Heroine Content

The Matrix Reloaded

2009-07-08T15:11:56Z

Welcome to the second installment of Matrix reviews, brought to you by our guest poster known as d. If you missed her review of The Matrix, check it out too!

"And after a century of war I remember that which matters most: WE ARE STILL HERE!"

The above quote was taken from the speech Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) uses to galvanize the people against overwhelming odds and almost certain annihilation. And as far as gender parity in action films go, I feel as if we're up against the same dismal odds. Thankfully there are bright spots. Is The Matrix Reloaded one of those spots? Like I'm gonna spoil that one! But there are some immediate differences that you'll notice as you watch the second act of this tale of man against machine.

Firstly, the pacing is different. The Matrix is hero myth, cast in the dark hues of film noir. This is not. In many ways, Matrix Reloaded is like your basic action flick: a guy saving the day; a love interest in peril; and a heaping bucket full of action. Does all this sound like a turn-off? If so, don't blink just yet; it is and it isn't. In fact, that's the basic gist of the plot: it is, and it isn't. Ok, the more straightforward plot point is that Neo (Keanu Reeves) now accepts he's "The One," but needs to figure out what exactly that means, and what his ultimate purpose is, or else he may be responsible for the death of all of humanity. But getting back to those clichés - they serve a purpose, and it's not just to make the hero look good.

But since I'm not writing a novel (yet!), I'd rather focus predominantly on the obvious HC, because that is where you're going to see the most radical divergence from anything you've seen in... well, heck, I'll say any film, but I'd be happy to hear of other films that do this. And unlike the last review, I'm only gonna really talk about 1 thing (since it more or less encompasses everything): Zion.

I didn't talk at all about Zion in my last review. Zion, according to previous Nebuchadnezzar crew member Tank, is "where the party would be" if the war was over (although they do quite a bit of partying anyway). It's the last human city, comprised of both free range and factory farmed humans, set deep within Earth's crust (so they can keep warm). And Zion is diverse... VERY DIVERSE.

Sci-fi landscapes are so devoid of any kind of real ethnicity that this became the theme at 2007's WisCon. Here's a snippet of the discussion topic, written by The Angry Black Woman (an oft-linked to blogger in these parts):

It's great that there are many great SF shows on television with diverse main casts... However, if you look in the background it doesn't take long to notice that even though the main players aren't all white, everyone else seems to be... Why is the Universe so damn white and what can we do to change that?

Well, if diversity (and not tokenism) is what you seek, this film is the real deal. Zion is ruled by an elder council, moderated by a female. On a couple of Matrix websites, they list the council with a gender ratio of 12 women and 6 men, but when I counted I only saw 7 women & 5 men on screen. Either way, that's radical considering the state of politics these days, at least in the U.S. The ethnicity isn't completely even on the council, but there is at least one female and male of noticeable Asian, African, and European descent. We've already seen one war ship and its crew. In Reloaded we see many more crews, and thankfully those crews look just as mixed as Morpheus's. Men and women seem to fill all the necessary roles for society. This includes the military, which is great - when the battlefield is the mind, women and men are equal. Period.
It's not just the actors that are diverse; the culture is a big mish-mash as well. In the real world (not the matrix) they dress in loose fitting eastern dress. There is a long dance scene, intercut with another scene of Neo & Trinity having sex. The scene could be described as some crazy rave (which quite a few reviewers did). Or, it could be described as a ritualistic celebration that many indigenous cultures perform(ed).

But there's one area that is not really diverse at all. You guessed it, the matrix; it looks like, well, modern day America. It has hierarchies, rules, and order. The people in power are white, and everyone at the bottom is still mostly white. There are no agents of color. In fact, in Reloaded they are downright Aryan. When Neo fights the new set, he comments that they are upgrades, which illustrates the mindset of the machines in more ways than one. These new agents are taller, more chiseled, more beefy - less ethnic looking than the first set. They are contrasted nicely against Neo, who is himself multi-ethnic. And, as we begin to see a wider variety of sentient programs (not just agents), they hold the same patterns: white head, and maybe people of color as henchmen. Women in this world are abused, ignored... the usual stuff. But in the real world there's no rigid stratum of society. Sounds all touchy-feely, but it's not. There's plenty of conflict in Zion, and it's interesting to see world views very different from Morpheus's crew.

All of this wonderfulness comes at a price: by really developing the many inhabitants of Zion, by necessity the screen time of the main characters decrease. We see less Morpheus and Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss), but we see less Neo as well, and heck, it's kind of his movie... and it's not. Even at its length, it feels a bit episodic, and a little less cohesive. I think the Wachowskis are using that to show the state of things in the movie's plot, but it can be noticeable.

The only other flaw, which I'd be remiss not to talk about, is the Asian representation in the film. With such a heavy Asian influence, from the fight choreography to the matrix code itself, you'd think we'd have more main Asian characters. What we do have are a good amount of background characters, and a couple substantial supporting characters: Seraph (Collin Chou) and the Keymaker (Randall Duk Kim).

By the way, I hope you didn't get the impression that Trinity has now been reduced to a romantic sub-plot. She still gets a good portion of heroic action to balance out the quieter, romantic scenes with Neo. One of my faves is when she jumps off an exit ramp onto a moving truck, steals a motorcycle from the flatbed, drives it onto the highway, reverses when she's chased by the police, and dodges oncoming traffic. Also joining the fray is Jada Pinkett Smith as captain Niobe; the two of them are nice foils for each other both in combat and romance.

So all in all, while the main gender HC is lessened, there are many more women and their influence in the story is expansive and critical. And even without a real main Asian character (besides Neo) the ethnic HC is unparalleled. So to me that says four stars! It's almost unbelievable actually, since some films' HC peters out long before the end credits. And now we have not 1, but 2 films that are cinematic breaths of fresh air. But can it last through the final installment? You'll just have to wait and see!

The Matrix

2009-07-06T15:16:58Z

Welcome to another guest post on Heroine Content by our active commenter d, who previously reviewed Speed Racer. d has pulled together reviews of all three Matrix films to share with us, and then as a final installment on Monday the 13th, Grace and I will be sharing some of our favorite links on all things Matrixy. Please feel free to comment and let us know your take on the trilogy. Grace and I always learn a lot from our commenters, and I know that d truly enjoys the chance to discuss and learn from everyone as well.

"I hope The Oracle gave you some good news."

It's been 10 years since the first Matrix opened in theatres (yeah, I know. I can't believe it's been that long either). This makes it a perfect time to review not just the first film, but the whole trilogy. Discussions have already begun about The Matrix's visual and ideological impact. But I'll only touch upon those things when necessary. Don't get me wrong, bullet time is way cool! But even cooler, and rarely duplicated, is the incredibly powerful heroine content. It is truly a standard-bearer. So beware readers, the Matrix has you! But hopefully you won't want to wake up just yet.

This film revolves around the disaffected Thomas A. Anderson (Keanu Reeves), who by day works as a corporate IT programmer, and by night engages in all kinds of cyber piracy under the alias Neo. He's being chased both by the Feds, led by agent Smith (Hugo Weaving), and a shadowy terrorist group led by a man known only as Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne).

As it turns out, the Feds are actually sentient programs created by a machine world that has conquered Earth and enslaved humanity by entrapping everyone inside a virtual computer program, fed directly into the brain. The terrorists are really human freedom fighters out to expose the truth: that people are now a factory-farmed commodity. They not only want Neo to join them in their battle, but some, Morpheus especially, believe that he is "The One": the person prophesied to end the war between humans and machines.

In case you were wondering, yup, that is a huge oversimplification of the plot. There are so many blessed layers I could write pages on each one: what is reality and how do you determine it; inevitability - of life, of the fulfillment of the true self, and what exactly is the true self (if there is such a thing)? The essence of existence, the power of love - all these things are played out, teased, and questioned by the film(s). And the glue that binds all these strands of thought together is radical revolution, which leads us very nicely to the Heroine Content (HC) factor - which is off the chain (figuratively as well as literally, hehe). Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski (the writing/directing team) use their heroine content to illuminate their vision of utopia. And while they give us a truckload of HC to sink our teeth into, I'll boil it down to four people who challenge and/or break away from the usual archetypes: Trinity, Switch, Morpheus and The Oracle.

It's hard for me to describe how preeminent Trinity (Carrie-Anne Moss) is as a female protagonist. But she's so great that even though the story focuses on Neo's journey, it's Trinity, second in command under Morpheus, who owns the first five minutes of the story, and sets the pace for the rest of the film. Also, through Trinity, the Wachowskis display gender prejudice without it becoming the focal point. When the agents arrive to capture her, this is the wonderful exchange between the hardened city cop and Mr. Smith:

Smith: The orders were for your protection.

Lieutenant: (laughter) I think we can handle one little girl...I sent 2 units, they're bringin' her down now.

Smith: No lieutenant, your men are already dead.

This exchange is great because Smith regards Trinity as a serious threat, and he does so prior to what we see her do. And oh what she does! The rotating 'bird of prey' stance is now legendary, and that's an apt description of her fighting technique: terrible, violent, and beautiful. She ends the altercation not in the usual cutesy pose, but in an aggressive stance framed by the unconscious policemen she's defeated. This leads to a chase on the rooftops, where she jumps from building to building, becoming more amazing. The scene ends with Trinity running directly into the path of a truck, hoping to reach a telephone before she's mowed down... all this in the first five minutes!

If she was just a fighting machine, that alone might have done it for me, but she is also one of the most well-rounded and fleshed out heroines I've seen. She's also in much of the film, which is not very common these days. In addition, she's both comforting and militant. She has this great scene near the end where she excoriates Neo for ordering her to stay put while he goes on a suicide mission to save Morpheus; but yet she's also the one who patiently answers many of his questions. Lastly, many scenes solidify not just her courage, but her intelligence and skill - such as in this exchange with Neo when she first meets him:

Neo: Trinity...The Trinity...that cracked the IRS dbase.

Trinity: That was a long time ago.

Neo: Jesus.

Trinity: What?

Neo: I just thought, um... you were a guy.

Trinity: Most guys do.

Again, the benign sexism is called out, but the plot moves on. I also like how she acknowledges it's only guys who think this way, which brings me to Switch.

I missed how great she was in my first viewings. If Trinity's like Ripley (from the Alien saga) then Switch (Belinda McClory) is Vasquez. She's the point person in conflict, and one of the two enforcers of the team. The first time we see her, she is unabashedly pointing a gun at Neo (for the team's safety). In a later scene she coldly picks off men with single shots. We don't see much of her, but when we do it's enjoyable. She doesn't talk much with Trinity, but when they do, it's not with the usual competitive tone. Also, while Switch, a tad more butch than Trinity, sports a cropped cut, she is blond and wears somewhat revealing white attire (inside the Matrix). What I normally see is the visually darker woman (in hair color and/or ethnicity) being the more ambiguously dressed butch; the turnaround is refreshing.

But HC comprises both gender and ethnicity. So let's start off with Morpheus. He runs the show as captain of the Nebuchadnezzar. His crew members believe in him, fight for him, and risk their lives for him. The only one who doesn't is shown to be quite villainous. Morpheus has wisdom in spades, which we know because he has the coolest lines! He also doesn't convey the stereotypical behaviors I see in many African American male characters. He's not loud, he's quite eloquent, and he's often gentle, applying just enough pressure to get the job done, or convey truth. He deftly dodges the magical negro stereotype because his desire to find and assist Neo serves the greater purpose of ending the war, not helping Neo for Neo's sake. I also thought it was interesting that Morpheus's character, according to Wikipedia, is partly inspired by Neil Gaiman's Morpheus of the famed Sandman series. Now Gaiman's Morpheus looks white, and is quite thin. But the Wachowskis were so committed to Lawrence (who looks nothing like that) for the role, that they were willing to walk when the producers wanted to use another actor. I'm making an intuitive leap here, but I wonder if part of their hesitancy was because of Fishburne's ethnicity. If so, then it's nice to know that the Wachowskis can envision other ethnicities for roles not specifically designed for them.

Lastly, I want to talk about the Oracle (the late Gloria Foster). Many of the sages we see in film are old white men - Obi-Wan Kenobi and Gandalf are a couple of examples. But what about an old black woman? Moreover, an old black woman living in a run-down project, with a Latin phrase over her kitchen door who chain smokes and bakes cookies? Well, now! You can see the confusion all over Neo's face, which The Oracle confirms when she says "Not quite what you were expecting, right?" She isn't like any sage I've seen of either gender. She's humorous and sarcastic; and you're never really sure whether she's telling you the truth. I also like how she conveys cultural traits of an African American grandma, but the traits don't overwhelm to the point of caricature. To say she's unique is an understatement.

There are so many things other than the HC, which makes this a must-see film in my opinion. The film is shot with a gorgeous film noir palette, and many of the even momentary frames are works of art. The visual effects are unparalleled even today, with marble clouds and bullets falling like rain. There are bits of whimsy woven into the plot, like when the entire crew race like children to watch Neo and Morpheus spar. Heck for being this dystopic nightmare, the film has a lot of fun moments. This film boasts not 1 but 2 of the most sympathetic and human antagonists I've seen. We could devote an entry on Neo alone. When Keanu read the script, he said he didn't know who the role was offered to, but he 'got' Neo. I believe him. Say what you will about his other roles, I can't imagine anyone else playing our cyber savior (and oh what a list that is!). The relationship between Neo and Trinity displays some subtle and not so subtle gender reversals, and is thankfully devoid of much of the baggage usually attached to action film couples.

So with all this going for it, I give it 2 stars.

I'm kidding of course! Four Stars.

I would love to tell you more, but you know what they say? Unfortunately no one can be told what The Matrix is, you have to see it for yourself.

Slightly New Look

2009-07-04T03:46:37Z

I just updated the Heroine Content template to have three columns, for possibly evil plans as yet unformulated. I'm going to keep tweaking over the weekend, but if you see any rough edges right off the bat, please do let me know.

Thanks!

And I do apologize if 15 posts now show up in your feed reader. I am so bad at avoiding that when I do these things.

A League of Their Own

2009-06-17T13:00:00Z

I don't know if you've noticed, but things here at HC have been a bit negative of late. We haven't given anything more than a couple of stars since March. Depressed by this, I thought it was time to pull out an old favorite and see how it held up to a re-watch.

It didn't disappoint. I love A League of Their Own. And how could I not? It features two Heroine Content all-stars, Geena Davis (from The Long Kiss Goodnight) and Lori Petty (from Tank Girl). It's got Madonna, back when Madonna was cool. It's directed by grrl-power director Penny Marshall (making her Heroine Content debut!). And it's about women playing baseball.

Set in the mid-40s, A League of Their Own doesn't pretend sexism doesn't exist. In fact, the central conflict of the film, aside from the sibling rivalry between Geena Davis' Dottie and Lori Petty's Kit, is about sexism. First, it's about convincing obnoxious drunk manager Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks, in my favorite role of his ever) that yes, "girls" can absolutely be ball players. Then, it's about convincing both the game's audience and its financial backers than it is worth it to them to let the "girls" play (which, eventually, they do, at least for a dozen years or so).

The women in the film actively fight sexism. Yes, they are forced to play baseball in ridiculous short dresses and take etiquette and deportment classes, but they do play. And they are shown playing--hitting and throwing and catching and running and sliding. They get tired. They get dirty. They get bruised. That, all by itself, is worth something. I have watched a lot of baseball movies. A League of Their Own is a baseball movie.

It's also a movie about women. Women who have relationships with each other that are highlighted above and beyond their relationships with men. It would have been so easy to slip into a stereotype and write in a romantic relationship between Hanks' Jimmy and Davis' Dottie, and, to the credit of everyone involved, they didn't. Ostensibly, this is because Dottie is married, but it's also because that's just not the point.

One of my favorite scenes in the film is the one during which the ball players sneak out and go to a dance hall. In part, I just like the dancing--Madonna tears it up--but the really great thing is how May, Madonna's character, and Rosie O'Donnell's Doris are really dancing with each other. Again and again, the film focuses on this relationship--the one between the women--and that puts it in a distinct minority.

The inclusion of O'Donnell's Doris, and of the much-maligned non-beautiful Marla Hooch (Megan Cavanagh), also forces at least some discussion about women who are not traditionally beautiful or feminine. Marla's initial scene, in which the scout, Ernie Capadino (Jon Lovitz), rejects her as a possible player due to her looks, is unpleasant to watch. That discomfort is only made worse by the girls' deportment teacher's snide remarks towards Marla (she suggests that the only thing to be done about Marla's looks is "lots of night games"). It gets better, though. Marla is redeemed. She not only gets to play; she's the only character to fall in love in the film. Her teammates include her in the dance hall escapade where she meets her husband because she's one of them. She may not be pretty like they are, but, like them, she's a ball player.

A League of Their Own is also one of the few cinematic portrayals of older women that doesn't make my stomach turn. The film begins with Davis' Dottie getting ready to go to a reunion of her teammates upon the occasion of them getting inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, and it ends with that reunion. Having followed these women through what had to be one of the best times of their youth, the viewer immediately sees the older versions of the women as complete, interesting characters. You wonder what has happened to each of them, in between when you left them in the 40s and where you pick up with them in the 80s. They don't suffer the invisibility to which older women are so often relegated, both in cinema and in real life. Making this part even better, many of the women featured are actual members of the All-American Girls' Professional Baseball League, most of whom were in their 70s and 80s when the movie was filmed.

The All-American League was an all-white league, and this is an all-white film. Given the historical moment it portrays, I have to forgive that. I wouldn't have been able to, however, if it hadn't included a moment's nod to this racist mistake. At one point, a ball is thrown out of the practice field, and a Black woman picks it up. Dottie, standing not far away, asks her to throw it. The woman hauls off and throws it over Dottie's head, far away. And she throws it so hard that the woman who catches it is left taking off her glove and shaking out her sore hand. Even though the whole thing takes up less than a minute of the movie, it makes a pretty strong impression about who is being left out.

A League of Their Own is a greatest hits movie for me. When it comes to heroine content, I have no complaints. Four stars.

Terminator Salvation

2009-06-06T12:30:26Z

We apologize for the delay in issuing this review of Terminator Salvation. You see, after I took one for the team and reviewed Terminator 3, I was kind of hoping that Grace would step up and save me from what I feared would be a race and gender FAIL. Alas, no. So here it is.

Ladies, be not afraid! In the future, your important roles as accessories to men's Important heroic actions will not be disturbed! You will be free to be kidnapped, knocked around, and rescued just as before, with no concessions made to the fact that the future of humanity depends on every person fighting tooth and nail against unstoppable foes!

People of color, you too will continue to enjoy your traditional positions as sidekicks to the Important White Men! And lest you fear that diversity will not be as highly valued in the future as it is now, let me reassure you that some of the higher echelons of the fight against the machines will be extremely international! There's a guy from Japan or somewhere!

p.s. To the guy who got a piece of rebar shoved through his chest: hope you like your new heart with a side of sand! And I'm glad they taught organ transplant surgery in vet school! Now if you just had access to a lifetime supply of anti-rejection medications, we'd be rocking this thing!

I'm sorry, what? Not long enough? Okay fine. I'll start over.

Terminator 2 was an amazing film. The amazingness was basically this:

Sarah Connor
That terrifying oh shit how are they going to get away from this unstoppable Terminator feeling
Whatever else happened

Obviously someone, somewhere knows this, because they launched an entire television show called The Sarah Connor Chronicles.

Obviously, that someone has been kept far, far away from any further movies in the franchise.

Part of my issue with this movie is my complete lack of ability to care about any character played by Christian Bale, the man of no emotions, so I'm trying not to hold that against the film. What I do hold against the filmmakers, however, is the decision to ignore all reasonable ideas of what humanity's future survival would require in order to privilege white men's experiences.

If you compare the statistical distribution of women's size and strength to that of men, in the current day, I have no doubt that there is some truth to that whole "but women just aren't as strong as men" thing which is often used to argue against women being in combat. But here's the thing: in the post apocalyptic future, it won't fucking matter. Even today, it doesn't matter, because there are still plenty of women who are way tough enough to exceed minimum standards of kick-ass-ness necessary to succeed in a military situation if they so choose to. The fact that proportionately more of the male population is at that level is totally irrelevant. And when a self-reproducing army of lethal machines is trying to KILL US ALL? If you can pick up a gun, you'd better be out there running, jumping, and blowing stuff up. Women, men, children, dogs, whoever.

(How anyone is supposed to do all of these physical tasks in a future where agriculture seems dubious is beyond me. Seriously, the supply chain issues in this movie boggle the mind. What are they eating? Where is the jet fuel coming from? Hell, where did all these people come from who can fly helicopters? We're supposed to assume that most of the people who survived Judgment Day are military? It's not like yours truly could just get in a helicopter and figure it out. I probably couldn't even drive a dump truck without wrecking the transmission while I was figuring out the gears. And did the machines just say "oh, well, we don't really need to target the military bases, there won't be anyone around to fly those planes anyway"? I realize that without all the gear, there wouldn't be much of a war, but I'm still wondering.)

So when I see combat forces made up of 80-90% men, and 99% adults, it tells me that the filmmakers are far more interested in telling a particular story than in creating a realistic vision of the future. That story is about Men doing Manly things. Men fighting. Men saving helpless people, like women and children. Men who make women fall in love with them.

Blair Williams, a female pilot, is supposed to be the badass, but her character is a joke. The tide has officially turned in the Terminator films. Sarah Connor is now the exception. She is the Only Woman, like Selene, Violet, Lara Croft, and too many more to mention. She is an aberration. For a good rundown of the other female characters, check out Terminator's Salvation Was/Is/Always Will Be Sarah Connor at Feminism to a Neurotic Extreme. I remember one other woman with some dialogue, a technician of some kind who is involved in testing the Ultimate Weapon, and she was a woman of color, but aside from that I think this list nails it. Save one anonymous female footsoldier who is quickly dispatched, none of them are in action roles. None. Did I mention the movie is set in the post apocalyptic future where humanity is fighting for survival? Oh I did? Good, I wouldn't want us to lose sight of that.

There's a sidekick of color for each of the three Important White Men in the film. John Connor has Barnes, played by Common. He gets to tag along while Connor is testing the Ultimate Weapon, and he gets to guard a prisoner. There is no indication that he's anything but a devoted subordinate. Kyle Reese, John Connor's future dad, has Star, played by Jadagrace. She's a young black girl who doesn't talk. As pointed out in the above linked post, she has more presence of mind than many of the adults, but she does spend an awful lot of time getting saved and carried around. As well she should, since she is a child, but in a movie where adult women are few and far between, her role feels manufactured. Marcus Wright, the prodigal cyborg, has Blair Williams, played by Moon Bloodgood who is part Korean. She may not be able to defend herself against rape, but she knows a good man when she looks into his eyes. Ah, love.

What did you say? Where are the Latino and Asian folks among the resistance fighters?

No clue, sorry. Perhaps they were all assassinated by Terminator Barbie in T3 when it was killing all of Connor's lieutenants.

I can't decide whether to give this film one star, because it's so damn typical, or no stars, because of what they've done to destroy the sliver of hope that Sarah Connor represented. I have finally decided on one star, in an attempt to be positive.

More commentary:

Terrified Waitresses and Chicks Who Kick Ass at Brutal Women

Heroine Content Summer 2009 Film Preview (and some thoughts on discouragement)

2009-05-26T01:48:33Z

Here at Heroine Content, we are blessed with a wonderful community of readers. Two of them have become guest posters, and during our email exchanges they have each asked very good questions which I'd like to address today - before walking through our list of films for the rest of 2009.

First question is from d (who apparently is spending her time writing really long comments here and at Women & Hollywood instead of getting me those final Matrix trilogy review edits). She asked this:

Do you ever get discouraged about the state of women in action films? Sometimes I feel like we, we as in the women who want these films, are just a small few screaming in a vacuum and no one hears us. I loved Sarah Conner in T2 and enjoyed Ripley in Aliens and Alien 3, but gosh, why are those still like the only ones we have that are good? Or rather, the ones most can agree are good? [...] So I guess I just wondered if you and Grace ever became discouraged as you saw the state of things, as well as watched all those movies.

BonnieBelle, who represented with her Star Trek review, asked this:

I'm looking at what's coming out this summer, and am not impressed. There are hardly any action movies, let alone girl-friendly ones. Transformers looks like a 2 hour shot of Megan Fox's backside, with 10 minutes of robot fights. :( What are your thoughts?

In 1992, I went to college in St. Paul, MN, and shortly thereafter found a world of amazing women rock stars on the radio. Hearing PJ Harvey, Liz Phair, and Tracy Bonham was like a revolution to me. I didn't quite realize they were a new thing on the scene, and I didn't realize that they were part of a mini-boomlet of female rockers that would fade away. I didn't realize that something I loved so much would be so limited.

That's part of the challenge Grace and I face with writing Heroine Content. The list of films we could possibly review is quite limited. For the first two years of the site, we were reviewing about 40-50 films per year. We have a list of past films split up between us. Though we don't think it's complete, we think it's pretty close. Each year we review some of those, and whatever new films we can find. In 2009, we've reviewed seven new release films so far, and there are only eight more new films left that we have identified as possibilities for reviewing here. A couple of them probably won't pan out. So let's say at best 12 new films, and then we'd have to pull 25 or more from the "old" list. At that rate, we would basically run out of films to review in the next three years... unless we start mixing in substantial amounts of Hong Kong cinema, which neither of us are particularly qualified to write about.

Can you imagine that happening if were were writing about action movies in general?

I'm pretty sure that for all practical purposes, there are an infinite number of action movies. What we lack is action movies in which women have action roles. So if you want to talk about being discouraged, let's talk about the fact that we could actually run out of movies.

Let's also talk about the fact that we often post several reviews in a row that basically say "Well, that sucked." I hate doing that. It feels negative and depressing and it almost takes away the central reason for doing the blog. We do it because we love seeing women really and truly kick ass, just like I really loved my women rockers during that lovely renaissance period. It's demoralizing showing up over and over again on the blog to point out the flaws, the disappointments, and the general suck. We have not given a film four stars since August of 2008. Watchmen was the first one to win three stars since September of 2008, and the last American big budget release to win three stars before that was reviewed here in January of 2008.

Part of that is undeniably our rising standards over time. (Unless Grace disagrees with me, in which case it's my rising standards over time.) We started this blog in part to practice our critical viewing skills, and by golly it's working. I don't claim to be perfect at this, or even very good, because what I know about race, ethnicity, class, disability, and other issues is still exceedingly slim compared to what I know about the rich white women's feminism that was my entry point into anti-oppression thought. However, writing Heroine Content has meant that I spend a whole lot more time thinking about these issues, reading about these issues, and being disappointed as hell when filmmakers fuck up so much.

Let me now throw in a snippet from The Invisible Woman, a September 2008 essay in The American Prospect by Alyssa Rosenberg:

When I was a kid, visiting my cousin meant I got to do two things: sleep on the top bunk and page through his epic comic-card collection. I may have learned about dating from Archie Comics' Betty and Veronica, but the superheroines of Marvel and DC Comics were much more exciting. I coveted Rogue's kinetically charged boyfriend, Jean Grey's red mane, and Wonder Woman's strength, even squeezed down to trading-card size. It was perfect training for a future superhero-movie consumer. I've followed my memories of those tiny illustrations to the theater to see the X-Men and Spider-Man franchises, I cheered Stan Lee's cameos in The Incredible Hulk and Iron Man, and in May, I read everything about Marvel Comics' announcement that its film-production division would release six new movies by 2011.

But as the biggest superhero summer so far comes to a close, I can't help but notice that women have been firmly relegated to the sidelines as girlfriends and assistants. Five of the six upcoming Marvel movies feature male leads, and it's not clear which, if any, superwomen will end up in the only ensemble picture in the lineup, The Avengers. Why is it that a film industry will cast lovably schlubby Seth Rogen as the Green Hornet and will take a serious chance on an Ant-Man movie (both are due to hit theaters in 2010) but can't get it together to make a Wonder Woman flick? Or any true superheroine movie at all?

I think many of the people reading this blog will recognize her experience immediately, both the love and the painful disappointment. I've read comments about our work here, both on other blogs and in comments here that we have not published, accusing us of having an agenda, setting out to bash films, trying to tear things down. I know that people of color, especially, are targeted for that kind of criticism. Here's a newsflash, people. We want Hollywood to give us something to love. Like Alyssa Rosenberg, we have a history with certain kinds of content that makes us want to accept it, internalize it, and share it. We give it the benefit of the doubt, we try to make excuses for it, but often it's just inexcusable and un-ignorable. We can't love it enough to make it anything other than what it is.

Beyond my own personal reaction, I can't imagine how much more acute it must be, what a horrible sense of being erased and backstabbed, for people of color, people with disabilities, and others who have bonded with these fantsy worlds and then get treated like they don't exist or like they're jokes. I have no way to understand it viscerally, my position in society is far too privileged.

So when d asked if we ever get discouraged, I would say hell yes, and the process of writing this blog has actually been one of the factors that has discouraged me. Learning more about how bad it is has discouraged me. Watching a bunch of terrible movies also doesn't help. (Red Sonja review coming up soon!)

d said she felt like one of a small few screaming in a vacuum. I was going to say that I am part of the problem because I often give filmmakers my money even though I know a film is going to be bad for women and everyone else... but now I'm realizing that my moviegoing patterns have shifted significantly since college. Here's what I noticed. I actually have to take BonnieBelle's word on it that there is a drought of action films this year because I don't track action films overall anymore. I used to go to just about every big action film that came out, unless it starred Sly, or Arnold in a non-Terminator role. But I stopped going to Bond films, because they just didn't interest me. And then I stopped going to some of the other action films. Never made it to Die Hard 4 (and not just because of the negative comments I heard about how Maggie Q's character was treated). I just wasn't interested anymore. Iron Man and Bourne managed to draw me in, but I can't recall any other action films from the last several years that has appealed to me unless they had women in action roles.

So my economic vote is going to different films than it was in the past, and I guess that means I'm less part of the problem than I used to be. Do I think there are enough people like me, or us, to make a difference any time soon? No. Sorry. We're not going to achieve anything through sheer numbers. Sometimes I have hope, like when suddenly the Bechdel test gets a lot of media attention, but generally I think that ticket sales

Looking at the film list for the rest of 2009, like BonnieBelle, I am not particularly inspired. Several times a year I look through upcoming film lists for any hint of a potential Heroine Content title, which is discouraging in and of itself, since it's so rarely evident from the film's description whether the one woman is actually going to do anything. But here are my thoughts and some trailers for the films we expect to review for the rest of this year. If I missed any, let me know.

Terminator: Salvation

Terminator: Salvation IMDB Page - now playing - Link to the Terminator trailer

Moon Bloodgood didn't impress me in Street Fighter, since she wasn't given anything to do, and the whole "will she be topless" faux controversy doesn't bode well. Still, here's a picture of her firing a gun, so who knows? Helena Bonham Carter would shock me if she slapped anyone, Bryce Dallas Howard is cast as wife, and there are a couple of other women on the first page of IMDB credits?

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen IMDB Page - opens June 24th - Link to the Transformers 2 trailer

I second what BonnieBelle said. And this time, it could even be more racist, if the devolution of other series we've reviewed here (cough Resident Evil cough) is any indication.

G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra

G.I. Joe: Rise of Cobra IMDB Page - opens August 7th - Link to the G.I. Joe teaser trailer

The Baroness is wearing a padded bra, is there any reason why aside from the director being a jackass? If there was some kind of economic argument, I could at least understand the logic, but does anyone think the profits on this film are going to be higher because of this "enhancement"? This is one I am seriously considering NOT gibing my money to based on that issue alone.

District 9

District 9 IMDB Page - Opens August 14th - Link to the District 9 trailer

Science fiction but probably not action. Also, likely to be extremely depressing.

Whiteout

Whiteout IMDB Page - Opens September 11th

Kate Beckinsale as a U.S. Marshal, tracking down a fugitive in Antarctica. I've been so mystified by Beckinsale's action career - she was Selene in Underworld, but she was also thrown in the fridge in Van Helsing. Will this be another kick ass role, or another turn as damsel in distress?

Surrogates

Surrogates IMDB Page - Opens September 25th - More at Get The Big Picture

Why does the synopsis of this film sound like an Asimov ripoff? Anyway, there are enough women listed in the credits that I'm hoping for a miracle.

2012

2012 IMDB Page - opens November 13th - Link to the 2012 Trailer

Surely if the world's ending, Thandie Newton and Amanda Peet might have to at least run, jump, or climb a tree, right?

Avatar

Avatar IMDB Page - Opens December 18th

No, not that Avatar, the other one. The one with Sigourney Weaver, Michelle Rodriguez, and Zoe Saldana, and CCH Pounder. Honestly, I barely care what it's about after reading that list of names, I'm going no matter what.

On Anachronisms, Sexism, and Reality

2009-05-25T13:38:07Z

We just received a comment on the Wolverine review that I'm not going to publish because it doesn't even begin to respect our comment policy. However, I had to share this one bit of it:

Of course it's a bunch of men, most of the movie was set in times before women were allowed in the army, much less help with anything non-medical or teacher related.

Let's leave aside the incorrect statement that "most" of the movie was set in times before women were allowed in the military. The part that interests me is the appeal to historical accuracy in a movie about a man with magical self-healing powers who has big metal claws sticking out of his hands.

During the part of the movie where Wolverine is in the mutant ops team that I mentioned in the review, the commenter is correct that in the military, women were not allowed in combat roles. I find it hard to believe, though, that Bad Guy Stryker would really care. Unless you specifically make the argument that he would have been just as sexist as his compatriots, despite his embrace of any and all means to his end in every other way, I just can't respect objections like this. If his attitude is your argument, I can probably respect that, because sexism does have the tendency to result in bad decisions - in this case, not using a powerful mutant as a weapon just because she's a woman. But I can't go with the argument based solely on historical policy, as if Stryker was thinking "Gosh, it's too bad that women aren't allowed in the military, because otherwise this mutant who can shred metal with her mind would come in really handy."

A similar came up in the comments on the review of Van Helsing, with commenter kira saying this:

i liked the movie. it kept with the era the film was suppose to be in, if the woman were stronger it wouldn't have fit right. i mean u cant have a caveman with a car it just doesn't fit. i do agree that Dracula's brides could have been tougher,but in the context of the time once again women not being string blah blah its fits. plus they would have been turned earlier in time when women were way timid.

Again, we have to leave aside part of the comment, in this case the part where it's argued that women living in rural areas in the late 19th century were "way timid." (Though I am not a historian, it doesn't seem likely to me given the demanding lives people led at the time.) The filmmakers aren't to blame for their sexist movies because history was just like that! It's not their fault there just weren't any women!

In a movie that's set in reality, I am usually down with this (though I would also argue that we need more movies depicting what everybody else was doing while the white able-bodied men were Making History). In the scenes in Wolverine that were supposed to be set during regular military operations during World War I, for example, I would not have expected to see a fully integrated team, because that was not how things worked.

In stories about monsters and demons, though, where we're obviously not dealing with reality? Sorry, I'm not buying it.

Monday Links: May 18th

2009-05-18T13:34:08Z

First of all, it's time for everybody to get involved with Racebending.com, the protest effort over the casting of Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Please go ahead, I'll wait.

Thanks!

Allrighty, so here are some links about items we've discussed lately, which you may already have seen since you probably read these blogs, but presented for completeness:

X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Same Old Story by the angry black woman at Feminist SF - The Blog!
X-Men Origins: Wolverine - The Greatest Story Never Told? at Fantasy Magazine.
Star Trek doesn't update the gender roles by Ariel Wetzel at Feminist SF - The Blog!
Live Long and Prosper at In Other Words.
To Boldly Go...Backwards by Jennifer Weiner at The Huffington Post
Star Trek's Reboot Seeks Out New Life, New Civilizations, New Audiences by Liza Paitz Spindler on Caution: Writers at Play. See particularly the section on Danger Gals.
Star Trek's Gender Problem at Women in Hollywood.
Working in the Dollhouse by Shannan Palma at Feminist SF - The Blog!
Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, Just Like Ibsen's Except With More Yoga Pants at The Rest is Cream Cheese.

Some older pieces I enjoyed:

How movies/TV help to change social norms (for better or worse) at Anthro Goggles.

Stories for Men. Just go read it, seriously.

The 9 Most Racist Disney Characters on Cracked.com. (This one's for Grace, love ya!)

The Day the Earth Stood Still Would've Been Great, If it Hadn't Been So Underwhelming by Mana G at All Mirth and No Matter. I was totally sympathizing with the "wow look at all this non suckiness and yet this movie is so boring oh well" vibe.

Babylon AD: Yet Another Scifi Flick About the Virgin Mary by Annalee Newitz on io9.

Terrified Waitresses and Chicks Who Kick Ass at Brutal Women, about the Terminator series.

Also don't miss the 3rd Tell It WOC Speak Carnival, Voices Have Power, and the first Asian Women's Carnival.

And that's it for this time. Coming up in a couple of days, I think we'll do a little preview of the rest of 2009 in new releases...

Star Trek

2009-05-13T03:36:08Z

For this review of the new Star Trek film, please welcome BonnieBelle of A Working Title. She called her review "Star Trek: Deconstructed" when she sent it in, and I have to say it's a darn thorough deconstruction! Thanks for making BonnieBelle feel welcome, I know we're all looking forward to some good discussion. -Skye

First of all, let me say that I am a Trekkie. I love the original Star Trek, and TNG and all the other ensuing seasons and spin-offs. Star Trek: TOS was a pioneer show in its time, portraying not only non-stereotypical characters of color, but women in strong roles. I'm going to spoil the heck out of the new movie, so read on at your own discretion.

Director JJ Abrams did a fantastic job of reimagining the style and visual impact of the series, the story he told was original and very much in line with the Star Trek legacy. The actors he chose, many of them unknowns or B-list stars, were perfect for their roles and very similar visually to the previous stars. It is a true restart for the series, and I hope to see more Star Trek movies in the future from this cast and director.

And yet... And yet...

I didn't take notes during the movie, because I wasn't expecting to write about this. But after thinking about what I saw, I really feel like I have something to say. The thing is, it was very much in line with the original incarnation. Too in line, in my opinion. If you're going to update a classic story for modern audiences, why not stretch their imaginations beyond what has gone before? Isn't the premise of the show, to boldly go where no one has else has?

I'll start with the women. Or should I say, woman. Specifically, Lieutenant Nyota Uhura. (There are five women with speaking parts in the entire movie. Lt. Uhura, Spock's mom, Kirk's mom, a female doctor, and Uhura's roommate. :( This is my frowny face. And they all fail the Bechdel test.) Uhura is of African decent, originaly played by Nichelle Nichols and reprised here by Zoe Saldana. She's super intelligent, strong-willed, and doesn't put up with anyone's bullshit, as evidenced by her repeated brush-offs of the womanizing Kirk. In the original incarnation, she remains unmarried and unattached throughout the series.

I'm wondering why the hell JJ Abrams and crew decided to romantically involve her with Spock. WTF? That's actually a step in the opposite direction! Not only is Spock her teacher, he's her commanding officer. There are all sorts of negative connotations there. Dominance, power plays, submissive and smart black girl, blah blah blah. And if you come to me, saying this is an alternate reality so they can do whatever they want with the characters, go fuck yourself. They took a cracker-jack character who took no man's shit, and made her the Pining Damsel. "I'll be monitoring your signal." reads as, "I'll be waiting for you and saving myself for you, you big strong man, you." Gag, barf, hurl. She becomes the prize for Spock!! Argh!!

And if they're going to give Sulu a chance to kick ass, which I'll talk about shortly, why the hell didn't they give Uhura that option? When Pike asks for officers trained in combat, I don't recall him specifically requiring men. And if he did, shame on JJ Abrams. Someone mentioned to me that her position on the ship was too important for her to leave and go fight, and also that she was the only one who spoke Romulan. These are so obviously constructs and excuses. If Kirk can ignore regulations and go off ship as the Captain, then Uhura definitely can. If Sulu can consider himself combat trained, then there's no reason she couldn't have been. And she never actually translates anything from Romulan in the movie, so that's shot down as well. I'm frowning big time now.

I'm not even sure I want to talk about the uniforms. Okay, I do. I know they're giving the nod to the old series. I get it. I'm a fan! But really, you can't tell me that in 200 years, women officers will be wearing pencil skirts and go-go boots in the military. If you try to pass that one off on me, I'm gonna call you on that shit. They don't even require that in today's military! It's an option, but not a requirement. But in Star Trek, we never saw a single woman officer in pants, for crying out loud.

What's the reasoning behind only one main character who also happens to be female? They took away her independence by making her "Spock's Girlfriend." If you're going to create an alternate universe, go all out! Battlestar Galactica changed the sex of one of their main characters, and pulled it off! Why couldn't Star Trek make a leap like that?

I'd say this is a big FAIL on the feminist front.

Now on to the race issue. First of all, they kept the two standard characters of color, Uhura and Sulu (played by John Cho), and actually cast them with very attractive actors. Thumbs up there. But Star Fleet was totally white-washed. The cadets of color stood out because there were so few of them. Again, 200 years from now, whether people like it or not, the population is going to be just a little bit more mixed than that. I mean, geez, hello, our first African-American POTUS was sworn in just four months ago!

And statistically, the ranks of the military, mainly the enlisted, have much higher percentages of people of color than other employment areas (51% of enlisted women and 36% of men). Of course, the percentage of officers of color is still much lower, (18% for combined genders) but you can't tell me that in 200 years, those percentages won't even out. (Here's a source for information on the military's composition.)

Now, Sulu really held his own in this movie. Originally played by George Takei, he's done justice here by John Cho. He was funny, without being the sole comic relief, and he had action scenes and was good at it. He even managed to save one of the main characters! And his combat training is not "Martial Arts," it's fencing, which according to Wikipedia's entry on Sulu is in line with the original Sulu. They could have easily made it something like Kendo and didn't. I think the two characters of color in the show were dealt with well, they weren't portrayed stereotypically for their race, and they had major roles. But there were two, period. Look at that picture up there and tell me that's equal representation. Major frowny face.

I'd say this is a race FAIL, too.

No characters from the LGBTQ community, no characters with disabilities, and actually, very few "Alien" characters. Most of the Federation is apparently human. Boooring, but really, not surprising.

Star Trek was a pioneer show in 1966 and I'm glad they did it such a fine homage in this new reincarnation. But it's 2009. You're telling me, in 43 years, we couldn't come up with something new? The movie was great. It was beautiful and gripping and action-packed, while still full of the relationships and (male) friendships that made it such a hit all those years ago. Imagine how much better it would have been if it were all-inclusive. That would really have been something to see.

It's worth seeing, especially for fans of the original, but don't expect anything new. It's the same old stuff in a shiny new package.

Other Commentary:

Star Trek doesn't update the gender roles by Ariel Wetzel at Feminist SF - The Blog!
Live Long and Prosper at In Other Words.
To Boldly Go...Backwards by Jennifer Weiner at The Huffington Post
Star Trek's Reboot Seeks Out New Life, New Civilizations, New Audiences by Liza Paitz Spindler on Caution: Writers at Play. See particularly the section on Danger Gals.
Star Trek's Gender Problem at Women in Hollywood.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

2009-05-05T11:48:47Z

Men, men, men, men, men, men, men, men, men. If you need men, X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie has men. Men over here, men over there, some more men hanging out over n the corner as backups just in case they run out of men. Which they won't, because of all the men everywhere.

If you need women, though, you're kind of fucked.

Before I lay out my complaints, let me say that I have little sympathy for any argument like "But they had to do it that way, it was like that in the comics." Sorry, but "the comics" aren't in and of themselves consistent. Also, the filmmakers don't hew to "the comics" all the time anyway, tons of stuff is rearranged, so to identify any specific detail and use that defense is just silly. Except for the part where Wolverine had claws.

Let me also say that I'm just going to spoil the fuck out of this movie, so make your own decision about whether to keep reading.

So for those not in the know, here is the basic plot of the film: bad storytelling held together with scotch tape, in which Wolverine kicks some ass.

With that out of the way, let's talk about how much it apparently sucks to be a woman in the Wolverine-verse. I can just imagine an early meeting for the planning of this film. Someone must have said "Oh Thank God this movie is called Wolverine and not X-Men, so we don't have to have so many women in it!"

So there's only one woman. She's supposed to be Silver Fox, but instead she's called Kayla. She has the power to manipulate people if she's touching them, which makes her perfect for seducing and betraying Wolverine, like women do to men all the time. Kayla is a pawn. She is not an actual person, she is a plot device. She is the Woman in the Refrigerator that leads Wolverine to get the adamantium treatment in order to pursue his revenge. Anyone find that in "the comics"? Let me know. I really hope my husband is wrong, and it's there somewhere, because otherwise the writers re-did the story specifically to set her up. Twice.

Yes, twice. The first time they kill her, it's Woman in Refrigerator. Then they kill her a second time just to make sure no plot points interfere with the whole "Wolverine doesn't remember who he is" storyline. Her second death is suicide as far as I'm concerned because she was ambulatory and capable of going for help, and she chooses not to, just so she can tell Wolverine she loooooooves him. I could have almost forgiven it if she'd been any help, but all she did was wander around bleeding and crying.

Oh wait, you know, I was wrong. there are two other women. One is an older woman who helps Wolverine and her payback is to be shot. The other is Emma Frost, portrayed as Kayla's sister (the mind boggles at this reorganization of the world). Emma's power is to protect men from getting shot while they do the fighting.

Honestly, I am completely baffled by the desperate lack of women. The badass mutant ops team that Wolverine belongs to for some time is all male. Are we supposed to think that Bad Guy Stryker was just too sexist to use women mutants as fighters until X-Men 2 when he engineers the mute adamantium Dragon Lady? And overall in the X-Men film universe, where are the women mutants with the awesome fighting powers? Thinking back to the X-Men film trilogy, Mystique was the only physically powerful fighter. Like in Push, the existence of brute force and kinetic powers seems to be split along gender lines. Men can do tricks with bullets, swords, fists, and claws, while women... well, they're so cute and little tiny! But at least in the X-Men trilogy, they existed, and they could zap you with lighting and whatnot.

On the race front, we have a possible nice bit of whitewashing with the casting of Lynn Collins to play a character based on Native American mutant Silver Fox. I'm torn here, because I hate to challenge Collins's self-identification in the press as part Native American, but I find it really hard to believe that they went looking for a Native actor to play Silver Fox and she was on the obvious short list. Check out the choice comments in Another "Native" actor discovered on the blog Newspaper Rock: Where Native America meets pop culture for more on that, including the removal of the Silver Fox name from the character. I had thought the change to "Kayla" was a gendered de-mutantization of the character, but this guy nails it that it's probably more to do with de-racializing her.

Jamaican-American musician Will i am plays Bad Guy turned Good Guy John Wraith. He doesn't strike me as the classic big dumb thug role that Black men often get assigned to, but he does die for the white man so there are no points here.

Agent Zero, however, struck me as a win for the casting of Asian men, specifically Daniel Henney, who is of Koren descent. Regular readers of Heroine Content may remember my oft-expressed desire to see an Asian man cast as a commando. I struck gold with this one. Some people might see this as another "ninja" role, but it really didn't feel like that to me. He's not the inscrutable warrior, he's just a guy who shoots a lot and he's extra good at it due to his powers. He doesn't leap nimbly down from the helicopter to silently slash Wolverine's throat, he launches a rocket. It's cool. And better yet? In the comics, the character was German. Yes, my friends, we have a white character cast with an Asian actor! Hardly makes up for the rest of film history, but it was nice. (More on the casting at 8Asians.com.)

I leave you with one of my favorite tidbits from press about the film, from Lynn Collins' role was vital to 'Wolverine' story, an article I found widely reprinted across media outlets nationwide:

The Texas native was already nervous about being cast in the biggest movie of her career - she is the only major female character in the film. [...] She felt like she was representing the entire female audience. All that pressure looked like it was about to overflow when early in the filming Jackman told her there was a problem with the early footage: Her outfits weren't skimpy enough. That made sense. Collins' character is supposed to be alluring enough to win the heart of Wolverine.

Thanks for advancing the logic that the only way to win a man is by showing lots and lots of skin. Heaven knows they're not interested in anything else, like your brain or your heart, and neither is anyone else. I'll let my son know that repeatedly as he grows up so he can behave appropriately.

I'll also be sure to make fun of fat people, so I don't leave out any of the wonderful messages about society I learned from this film. Might as well get my money's worth.

I would almost remove one additional star removed for the horrible CGI claws in the bathroom mirror scene, but "Typical" describes this movie perfectly so I will leave it at one star.

Other Commentary:

X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Same Old Story by the angry black woman at Feminist SF - The Blog!
X-Men Origins: Wolverine - The Greatest Story Never Told? at Fantasy Magazine.

It's Amazing What Modern Tools Can Accomplish

2009-05-02T15:20:16Z

New Video Game Technology Finally Allows Rendering Of Smaller Breasts

Monday Links: April 27th

2009-04-27T14:31:12Z

Zoe Saldana's Playing Uhura! on TransGriot. (I don't know how I missed out on reading TransGriot until last week, but if it's not in your feed reader yet, you should fix that immediately.)

A Call for Diversity in Web TV on Everyday Goddess.

Especially in light of the conversation in the comments on Grace's review of Dragonball Evolution, I found A Chocolate Coating to make the Bitter White Pill Go Down Easier by nojojojo on The Angry Black Woman quite informative. And freakin' depresssing.

The Incredibles by Mz Razorblade at The F-Word.

Best. Starship Captain. Ever. at OverMediated.

Media Ethics, Blogging & "Battlestar Galactica" at Megan's Minute. What I find so interesting about this is how anyone writing about BSG and feminism had NOT come across the Feminist SF post in question.

Movie review: Watchmen at WriteBlack.

That's why it's called go-go, not cry-cry by Amanda Marcotte at Pandagon, regarding Tarantino's Grindhouse.

Dragonball Evolution

2009-04-14T19:58:51Z

You may have seen previews or read about Dragonball Evolution and thought "wow, that looks really bad." I did. I had no idea, before seeing this film, just how right I could be.

I saw the movie with my lovely co-blogger, who, at one point near the end of the film, just burst out laughing at the sheer stupidity of it. I'm surprised it took one of us that long to guffaw. This movie is, beginning to end, terrible. The dialogue is painful, the acting belongs in a high school play, and the characters are paper cut outs. As far as film quality is concerned, there is nothing good about it. Zero stars.

However, Dragonball doesn't fail its female characters.

To begin with, there are three major females--Emmy Rossum's "I have a Ph.D. in applied dynamics with a minor in tactical weaponry" Bulma, who is part of the "good guys" group searching for the dragonballs, Piccolo's henchwoman, Mai (Eriko Tamura), and Goku's love interest, Chi Chi (Jamie Chung). Bulma, though she is played as a joke quite a few times in the film, is independent, smart, and brave. The device that allows the group to track the dragonballs is her invention. Mai is a role that could just have easily been male--she is treated by Piccolo and acts towards him just as a male henchman might. Even Chi Chi, who is "just" a love interest, holds her own. She's a fighter with her own moves, which we get to see, and the movie ends with her challenging Goku on his assumption that he could beat her in a fight. Taken by themselves, the female characters are surprisingly good. I'd give them three stars.

Dragonball has a major race problem right from the inception. It's another "white boy does martial arts" movie. Goku may have a Japanese name, but he's played by Justin Chatwin, a white Canadian actor. The comic book Goku, on the other hand, is actually from an alien race, but is drawn to appear Japanese. It is clearly more important in Dragonball casting that Goku has the right hair than the right racial heritage. That, as always, bugs. Much of the rest of the cast is actually Asian or of Asian descent: Goku's grandfather, whom we would assume should also be Japanese, is played by Hawaiian native actor Randall Duk Kim. Master Roshi is played by Chow Yun Fat (who really ought to be ashamed to be involved in this). Chi Chi is played by Korean-American Jamie Chung; Mai by Japanese actress Eriko Tamura; and the other "good guy," Yamcha, by Korean-American actor Joon Park. Lord Piccolo is played by a white dude (James Marsters, who is the whole reason I consented to see the movie in the first place), but really, he's green, so who cares? As an extra nod toward racial diversity, the film briefly features a Buddhist monk played by African-American actor Ernie Hudson (thanks to Skye for pointing that out, as I may have missed it). Given the preponderance of other good things it has going on, I give it three stars for race, with just one subtracted for Goku.

So if I give equal weight to the overall film, gender, and race categories, Dragonball Evolution gets an average of .5 stars. I'll be generous and round that up to 1. Which is sad--this would be a three star movie if it didn't suck so very, very much.

Monday Links: April 13th (but first, a bit about Observe and Report by Seth Rogen)

2009-04-13T15:51:24Z

I put this together over the weekend, and was all set to publish it this morning, when I found this post about Observe and Report by Seth Rogen over at Tiger Beatdown, via this post at The Curvature. I feel sick now. If you're a sexual assault survivor and you're not in a good place, take a pass on reading about this movie, but everyone else really needs to head over there, read, and then tell me that feminism is no longer necessary because everything is peachy keen for women living in this society.

Moving on...

It's been a long, long time since I did one of these, and I'd like to get back in the swing of things. So here are some links, old and new, for your perusal and enjoyment, and links back to our reviews of some of the movies referenced in case you missed them the first time around. Cheers!

I will not die for your amusement by Yonmei over at Feminist SF - The Blog, about Lesbian Vampire Killers and Watchmen.

Danger Gal Friday: Mary Embrey by Lisa Paitz Spindler, on Charlize Theron's character in the film Hancock. Her take on it is definitely worth reading, though I ultimately feel differently about the character.

Revisiting 'Dollhouse' by Arturo R. García at Racialicious. (Grace's review of Dollhouse.)

Women Directing Action Flicks at Women and Hollywood

unsettling moments in resident evil: extinction (triggering and spoilered) at the LJ feminist film community, written by a person. (my review of Resident Evil: Extinction.)

Frank Miller's "300″ and the Persistence of Accepted Racism by Jehanzeb Dar of Broken Mystic, also published on Racialicious. (Grace's review of 300 and her addendum on the rape issue.)

Kill Bill by Aideen Johnston at The F-Word. (Grace's review of Kill Bill.)

The Girly Gun: Gender in Mr. And Mrs. Smith by Revena at The Hathor Legacy. (Grace's review of Mr. and Mrs. Smith.)

The Girls Who Lived by Sigrid Ellis at Thinking Too Much.

Badass Feminist of the Week: Sarah Connor‏ by Sabina at Not Just Movies. (Grace's review of Terminator 2.)

Also check out the first Asian Women's Carnival.

Dollhouse

2009-03-31T03:14:35Z

First, take a moment to consider my incredible restraint in waiting for six full episodes before telling you all what I think about Joss Whedon's new show, Dollhouse. It is amazing, is it not?

OK, now then, about the show itself. First off, the premise is pretty abysmal. Basically, some sort of evil corporation (about whom we are slowly learning as the show progresses) coerces young and beautiful men and women into human slavery, during which their entire memories and personalities are erased so that they can be imprinted with new ones in order to be rented out to the rich and powerful. For some feminists, this premise alone is enough to sink the show. The man behind Buffy makes a show about human trafficking? Inconceivable! But I found feminism in Deadwood, so obviously the premise isn't going to be sufficient to turn me off. It's all about how it's handled.

Over the course of the first six episodes, Echo (Eliza Dushku, the show's star and one of it's producers) is featured as a hostage negotiator, an outdoors/adventure enthusiast, a bodyguard/back up singer, a high-end thief, a blind religious cultist, an assassin/thug, and an average every day girlfriend. In each role, she kicks asses and saves lives (most notably in the second episode, where she turns the hunt around on a psychotic outdoorsman who is trying to kill her). That's to be expected. What's just as important to me, though, is that there is variety in the roles she's playing. While there are definitely a good number of revealing outfits and silly situations (the whole scene where she has to get topless while trying on backup singer costumes was ridiculous), Echo isn't made into a sex object on every single job. Even when she's supposed to be imprinted to be harmless as a kitten (as in the most recent episode, where she played a ridiculously innocent girlfriend to a spoiled rich boy), things always turn around so that she's actually doing something. It's clear in every episode that Dushku is the star on this show, and there are definitely shades of Buffy.

The other female characters impress me as well. For one thing, there are lots of them. The Dollhouse is run by Miss DeWitt (Olivia Williams), who is smart, British, sarcastic, and maybe not quite as evil as she lets on. Some episodes feature Angel's Amy Acker as Dr. Saunders, the scarred and resigned Dollhouse physician. And two other "Actives" (Dolls) are featured regularly. The first, Sierra, is played by the truly haunting Dichen Lachman and has popped up as various badasses in several episodes (and then was unexpectedly and brutally made into a rape victim). The second, Mellie (Miracle Laurie), has made the transition from frump-next-door to love interest to rape avenger to Doll over the course of just a few episodes. All four actresses are playing strong roles, with indications of much greater things to come.

As is so often the case with Joss' shows, the question of race is a bit stickier than that of gender. At Racialicious, Thea Lim wrote about racial appropriation in the show, saying:

Now, if I had never watched and despised Firefly with its Chinese take-out mania, I might never have noticed Dollhouse's opening motorcycle race through Chinatown, the decorative Buddha heads and bonsai plants in the Dollhouse's head office, the "midcentury modern motif with a Japanese aesthetic" that informs entire freakin' set. Or maybe I would've, but it wouldn't have irritated me as much, I don't think. You know, I could get over the glib and unbelievable characters, because Whedon has an amazing imagination and always interesting concepts. But now that the curtain's been pulled back on Whedon's cultural mining, I can't put it out of my head, and I don't really feel like watching episode two of Dollhouse.

First, I think this is a fair criticism. The cultural (in)appropriation in Firefly only becomes more obvious to me as a re-watch it, and it was already pretty obvious. But, six episodes in, I don't think Dollhouse is anywhere near as bad. The faux-Asian aesthetic of the Dollhouse reads to me as part of the blank, modern, lifeless feeling the set designers have to be going for. It's intended to be seen as senseless appropriation, as is, I think, the Dolls' yoga and Tai Chi. These things are included for a much different reason than the Chinese elements of Firefly--they are there in order to make the Dolls' keepers look that much worse.

The other big difference in appropriation is that there are actual Asian characters on Dollhouse. Sierra, who is the most featured Doll after Echo, is played by an Australian-Tibetan actress. Even more interesting, to me is Ivy, who has barely been seen yet, but works as an assistant to Dollhouse's scientific mastermind, Topher. Ivy is played by Asian-American actress Liza Lapira, and I fully expect her character to get bigger in the future.

The other major non-white Dollhouse character is Boyd, Echo's "handler," who is played by Harry Lennix. Boyd is an ex-cop who has a lot of qualms about what the Dollhouse is doing, and his mission on the show thus far seems to be to try to make the situation as easy for the Dolls, particularly Echo, as he can. It is Boyd who finds out who is raping Sierra and puts a stop to it. He's the "good guy."

Already we see that the racial profile of the show's cast is the best yet for a Whedon program. So maybe that's progress? I think whether or not it can be viewed as such really depends on what happens from here with the characters, particularly Ivy.

As of right now, I'm giving Dollhouse two stars. I think it represents an improvement in Joss' work when it comes to diversity in the cast, and it has definite feminist moments. However, it doesn't, so far, have enough of those moments to make up for the horrifying premise. As the first partial season closes, it may get better--if Miss DeWitt turns out to be something other than what she seems, if Echo is really able to break out of her conditioning, if Mellie and Sierra are allowed to do more. If it does, I may have to be more generous. I definitely think it's worth it to continue watching and see how it plays out. But for now, just the two.

More Commentary:

Working in the Dollhouse by Shannan Palma at Feminist SF - The Blog!
Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, Just Like Ibsen's Except With More Yoga Pants at The Rest is Cream Cheese.
Revisiting 'Dollhouse' by Arturo R. García at Racialicious