The internet is talking about the failure of representation of women in film at last. Everywhere you look at the moment, there’s column inches devoted to female characterisation It’s something I’ve pushed for via my writers’ site, Bang2write for years, so you’d think I’d be happy about this development, right? Wrong. Here’s why.
Recently it was lamented by The Dissolve we’re losing our heroines to so-called “Trinity Syndrome”. The article went viral fast; social media was set alight with a chorus of agreement that yes, modern action movies DO only pay lip service to the notion of “strong female characters,” signified by Trinity from THE MATRIX franchise (1999-2003), played by Carrie-Anne Moss. And certainly, of all the acres of articles I’ve read pertaining to female representation on the silver screen, The Dissolve’s was the least annoying, at least suggesting (albeit somewhat grudgingly) that “strong” *could* mean different things depending on the tone, genre, story and character role function (at last!).
But why “Trinity Syndrome”? Trinity is, in The Dissolve’s own words, a “hugely capable woman”, but also according to them, “never once becomes as independent, significant, and exciting as she is in her introductory scene.” This is possibly the politest way I’ve seen Trinity described as a weak character! She has caught heat from feminist film critics’ quarters over the last decade or so for various reasons, including (but not limited to): deferring both to Orpheus, the story’s mentor figure and to Neo, the film’s protagonist (played by Keanu Reeves); being surpassed (easily) by Neo in his training as The Chosen One; for being Neo’s love interest; even for being androgynous in both appearance and/or name. In short, Trinity is no stranger to getting the boot from feminist film critique. But what is capability, or independence? How does a character become significant or exciting? Ah, well that’s where it gets really complicated.
I am no fan of The Matrix (really!) or of Trinity as a character, I’ve always thought the above bizarre complaints. After all, every character defers to a mentor character, even the protagonist in the first instance – otherwise that character does not have a mentor function! It’s the protagonist’s will that (usually) prevails, especially in action adventure movies, so again: secondaries must ultimately defer to him, else again: he is not the hero who saves the day. When it comes to “Chosen Ones” in the action adventure, yes the vast majority of them are both male and white and it’s definitely true the lack of variety is not good enough. In addition, the majority of female characters in the genre exist as love interests for those heroes (why not gay action heroes? That’s a serious question). But whatever the gender of a character with love interest role function, why is being someone’s lover automatically a subordinate role? Why doesn’t being the partner of The Chosen One actively aid her position within the story? As for Trinity being androgynous, I find it rather ironic the very commentators who usually insist good characterisation should not take into account a sense of “female-ness” then would complain about that Trinity is not female “enough” (whatever that means).
The issue regarding so-called “Trinity Syndrome” then is not the fact Trinity is (in my opinion) a somewhat forgettable character (and thus, magically, somehow all “strong women” in movies are found wanting), but the fact feminist critique insists on viewing female characterisation in isolation. Yes, if you pluck out Trinity from THE MATRIX, you will see her inner workings, including her flaws. The same is true of Neo, Morpheus or indeed any character in every movie, ever. We’re stating the obvious and it’s time for the conversation to move on and ultimately, evolve. But how to do this?
Well, for starters, we need to stop obsessing over reductive tools like The Bechdel Test and start picking our battles more wisely. I’m not proposing a free pass for sexism in movies: that would be absurd, when I have spent the last eight years as Bang2write crusading for better roles for female characters in the screenplays I read and script edit. However, I do believe a single movie cannot change decades of poor gender representation around, plus it’s unwise to pin all our hopes on the next GRAVITY; HUNGER GAMES or **whatever**. Instead we should celebrate each step forward and stop attacking every supposed “failure”, especially when different images mean different things to different people in the audience, anyway.
What’s more, we need to start looking at story holistically and instead of pointing fingers, we should be asking questions of ALL characterisation and all movies, such as:
Why the hero’s journey – why not the heroine’s as well?
Why is the villain of the piece nearly always male?
Why are main characters so often white?
Why are supporting characters – especially “expendable heroes” – so often male and people of colour?
Why are exorcism stories nearly always centered around “possessed” females and male priests?
Why do characters’ disabilities or sexual preferences apparently have to inform the plot, when non-disabled, heterosexual characters’ don’t?
Where are LGBT characters outside of Rom-Coms?
Why do genre pieces exploit potentially offensive stereotypes so readily, especially political spy thrillers and comedies?
Why are traditional archetypes – the nurturing parent, the princess in the tower, the star-crossed lovers - seen as automatically “wrong”?
Why not personality, before gender?
And most importantly:
How can we start to address the above, as writers and filmmakers ourselves?
Stories are the sum of all their parts. If we want those parts – like female characterisation – to be better, I believe we have to look at the stories first, otherwise we are jamming supposedly “better” characters into the same-old, same-old plots … and guess what? It doesn’t work.
Lucy V. Hay is a novelist, script editor and blogger who helps writers via her Bang2write consultancy. Lucy is the author of The Decision Book Series of YA novels and WRITING AND SELLING THRILLER SCREENPLAYS for Kamera Books' "Creative Essentials" range. Check out all her books, HERE.
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