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Further, no, Pixar is not sexist.
The focus is on telling a great story. I mean look at the AFI Top 100, only 2 of the top 10 are centered around female leads and those are "Wizard of Oz" and "Gone with the Wind." The larger question should be "Is Hollywood sexist" because the only movies that have female leads inevitably get marketed as "chick flicks" unless they feature Angelina Jolie blowing shit up.
Your comment is actually the point that the NPR author makes - that she would rather see a new female character for younger girls instead of the stand-by princess. Gender role creation is exactly what she's talking about - so thanks for making her point for her!
You are so good at that.
Some girls like princesses. Some girls like robots. Or lizards. Or dinosaurs. Some boys want to be cowboys. Some actually prefer dolls and dress-up to meccano, but when was the last time you met a parent who wouldn't react somwewhat negatively to little Timmy playing with his sisters tutus?
I wanted to be a mad scientist/artist/rock star/archaeologist/vet when I was a kid. All at once. With superpowers. Just because. Princesses didn't enter into it. We don't tumble out of the womb with a special preference for gendered things like cowboys and princesses hardwired into our brains. Such things are at least partially about conditioning. It is probably no coincidence that I developed a desire for archaeology with an Uncle who loved going beach combing, digging and generally looking-for-interesting-rocks, or loved The Doors after another uncle practically forced me to listen to them every time I visited him!
I am so goddamned tired of PC whining I'm going ouot right now to club a few baby seals. That always makes me feel better.
And why not make a movie about a prince? It could be cool. A prince who gets rescued by a peasant girl, who saves the day.
How about, instead of insisting it must be ALL empowered women or ALL little-princesses we could have a variety of exciting, varied and interesting characters for children of both genders and all races and colours? Then everyone can be happy.
Why not just switxh it around? It's not written in stone that the girls MUST only like the princess stories and the boys MUST only like adventures. It can be vis versa anyway you see fit. The movies are for anyone who shows intrest in the certain genra.
But, it's risky, since they've never done that before, do they want to ruin thier record of ten hits in a row?
You know if Pixar does a film with a female lead the media will start calling it a "girl's movie." Boys won't see a girls movie.
Perhaps a story with a boy and a girl as the stars?
Pixar is formulatic to a fault in all their movies but that's no excuse to not being able to write in a female character that isn't weird or a flat support character.
On this point, this practically demands (even though it is not always the case and certainly not the case when talking about the main role since you need background anyway) for the "hero" of the story to be male. I'm not trying to be sexist but when people regularly think hero they think strong (physically and mentally), smart, and can do things on their own, which is normally embodied by a male role. And while the main character doesn't need to fill this mold, if you break it for them then you need to break it for the supporting roles as well (otherwise you get characters that could easily replace the main role or otherwise they just do not fit the story), which eventually requires you to make back stories for everyone else too, which is difficult to fit into one movie. Movies have always been centered on bringing characters together that are all different from each other and having them unite to make a well-rounded group.
However, past Pixar films have showcased strong and admirable female leads. The Incredibles with Elastigirl/Helen, Jesse in Toy Story 2, That Porsche in Cars, Eve (it's pretty much implied/accepted that she's a girl), etc..
That is not to say they don't have great female characters, you know? Like so many other on this comment board said, their stories would go no where without the female characters. We admire them, don't t we? Which means the Pixar writers might not know women enough to have them be leads, they do love, respect and admire them. Which is a lot more than you can say about most main-stream flicks, no? Really, think about it. Also, what Princess movies from Disney had male characters as flowed and realistic and non-cliche attractive as female characters in Pixar films? Am I wrong here?
Maybe when Pixar and animation world in general has more women, and general audience and industry is more accepting of female creators, we will have female lead Pixar movie that is not a princess movie and everybody would want to watch. I'd love to see that, I do.
John Lasseter worships Miyazaki, so what's holding him back? Answer: He knows the average American audience too well.
I don't think Pixar is sexist, I just think they're part of the same Hollywood machine that has ignored the female audience (and therefore, the female dollar) for decades.
Pixar have very few female leads, but they do have them. I believe Monsters Vs Aliens was a Pixar move; in which a strong woman gets superpowers that, subconsciously, are not the sort of thing we would epxect for a woman - she gets HUGE! SUPERBIG! And of course strong with it. Women are not supposed to take up space - physical, social, political, that is what we are usually told. But this woman does, she kicks arse, and she has the guts ot kick her ex out on his ear when he comes crawling back.
Mrs Incredible was not the lead but was a strong, independent, capable and feisty woman all on her own right, and did not sit back waiting to be rescued or watching her man be heroic; she took action herself.
Pixar rarely produce princess-type women, and even when they do their princesses do not fit the standard mold; just look at Shrek. Okay, not a lead, but pretty damn good. I think Disney (oldschool) is far more guilty. Growing up, the strongest female character I remember is Mrs Dibley from The Secret of Nimh; Mulan was a little too late for me, and the other Disney princesses just... sucked. They suck even more now, though, since they were made more "marketable". (read, bland).
Really, I think the issue now is Pixar clearly know that strong female characters sell well, they just are only slowly getting brave enough to risk putting one in as the central character. I have no doubt they are trying to though, and expect to see more female leads in the future.
And then there are all those who gripe about "the PC police" and roll their eyes... I agree that political correctness can get out of hand, but trying to include all kinds of people is more than just PC. It's equality. I'm glad that a person of colour finally made it into a lead role in a Pixar film. I'm glad Disney finally has an African-American princess. It isn't "sad" or succumbing to criticisms to include people who are different from the norm, it's inclusive and progressive!
I'm withholding judgement on the princess thing until I see what kind of princess she'll be, but I'd really like to see the idea that men can't relate to female characters thrown out. If women can do it, why can't we?
I'm a German, and we get lots of dubbed movies from other nations, and I just can't imagine a lot of German and foreign movies with girl protagonists getting successfully remade in the US, because critics would reject them for these girls being bad role models, the movie would be called girly, and it's very hard to make changes that both please the critics, and get the boys to watch the movie, so ultimately, a remake will paint the movie pink to get the girls to view it, and most likely ruin it.
For the record, I am female, but I usually prefer watching male leads. A good female character is hard to shoot for; males are a safer bet, I think.