When Cate Blanchett accepted her Oscar for Best Actress earlier this month, she acknowledged a huge fault in the movie industry: the sexism in female-centered movies. As she brilliantly stated, "Those in the industry are foolishly clinging to the idea that female films, with women in the centre are niche experiences. They are not," she said. "Audiences want to see them. In fact, they earn money."
Fortunately, there is a generation of girls growing up with the ability to see this come to fruition. With the latest installment in the Hunger Games series and, most recently, Divergent, young, teenaged girls are watching successful, money-making movie franchises with female protagonists. Apart from Twilight, which totally doesn't count, these female-centered movies are creating a Young Adult (YA) genre sensation, are huge crowd pleasers, and are all highly anticipated by everyone in the movie industry. However, for every two steps that Hollywood takes forward, they take one step back.
Divergent is a story centered upon Tris Prior, new initiate into the Dauntless faction in a dystopian world. Members of this faction system choose their factions based on a dominant personality trait, such as kindness or selflessness. Tris, however, defies the norm and chooses for herself a new faction, leaving her family of selfless people, and takes a life which is focused on bravery. In Veronica Roth's three-book series, this coming of age story takes precedence over anything else and serves as an example for young girls who are struggling to find their own story. Hollywood's big mistake is that they instead choose to focus on her relationship with her Dauntless boyfriend, Four.
Look, Hollywood. I get it. You want to make money and you want to market these movies to young girls as expertly as you can. Unfortunately for us, sex sells, and you tailor it's story to the marketability of its eye candy and appeal to adolescent romantics. But unfortunately for this generation of girls, you focus on the idea that without Four, Tris may not be able to find herself. To the average moviegoer, they will see the screen time devoted to her relationship.
As I sat in a full auditorium on opening night and heard a hundred teenage girls gasp, giggle and fawn over any romantic exchange between Tris and Four, I couldn't help but be disappointed and sad for them. For any moviegoers who are not also fans of the book, they miss out on the point of Veronica Roth's story: that Tris is finding her way to become her own person who makes her own choices and doesn't need Four to stand by her side; she chooses to let him. Hollywood tells a very different story, that of Tris and Four as Tris struggles to find who she is.
If this were a movie with a male protagonist, the plot line would follow Four and his mission to fulfill his destiny (or whatever). His relationship with Tris (and subsequently the female role) would always come second. But in these two steps forward in a high-grossing, female protagonist film, Tris's internal conflict takes the backseat to her relationship, and the movie misses the point.
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