyed it … uh … did you?

Caroline: Hmmm. You know, I have this weird feeling I did … You were pretty crazy … you know what I like best? Waking up in your arms.

Fuck you, John Hughes.
Caroline wakes up, unsure of who Ted is, but very sexually satisfied
And so many more problems exist in this film that I can’t fully get into in the space of one already long review, but the fact that Ginny (Sam’s sister) starts her period and therefore needs to take FOUR muscle relaxers to dull the pain also illustrates major problems with consent; her father at one point appears to pick her up and drag her down the aisle on her wedding day. (And, congratulations for understanding, John Hughes, that when women bleed every month, it requires a borderline drug overdose to contain the horror.)
Ginny’s dad drags her down the aisle on her wedding day
The racism, too, blows my mind. Long Duk Dong, a foreign exchange student living with Samantha’s grandparents, speaks in played-for-laughs broken English during the following monologue over dinner: “Very clever dinner. Appetizing food fit neatly into interesting round pie … I love, uh, visiting with Grandma and Grandpa … and writing letters to parents … and pushing lawn-mowing machine … so Grandpa’s hyena don’t get disturbed,” accompanied by such sentences as, “The Donger need food.” (I also love it, not really, when Samantha’s best friend Randy mishears Sam and thinks she’s interested in a Black guy. “A BLACK guy?!?!” Randy exclaims … then sighs with relief once she realizes the misunderstanding.)
Long Duk Dong talks to the Baker family over dinner
And I haven’t even touched on the problematic issues with class happening in Sixteen Candles. (Hughes does class relations a tiny bit better in Pretty in Pink.)
Basically, it freaks me out—as it should—when I watch movies or television shows from 30 years ago and see how closely the politics resemble today’s anti-woman agenda. Phrases like “legitimate rape” and “forcible rape” shouldn’t exist in 2013. In 2013, politicians like Wendy Davis shouldn’t have to stand up and speak for 13 hours—with no food, water, or restroom breaks—in order to stop a bill from passing in Texas that would virtually shut down access to safe and legal abortions in the entire state. Women should be able to walk down the street for contraception in 2013, whether it’s for condoms or for the morning after pill. The US political landscape in 2013 should NOT include talking points lifted directly from a 1984 film about teenagers.
I know John Hughes is a national fucking treasure, but please tell me our government officials aren’t using his screenplays as legislative blueprints for the future of American politics.

 

A Brain, an Athlete, a Basket Case, a Princess, and a Criminal: How ‘The Breakfast Club’ Archetypes Set Standards for High School in Brat Pack Cinema and Beyond

While today’s entertainment sources a lot of inspiration from Brat Pack Cinema, especially the high school-coming-of-age era of Brat Pack Cinema, we have to be very aware that we do not fall into the trap of embracing multifaceted male characters and yet only providing a Princess/Oddball dynamic with female characters. Not all of us fall into The Brain, The Athlete, The Basket Case, The Princess, and The Criminal, and while we can look to Brat Pack Cinema for inspiration to create new projects for our generation and generations to come, archetypes are suggestions, not the end-all be-all for characters in entertainment.

Breakfast Club Cast Photo
The Breakfast Club

 

This guest post by Kylie Sparks appears as part of our theme week on the Brat Pack.

We all remember the first time we saw The Breakfast Club, that wonderful John Hughes ode to Saturday morning detention at Shermer High School (and as a full disclaimer, it’s one of my favorite films).

At first, we saw five teenagers as the Brain, the Athlete, the Basket Case, the Princess, and the Criminal–perfectly neat archetypes in the basic high school caste system, but they actually were five kids who saw the world more than just through their own designated lens. As Brian Johnson (Anthony Michael Hall, or the “Brain”) narrates, “You see us as you want to see us – in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions.” At the end of the film, each character grew to explore what would happen across party lines (the Athlete and the Basket Case, the Princess and the Criminal, the Brain becoming his own entity of independence, and the Basket Case being “made over” by the Princess to become another Princess) and we knew their lives were forever changed by that one Saturday in detention.

It’s awesome to see teenagers explore their own identities and not conform to their own archetypes, but if we examine Brat Pack Cinema and how archetypes are portrayed throughout the 1980s coming-of-age films, there is a common trend. High school boys in Brat Pack films are allowed to be the jock, the nerd, the best friend, the weirdo, the leading male, and any other category a person would see themselves in and be multifaceted, while high school girls in Brat Pack Cinema fell under two categories: the Princess or the Oddball. While The Breakfast Club is a classic example of defining the Princess and the Oddball, several other films in Brat Pack Cinema cling to this dynamic, only showcasing that high school girls fall into these two categories with no in between.

Cast Still from Sixteen Candles
Sixteen Candles

 

Sixteen Candles, which starred Breakfast Club alums Molly Ringwald and Anthony Michael Hall, as well as Michael Shoeffling, Gedde Watanabe, and Brat Pack regulars John Cusack and Haviland Morris, showcases classic archetypes in Brat Pack Cinema: the Athlete/All-American (Shoeffling), the Awkward Princess (Ringwald), the Prom Queen (Morris), the Geek (Hall, Cusack), the Exchange Student/Geek (Watanabe), and the female Oddball (Deborah Pollack, playing The Donger’s girlfriend Marlene or “Lumberjack”). While Ringwald’s character is supposed to be an “awkward” girl on the verge of turning 16, she is cast as our Girl Next Door Princess to be a contrast to Morris’ Prom Queen Princess as “everything she isn’t.”

Given Ringwald’s prominence in the Brat Pack as a leading lady (no matter if she is deemed “awkward,” “poor,” or the “every girl”), she is still viewed as a Princess. Ringwald’s sister in the film is also a classic Princess, as everyone is preparing for her beautiful wedding and forgets Ringwald’s birthday is at the same time. Our only female character who is not billed as a Princess is our Oddball, Marlene. Marlene is also called the “Lumberjack” as she is a strong female athlete who begins dating The Donger (Watanabe), but because of her stature and strength, she is not classified as a Princess, leaving her to be relegated to Oddball status.

While the argument can be made that Sixteen Candles came out a year before The Breakfast Club, the archetype lines are solid. You can categorize the men in various archetypes in Sixteen Candles, but women can only fit inside the boxes of Oddball or Princess with no in between. Pretty in Pink follows a similar archetype map to Sixteen Candles, with Ringwald as the “Poor Outcast” Princess and Andrew McCarthy as the “All-American,” James Spader as “The Douchebag/Criminal” and Jon Cryer as the “Best Friend/Brain.”

Still from Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Ferris Bueller’s Day Off

 

Other films in Brat Pack Cinema that don’t include The Breakfast Club stars and feel worlds apart from the triumvirate of The Breakfast Club, Sixteen Candles, and Pretty in Pink also follow this same archetype map of Princess/Oddball versus more diverse male archetypes in High School. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off is a classic example. Ferris Bueller (Matthew Broderick), although he’s viewed as a “snot-nosed punk” by Principal Rooney (Jeffrey Jones), actually also falls into the “Popular Everyman” archetype of the high school caste system, adored by all the students –“the sportos, the motorheads, geeks, sluts, bloods, wastoids, dweebies, dickheads…they think he’s a righteous dude” as Rooney’s assistant Grace (played by Edie McClurg) informs Rooney. Ferris’ best friend is Cameron Frye (Alan Ruck), who on first appearance would fall into the “Freak” archetype, also falls into different archetypes as the Rich Kid, and by being Ferris’ best friend, Popular by Association.

Charlie Sheen’s appearance as the kid in the police station falls under the classic “Criminal” archetype, but we don’t know the rest of his background and he could fall under different archetypes. While our male characters are multifaceted, our two prominent female high school characters, Jeanie (Jennifer Grey) and Sloane (Mia Sara) are seen solely as Princesses. Sloane is a classic Princess–pretty and popular. Jeanie, although misunderstood and somewhat of an outcast, is also a Princess falling in line with Ringwald’s classic “every girl” princesses she portrays in Sixteen Candles and Pretty in Pink.  Neither one would be classified as Oddballs based on the criteria presented in Brat Pack Cinema, and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off does not provide any leading, prominent female characters in the high school caste system other than various forms of Princesses.

John Cusack as Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything
John Cusack as Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything…

 

Say Anything… is also an interesting film to look at in terms of male archetypes versus the Female Princess/Oddball structure since its male lead, John Cusack, played different high school archetypes in Brat Pack Cinema. In this case, in Say Anything… Cusack played iconic underachiever Lloyd Dobler, making millions of hearts break by lifting a boom box playing “In Your Eyes” by Peter Gabriel outside Diane Court (Ione Skye)’s window. Diane is a classic Princess–beautiful, rich, high school valedictorian, and the object of Lloyd Dobler’s dreams. Although Lloyd and Diane have a rocky relationship the summer after high school–between falling in love and breaking up, ultimately–Lloyd has crossed party lines, the Underachievers, to date and fall in love with the Princess, eventually going with her to London for her fellowship. Our female Oddballs are Lloyd’s fellow underachiever friends Corey Flood (Lili Taylor) and D.C. (Amy Brooks); however, with the focus of the film being the relationship between the Underachiever and the Princess as well as the Princess’ father being investigated by the IRS, this is a love story between two classic crossing archetypes we see in Brat Pack Cinema, especially since a few years before, we saw The Princess and The Criminal fall in love in The Breakfast Club.

While we examine character archetypes in High School Brat Pack Cinema, it is also important to examine the actors. Previously, Cusack played a geek (Bryce in Sixteen Candles) and the Artistic Romantic in One Crazy Summer, and with his role as the Underachiever in Say Anything…, it highlights a point that men in Brat Pack cinema may get the opportunity to portray different archetypes in the high school era. Only one female Brat Pack regular comes to mind in portraying both the Princess and the Oddball in High School: Ally Sheedy. Sheedy played Matthew Broderick’s girlfriend Jennifer in WarGames, but also played Allison Reynolds in The Breakfast Club. Every other female in the high school era of Brat Pack films plays either the Princess or the Oddball.

comparison of Allison Reynolds before and after the Princess makeover in The Breakfast Club
Comparison of Allison Reynolds before and after the Princess makeover in The Breakfast Club

 

After examining these four films (as well as looking at several others), there is the question of how we present teenagers in entertainment today so we do not fall into the trap of basing characters on the Brat Pack high school female archetypes of Princess and Oddball, especially since very rarely do we allow girls to cross these lines unless the Oddball is given a makeover into a Princess and not vice versa. While today’s entertainment sources a lot of inspiration from Brat Pack Cinema, especially the high school-coming-of-age era of Brat Pack Cinema, we have to be very aware that we do not fall into the trap of embracing multifaceted male characters and yet only providing a Princess/Oddball dynamic with female characters. Not all of us fall into the Brain, the Athlete, the Basket Case, the Princess, and the Criminal, and while we can look to Brat Pack Cinema for inspiration to create new projects for our generation and generations to come, archetypes are suggestions, not the end-all be-all for characters in entertainment.


Kylie Sparks is an actor, producer, writer, singer and USC Alumna living with a pug and a pug mix in Los Angeles. She’s passionate about entertainment, pancakes, pugs, coffee, college football and feminism. You can find her @kyliesparks on Twitter and her official website is kyliesparks.com.

Child and Teenage Girl Protagonists: The Roundup

Check out all of the posts for Child and Teenage Girl Protagonists Theme Week here.

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.


Are You There, Hollywood? It’s Me, the Average Girl by Carrie Gambino

The expectations for girls in film and television are incredibly mixed. It is naïve to say that girls nowadays are just expected to be a sexy sidekick or afterthought. With more strong female roles popping up in bigger budget films such as Harry Potter and The Hunger Games, there is the expectation that girls should also be intelligent and incredibly clever (while also being visually pleasing)… There isn’t really a place for the all-around average girl. The first two examples of strong female protagonists that I could think of are in fantasy franchises. Are real female characters really that difficult to come up with? Real female characters are often created with good intentions but tend not to work on a larger scale.

Six Lessons Lisa Simpson Taught Me by Lady T

…Lisa takes a stand against the sexism spouting from the mouth of the new talking Malibu Stacy doll. Frustrated with the doll’s collection of sexist catchphrases that include “Let’s bake some cookies for the boys,” “Thinking too much gives you wrinkles,” and “My name’s Stacy, but you can call me *wolf whistle*,” Lisa collaborates with the creator of Malibu Stacy to create their own talking doll, Lisa Lionheart. When Malibu Stacy outsells Lisa Lionheart, our creator feels temporarily dejected, until she hears her own voice speaking behind her: “Trust in yourself and you can achieve anything.” She turns to see a girl her age hold a Lisa Lionheart doll in her hand and smile.

Delightful Tina. Shy, painfully weird, butt-obsessed, quietly dorky, intensely daydreamy Tina. Tina is a little bit like all of us (and–cough–a lot like some of us) at that most graceless, transitional, intrinsically unhappy stage of life that is early adolescence. She is also a wonderfully rich and well-developed character, both in her interactions with her family and in her own right, and she’s arguably the emotional core of the whole show.

It’s common wisdom that maintaining relationships requires constant work, but there’s often an assumption (in TV, movies, and real life) that this only applies to romantic relationships. Platonic relationships are rarely the focus of a story, and when a storyline deals with issues in these relationships, they’re often easily dealt with, and the friendship goes back to being simple. Exceptions to this are problems that are caused by romantic relationships. Veronica Mars is an exception to this; for its first two seasons, it depicts many platonic relationships, and explores the many issues involved in navigating them (some of these problems are related to romance, but many are not, showing platonic relationships have their own complexities, separate from romance).


My Sister’s Keeper is a story about growing up, identify, family, death, and life (how can we truly tell any story about life when death isn’t the costar?), but its uniqueness is that it is told primarily through two young girls.

So, these are the important things in Sixteen Candles: Samantha’s family forgets her birthday; she’s in love with a hot senior who’s dating Caroline (the most popular girl in school); and there’s a big ol’ geek (Farmer Ted) from Sam’s daily bus rides who won’t stop stalking her. Oh, and Long Duk Dong exists [insert racist gong sound here]. Seriously, every time Long Duk Dong appears on screen, a fucking GONG GOES OFF on the soundtrack. I suppose that lines up quite nicely with the scene where he falls out of a tree yelling, “BONSAI.”

Since the entire movie is like a machine gun firing of RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY parts, the only way I know how to effectively talk about it is to look at the very problematic screenplay. So, fasten your seatbelts and heed your trigger warnings.

The 80s were quite possibly a nightmare.

 


My main issue with the film is that it is speckled with meaningless platitudes and clichés about girl empowerment when the film simply isn’t empowering. The women in the film are portrayed as oversexualized, helpless, damaged goods. Though there are metaphors at work that symbolize abuse or objectification of women, nowhere does the film stress an injustice or seek to dismantle its source. It is just like any other formulaic action movie complete with boobs, guns, and explosions, but it has a shiny, artificial veneer of girl empowerment. The false veneer is the aspect of the film that truly infuriates me, along with the side of artsy pretentious bullshit.

On Milk-Bones, Toothed Vaginas, and Adolescence: Teeth As Cautionary Tale by Colleen Clemens

Early in the film, Dawn is a nymph-like virgin committed to “saving herself” until marriage. She is the poster child for the “good” girl: a loving daughter who obeys the doctrines of the church and spends her time spreading the gospel of virginity. Everything Dawn knows about the world and herself changes when her falsely pious boyfriend Tobey takes her to a far off swimming hole and tries to rape her. A confused and terrified Dawn reacts by screaming and then—much to everyone’s surprise—cutting off his penis to interrupt the rape. Little does Dawn know that her lessons about Darwin in her biology classes are taking hold in her own body.


The Horror of Female Sexual Awakening: Black Swan by Rebecca Willoughby

What disappointed me most, I think, was that Black Swan could easily have been a progressive film with a positive, young woman-centered journey out of repression at its center. It could have recouped that gender-centric childhood ballerina dream of so many little girls into a message about determination, hard work, personal strength, and emotional growth. Instead, Darren Aronofsy has produced an Oscar-winning horror film. That’s right: I said HORROR. While that might seem like a stretch, it seems clear to me that the horror I refer to is the possibility of changing an age-old story. The horror of Black Swan is the absolutely terrifying idea that a young woman might make it through the difficult process of maturation, develop a healthy, multi-faceted sexuality, and be successful at her chosen career at the same time.

While most teen movies revolve around coming-of-age stories, gang movies reveal the extreme side to adolescence—the misfit, criminal, and violent side. Gang movies are rather simple, either focusing on episodes of gang debauchery, or revolving around rivalry and jealousy. Usually the viewpoint is that of the ring leader, or the “new girl,” who is initiated into the gang but is still an outsider. Yet, among the plethora of girl gang movies, every decade has produced stories involving specific issues and specific types of teenage girls.


Kiki’s Delivery Service carefully constructs a world where a girl’s agency is expected, accepted and supported, while Disney movies typically present a girl’s agency as unusual, forbidden, and denied. The difference between these two messages is that Kiki’s world anticipates and encourages her independence, while the women of Disney are typically punished for this.

For example, in The Little Mermaid Ariel wants to “live out of these waters,” but her father forbids her exploration of the human world and punishes this dream. Sea witch Ursula exploits Ariel’s desire to discover another world beyond her own as well. This is hardly an isolated incident.


The Book Thief: Stealing Hearts and Minds by Natalie Wilson

Liesel, unlike so many young heroines, resists romance—from her friend Rudy’s early problematic insistence and then throughout the remainder of the movie. Instead of being positioned in relationship to romantic partners, she has three male best friends—Rudy, Max and Hans (Papa)—as well as two females of great importance to her life, Rosa (Mama) and Ilsa Hermann (the mayor’s wife who, transgressively, supplyies Liesel with books). As for Liesel, like her futuristic counterpart, Katniss Everdeen, she is a life-saving heroine and inspirational rebel.


Terri sets out to explore the luxury of male privilege disguised as a young man. Just One of the Guys smacked us straight in the face with the unspoken universal knowledge that sexism was real, it existed and the film gave us tangible proof. Terri decides to use her parents’ trip out of town to switch things around for herself by getting another shot at the newspaper internship with another article, an expose of sorts. She switches high schools and uses her brain, and as much as she can, is herself.

Troop Beverly Hills: What A Thrill by Phaydra Babinchock

Initially the girls of Troop Beverly Hills are portrayed as clueless and privileged, but they are allowed to grow and transform themselves over the course of the movie. The film writers don’t do it unrealistically by turning them into tomboys overnight or at all. The girls retain their femininity, which they are made fun of for by the Red Feathers, throughout the film.

Immortality is not what makes a world better. Hope, friendship, and love do, and love is not limited by sex, gender, ethnicity, or race. Women like Homura and Kyoko can fall in love with other women like Madoka and Sayaka respectively. We have the responsibility to stand up with people like them. This series is part of the reason I try to do that and more. I hope that many others to do the same.

Is Wanda a girl/teenage female protagonist? Technically she is not “young” as she is 1,000 years old and seemingly immortal, but she is new to Earth so that makes her young in some sense. Also, why would the Souls even have genders that mirror that of humans or have genders at all? The Souls look like beams of light and they probably aren’t even a carbon based species and yet somehow Wanda is a female? So. Frustrating. Nonetheless she is controlling a person’s body who identifies as a teenage girl and is thus somewhat restricted to her occupied body’s feelings, emotions, and categorizations.

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?


The Hunger Games, saturated as it is with political meaning (the author admits her inspiration for the trilogy came from flipping channels between reality TV and war footage), is a welcome change from another recent popular YA series, Twilight. As a further bonus, it has disproven the claim that series with female protagonists can’t have massive cross-gender appeal. With the unstoppable Katniss Everdeen at the helm (played in the films by the jaw-droppingly talented Jennifer Lawrence), perhaps the series will be the start of a new trend: politically themed narratives with rebellious female protagonists who have their sights set on revolution more than love, on cultural change more than the latest sparkling hottie.


The CW: Expectations vs. Reality by Nicole Elwell

The CW is a rarity among the many networks of cable television. Its target demographic is women aged 18-34, and as a result has a majority of its original programming centered on the lives of young women. On paper, this sounds like a noteworthy achievement to be celebrated. However, the CW produces content devoid of any sense of the reality of its young audience, and as a result actually harms its most devoted viewers. The CW creates an unattainable archetype for what a teenager should look like and fails to maturely handle issues of murder and rape.


Defending Dawn Summers: From One Kid Sister to Another by Robin Hitchcock

OK, sure, my big sister didn’t have superpowers, and as far as I know she did not save the world even one time, much less “a lot.” But from my perspective as her bratty little sister, I felt like I could never escape her long and intimidating shadow. I could never be as smart as her, as special as her; I couldn’t hope to collect even a fraction the awards and accolades she racked up through high school. And she didn’t even properly counteract her super smarts with social awkwardness: she always had a tight group of friends and the romantic affections of cute boys. She was the pride and joy of my family, and I always felt like an also-ran. Trust me: this makes it very hard to not be at least a little bratty and whiny.


Why Alex Russo Is My Favorite Fictional Female Wizard by Katherine Filaseta

The protagonist of Wizards is a girl who acts like girls really act: she has boyfriends and broken hearts, but isn’t overly boy-crazy or dependent on them; she’s curious and smart enough to ask questions when other people are telling her not to; and throughout the series she faces a lot of the struggles women really do face throughout their lives.


Ja’mie: Mean-Spirited Impression of a Private School Girl by Katherine Murray

Power dynamics mean something in comedy. Making fun of someone less powerful than you is sort of like beating up someone who’s small, or taking advantage of someone naive. It’s not very sporting, and it makes you look mean. The problem is that the same person can be powerful in some contexts and not in others. A rich, white 17-year-old girl, for example, might be very powerful in contexts where she’s bullying her classmates at school, but less powerful in contexts where she’s trying to meet the demands of a sexist culture. If you’re an adult man nearing 40, it’s hard to make fun of the way a teenage girl dresses, flirts, and moons over boys without starting to look kind of petty.

True Grit: Ambiguous Feminism by Andé Morgan

Mattie wears dark, loose, practical clothing. She climbs trees and carries weapons. She shows utter disdain for male privilege or La Boeuf’s pervy allusions to sexual contact. She has no interest in the older men for romance or protection. She is only concerned with their usefulness to her task, and she uses her will and her reasoning rather than seduction to convince them. Steinfeld’s Mattie emanates competence and confidence.

Not since Megan Follows played Anne of Green Gables in the 1985 adaptation of the novel with the same title have girls had a young protagonist on screen who fights against social conventions that are designed to limit her because of her age and gender. Mattie’s similarity to Anne doesn’t end at their indignation and fearlessness, they both also share a love of long braids, both can be found wearing ill-fitting clothes, both of their stories are set in a similar time period, and finally, both girls are orphans.

Granted, Ashitaka (voiced by Billy Crudup) is an important character. Even so, it is a bit disconcerting when the IMDb blurb about this movie only mentions him, and almost none of the female characters who are equally, if not more, important to the story. Princess Mononoke (voiced by Claire Danes) is the title character, but is only mentioned toward the end of the blurb. This movie is so much more than yet another “save the princess” quest!


In Pretty In Pink, Andi is a self-sufficient, seemingly self-aware teenage girl who lives in a little cottage with her single father. Andi isn’t the type of girl who goes gaga for cocky, linen suit-wearing Steff (James Spader). She’s too busy at home sewing and stitching together her latest wardrobe creations. To her fellow girl students, she’s just a classless, lanky redhead who shouldn’t dare be caught dead at a “richie” party. So, she spends her time at TRAX, a record shop she works at, and a nightclub that showcases hip new wave bands like Ringwald’s real-life fave, The Rave-Ups. Her best friends Duckie (Jon Cryer) and Iona (Annie Potts) admire and envy Andi.

What is clear is that Campion is interested in the strategies women use to survive in patriarchy. But she is not only interested in the fate of women. She is also interested in how girl-children negotiate their way in a male-dominated world. It is through Ada’s daughter as well as Ada herself that Campion explores the feminine condition in the 19th century. Her rich, multi-layered characterization of Flora is, in fact, one of the most remarkable features of The Piano. She is as interesting and compelling as the adult characters and, arguably, the most convincing. The little girl also has huge symbolic and dramatic importance. This is, of course, unusual in cinema. There are relatively few films where a girl plays such a significant, pivotal role.

Temporary Tomboys: Coming of Age in My Girl and Now and Then by Elizabeth Kiy

However, the tomboy was a prominent figure in two well-loved films of the period aimed at young girls, though both presented her as a transitional stage in development. My Girl (1991), is the story of precocious 11-year-old Vada Sultenfuss (Anna Chlumsky) who grew up in a funeral parlor and is obsessed with death, while in Now and Then (1995) four childhood friends reunite as adults and remember (in flashbacks) the summer they were 12.


Basically, Brave isn’t really that brave of a film. It’s traipsing through a well-established trope that, though positive, is stagnant. Don’t get me wrong; I love all the prepubescent female power fantasy tales I’ve listed, and I’m grateful that they exist and that I could grow up with many of them. However, we can’t pretend that Brave is pushing any boundaries. It sends the message that little girls can be powerful as long as they remain little girls. The dearth of representations of postpubescent heroines who are not objectified, whose sexuality does not rule their interactions, and who are the heroes of their own stories is appalling.

‘Sixteen Candles,’ Rape Culture, and the Anti-Woman Politics of 2013

So, these are the important things in Sixteen Candles: Samantha’s family forgets her birthday; she’s in love with a hot senior who’s dating Caroline (the most popular girl in school); and there’s a big ol’ geek (Farmer Ted) from Sam’s daily bus rides who won’t stop stalking her. Oh, and Long Duk Dong exists [insert racist gong sound here]. Seriously, every time Long Duk Dong appears on screen, a fucking GONG GOES OFF on the soundtrack. I suppose that lines up quite nicely with the scene where he falls out of a tree yelling, “BONSAI.”

Since the entire movie is like a machine gun firing of RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY parts, the only way I know how to effectively talk about it is to look at the very problematic screenplay. So, fasten your seatbelts and heed your trigger warnings.

The 80s were quite possibly a nightmare.

Movie poster for Sixteen Candles

This repost by Stephanie Rogers appears as part of our theme week on Child and Teenage Girl Protagonists.

Holy fuck this movie. I started watching it like OH YEAH MY CHILDHOOD MOLLY RINGWALD ADOLESCENCE IS SO HARD and after two scenes, I put that shit on pause like, WHEN DID SOMEONE WRITE ALL THESE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY PARTS THAT WEREN’T HERE BEFORE I WOULD’VE REMEMBERED THEM.

Nostalgia is a sneaky bitch.
I wanted to write about all the wonderful things I thought I remembered about Sixteen Candles: a sympathetic and complex female protagonist, the awkwardness of adolescence, the embarrassing interactions with parents and grandparents who JUST DON’T GET IT, crushing hard on older boys—and yes, all that stuff is still there. And of course, there’s that absolutely fantastic final wedding scene in which a woman consents to marry a dude while under the influence of a fuckload of muscle relaxers. OH WAIT WHUT.
Ginny Baker getting married while super high

 

Turns out, that shit ain’t so funny once feminism becomes a thing in your life.
The kind of adorable premise of Sixteen Candles is that Molly Ringwald (Samantha Baker) wakes up one morning as a sixteen-year-old woman who still hasn’t yet grown the breasts she wants. Her family, however, forgets her birthday because of the chaos surrounding her older sister Ginny’s upcoming wedding; relatives drive into town, future in-laws set up dinner dates, and poor Samantha gets the cold shoulder. It reminded me of the time my parents handed me an unwrapped Stephen King novel on my sixteenth birthday like a couple of emotionally neglectful and shitty assholes, but, you know, at least they REMEMBERED it.
Anyway, she rides the bus to school (with all the LOSERS), and in her Independent Study “class” the hot senior she likes, Jake Ryan, intercepts a note meant for her friend Randy. And—wouldn’t you know it—the note says, I WOULD TOTALLY DO IT WITH JAKE RYAN BUT HE DOESN’T KNOW I’M ALIVE. Well he sure as fuck knows NOW, Samantha.
Samantha and Randy, totally grossed out, ride the bus to school

 

So, these are the important things in Sixteen Candles: Samantha’s family forgets her birthday; she’s in love with a hot senior who’s dating Caroline (the most popular girl in school); and there’s a big ol’ geek (Farmer Ted) from Sam’s daily bus rides who won’t stop stalking her. Oh, and Long Duk Dong exists [insert racist gong sound here]. Seriously, every time Long Duk Dong appears on screen, a fucking GONG GOES OFF on the soundtrack. I suppose that lines up quite nicely with the scene where he falls out of a tree yelling, “BONSAI.”
Since the entire movie is like a machine gun firing of RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY parts, the only way I know how to effectively talk about it is to look at the very problematic screenplay. So, fasten your seatbelts and heed your trigger warnings.
The 80s were quite possibly a nightmare.
Long Duk Dong falls out of a tree (BONSAI) after a drunken night at the homecoming dance
The first few scenes do a decent job of showing the forgotten-birthday slash upcoming-wedding fiasco occurring in the Baker household. Sam stands in front of her bedroom mirror before school, analyzing her brand new sixteen-year-old self and says, “You need four inches of bod and a great birthday.” I can get behind that idea; growing up comes with all kinds of stresses and confusion, especially for women in high school who’ve begun to feel even more insecure about their bodies (having had sufficient time to fully absorb the toxic beauty culture).
“Chronologically, you’re 16 today. Physically? You’re still 15.” –Samantha Baker, looking in the mirror

 

While Samantha laments the lack of changes in her physical appearance, her little brother Mike pretends to almost-punch their younger sister. When he gets in trouble for it, he says, “Dad, I didn’t hit her. I’d like to very much and probably will later, but give me a break. You know my method. I don’t hit her when you’re just down the hall.” It’s easy to laugh this off—I chuckled when I first heard it. But after five seconds of thinking about my reaction, I realized my brain gave Mike a pass because of that whole “boys will be boys” thing, and then I got pissed at myself.
The problem with eye-rolling away the “harmless” offenses of young boys is that it gives boys (and later, men) a license to act like fuckers with no actual repercussions. The “boys will be boys” mantra is one of the most insidious manifestations of rape culture because it conditions both boys and girls at a young age to believe boys just can’t help themselves; violence in boys is inherent and not worth trying to control. And people today—including political “leaders”—often use that excuse to justify the violent actions of men toward women.
Mike Baker explains to his dad that he hasn’t hit his younger sister … yet

 

Unfortunately, Sixteen Candles continues to reinforce this idea throughout the film.
The Geek, aka Farmer Ted—a freshman who’s obsessed with Samantha—represents this more than any other character. The film presents his stalking behavior as endearing, which means that all his interactions with Samantha (and with the popular kids at school) end with a silent, “Poor guy!” exclamation. Things just really aren’t going his way! And look how hard he’s trying! (Poor guy.) He first appears on the bus home from school and sits next to Samantha, even though she makes it quite clear—with a bunch of comments about getting dudes to kick his ass who “lust wimp blood”—that she wants him to leave her alone. Then this interaction takes place:

Ted: You know, I’m getting input here that I’m reading as relatively hostile.

Samantha: Go to hell.

Ted: Come on, what’s the problem here? I’m a boy, you’re a girl. Is there anything wrong with me trying to put together some kind of relationship between us?

[The bus stops.]

Ted: Look, I know you have to go. Just answer one question.

Samantha: Yes, you’re a total fag.

Ted: That’s not the question … Am I turning you on?

[Samantha rolls her eyes and exits the bus.]

POOR GUY! Also homophobia. Like, all over the place in this movie. The words “fag” and “faggot” flood the script and always refer to men who lack conventional masculine traits or who haven’t yet “bagged a babe.” And the emphasis on “Man-Up Already!” puts women in harm’s way more than once.
Samantha looks irritated when her stalker, Farmer Ted, refuses to leave her alone. Also Joan Cusack for no reason.

 

The most terrifying instance of this happens toward the end of the film when Ted ends up at Jake’s party after the school homecoming dance, and the two of them bond by objectifying women together (and subsequently creating a nice little movie template to last for generations). The atrocities involve a very drunk, passed-out Caroline (which reminded me so much of what happened in Steubenville that I had to turn off the movie for a while and regroup) and a pair of Samantha’s underwear.
This is how we get to that point: After Jake snags Samantha’s unintentional declaration of love during Independent Study, he becomes interested in her. He tells a jock friend of his (while they do chin-ups together in gym class), “It’s kinda cool, the way she’s always looking at me.” His friend responds—amid all that hot testosterone—that “maybe she’s retarded.” (This statement sounds even worse within the context of a film that includes a possibly disabled character, played by Joan Cusack, who lacks mobility and “hilariously” spends five minutes trying to drink from a water fountain. Her role exists as nothing more than a punch line; she literally says nothing.)
Joan Cusack drinking water (queue laughter)
Joan Cusack drinking a beer (queue laughter)
Jake’s girlfriend, Caroline, picks up on his waning interest in her and says to him at the school dance, “You’ve been acting weird all night. Are you screwing around?” He immediately gaslights her with, “Me? Are you crazy?” to which she responds, “I don’t know, Jake. I’m getting strange signals.” Yup, Caroline—IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD NOT REALLY.
Meanwhile, in an abandoned car somewhere on school premises (perhaps a shop lab/classroom), Samantha sits alone, lamenting Jake’s probable hatred of her after their interaction in the gym where he said, “Hi!” and she freaked out and ran away. Farmer Ted stalk-finds her and climbs into the passenger seat. Some words happen, blah blah blah, and a potentially interesting commentary on the culture of masculinity gets undercut by Ted asking Samantha (who Ted referred to lovingly as “fully-aged sophomore meat” to his dude-bros earlier in the film) if he can borrow her underwear to use as proof that they banged. Of course she gives her underwear to him because.
Ted holds up Samantha’s underwear to a group of dude-bros who each paid a buck to see them

 

Cut to Jake’s after-party: everyone is finally gone; his house is a mess; Caroline is passed out drunk as fuck in his bedroom; and he finds Ted trapped inside a glass coffee table (a product of bullying). Then, at last, after Jake confesses to Ted that he thinks Samantha hates him (because she ran away from him in the gym), we’re treated to a true Male Bonding Moment:

Ted: You see, [girls] know guys are, like, in perpetual heat, right? They know this shit. And they enjoy pumping us up. It’s pure power politics, I’m telling you … You know how many times a week I go without lunch because some bitch borrows my lunch money? Any halfway decent girl can rob me blind because I’m too torqued up to say no.

Jake: I can get a piece of ass anytime I want. Shit, I got Caroline in my bedroom right now, passed out cold. I could violate her ten different ways if I wanted to.

Ted: What are you waiting for?

C’MON JAKE WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR GO RAPE YOUR GIRLFRIEND. Or wait, no, maybe let’s let Ted rape her?

Jake: I’ll make a deal with you. Let me keep these [Samantha’s underwear, duh]. I’ll let you take Caroline home … She’s so blitzed she won’t know the difference.

Ted carrying a drunk Caroline to the car

And then Ted throws a passed-out Caroline over his shoulder and puts her in the passenger seat of a convertible. This scene took me immediately back to the horrific images of two men carrying around a drunk woman in Steubenville who they later raped—and were convicted of raping (thanks largely to social media). This scene, undoubtedly “funny” in the 80s and certainly still funny to people who like to claim this shit is harmless, helped lay the groundwork for Steubenville, and for Cleveland, and for Richmond, where as many as 20 witnesses watched men beat and gang rape a woman for over two hours without reporting it. On their high school campus. During their homecoming dance.

Jake and Ted talk about how to fool Caroline

People who claim to believe films and TV and pop culture moments like this are somehow disconnected from perpetuating rape need to take a step back and really think about the message this sends. I refuse to accept that a person could watch this scene from an iconic John Hughes film—where, after a party, a drunk woman is literally passed around by two men and photographed—and not see the connection between the Steubenville rape—where, after a party, a woman was literally passed around by two men and photographed.

Caroline looks drunk and confused while Ted’s friends take a photo as proof that he hooked up with her

 

And it only gets worse. Caroline wakes up out of nowhere and puts a birth control pill in Ted’s mouth. Once he realizes what he’s swallowed, he says, “You have any idea what that’ll do to a guy my age?” Caroline responds, “I know exactly what it’ll do to a girl my age. It makes it okay to be really super careless!”
It makes it okay to be really super careless.
IT MAKES IT OKAY TO BE REALLY SUPER CARELESS.
So I guess the current anti-choice, anti-contraception, anti-woman Republicans found a John Hughes screenplay from 30 years ago and decided to use this cautionary tale as their entire fucking platform. See what happens when women have access to birth control? It makes it okay to be really super careless! And get drunk! And allow dudes to rape them!
Of course, believing that Caroline is raped in Sixteen Candles requires believing that a woman can’t consent to sex when she’s too “blitzed to know the difference” between her actual boyfriend and a random freshman geek. I mean, there’s forcible rape, and there’s not-really rape, right? And this obviously isn’t REAL rape since Ted and Caroline actually have THIS FUCKING CONVERSATION when they wake up in a church parking lot the next morning:

Ted: Did we, uh …

Caroline: Yeah. I’m pretty sure.

Ted: Of course I enjoyed it … uh … did you?

Caroline: Hmmm. You know, I have this weird feeling I did … You were pretty crazy … you know what I like best? Waking up in your arms.

Fuck you, John Hughes.
Caroline wakes up, unsure of who Ted is, but very sexually satisfied
And so many more problems exist in this film that I can’t fully get into in the space of one already long review, but the fact that Ginny (Sam’s sister) starts her period and therefore needs to take FOUR muscle relaxers to dull the pain also illustrates major problems with consent; her father at one point appears to pick her up and drag her down the aisle on her wedding day. (And, congratulations for understanding, John Hughes, that when women bleed every month, it requires a borderline drug overdose to contain the horror.)
Ginny’s dad drags her down the aisle on her wedding day
The racism, too, blows my mind. Long Duk Dong, a foreign exchange student living with Samantha’s grandparents, speaks in played-for-laughs broken English during the following monologue over dinner: “Very clever dinner. Appetizing food fit neatly into interesting round pie … I love, uh, visiting with Grandma and Grandpa … and writing letters to parents … and pushing lawn-mowing machine … so Grandpa’s hyena don’t get disturbed,” accompanied by such sentences as, “The Donger need food.” (I also love it, not really, when Samantha’s best friend Randy mishears Sam and thinks she’s interested in a Black guy. “A BLACK guy?!?!” Randy exclaims … then sighs with relief once she realizes the misunderstanding.)
Long Duk Dong talks to the Baker family over dinner
And I haven’t even touched on the problematic issues with class happening in Sixteen Candles. (Hughes does class relations a tiny bit better in Pretty in Pink.)
Basically, it freaks me out—as it should—when I watch movies or television shows from 30 years ago and see how closely the politics resemble today’s anti-woman agenda. Phrases like “legitimate rape” and “forcible rape” shouldn’t exist in 2013. In 2013, politicians like Wendy Davis shouldn’t have to stand up and speak for 13 hours—with no food, water, or restroom breaks—in order to stop a bill from passing in Texas that would virtually shut down access to safe and legal abortions in the entire state. Women should be able to walk down the street for contraception in 2013, whether it’s for condoms or for the morning after pill. The US political landscape in 2013 should NOT include talking points lifted directly from a 1984 film about teenagers.
I know John Hughes is a national fucking treasure, but please tell me our government officials aren’t using his screenplays as legislative blueprints for the future of American politics.

 

The Ten Most-Read Posts from July 2013

Did you miss these popular posts on Bitch Flicks? If so, here’s your chance to catch up.
 

Sixteen Candles, Rape Culture, and the Anti-Woman Politics of 2013″ by Stephanie Rogers

The Killing and the Misogyny of Hating Bad Mothers” by Leigh Kolb

“Does Hollywood Revolve Around Men? ‘One Man’ Video Says Yes” by Megan Kearns

Glee‘s Not So Gleeful Representation of Disabled Women” by Erin Tatum

“The Flattening of Celine: How Before Midnight Reduces a Feminist Icon” by Molly McCaffrey

“Cool Robots, Bad-Ass Monsters and Disappointment in Pacific Rim by Leigh Kolb

“Am I the Only Feminist Who Didn’t Really Like The Heat? Or Why I Want My Humor Intersectional” by Megan Kearns

Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Consent Issues (Seasons 1-2)” by Lady T

The To Do List: The Movie I’ve Been Waiting For” by Leigh Kolb

“The Strong Yet Traditional Women of World War Z by Amanda Rodriguez

‘Sixteen Candles,’ Rape Culture, and the Anti-Woman Politics of 2013

Movie posters for Sixteen Candles

Written by Stephanie Rogers (but not in time for Wedding Week).

Holy fuck this movie. I started watching it like OH YEAH MY CHILDHOOD MOLLY RINGWALD ADOLESCENCE IS SO HARD and after two scenes, I put that shit on pause like, WHEN DID SOMEONE WRITE ALL THESE RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY PARTS THAT WEREN’T HERE BEFORE I WOULD’VE REMEMBERED THEM.

Nostalgia is a sneaky bitch.
I wanted to write about all the wonderful things I thought I remembered about Sixteen Candles: a sympathetic and complex female protagonist, the awkwardness of adolescence, the embarrassing interactions with parents and grandparents who JUST DON’T GET IT, crushing hard on older boys—and yes, all that stuff is still there. And of course, there’s that absolutely fantastic final wedding scene in which a woman consents to marry a dude while under the influence of a fuckload of muscle relaxers. OH WAIT WHUT.
Ginny Baker getting married while super high

 

Turns out, that shit ain’t so funny once feminism becomes a thing in your life.
The kind of adorable premise of Sixteen Candles is that Molly Ringwald (Samantha Baker) wakes up one morning as a sixteen-year-old woman who still hasn’t yet grown the breasts she wants. Her family, however, forgets her birthday because of the chaos surrounding her older sister Ginny’s upcoming wedding; relatives drive into town, future in-laws set up dinner dates, and poor Samantha gets the cold shoulder. It reminded me of the time my parents handed me an unwrapped Stephen King novel on my sixteenth birthday like a couple of emotionally neglectful and shitty assholes, but, you know, at least they REMEMBERED it.
Anyway, she rides the bus to school (with all the LOSERS), and in her Independent Study “class” the hot senior she likes, Jake Ryan, intercepts a note meant for her friend Randy. And—wouldn’t you know it—the note says, I WOULD TOTALLY DO IT WITH JAKE RYAN BUT HE DOESN’T KNOW I’M ALIVE. Well he sure as fuck knows NOW, Samantha.
Samantha and Randy, totally grossed out, ride the bus to school

 

So, these are the important things in Sixteen Candles: Samantha’s family forgets her birthday; she’s in love with a hot senior who’s dating Caroline (the most popular girl in school); and there’s a big ol’ geek (Farmer Ted) from Sam’s daily bus rides who won’t stop stalking her. Oh, and Long Duk Dong exists [insert racist gong sound here]. Seriously, every time Long Duk Dong appears on screen, a fucking GONG GOES OFF on the soundtrack. I suppose that lines up quite nicely with the scene where he falls out of a tree yelling, “BONSAI.”
Since the entire movie is like a machine gun firing of RACIST HOMOPHOBIC SEXIST ABLEIST RAPEY parts, the only way I know how to effectively talk about it is to look at the very problematic screenplay. So, fasten your seatbelts and heed your trigger warnings.
The 80s were quite possibly a nightmare.
Long Duk Dong falls out of a tree (BONSAI) after a drunken night at the homecoming dance
The first few scenes do a decent job of showing the forgotten-birthday slash upcoming-wedding fiasco occurring in the Baker household. Sam stands in front of her bedroom mirror before school, analyzing her brand new sixteen-year-old self and says, “You need four inches of bod and a great birthday.” I can get behind that idea; growing up comes with all kinds of stresses and confusion, especially for women in high school who’ve begun to feel even more insecure about their bodies (having had sufficient time to fully absorb the toxic beauty culture).
“Chronologically, you’re 16 today. Physically? You’re still 15.” –Samantha Baker, looking in the mirror

 

While Samantha laments the lack of changes in her physical appearance, her little brother Mike pretends to almost-punch their younger sister. When he gets in trouble for it, he says, “Dad, I didn’t hit her. I’d like to very much and probably will later, but give me a break. You know my method. I don’t hit her when you’re just down the hall.” It’s easy to laugh this off—I chuckled when I first heard it. But after five seconds of thinking about my reaction, I realized my brain gave Mike a pass because of that whole “boys will be boys” thing, and then I got pissed at myself.
The problem with eye-rolling away the “harmless” offenses of young boys is that it gives boys (and later, men) a license to act like fuckers with no actual repercussions. The “boys will be boys” mantra is one of the most insidious manifestations of rape culture because it conditions both boys and girls at a young age to believe boys just can’t help themselves; violence in boys is inherent and not worth trying to control. And people today—including political “leaders”—often use that excuse to justify the violent actions of men toward women.
Mike Baker explains to his dad that he hasn’t hit his younger sister … yet

 

Unfortunately, Sixteen Candles continues to reinforce this idea throughout the film.
The Geek, aka Farmer Ted—a freshman who’s obsessed with Samantha—represents this more than any other character. The film presents his stalking behavior as endearing, which means that all his interactions with Samantha (and with the popular kids at school) end with a silent, “Poor guy!” exclamation. Things just really aren’t going his way! And look how hard he’s trying! (Poor guy.) He first appears on the bus home from school and sits next to Samantha, even though she makes it quite clear—with a bunch of comments about getting dudes to kick his ass who “lust wimp blood”—that she wants him to leave her alone. Then this interaction takes place:

Ted: You know, I’m getting input here that I’m reading as relatively hostile.

Samantha: Go to hell.

Ted: Come on, what’s the problem here? I’m a boy, you’re a girl. Is there anything wrong with me trying to put together some kind of relationship between us?

[The bus stops.]

Ted: Look, I know you have to go. Just answer one question.

Samantha: Yes, you’re a total fag.

Ted: That’s not the question … Am I turning you on?

[Samantha rolls her eyes and exits the bus.]

POOR GUY! Also homophobia. Like, all over the place in this movie. The words “fag” and “faggot” flood the script and always refer to men who lack conventional masculine traits or who haven’t yet “bagged a babe.” And the emphasis on “Man-Up Already!” puts women in harm’s way more than once.
Samantha looks irritated when her stalker, Farmer Ted, refuses to leave her alone. Also Joan Cusack for no reason.

 

The most terrifying instance of this happens toward the end of the film when Ted ends up at Jake’s party after the school homecoming dance, and the two of them bond by objectifying women together (and subsequently creating a nice little movie template to last for generations). The atrocities involve a very drunk, passed-out Caroline (which reminded me so much of what happened in Steubenville that I had to turn off the movie for a while and regroup) and a pair of Samantha’s underwear.
This is how we get to that point: After Jake snags Samantha’s unintentional declaration of love during Independent Study, he becomes interested in her. He tells a jock friend of his (while they do chin-ups together in gym class), “It’s kinda cool, the way she’s always looking at me.” His friend responds—amid all that hot testosterone—that “maybe she’s retarded.” (This statement sounds even worse within the context of a film that includes a possibly disabled character, played by Joan Cusack, who lacks mobility and “hilariously” spends five minutes trying to drink from a water fountain. Her role exists as nothing more than a punch line; she literally says nothing.)
Joan Cusack drinking water (queue laughter)
Joan Cusack drinking a beer (queue laughter)
Jake’s girlfriend, Caroline, picks up on his waning interest in her and says to him at the school dance, “You’ve been acting weird all night. Are you screwing around?” He immediately gaslights her with, “Me? Are you crazy?” to which she responds, “I don’t know, Jake. I’m getting strange signals.” Yup, Caroline—IT’S ALL IN YOUR HEAD NOT REALLY.
Meanwhile, in an abandoned car somewhere on school premises (perhaps a shop lab/classroom), Samantha sits alone, lamenting Jake’s probable hatred of her after their interaction in the gym where he said, “Hi!” and she freaked out and ran away. Farmer Ted stalk-finds her and climbs into the passenger seat. Some words happen, blah blah blah, and a potentially interesting commentary on the culture of masculinity gets undercut by Ted asking Samantha (who Ted referred to lovingly as “fully-aged sophomore meat” to his dude-bros earlier in the film) if he can borrow her underwear to use as proof that they banged. Of course she gives her underwear to him because.
Ted holds up Samantha’s underwear to a group of dude-bros who each paid a buck to see them

 

Cut to Jake’s after-party: everyone is finally gone; his house is a mess; Caroline is passed out drunk as fuck in his bedroom; and he finds Ted trapped inside a glass coffee table (a product of bullying). Then, at last, after Jake confesses to Ted that he thinks Samantha hates him (because she ran away from him in the gym), we’re treated to a true Male Bonding Moment:

Ted: You see, [girls] know guys are, like, in perpetual heat, right? They know this shit. And they enjoy pumping us up. It’s pure power politics, I’m telling you … You know how many times a week I go without lunch because some bitch borrows my lunch money? Any halfway decent girl can rob me blind because I’m too torqued up to say no.

Jake: I can get a piece of ass anytime I want. Shit, I got Caroline in my bedroom right now, passed out cold. I could violate her ten different ways if I wanted to.

Ted: What are you waiting for?

C’MON JAKE WHAT ARE YOU WAITING FOR GO RAPE YOUR GIRLFRIEND. Or wait, no, maybe let’s let Ted rape her?

Jake: I’ll make a deal with you. Let me keep these [Samantha’s underwear, duh]. I’ll let you take Caroline home … She’s so blitzed she won’t know the difference.

Ted carrying a drunk Caroline to the car

And then Ted throws a passed-out Caroline over his shoulder and puts her in the passenger seat of a convertible. This scene took me immediately back to the horrific images of two men carrying around a drunk woman in Steubenville who they later raped—and were convicted of raping (thanks largely to social media). This scene, undoubtedly “funny” in the 80s and certainly still funny to people who like to claim this shit is harmless, helped lay the groundwork for Steubenville, and for Cleveland, and for Richmond, where as many as 20 witnesses watched men beat and gang rape a woman for over two hours without reporting it. On their high school campus. During their homecoming dance.

Jake and Ted talk about how to fool Caroline

People who claim to believe films and TV and pop culture moments like this are somehow disconnected from perpetuating rape need to take a step back and really think about the message this sends. I refuse to accept that a person could watch this scene from an iconic John Hughes film—where, after a party, a drunk woman is literally passed around by two men and photographed—and not see the connection between the Steubenville rape—where, after a party, a woman was literally passed around by two men and photographed.

Caroline looks drunk and confused while Ted’s friends take a photo as proof that he hooked up with her

 

And it only gets worse. Caroline wakes up out of nowhere and puts a birth control pill in Ted’s mouth. Once he realizes what he’s swallowed, he says, “You have any idea what that’ll do to a guy my age?” Caroline responds, “I know exactly what it’ll do to a girl my age. It makes it okay to be really super careless!”
It makes it okay to be really super careless. 
IT MAKES IT OKAY TO BE REALLY SUPER CARELESS.
So I guess the current anti-choice, anti-contraception, anti-woman Republicans found a John Hughes screenplay from 30 years ago and decided to use this cautionary tale as their entire fucking platform. See what happens when women have access to birth control? It makes it okay to be really super careless! And get drunk! And allow dudes to rape them!
Of course, believing that Caroline is raped in Sixteen Candles requires believing that a woman can’t consent to sex when she’s too “blitzed to know the difference” between her actual boyfriend and a random freshman geek. I mean, there’s forcible rape, and there’s not-really rape, right? And this obviously isn’t REAL rape since Ted and Caroline actually have THIS FUCKING CONVERSATION when they wake up in a church parking lot the next morning:

Ted: Did we, uh …

Caroline: Yeah. I’m pretty sure.

Ted: Of course I enjoyed it … uh … did you?

Caroline: Hmmm. You know, I have this weird feeling I did … You were pretty crazy … you know what I like best? Waking up in your arms.

Fuck you, John Hughes.
Caroline wakes up, unsure of who Ted is, but very sexually satisfied
And so many more problems exist in this film that I can’t fully get into in the space of one already long review, but the fact that Ginny (Sam’s sister) starts her period and therefore needs to take FOUR muscle relaxers to dull the pain also illustrates major problems with consent; her father at one point appears to pick her up and drag her down the aisle on her wedding day. (And, congratulations for understanding, John Hughes, that when women bleed every month, it requires a borderline drug overdose to contain the horror.)
Ginny’s dad drags her down the aisle on her wedding day
The racism, too, blows my mind. Long Duk Dong, a foreign exchange student living with Samantha’s grandparents, speaks in played-for-laughs broken English during the following monologue over dinner: “Very clever dinner. Appetizing food fit neatly into interesting round pie … I love, uh, visiting with Grandma and Grandpa … and writing letters to parents … and pushing lawn-mowing machine … so Grandpa’s hyena don’t get disturbed,” accompanied by such sentences as, “The Donger need food.” (I also love it, not really, when Samantha’s best friend Randy mishears Sam and thinks she’s interested in a Black guy. “A BLACK guy?!?!” Randy exclaims … then sighs with relief once she realizes the misunderstanding.)
Long Duk Dong talks to the Baker family over dinner
And I haven’t even touched on the problematic issues with class happening in Sixteen Candles. (Hughes does class relations a tiny bit better in Pretty in Pink.)
Basically, it freaks me out—as it should—when I watch movies or television shows from 30 years ago and see how closely the politics resemble today’s anti-woman agenda. Phrases like “legitimate rape” and “forcible rape” shouldn’t exist in 2013. In 2013, politicians like Wendy Davis shouldn’t have to stand up and speak for 13 hours—with no food, water, or restroom breaks—in order to stop a bill from passing in Texas that would virtually shut down access to safe and legal abortions in the entire state. Women should be able to walk down the street for contraception in 2013, whether it’s for condoms or for the morning after pill. The US political landscape in 2013 should NOT include talking points lifted directly from a 1984 film about teenagers.
I know John Hughes is a national fucking treasure, but please tell me our government officials aren’t using his screenplays as legislative blueprints for the future of American politics.