If you see an animated film today, it’s likely to include a token strong female character or two who reviewers will call “feisty.” In “How to Train Your Dragon,” Astrid; in “Toy Story,” Jessie; in “Ratatouille,” Colette. She’s supposed to make us feel like the movie is contemporary and feminist, unlike those sexist films of yesteryear.
The problem is that because Pixar or Disney has so magnanimously thrown in this feisty female (who may even have some commentary about sexism or male domination) we’re no longer supposed to care that almost all of the other characters in the film are male, including the star who the movie is often titled for and usually his best buddy as well. The crowd scenes in the film are also made up of mostly males.
Parents, the next time you watch a children’s movie, try not to let the token feminist distract you. Pay attention to the number of female characters versus male characters. Now imagine that ratio reflected in the real world. Is that a world you want your kids to live in?
Why does there have to be sexism in the imaginary world at all?
See Reel Girl’s Gallery of Girls Gone Missing From Kids Movie Posters in 2011.
Yep!
Wow,…SO many examples of this! _Cars_ is another one. Of course, if the female character happens to be black or Latina, she’ll be described as “sassy” or “fiery”.
Hi Lesley,
Yes, sassy and fiery! There are so many examples: Po In Happy Feet 2, Kitty Softpaws in Puss in Boots, probably the Taylor Swift character in The Lorax will be feisty, Smurfette, the Angelina Jolie character in Kung Fu Panda…
MM
Well their next movie Brave at least has a “fiesty” young woman as the main character… in a world full of men.
Hi Bubbawheat,
Is the heroine of Brave surrounded by men? I am hoping there is at least one other female who helps her in some way. I just blogged about the phenomenon od surrounding the heroine with males in The Golden Compass.
MM
I’m pretty sure her mother is an important character, though I got the feeling she was opposed to the main character’s actions rather than supporting her.
Bubbawheat,
There is often a wicked mother or mother figure (if not a dead one!). I hope there’s another female in there…
MM
What about Serafina Pekkala in The Golden Compass? What I find interesting about her is that she’s a witch (which isn’t a bad thing in Lyra’s world), and only women can be witches; any boys they give birth to are just ordinary humans. Thus the women in their society are the ones with the inherent power.
More generally on the topic of the post as a whole, I think part of the damage done by the ‘token feisty female’ is that it sets this up as how women should be. It’s not really any different from the Smurfette, in that this has become the new standard female, in which the femaleness of a character *is* her personality.
Oh, and this article is great for explaining the problem of ‘Strong Female Characters’:
http://www.overthinkingit.com/2008/08/18/why-strong-female-characters-are-bad-for-women/
In a way it’s more applicable to films directed at teen and adult audiences, because it talks about how female characters remain ‘sexy’, but then again a lot of kids’ movies have pretty, skinny, scantily-clad female characters, too, so it probably does still apply.
Hmmm…that’s very interesting. Now I’m thinking over all these kids’ movies and it’s exactly what you just pointed out. Now I’ll be looking for the sassy female in all the movies that come out.
labyritnth,
It’s a bummer, maybe we could turn it into a drinking game…
MM
Makes me crazy. You are so right.
Heh heh, I was actually just thinking about Astrid just yesterday.
While she certainly has the facade of a strong character, I dare say the film would have been much more interesting had she been in the lead role instead.
Unfortunately, she’s relegated to being a pseudo sidekick/love interest and I doubt the upcoming sequel will change this.
Hi Charles Kenny,
Totally agree, or why couldn’t the dragon have been female at least? I know, I know because it was a book first and the book had male lead characters. I did not know a sequel was coming. Is it a book as well?
I love your blog by the way, learning a lot about animation.
MM
Thank you for the kind words! I’m enjoying your blog too 🙂
There is a series of books, but to the best of my knowledge, the first film took bits and pieces from them all, so it’s not like say, Harry Potter, where the films follow the books exactly. The sequel is likely to stray further from the original material.
It’s almost like they put her in just to make us have that frustrating “but what about Jessie?” conversation with people, over and over.
“Ratatouille” made me the most cross, because even if they made a point about the sexism in the humans’ world, that gave them zero excuse for the rats. Was I the only one wondering how they managed to breed so many of them when they didn’t appear to have any females?
(As a side note, my little boy spent a couple of months telling people that his name was Astrid, after “Dragon” came out, then this week there was a new little girl in his dance class who was insisting on being called Hiccup. I see a great future for them both.)
Hi Orlando,
Yes, that speech Colette made about how hard it was to get ahead in a male dominated kitchen TOTALLY PISSED ME OFF. This is a movie about a rat who can cook, but when it comes to sexism, all of a sudden we are concerned with being realistic?? WHY?
MM
This ones’s pretty obvious,but the entire Star Wars series fits that pattern! Are there ANY women in Lucas’ universe except Leia and Amidala?
Lesley,
Star Wars totally fits. So do its endless figures, LEGO sets, video games, lunchboxes, T shirts…
MM
Please tell me you’ve heard of the Bechdel test! (There’s a brief YouTube video explaining what the test is in a nutshell: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLF6sAAMb4s) I think we all can predict what the overwhelming majority of results would be if applied to kids’ films.
Yes Dottie I have but think it needs to be adjusted for kids movies…do a search on my blog for it and you’ll see what I came up with