It’s revolutionary but sad to think it’s taken over 100 years for women to be respected enough for their talents and merits alone in Hollywood...
The last two movies I’ve seen were “I, Tonya” and “Three Billboards”. From both I emerged LOVING the roles these women portrayed.
Margot Robbie, despite her Barbie doll good looks, orbits a female lead role sporting a mullet, a foul mouth, domestic and family violence of the cruellest kind and a defiant character that an a-typical Hollywood leading female role is usually denied.
She wasn’t pretty.
Maybe it’s why she had to start up her own production company which researched, wrote and filmed the movie because Margot knows there’s more to her than model looks, and the world won’t see past that unless she demands it of them.
Frances Mcdormand took her moment in the sun to receive the Oscar for best actress this week for her role in “Three Billboards”; dressed in a sack like gown, no make-up, hair done for no-one and did she bring it for the ladies? Oh, yes she did.
She was bold and apparently that is the new beautiful.
But hang on. Tinsel town is built on deep-seeded insecurity about looks which are bankable, so the shifts occurring there are seismic and refreshing.
The Hollywood “star” system has its roots in the 1910s and from it emerged gender and power imbalances which could only be steadied on the casting couch.
Both sides it seems could not make the first move to break the habit until now. Are the rewards too mesmerising? Is the wealth, fame, fortune, freedom and success worth the inner turmoil, the injuries?
At long last, no.
It’s revolutionary but sad to think it’s taken over 100 years for women to be respected enough for their talents and merits alone in Hollywood irrespective of their bust, waist or hip size, their hair colour or their age, and respect themselves enough to say out loud, “I’m enough.”
Physical beauty is not one of the characters in “I, Tonya” except to reveal the ingrained prejudice towards it, or “Three Billboards” which is the truest representation of American society I’ve ever seen in a Hollywood flick, because the women portrayed there were interesting, had something genuinely important to say, were flawed and imperfect and suffered many systemic injustices which they fought and lost.
No fairy tale ending.
No ship of fools either. Both films are progressive on many levels and perfect for mentioning on International Women’s Day (today, Thursday, March 8) because the International Women’s Day theme is #Pressforprogress. There is a new language around women learning to stand up, speak up; push back.
Make cookies if you want to, or work in a mine, or produce a film or run a country, but get it done with the respect you deserve.
Get it done without gender being a stumbling block or an assumption about your intelligence, ability or worth. ■