Laura Mulvey once put forward this concept in her "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Film", thinking that the image of women on the screen is the object under the gaze of men. With the rise of the civil rights movement, feminist movement, and sexual liberation movement in the United States in the 1960s, feminist films have once become a new topic that has attracted the attention of academic circles.
But in my opinion, feminist films are to a large extent concept-first works. They derive an idea into a film, and more reflect the director’s personal ideas or experience. To what extent can they represent the female collective? ? To what extent can feminist films change the object status of women being stared at on the screen?
The real way to change this situation is that women must first become the main consumers of culture and movies. Only when women become the main consumer of culture, culture will make adjustments and changes in a manner of serving women.
Hollywood chick movies are films made specifically for female consumer groups. But Hollywood has not believed that women's spending power can really be comparable to men's for a long time. Therefore, Xiao Niu movies are mainly urban fashion romantic dramas with small and medium costs.
But Hollywood will soon realize that it was wrong. In 2001, a small-cost film "The Lawful Beauty" with a production cost of only US$18 million, ended up with a global box office of US$140 million, making the producer a lot of money. The box office revenue of its sequel also reached 120 million U.S. dollars.
Also in 2001, the production cost of "BJ Singles Diary" was 26 million U.S. dollars. In the end, the global box office reached 280 million U.S. dollars, and its sequel even reached an outrageous U.S. $540 million.
The 2008 movie "Sex and the City" finally let Hollywood producers get the hang of it. Of course, they are still cautious, but for this TV series adaptation film with a good audience base, they still invested an unprecedented $65 million in production costs. As a result, "Sex and the City" really lived up to expectations, with a box office record of 340 million. On the day of the film’s premiere, female audiences accounted for 85% of the audience.
However, the more eye-catching chick movie in 2008 was actually "Mamma Mia". This film, which cost US$52 million in production, had a global box office total of US$570 million.
If Hollywood’s major filmmakers come to this time and have not realized what a huge new mine they have unearthed, then a phenomenal movie at the end of 2008 will completely kick their elm heads awake. It is the "Twilight" series.
Compared with "Twilight", the box office records created by the above movies will seem too pediatric. How profitable is "Twilight"? "Twilight" is US$390 million (costing US$37 million), "New Moon" is US$700 million (costing US$51 million), "Lunar Eclipse" is US$698 million (costing US$65 million), and "Breaking Dawn (Part 1)" is US$700 million (Cost 110 million).
Along with the box office miracle of "Twilight", the production cost of the chick film has also begun to rise. The high investment of 110 million yuan in "Breaking Dawn (Part 1)" is exactly the new expectations that Hollywood producers have on women's spending power. Hollywood has realized that women are occupying an increasing share of the film market.
"The Hunger Games" is a film created by Lionsgate for $78 million. This number is of course insignificant compared to Hollywood’s super large-scale productions, but compared with the production costs of previous chick movies, it is already a large-scale production with an ultra-high budget. Moreover, this is just a test of water after all. It is entirely predictable that Lionsgate will invest more drastically in the sequel of "The Hunger Games" after having tasted the sweetness of the first film. The production budget of hundreds of millions is not impossible.
More importantly, "The Hunger Games" no longer limits the story to little girls talking about love, but begins the theme of female growth and adventure. This world originally belonged to men, and women should be just a foil to this world.
Who can imagine that a film dominated by women's viewpoints and women as the main body can also tell a grand and epic story? Will anyone go to see such a movie? Would anyone like such a movie? At least boys don't like to watch it. This story is too fake, and the action scenes can't be intense. With a wobbly close-up lens, watching the heroine pose and shoot an arrow is great. Do you really expect a girl to show off there? Would girls like to watch it? Shouldn't girls love to watch romantic comedies that talk about love, and are not interested in such stories of fighting and killing?
Facts have proved that Lionsgate’s attempt was a complete success. Although the total global box office has not yet been counted, it shouldn't be a problem at around 700 million. It is estimated that "The Hunger Games" will soon replace "Twilight" as the most successful novel adaptation film.
Many domestic fans compare "The Hunger Games" with "Battle Royale", which in my opinion is really useless. The audience of "Battle Royale" is male, and its display of blood, violence and hunting caters to the taste of male audiences. And "The Hunger Games", from the beginning of the novel, is aimed at female consumers.
Perhaps we should compare the fairy tales of "The Hunger Games" and "Cinderella" so that we can better see the characteristics of the film. This is a story of women's growth and awakening. When this dirty girl from the coal zone suddenly put on a gorgeous fire suit during the grand entrance ceremony, and greeted the cheers and love of the audience, she and Cinderella wore What's the difference in crystal shoes?
Many people questioned why this two-hour movie made the scene before going to the island account for more than an hour? And the climax scenes that are really fighting each other on the island are made perfunctory? Because the film itself was not made for boys.
What attracted female audiences in this movie was precisely how the heroine, the ugly duckling, became stronger step by step in various trials and won everyone's love. Instead of looking at how the heroine kills others one by one. The admission ceremony, judges score, accept interviews, and see how the protagonist dances with long sleeves, to impress all the proud men. This is the point of this film. But the fight on the island is nothing more than the aftermath of the climax.
In such a movie, how the heroine fights against the world is not the point. The heroine may not even need a clear villain to be her destined opponent (and in a male-dominated movie, such an opposite, no matter how true it is. The villain in existence is still a certain destiny, all must exist, conflicts and plots can be structured from this).
What's the point? The point is that the heroine wants to get the love of everyone. Everyone must love her, and everyone must help her. Of course, these people definitely didn't like her at first, and they didn't like her. But she must rely on her own charm, her own kindness, her own bravery to influence all these people, so that they all surround her in the end.
Look at the mentor of the heroine. He was so decadent at first, he was not interested in anyone or anything. The female protagonist's stunned male teammate obviously can't impress such a person, he can only enjoy the big feet of the mentor. But the heroine can. In the end, the instructor changed his own frustration for the heroine, and ran to the patron to save the heroine's life.
And the makeup artist. He said from the beginning that he was in love with the heroine. Before the heroine went to the island, he said affectionately that if he could place a bet, he would bet on the heroine to win.
That stunned male teammate, needless to say, he has fallen in love with the heroine since he was a child. This time, she is always ready to sacrifice herself for the heroine.
Even enemies in other districts, a black girl and a strong black man appeared to help the heroine. The producer with a very handsome beard also favors the heroine and even is willing to change the rules for her. It seems that no one does not love the heroine except for the final boss, Mr. President.
I think this is the reason why I don't like to watch this movie as a boy. This world is too fake, too harmonious and loving. The heroine's protagonist's aura is too strong, it is simply the female version of the king.
But just as men have the right to watch pornographic novels, girls also have the right to like movies like this: a fat female cock, like two men with different styles vying for her ("BJ Singles Diary"); an ordinary one Little girl, want two mysterious races to fight for her jealousy ("Twilight"); a village girl in a coal mine, won the love of the world, and she will eventually change the rules of the game and change the world.
As the female consumer group grows stronger, Hollywood will invest more and more money to shoot such movies. The narrative style and image style of the film will change accordingly, and this is something that feminist filmmakers have not done in their entire lives. They may curse such movies as deceiving and paralyzing women and eliminating women's sense of resistance. But they can't change the fact that women like to watch such movies, and women women have indeed changed the form of movies.
The strong antagonism and conflict in male films cannot be seen in chick films. The story that follows is how women discover their own charms to gain everyone's love. I really don’t like to watch such movies, but since I never ask my girlfriend to watch "The Avengers", why should I ask myself to watch "The Hunger Games" or "Twilight"?
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