Welcome to the 21st century, where movies now include female characters as leads and give them prominent and pivotal roles. They are no longer damsels in distress, and they aren't standing in the background while the male characters indulge in lengthy monologues.They are strong, resilient, are backed by writers who totally know how to portray a strong, independent woman. Or do they?
Let's face it, no matter which century we find ourselves in, female characters in movies are stereotyped as shallow, selfish, and clumsy women who constantly need to be aided.
Their careers are limited to either kindergarten teachers or personal assistants, or some obscure executive who needs to visit a small town to close down a business.
The movies are not about her career. It is about what truly matters in her life: a family with kids.
Okay, so there's nothing wrong with that. A woman can choose to have a family and be a housewife, and build a home.
But it is the lackadaisical writing that portrays female characters as these desperate species who just want to be impregnated. The characters are given zero development or any dimension.
The character is written as someone obsessed with her career and who can't manage a social life. Enter the love of her life, who changes her goals from being a career woman to a housewife and mother.
She can do both. Or she can choose one over the other. But of course, there is no development. No plot turn that carefully navigates the character to her choices. She just falls in love, and all her hopes and dreams are down the drain.
And of course, let's not forget the uptight attire. Hair in a tight knot. Flawless makeup. Tight jackets over pencil skirts. And the heels, the taller the better.
But then she falls in love, and her hair is let loose. Her skirts transform into sweatpants, and she is suddenly wearing sneakers, even though you are pretty sure that, based on how she is introduced, she doesn't own any of these outfits.
No matter how fiercely independent she is, she is prone to tripping a lot. And usually, where her love interest is loitering about.
She may be stern and unpopular, but she has that one friend whom nobody gives any attention to. Especially the love interest. Not even a polite hello. But the friend is there to support the protagonist and urge her to go after true love.
Most of the time, the friend is also a female character, and hence one-dimensional.
So...what is the point of female characters if they are just checklists?
When are we going to see more stories about female characters doing more than the bare minimum and not being used as decorative pieces?
Female characters are victims of bad writing and a lack of research and perspective. They must wear the tightest clothes and a bucket load of makeup even in their free time because that's what is expected out of them.
If they intend to fall in love, they must be wearing makeup and short dresses at all times. It's not about their careers, or their choices, or their ambitions.
Female characters are written just as accessories to the male characters, who must save them from a life of loneliness and despair.
Here’s to the day she gets a plot twist that isn’t a makeover.
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