The Increased Prominence of Female Leads in Television and Film
In such as male dominated business the female lead is getting more and more attention then ever. Let’s discuss a few examples.
First let’s have to look at the largest grossing film franchise, The Marvel Cinematic Universe. Last year Marvel introduced their first feature film featuring a lead female superhero “Captain Marvel”. Bre Larson who played Captain Marvel said In a speech in 2018, that 64 percent of the reviews for Hollywood’s 100 top grossing movies in 2017 were written by white men. “We’re telling a female story, but it’s not good enough to just be like, ‘You just hired a female lead and then we did it!’,” Larson said. We will also see Black Widow starring Scarlett Johansson hitting theaters in May.
DC/Warner Brothers released “Wonder Woman” two year prior to “Captain Marvel” which was the first female-led superhero film in more than a decade, and with Patty Jenkins at the helm, it’s the first to be directed by a woman. Jenkins is just the second female director to make a movie with a budget of more than $100 million (Kathryn Bigelow, with 2002’s K-19: The Widowmaker, was first) and she now holds the record for the largest opening of all time for a female helmer, with Wonder Woman taking in an estimated $100.5 million.
We were also introduced to Harley Quinn in Suicide Squad (2016) who we can expect a feature in 2020 “Birds of Prey: And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn”
Not just are we seeing female lead superheros but we are also seeing women behind the camera directing these films as well. Five of the biggest titles set for release this year — including all four major superhero movies — will be directed by women: “Birds of Prey” by Cathy Yan, on Feb. 7; “Mulan” by Niki Caro, on March 27; “Black Widow” by Cate Shortland, on May 1; “Wonder Woman 1984” by Patty Jenkins, on June 5; and “Eternals”by Chloé Zhao, on Nov. 6.
Over the past 12 months, the likes of Greta Gerwig (“Little Women”), Lorene Scafaria (“Hustlers”), Olivia Wilde (“Booksmart”), Lulu Wang (“The Farewell”) and Melina Matsoukas (“Queen and Slim”) helped propel the number of female-helmed movies to new heights — some 10.6% of the 100 highest-grossing films of the year were from female directors. In fact, two of the top 10 most successful global releases, “Frozen II” and “Captain Marvel,” were co-directed by women (Jennifer Lee and Anna Boden, respectively). It’s a big jump from 2018 when a meagre 4.5% of the top films were overseen by women.
Now the second highest grossing movie franchise is also taking suit, Star Wars. Rey (Daisy Ridley) from Star Wars: Episode IX – The Rise of Skywalker (2019) who was also in the two previous films “The Last Jedi (2017)” & “The Force Awakens (2015)”. Rey, a young woman with surprising Force powers, takes over as the lead previously taken by Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill). Rey is a young woman living in the nowhere planet of Jakku as a scavenger. It’s the same diamond in the rough theme repeated in Star Wars as we have seen recently in Rey’s character as Luke who was introduced living on a moisture farm on the desert planet of Tatooine with his Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru.
June Osborne from The Handmaid’s Tale is played by Elisabeth Moss. The Handmaid’s tail is set in a dystopian future, a woman is forced to live as a concubine under a fundamentalist theocratic dictatorship. It is another major production and is Hulu’s top viewed original show with over 8 million views.
Writer/Producer/Director James Cameron, known for Titanic and Avatar was involved in two movies last year with a female lead, Alita: Battle Angel played by Rosa Salazar and Terminator: Dark Fate which actually featured three female roles. The First is Sarah Connor played by Linda Hamilton who we know from the original two films Terminator & Terminator 2. The second is Grace played by Mackenzie Davis a enhanced cyborg sent from the future and Dani Ramos played by Natalia Reyes. Cameron said “Sarah Connor was not a beauty icon. She was strong, she was troubled, she was a terrible mother, and she earned the respect of the audience through pure grit. And to me, [the benefit of characters like Sarah] is so obvious. I mean, half the audience is female! When asked why are movies still so bad when it comes to depicting truly powerful women? For the first time, Cameron is lost for words. “I don’t – I don’t know. There are many women in power in Hollywood and they do get to guide and shape what films get made. I think – no, I can’t account for it. Because how many times do I have to demonstrate the same thing over again? I feel like I’m shouting in a wind tunnel!”
Some other recent television shows that featured a lead female are American Horror Story, How to Get Away with Murder, Quantico, Shadowhunters, Jessica Jones, Claws & Once Upon a Time.
Not just are we seeing and increase of lead females and directors but we are seeing more female music supervisors. Women are absolute dominating music supervision. Some examples would be Andrea Von Foerster who has worked on “Yellowstone” 2018-2020, “Queen of the South” 2017-2019, “500 Days of Summer” 2009 and “Daybreak” 2019. Mary Ramos who has worked exclusively with Quentin Tarantino including in his film released last year “Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood” and some some other films such as “Marshall” 2017 and the upcoming film “Stillwater” featuring Matt Damon coming out later this year. Another music supervisor, Lauren Marie Mikus who was a guest speaker we had at our event: Panel and Pitch, in Atlanta May 21st 2017 has worked with director Terrence Malick on films such as “Tree of Life” (2011) and “Song to Song” (2017) as well as a few other films such as “Swiss Army Man” (2016) and” Green Room” (2015). Jen Malone is another superstar in music supervision working on such projects as “Creed II” (2018), “Atlanta” (2016-2018) and “Euphoria” (2019).