Grace and I are looking for guest reviewers to cover Speed Racer and Prince Caspian (plus an optional extra review of Narnia) in the next few weeks. We would appreciate someone who will take a look at the films in terms of feminism and anti-racism, while also monitoring for class, national origin, sexual orientation, disability issues, etc. If you want to take one or both, please email us ASAP. If you don't have a blog, that's fine, as long as you can send us a brief writing sample so we know your review won't come out "HEY DUDEZ THIS F1LM RUUUUULD!!!"

Now on to the links.

First, a big ol' apology to the always awesome People of Colour in SF Carnival, which posted a day or two before we did our carnival last week. My Google Reader was overflowing and I totally missed it. Go there! Go there now!

News blurbs recently:

• Ghost in the Shell going to be adapted in 3-D.
• Moon Bloodgood has been cast as the female lead in Terminator 4 (she's also now in Street Fighter, says Cinematical)
• Finally, A Dystopia Grim Enough For Vin Diesel with stills from Babylon A.D. on io9

Bizarre interview reprinted from USA Today at ComicBookMovie.com: The Supergirlfriends of Batman, Hulk & Iron Man. Gwyneth Paltrow apparently thinks "Comic books are still for boys." Maybe that's why she was so lifeless in Iron Man? Maybe if you're going to get caught sneaking into an office, you should at least TRY to bluff instead of just looking terrified? Maybe when your boyfriend is on the roof, you could try yelling "Get off the roof, dammit!" instead of screaming "But you'll die!"

To be fair, Patrick at The Hathor legacy thought Pepper was fine. Jess McCabe has something to say about it on The F-Word blog, and links to this awesome post at WOC PhD.

Elisabeth Rappe over at Cinematical asserts that Frank Miller Loves Tough Girls, in reference to the forthcoming film The Spirit.

(I love the descriptions of the women in this synopsis from Lionsgate:

...a bevy of beautiful women who either want to seduce, love or kill our masked crusader. Surrounding him at every turn are ELLEN DOLAN (Sarah Paulson), the whip-smart girl-next-door; SILKEN FLOSS (Scarlett Johansson), a punk secretary and frigid vixen; PLASTER OF PARIS (Paz Vega), a murderous French nightclub dancer; LORELEI (Jaime King), a phantom siren; and MORGENSTERN (Stana Katic), a sexy young cop. Then of course, there's SAND SAREF (Eva Mendes), the jewel thief with dangerous curves. She's the love of his life turned bad.

With characters like that, how can we lose? Oh, I mean, how can we win?)

Sarah Seltzer gives us a little link love in Take Back The Screen at R H RealityCheck, analyzing the portrayal of rape and assault in film. She mentions 300 and Spiderman, so go take a look.

I have a really hard time believing that Zombie Strippers is an intellectual feast.

The 58th Carnival of the Feminists is up at Be A Good Human, who then moved to Hop To It.

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I liked Doomsday. Cinematical liked Doomsday, though I can't figure out why the reviewer thought Sinclair was a doctor/scientist - she's obviously the muscle. io9 also liked Doomsday.

Hollywood's 6 Favorite Offensive Stereotypes by Juan Arteaga on Cracked was, well, a crack-up. And a really good, thoughtful read. So of course the commenters slammed it repeatedly.

The 55th Carnival of the Feminists is up at Penny Red. The 56th Carnival of the Feminists is up at Redemption Blues.

A couple of older links:

Bad Heroines, by Mary Spicuzza, published in the San Jose Metroactive in 2001. You know, back in the good old days when heroines abounded.

Revena, on the Hathor Legacy, reviewed Fantastic Four 2. My favorite quote: "I think I knew from the moment Jessica Alba looked into the camera while sporting contacts that made her look like she'd been vacationing on Arrakis and eating melange between the two films that things were not going to go well." I was interested to learn, though, that a character who was white in the comics was cast as black in the movie. Is that a first? (Also see these thoughts on Jessica Alba's appearance on notcoming.)

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Hello all, I'm back with another round of Friday links. I'm sure you were all devastated when I missed last week.

I try to keep an eye on Heroine Content contenders that are in the pipeline, but I had never heard of Twilight until now. It's a teen vampire thing. I'm having bad flashbacks to Blood and Chocolate, but I'll pencil it in anyway.

I have been waiting to review Starship Troopers until I am in a mean mood, since it is so awful, but Starship Troopers 3 is apparently on its way to DVD and some people are taking it seriously. I imagine the fact that it's "actually based on" a Heinlein novel would tend to make it more sexist, though.

It's only 24 minutes long, but the documentary Kick Like A Girl looks quite interesting. "The 24-minute documentary examines what happens when the Mighty Cheetahs, an unbeaten elementary school level girls soccer team, graduates to a boys' league." It will allegedly be available online in March at a website which is currently a parked page.

Amy Monaghan called out My Super Ex-Girlfriend as one of the most misogynistic movies of the decade in her article No Country for Fat Chicks. Grace gave it no stars.

It's not specifically about action films, but check out I am woman, hear me snore by Stephanie Bunbury at The Age. Also see And the best frock is ... by Sarah Churchwell at The Guardian.

The 53rd Carnival of the Feminists and the 54th Carnival of the Feminists were posted recently. Props to Uncool, host of the 53rd, for clever use of alphabetization as an organizing technique.

And some quality links from the past...

Seeing Red by Kalinara at Pretty, Fizzy Paradise, about Red Sonja.

Beyond Children of the Atom: Black Politics, White Minds and the X-Men by Morpheus Reloaded.

how to fight like a girl, a mega-piece about action heroines focusing on Alien, Aliens, Terminator 2, Tank Girl, Long Kiss Goodnight, and Supercop. I have not made it all the way through, honestly, though I'm working on it.

Finally, a shout out to Bitch Magazine. Bitch #38 arrived with a back-page feature on women with amnesia in the movies. One of the four films mentioned is Heroine Content fave The Long Kiss Goodnight. Author Taylor Hudson describes the moral of the film as follows, and we think it's just right:

Suburban sweetness is transient; sharpshooting skills are forever.

Good night, everyone.

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A couple of new links:

Brooke Shields drives Green Lantern crazy in 'New Frontier' on Comics2Film. I have no idea why they chose that title for the article. Love the quotes from Shields about her desire to play an action heroine.

The first trailer for Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull shows a hint of Cate Blanchett as a uniformed villain. Can we hope she'll kick a little butt?

And a few older ones:

The Portrayal of the High Kicking Action Heroine: Across Space, Format, and Theories by Angela Waldrop in Latent Image: A Student Journal of Film Criticism. Mentions Supercop 2 and Heroic Trio.

The Long Kiss Goodnight by Gategrrl on The Hathor Legacy. Also see Chick Fight! by Ifritah over there for some good insight.

Violent Femmes by Stephanie Mencimer in Washington Monthly, from back in 2001. Ah, the good old days...

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Welcome to Friday links. On Saturday.

First, check out Fearless female Iranian film maker Tehmineh Milani's new film "Payback" on UK blog Dollymix:

Kick ass Iranian film director Tehmineh Milani has been arrested and charged with four crimes that carry the death penalty because of her relentless bravery and films that "divide Iran". Her latest film called "Payback" is about four Iranian women who meet in prison, and form a vigilante gang, pose as prostitutes and seek the revenge they so desperately need.

Latino Review has an interview with Anna Walton, who will be in Hellboy 2. Her Hellboy role won't be an action role, but she makes some comments about her work in The Mutant Chronicles. Sword fighting? All right! Let's get that thing a release date. Latino Review also has an interview with Selma Blair about Hellboy 2, and SuperHeroHype.com has a piece as well... I'm getting mixed signals on Liz. Time will tell.

I had basically written off Speed Racer, but Rotten Tomatoes has some comments from Christina Ricci about her role that may put this back in Heroine Content land. No points for calling it "progressive women's lib stuff," though, Mr. Reporter, and for the love of all that's holy don't read the comments if you head over there to take a look. (Now you're going to feel compelled to read the comments, aren't you?)

The 20th Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans is up, Diamond Age style. The February 2008 issue of Cerise is up. Feminist Law Professors has details of a Call For Papers from Transformative Works and Cultures, a journal which "publishes articles about popular media, fan communities, and transformative works, broadly conceived."

And from my files...

TMNT: April O’Neil Kicks Ass, Takes Names by Patrick on the Hathor Legacy. I would not have looked there for a heroine.

The Fifth Element: One Man's Guide to Women by Maryann Johanson on FlickFilosopher.com. You know that cringe you get when you read something critical about something you love because you know it's true? Yeah.

And finally, Pirates of the Caribbean: At Wit's End: It's time to throw Jack Sparrow overboard by by Nathan Lee at the Village Voice, for the following line:

Ah, but I have forgotten Captain Sao Feng! Luxuriating in the hysterical chinoiserie of his exotic Singapore lair, this outrageous Oriental (played by Chow Yun-Fat) has been wedged into the Pirates panoply in order to exude colorful slant-eyed menace, enable the destiny of a white woman, then die.

See you next week.

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I'll just pull a few quotes from this Reuters article:

The annual study by Martha Lauzen, of the university's School of Theatre, Television and Film, surveyed the top 250 domestic-grossing films in 2007 and found no growth in the number of women employed in the positions of director, producer, writer, cinematographer and editor.

Lauzen also did a historical comparison of those top films from 2007 and 1998, finding that the percentage of women in every role had declined.

The study also concluded that women were most likely to work on romantic comedies, romantic dramas and documentaries and least likely to work in horror, action-adventure or sci-fi features.

The 7th People of Colour in Science Fiction / Fantasy Carnival is up at Seeking Avalon, and it's AMAZING. I can't wait to read the piece about Dune by Gwneth Jones in its entirety. The 20th Carnival of Feminist Science Fiction and Fantasy Fans will be at Podblack Blog. (You must see the Call for Entries. Trust me.) And last but not least, the 52nd Carnival of the Feminists is up at Figure: Demystifying the Female Physique.

And a few from the vaults:

A review of Silent Hill on Venturesome and another one by Tekanji. I saw Silent Hill, intending to review it, but could not work up any enthusiasm. These two reviews say everything I would have said if I did.

300: A Fangirl's Rant: Zack Snyder Overthought Us Fangirls by Laura Martin at Sequential Tart. Here's Grace's review of 300.

For your entertainment, an article by Kira Cochrane in the Guardian that discusses "torture porn" and includes a discussion of Grindhouse. Via Death Proof protests on UK blog the f-word. Here's Grace's review.

I'm a little behind adding links to our past reviews, since Fridays have turned out to be "no nap" days for the baby I currently supervise (or does he supervise me?). However, I will get caught up! I also encourage folks to send me links. Leave them in the comments, or email skyekilaen@gmail.com.

Have a good weekend, everyone. Or if you're reading this on Monday, have a good week!

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I was just sent a link to this Guardian story, and thought HC readers might like to peruse it. Feminist writer Cath Elliott takes serious umbrage to the idea that young girls don't pretend to have super powers or look up to superheroes, as was implied in a British report on how to improve educational outcomes. Elliott also mentions some of our HC favorites as counter examples.

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Check out Forty years on, stuntwoman Sandy Gimpel still loves her occupational hazard in Friday's Christian Science Monitor for some interesting tidbits about one stuntwoman's film career - and her side businesses. We should all keep in mind that for every ass-kicking movie heroine we love, there's probably also a real-life heroine handling the falling and fighting.

These women get even more props than their male counterparts, in my opinion. As pointed out in the documentary Double Dare, which Grace reviewed back in September, women's costumes in films are often very revealing. So unlike men, who are often dressed in shirts with sleeves and pants with legs, women don't have as many places to put protective padding when they do their stunts. Then they don't always get as much respect for the work they do.

So here's to Ms. Gimpel and her fellow professionals! And I highly recommend Double Dare if you haven't yet seen it.

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In what we're tentatively referring to as good news, it's been announced that fantastic stuntwoman Zoe Bell has been signed for her first action-adventure lead role.

I wrote about Bell in my review of Grindhouse, in which she plays herself in the Tarantino segment, "Death Proof." She completely owned that movie, with her real person body, fun dialogue, and badass Dodge Charger-related stunts. You've also seen her stunt work in high-profile heroine content roles including Kill Bill I and II and Xena. I can't wait to see her in her own film.

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Entertainment Weekly has added another 25 movies to its list of greatest action films. The new list is called The Bigger Bang!, and it's described as "the online-only list of the 25 films that would have been included if the magazine had listed the top 50." So, basically, leftovers.

With another 25 slots available, I would have expected to see a few more heroine-centric films. The only films that I saw in this group, though, were:

42 - La Femme Nikita (Grace's review is here)
38 - X2
28 - Kung Fu Hustle

Out of the top 25, we got five (20%). Out of the top 50, we get 8 (16%). That's just as bad as the U.S. Congress. I really hope they don't add another 50, or we'll barely exist!

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Entertainment Weekly has put out a list of The 25 Greatest Action Films Ever! (Yes, the exclamation point is theirs.)

Five films with heroine content made their list:

20 - Kill Bill Volume 1
16 - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon
10 - Terminator 2: Judgment Day (Grace's review is here)
5 - The Matrix
2 - Aliens

I found their description of T2 a little odd, since they don't mention Linda Hamilton. Then when I got to their description of Aliens, I found this (emphasis mine):

In all of action herodom, Sigourney Weaver's Ripley is unique. She's a woman, which makes her part of an elite club. And writer-director James Cameron miraculously found a way to treat her gender as both a nonissue and the core of her character. Ripley isn't a vixen like Lara Croft or Charlie's Angels. Yet Weaver wasn't forced to turn Ripley into a man, either. (Remember Linda Hamilton in T2?) Aliens — a relentless Swiss watch of a war film — is a movie about women, about the matriarchs of two tribes fighting to protect their young.

Stop this train, I want to get off! Linda Hamilton was a MAN?

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An interesting piece popped up on Yahoo! Entertainment News and Gossip yesterday. Titled Female action pics need heroes of their own, it uses the signing of Robert Rodriguez to direct the new Barbarella as a springboard to discuss why there aren't more action movies that star women.

The article identifies a number of reasons for this:

• When an action movie led by a woman fails, studios back away from making more - unlike when an action movie led by a man fails and they crank out a few more.
• Many female actors who do an action movie don't do another one - unlike male actors who make a bunch even if one fails.
• Screenwriters write action movie scripts differently if a woman is going to have the lead role, changing the plot and character development.

Grace and I have a running list of films we want to review for Heroine Content, but it's pretty short compared to the list we could make of action films that focus on men. Part of that is definitely due to the "repeat" behavior of male actors. Add one Bruce Willis or Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, and you can add a dozen. Among female actors in American action films, I can think of a number of repeaters: Sigourney Weaver, Angelina Jolie, Kate Beckinsale, Lucy Liu, Michelle Rodriguez, Pam Grier, Uma Thurman, and Milla Jovovich. However, each of them has only about five films that could go on the list, definitely not as many as ten. Plus, many of the films that star men don't have a woman in an action role as well. Most of the films that star women also have at least one man in an action role.

The article didn't go into great depth, but I would imagine that studio skittishness and female actors not having multiple action films under their belts are related. Fewer opportunities equal fewer movies.

It was thought-provoking, though, especially the comparisons drawn between movies and television. And the part where they only quoted men.

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No, I did not go to see it last night, and this is not my review of it. I'm not a big opening-day crowd fighter. Maybe this weekend, though. However, since we're going to be at least a few days in on reviewing Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World's End, I thought I'd point you gentle readers towards a few reviews from people who did bother to see it when/before it came out. They're...mixed.

Chicago Tribune critic Michael Wilmington liked it, calling it "the most visually spectacular, action-packed and surreal of the adventures of Capt. Jack Sparrow." He lauded in for the dazzling spectacle as well as for the fine performances put in not only by Johnny Depp, but by the extensive supporting cast. Rolling Stone's Peter Travers disagrees, lambasting the film's length, confusion, and "focus on Will Turner, played by the aggressively bland Orlando Bloom, and his quest to find a personality" (I can't help but find that exceptionally funny). Travers goes on to say that the film "raises everything from the dead, except inspiration," and ends his review with a comment about it being a business proposition rather than a movie. Ouch. Other reviewers more or less split along these lines, with some loving the film's big expensive self, and some saying it's too much, gone on for too long, and has too little of Johnny Depp's Captain Jack Sparrow, who was the only thing worth watching in the first place. It's currently polling at exactly 50% on Rotten Tomatoes, so it could really go either way.

The interesting thing to me, of course, is that I don't see a single review that addresses sex or race in the film. The mainstream critics have lots to say about the effects, tons about the lack of Johnny Depp, confusing plot twists, lengthiness, and general overbloatedness of the film, but nothing about the integrity of the characters, particularly the female ones and the ones of color. I'm sure the blog world will continue this oversight (I know we won't here), but the first words in are pretty mute on the subject. (Note: Obviously, I haven't read every review out there, so if there's something germane I'm missing, please leave a comment, I'd love to see it.)

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Today, USA Today gave major heroine Geena Davis (Thelma & Louise, A League of Their Own, The Long Kiss Goodnight) its second annual Hollywood Hero award. Davis was recognized for founding See Jane, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the varied roles of female characters in children's media. A laudable goal, I'd say.

See Jane also just helped to publish a study, "Now You See 'Em, Now You Don't" (warning: that's going to open a PDF) that looks as gender and racial disparity in children's television programming. I'd especially recommend taking a look at if you have kids yourself, as it includes a really interesting section on how to discuss gender and race on TV with the small ones. All in all, its excellent work and I salute Davis and her organization.

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For the most part at the studios, there are now two genres available to women in leading roles: romantic comedies (which made Julia Roberts and Reese Witherspoon into huge box-office stars) and women-in-peril films (think of Jodie Foster in the mega-hits “Flightplan” and “Panic Room”). Occasionally, women can be cast in starring roles as action heroes, as with Angelina Jolie in “Lara Croft: Tomb Raider” and “Mr. and Mrs. Smith.”

The above quote is from the recent The New York Times Magazine article on women in film (login required). The article focuses on the economic reason women are pigeonholed into romantic comedy and lady-in-peril roles (drama just isn't big box office). Though women in action films are mentioned above, very little text is given to the role of women in action movies, which do draw big numbers to theaters. Still, the article is worth a read. It also gets into the interesting question of whether "serious" actresses fleeing away from the studios and towards independent films is a realistic remedy for the situation.

Thanks to Tony for the heads up on this.

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It didn't take a genius to figure out that the "Last Stand" thing was a big lie. There will be an X-Men 4, because they know that I have $8.50 that is not yet spoken for and they want it. And unfortunately, they're going to get it whether they deserve it or not, because I wasn't disappointed enough in X-Men 3 to sit out the next one.

I don't know much about the critics' general reaction to X3. Most people I know who saw it were at least a little disappointed. But from a heroine content perspective, one particular article in CNN back in May (it used to live here) did catch my attention.

The women of 'X-Men': Berry, Janssen, Romijn and Paquin on powers, hair, men

Feminism doesn't mean that I can't appreciate cool mutant hair, so I'm good so far.

The women of "X-Men: The Last Stand" can kick your butt.

Yes, I imagine that's true, and bravo for a strong opening line. But let's check out what the women of X-Men had to say about all of that butt-kicking:

Q: Did you ever envy one another's superpowers?

HALLE BERRY: I envied that I never really got to do my powers until the third movie. Fly and do electricity and spin and make a tornado like I got to do now. I envied that I never got to do what I do.

ANNA PAQUIN: I still never get to do anything. Three movies, absolutely no action. It's kind of amazing. [...] I managed to survive three action comic-book movies and pretty much almost not to see one single bit of real violence or, you know, action sequences.

BERRY: You'll have to do a Rogue spinoff, just so you can do something.

PAQUIN: Dude, I don't know if anybody wants to see that, actually.

BERRY: Well, you got a great love story. I didn't have that. I got no action and no story. I had nothing.

PAQUIN: I had some gloves.

Ouch.

Q: With women so prevalent, are the "X-Men" movies female-empowerment films?

ROMIJN: What I like most about these movies is they're not gender-specific at all. Yeah, of course, the women kick butt, and so do the guys. It's a non-issue.

PAQUIN: It's never even addressed. When they're going into battle, it's more whose power is most useful.

Except that you just said you never got to do anything.

JANSSEN: I find it's rare to see in a Hollywood movie, period, that many female characters. That many strong female characters. But specifically in the genre of comic-book adaptations, it just does not happen, because you have "Superman," you have "Batman," you have all these characters, and then you have the love interest. The fact that we have that many female characters in a movie of any size in Hollywood, it's great.

That's crap. We are well past the time when just having female characters in a Hollywood movie is enough. What good does it do to have them when they get the short end of the stick? Storm stood around wringing her hands a lot, Jean/Phoenix moped, and Rogue pined after a boy. Mystique started off powerful, but then the "cure" reduced her to begging on the floor, with backstabbing as her only remaining power.

So what will we see in X-Men 4?

Well, maybe there will be some good hair:

JANSSEN: It was really a hair commercial, if you think about it. We all said, if you want to get a great hair commercial out of this movie, let's just make sure that the hair changes and upstages everything.

Sigh. That'll be $8.50 well spent.

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The Cult of Leia's Metal Bikini is a an interesting look at how a movie from the 1970's is still inspiring women today:

There's no doubt that the sight of Carrie Fisher in the gold sci-fi swimsuit was burned into the sweaty subconscious of a generation of fanboys hitting puberty in the spring of 1983. But, remarkably, it's women for whom the costume holds the most enduring meaning today.

"I saw the movie when I was seven and I was absolutely thrilled by Leia -- what a wonderful character," says Amira Sa'id, a dancer who has used a Leia bikini in her performances. "Jabba put her into the outfit to humiliate her, but Leia was such a strong character, her will made the costume empowering."

And the costume designer who created the bikini was a woman!

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