Women being hailed as action stars? No way!

" [women] have been shooting and not just clawing their way into macho territory. Is this empowerment or exploitation? Feminism or fetishism? The chief film critics of The New York Times, Manohla Dargis and A. O. Scott, discuss the new pow, crash and splat."


I will keep this one short and sweet because I think this article is not focusing enough on film history and how that also influences how far movies and women in those movies has come today (they do briefly mention "I Spit on Your Grave" but say absolutely nothing about it). The article focuses on movies that are coming out this summer, or that even came out last summer and the women who are portrayed as kicking ass in them. Also as a nation are we ready or do we want to see women portrayed this way? And why in half of these movies are the women being tortured and then trying to get back or then realizing their strength only after something horrible happens to them? Or women being held captive and then realizing their potential and ass kicking their way out of the situation they are in? Many comic movies are coming out this summer, with male leads, and with female co-stars, some are tough in them, some are passive. The article states how some of the movies that are coming out are having the females as the leads and letting them 'show their stuff.' The problem with this, is how the women actually being portrayed, are we glamorizing their femininity and strength or are we putting them in tight clothes and making them masochistic and strong because that is what the male viewer wants to see?


My biggest problem with this article is that we have already gone through this period on our film history, maybe we are just finally coming back around to wanting to see strong women on screen, even if they are using violence to get what they want. 


There are many Russ Meyer movies that I could mention but the one that really comes to mind is "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!" (1965) Really women are violent in the movies that are coming out this summer?? Only after they are brutally raped of course (the girl with the dragon tattoo series), these women looked good and beat the hell out of anyone who crossed their path, why? Because they could. There also was an entire genre of movies in the seventies that came out that was to see how far filmmakers could push the limits, and what better way to do that, than to use women and violence?


So please, let's make people see some of these movies before we mention how violent women are getting in movies that are now coming out. The movies will appear tame compared to how women were viewed in some of the "shock" movies. 


"To avoid fainting, keep repeating, it's only a movie, it's only a movie, it's only a movie...."


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/01/movies/women-as-violent-characters-in-movies.html?_r=1&ref=arts