What do female moviegoers learn from the movies about being women? Fortunately, not much.
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While Hollywood and Washington wrestle with the notion that movies are making young men more aggressive, nobody seems to be worrying about how impressionable young women are being influenced by the big screen. We should be worried, because if girls took their cues from the screen, they'd all become vacuous bimbettes who treat their friends like shit.
Luckily, women are smarter than guys, who do bust out of theaters with testosterone gushing from their glands. Women know that movies don't help them find solutions for the problems of life. Otherwise, there would be thousands of women flashing their beavers in hopes of becoming best-selling novelists and successful murderesses (Basic Instinct), having their ovaries taken out when they don't have to in order to get large insurance settlements (Malice), or dripping hot wax over lawyers' bodies (Body of Evidence), which, come to think of it, isn't such a bad idea. Or we'd be sleeping with old men in overpriced suits because they offered us a shitload of money... wait a minute, I forgot--we do do that.
We know that when we look for moral lessons from the movies, we come away with dangerous ideas. Of course, there's one idea that, despite our innate distrust and natural wisdom, we can't help falling for over and over again. Do I hear somebody humming, "Someday, my prince will come"? Pretty Woman was just the most influential of a seemingly endless string of films that say, Hey, you can't see a way out of your lonely, rotten life? Not to worry: a prince, or at least a middle-aged guy with oodles of dough and a car that costs as much as your family's house, is heading your way.
"That's the kind of thing that totally screwed me up as a kid," my friend Val, age 39, says. "I figured I just had to wait. And it was mixed in with being beautiful, too, because there were no ugly heroines. I realized I wasn't beautiful enough, because I waited and waited and waited. I'm still convinced my prince will come, only now I'm having a good time while I'm waiting."
Tory, age 35, went apoplectic on this subject. "Katharine Ross in The Graduate . . . remember that? Her character teaches you to take a passive role in your life, to be sweet and demure, and Prince Charming will come and rescue you--even though he's shtupping your mother, and she's sexier than you are!"
Millions of women continue to blindly buy into this myth, including my niece, Mara, the most romantic 26-year-old since Jane Eyre. "I think there aren't enough stories where the woman is feminine and the man takes care of her, like Pretty Woman," she said at dinner one night, inciting a virtual lynch mob. "Really, I think women are too tough nowadays in the movies."
It was no surprise to me that Sleepless in Seattle went through the roof. Here's a film that says that whatever the happiness you may be finding with the man you're with, it's nothing compared with what would happen if your phantom lover, who lives halfway around the world and has never met you before, showed up at the Empire State Building. Am I the only one who wanted to push the Meg Ryan character in front of an oncoming cab, thereby making her eligible for the remake of _An Affair to Remembe_r?
Since the action-'80s, women seem to be doing more on-screen. But more may not mean better. Some of my friends, who usually have more sense, nattered on about what great role models we've seen in the past few years. "Holly Hunter in The Piano," Barbara, age 21, said, her eyes nearly rolling back in ecstasy. "Oh yeah?" said my friend Michelle, age 38. "What the hell was Holly Hunter trying to say: Cut out my tongue, shame on you. Cut off my finger, shame on me?" Val brought up Geena Davis in Thelma & Louise. "Oh sure," I said, "have your first orgasm, and death will surely follow." Susan Sarandon in Lorenzo's Oil, my sister suggested. "Okay, here's the deal," said Michelle, "if you're a ferocious and loyal mom, your desperately ill child may one day be able to blink at you." Mary McDonnell in Passion Fish was the next one up. "Oh sure, the movie that proved that most actresses would be better people if they were in wheelchairs," Michelle said. My mother brought up the women in Fried Green Tomatoes. I had to agree--most men would taste better with barbecue sauce. Val remembered loving Sigourney Weaver in The Year of Living Dangerously. "An interesting lesson," noted Michelle. "She decides that Mel Gibson is not only more important than her career, he's worth threatening national security!"
Women know men run Hollywood, so the last thing we'd expect is movies that give us good advice on mothering. This is a town that thinks it's all right to arrive at your destination, realize you've forgotten your youngest child at home, and your biggest dilemma is whether you'll get another chance to steal the crystal salt-and-pepper shakers from first class. Hello? As my young friend Janina remarked, "What can they be thinking when the best mother we saw all year on-screen was a man?"--i.e., Robin Williams in Mrs. Doubtfire.
Some of the women I spoke with said that the only advice they felt safe taking from the big screen was from films made decades ago, when women like Katharine Hepburn, Greer Garson, Susan Hayward and Audrey Hepburn were using their feminine wiles to get what they wanted, all the time letting men think they were sweet, innocent and helpless. These, they argued, were women who worked, who had serious things on their minds, who could wear a peplum jacket and tight skirt and not look idiotic. But others said that they hated those old movies, where Doris Day goes through one imbroglio after the other, having to share her phone line with someone she hates, taking exotic vacations with men she doesn't know, and through it all, she holds on to the thing she values more than life itself--her virginity. And what does she get for all the trouble? A nice mink coat. "What the woman needed was a vibrator," Traci observed.
No, we can't look toward Hollywood to help us with our feminine psyches. We know that in movieland, we will be assured that what you look like is much more important than who you really are, that showing off your body is always a better idea than showing off your mind, and that if you act strong, you'll be known as a pushy bitch.
In the end, my girlfriends (who are experts on everything, and have opinions on even more than that) agreed that women should look to the movies only for the practical tips they can offer us. And everyone from Val,age 39, to Rosie, age 20, could name helpful hints they'd picked up at the cineplex.
How to Kiss
For years, before I could do the real thing with real boys, I practiced kissing the bathroom mirror. I can still remember my mother screeching, "Martha, don't go near that mirror. The cleaning girl was here today."
But how else was I going to figure out how the whole thing worked? And I knew I'd need lots of practice if I was going to do what they seemed to do so effortlessly in films. It was the nose thing that drove me nuts. Where did you put it? Did you breathe out or not? Movies made me aware of how silly the whole thing could look if you didn't figure out where your nose was supposed to be. Just think of Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway in Chinatown.
"I learned everything I needed to know about kissing from the movies," said Val, "until a guy stuck his tongue in my mouth and I almost gagged. They never did that in the movies! I thought the whole deal was that you pushed your faces together as close as possible--I even imagined that your teeth would grind against his--and then you just stayed that way. Nowhere was the tongue ever implied."
"Gone With the Wind--now that was a kiss," said Lizzie. "And you didn't see them slobbering all over each other. I heard somewhere that later on, Vivien Leigh said that Clark Gable had bad breath, but that still doesn't ruin it for me. It was so wonderful."
My sister, Helene, remembers another one. "I almost died when Paul Newman kissed Eva Marie Saint in Exodus. They were on that mountain-top, and I can remember feeling how intense it was. I very much wanted a boy--any boy!--to kiss me that way." Michelle agreed: "That kiss turned me into a Zionist."
One of my young friends pointed out that the minute she began to draw more than mere practical tips from screen kisses, she ran smack into a dilemma: "I noticed that a kiss is never just a kiss anymore. It's like, you kiss, you fuck. It seems to go hand in hand. One minute they're smooching, the next they're putting on their bathrobes, postcoital. Don't you ever get to just kiss in real life, and not worry that intercourse is the next step?" In a word, no.
How to Get Boys
Some of us may have adored Gidget, the symbol of modern, wholesome young womanhood. But what the hell was she doing walking around in the bikini all the time, shaking her ass for all the world to see? In reality, Gidget was a nice girl cleverly disguised as a bimbo, which is why she managed to have fun. (Actually being a bimbo is not as much fun.)
"Remember Grease?" asked Lisa, age 25. "I loved that movie, because of how Olivia Newton-John went from good girl to bad girl by the end of the film. I learned from that movie that showing off your body is very key in relationships with men. What you think will happen is that John Travolta will become good because he wants her so bad, and he thinks she's sweet and virginal. But in the end, she dresses like a slut and he loves her even more."
Movies made it perfectly clear that being too good was usually an unrewarding activity. Remember Maria in West Side Story! She was good and wore a white dress to the dance. "I was a good girl looking for a good boy," said Michelle. "West Side Story taught me that, yes, there's a tall, dark, sensitive man out there for you, and he'll die before you can marry him."
I decided long ago that being bad may get you in trouble, but at least you'll have good stories to tell. Guys will like you and girls will remember you. Who do we remember from Desperately Seeking Susan: the decent Rosanna Arquette, who spent all her time looking for a guy who was looking for another girl, or the sexy and contemptible Madonna, who cheated and stole, used all her friends, and dried her armpits in the bus terminal? No contest.
The Importance of Having a Job
My mother stayed home to take care of us so, of course, I loved all the women in movies who worked. They got out of the house, got to wear those fab dresses, got to trade barbs at the office with guys who were witty and urbane.
"When I was growing up in the Bronx," says Annie, age 40, "all the women in the neighborhood were housewives. The one woman who worked was considered a tramp! All I had was Saturday at the movies, so Susan Hayward became my idol and my role model. In the '50s, she was the independent, powerful, career woman. Didn't matter what job. She was everything I wanted to be. And she smoked cigarettes with incredible style. She was strong and smart, and very independent. It wasn't whether she got the man or not: the impression was that she could stand on her own two feet."
Not to mention that she was usually a raving drunk. "Really?" said Annie. "I never noticed that."
Helene loved Working Girl for what it told her about having a job in a large organization. "It taught me that if you fight hard enough, you'll get there. If you believe in yourself, you'll make it. And you don't need anyone else to believe in you." Obviously, I saw a different movie, one that made it clear you should do anything except work in a large office building in Manhattan, where your ultimate reward was having a tiny, sterile office to yourself. I also thought Working Girl had another hidden message, just the kind of lesson moviegoing women must steel themselves against. For what is Melanie Griffith saying except, "Don't worry about all the advice you've been given. It is all right to sleep with your coworkers. And using sex at business parties is a great idea. Use your brain till five, then turn on the sex appeal. Everyone who works with you will love you and think you're terrific. No problem with ethics there."
Frankly, I'm certain that all the women I know who work have gotten wherever they've gotten without benefit of cinematic inspiration. You have to believe what you're seeing on the big screen to be inspired--or at least you've got to suspend disbelief. Try suspending disbelief while reading the following list of occupations actresses have had on-screen:
Sean Young as a helicopter pilot
Barbra Streisand as a psychiatrist
Melanie Griffith as an undercover cop
Demi Moore as a lawyer
Laura Dern as a paleontologist
Ellen Barkin as an opera singer
Kim Basinger as a bank robber.
My young friends, whose mothers all work, said that they hated that all women seem to have careers in the movies these days. "Don't any of them want to stay home and take care of their kids?" one asked. We older women stared back with flat glazes. "Just the mother in Home Alone," I told them.
How to Dress
This is, ultimately, the best thing the movies show us. When Richard Gere wanted to impress Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, did he bring her to the hospital ward he had recently endowed, or introduce her to the orphans he had saved from near death? No, he took her directly to Rodeo Drive. And women the world over lusted for a brown-and-white polka-dot dress that would have made most of them look like heifers at a shooting range.
I mean, really, do you think Demi Moore slept with Robert Redford for the money? Redford, the old fool, could have saved the million if he'd realized that she was willing to let him have his way because he'd been thoughtful enough to buy her that black dress (which could later have served as a hammock in the backyard where Demi and Woody were no doubt reduced to sleeping after giving all the money to a hippo).
Anybody remember the plot of Intersection? No, but few women failed to note Sharon Stone's creamy cashmere sweaters. And what else could have gotten so many women to treat bras as outerwear if not Madonna's vulgar display in Desperately Seeking Susan?
Audrey Hepburn was the fashion guru to a whole generation in the '50s and '60s. "The funny thing about Audrey Hepburn," says Linda, who has a body very similar to Audrey's, "is that she made the biggest impression on me, in terms of clothes, in Wait Until Dark, where her character was blind and couldn't see herself in the mirror. Remember those corduroy pants, and turtlenecks? She was just so elegant. Only later did I realize it didn't matter what she wore."
Margie agreed: "Any Audrey Hepburn movie, except The Nun's Story, was my fashion Bible. So many of her movies were showcases to dress her--_Sabrina_, Funny Face, even Breakfast at Tiffany's. She had that incredible shape."
Michelle almost gagged at this: "Audrey Hepburn gave me the creeps from early on because I knew that I was being fed an image that was impossible to attain. She may have devoted years of her life to easing hunger among children in poor countries, but she inadvertently encouraged starvation among young females in industrial nations."
My cousin Barbi took hints from Jane Fonda in Barbarella: "Those short shorts, those space outfits, the colors that were so wild, and those vinyl boots! I can't remember how many pairs I had, but I'm sure I had them in every color."
The younger women I spoke with were predictably bowled over by Julia Roberts's clothes in Pretty Woman, but they all admitted that they knew they didn't have the body, the wallet, or the hair to pull it off. "Every girl I know who tried the Pretty Woman look went for the hooker attire," explained Rosie, "because the Rodeo stuff was too expensive and not as much fun to wear."
Annie Hall's, over-the-top layered men's look rocked my friend Karen, age 35, along with a lot of other women. "I'll tell you, when that first came out, I went and bought everything I could find in the boy's department of Macy's. It was the first time that you could look good, and sexy, without positioning yourself to look like a slut."
Chris only likes the clothes from before 1900. "I went wild for Valmont," she says. "A lot of the new stuff in movies is just everyday wear, but the early clothes were so romantic and so inspired. Then again, I never wear Valmont. I wear Reality Bites."
As for hair, there were three "don'ts" that came up repeatedly in my survey: Ricki Lake in Hairspray, Joan Cusack in Working Girl ("My God," said Traci, who sports some major big hair herself, "it made you want to scream and run under the shower!"), and Mary McDonnell in Dances With Wolves. "She was an Indian, but her hair was cut in a shag and had mousse in it," says Elizabeth. "I say, when you're supposed to have been raised by Indians, ixnay to the bouffant."
The bottom line here is that women take their cues from real life, not reel life. They aren't watching Linda Hamilton and thinking that a semiautomatic makes a good accessory. They're not viewing Thelma & Louise and deciding to shoot every asshole trucker they meet on the road. They're not becoming mute in the hope that a tattooed man will loosen them up and talk dirty to them.
No, women look for their role models in actual life. They look at women like Janet Reno. After all, as Attorney General, you get to travel, lead important meetings and open fire on stupid cults. Of course, you do occasionally have to have lunch with Barbra Streisand, but nobody's life is perfect. Nevertheless, as any woman who has been to the movies could tell her, Janet needs a better hairdresser and some good advice from a costume designer. She'd certainly get our attention if she wore that brown-and-white polka-dot dress.
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Martha Frankel interviewed Brendan Fraser for the March Movieline.