Geena Davis has had enough of Hollywood’s inability to produce quality roles for women.
She may have a point, but she uses some dodgy techniques to make it.
Davis, who won an Oscar for the 1988 film “The Accidental Tourist,” spoke before the United Nations Feb. 24 as part of a new UN Women initiative.
“Gender stereotypes remain deeply entrenched in today’s entertainment and there has been no significant progress over the last 20 years … our research shows that from 2006 to 2009 not one female character was depicted in family films in the field of science, as a business leader, in the law profession or in politics.”
It took this film blogger all of five minutes to throw a bit of cold water on that claim.
The 2006 film “The Da Vinci Code” stars Audrey Tatou as a cryptology expert, which according to my dedicated google search means, “the science of analyzing and deciphering codes and ciphers and cryptograms.” In 2009’s “Avatar,” one of the main characters is a heroic scientist played by Sigourney Weaver.
Now, “Code” and “Avatar” earned PG-13 ratings, so perhaps that doesn’t fall under the study’s “family films” designation. Both were seen by millions of movie goers, though.
More importantly, how often do family films tackle politics? Or science? Or business? If a family film traffics in the latter it’s likely to use the character as a villain, part of the evil corporation stereotype. Just consider the Brendan Fraser’s anti-development screed “Furry Vengeance” from last year as a prime example.
Davis does have a point about the lack of solid women’s roles in films. Too often women appear as window dressing on screen. But she would be better served using her clout, and that of her female peers, to start writing and greenlighting projects with meaty female roles rather than trumping up fuzzy statistics to state her case.
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{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
“Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” (family film, 2009) also featured a strong female scientist character.
Good catch … it took me all of three minutes to find the Da Vinci example, but yours is G-rated to boot.
“The Incredibles”?? Very strong female character who was not only a super hero but a mother as well and she saves her family to boot.
Are you trying to make Geena Davis angry, Aleric? She’s pretty tough – she’s the faux president, after all!
She chose 2006 to 2009 simply because it made her point. Another one would be Rachael Taylor playing the young prodigy scientist in the 2007 “Transformer” movie which, conveniently, is rated PG-13.
From “The Scientist” website:
In a survey of 60 films containing scientists between 1929 and 2003, Eva Flicker from the University of Vienna reported that eleven (18%) included female scientists. But a survey of more recent films (1991-2001) by Jocelyn Steinke at Western Michigan University found 23 female scientists in 74 science-related films (31%). My own keyword searches on the Internet Movie Database (IMDB) identified 84 women scientists out of 382 films containing scientists (22%). So female scientists on film are in the minority, but there are more of them in recent films. And the 22% figure from IMDB isn’t too bad, considering that studies suggest that women comprise only 25% of the science and engineering workforce,
So women have only been represented at a lower level during that 3 year period – in family movies which Sci-fi films don’t tend to be in general.
I have some trouble getting all upset about that since men are now under represented in college admissions and graduation rates by roughly 40 to 60 percent. When Ms. Davis’s issues finds teh outrage about that statistic I’ll start taking notice how many times women role models show up in the movies, other wise I’ll just write her down as just another disgusting female supremacist looking for victim points.
It’s a good point with bad example. If she would like to point female stereotypes in movies, just point at teen or horror movies, there are a lot of better examples.
@cftoto
I think I can take Geena, after all she plays tough characters in movies, while I live it……lol.
Careful, Aleric…she is a crack shot (Olympic quality) with a bow and arrow.
Well, first off, there are fewer female scientists and business and political leaders, in large part because women do not *choose* to enter those fields, often because they require sacrifices of their families that the women are not willing to make.
Besides, does she think the average Hollywood actress, cast largely for her resemblance to a JV cheerleader, is convincing in a role like that? That’s hilarious. If anything, there are too *many* women in male-dominated roles in film (“female special forces soldier”, for instance, is often cited as an example of how Hollywood departs from reality for dramatic purposes).
Hey, if we’re talking about double standards in film, how about how it’s always portrayed as horrible for men to neglect their families for their careers, but it’s practically a duty for women to do it? Maybe I have an old dictionary, but its definition of “equality” would seem to imply something that’s wrong for men is also wrong for women.
If you look beyond the occupations of women in family movies, it’s become quite common in them (and also in TV) for the male character to be either lazy or incapable of success without the assistance from a plucky gal, such as ‘The Princess and the Frog’, ‘Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs’.
It’s also common in family movies where the parents are divorced, the mother is the strong, stable parent with custody of the kids while the father is the irresponsible one (or lovable loser) who has been absent from their kids’ lives, such as in ‘Night at the Museum’.
I’d say that men don’t get all, or even more of the glory in movies, even if they are given better occupations.