{"id":45950,"date":"2012-04-09T11:30:22","date_gmt":"2012-04-09T16:30:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=45950"},"modified":"2012-04-07T20:32:56","modified_gmt":"2012-04-08T01:32:56","slug":"the-hunger-games-hollywood-and-fighting-fuck-toys","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2012\/04\/09\/the-hunger-games-hollywood-and-fighting-fuck-toys\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hunger Games, Hollywood, & Fighting Fuck Toys"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at Ms.<\/a> and Caroline Heldman’s Blog<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The Hunger Games<\/em>\u00a0should serve as a wake-up call to Hollywood that women action-hero movies can be successful if\u00a0the protagonist\u00a0is portrayed as a complex subject — instead of a hyper-sexualized\u00a0fighting fuck toy<\/a>\u00a0(FFT).<\/p>\n

In its first weekend,\u00a0The Hunger Games<\/em>\u00a0grossed\u00a0$155 million<\/a>, making it the\u00a0third highest\u00a0opener of all time (behind the last Harry Potter film and\u00a0The Dark Knight<\/em>), despite a marketing budget\u00a0half the size<\/a>\u00a0of a typical big-studio, big-budget film. It seized the records for top opener released outside of July, top non-sequel opener and top opener with a woman protagonist. By the second weekend,\u00a0The\u00a0Hunger\u00a0Games<\/em>\u00a0had made\u00a0$251 million<\/a>\u00a0in the U.S. — the fastest non-sequel to break the quarter-billion-dollar mark.<\/p>\n

While the movie arguably plays up the\u00a0romance<\/a>\u00a0angle more than the books,\u00a0The\u00a0Hunger Games<\/em>\u00a0is still squarely an\u00a0action thriller, set in a dystopic future world where teens fight to the death in a reality show.<\/p>\n

Its\u00a0success is largely based on the wide appeal of its teenage hero, Katniss\u00a0Everdeen, who makes it through the movie without being sexually objectified once — a rarity in action films. Katniss\u00a0is a believable, reluctant hero.<\/p>\n

Katniss succeeds with audiences where other women heroes\u00a0have failed because she isn\u2019t an FFT. Fighting fuck toys\u00a0are hyper-sexualized women protagonists\u00a0who\u00a0are able to \u201ckick ass\u201d (and kill) with the best of them — and look good doing it. The FFT\u00a0appears empowered, but her very existence serves the pleasure of the heterosexual male\u00a0viewer. In short, the FFT takes female agency and appropriates it for the\u00a0male gaze<\/a>.<\/p>\n

From an ethical standpoint, Hollywood executives should be concerned\u00a0about the\u00a0damage<\/a>\u00a0girls and women sustain\u00a0growing up in a society with ubiquitous images of sex objects. But it appears they are not. From a business standpoint, then, they should be concerned about the money they could be making with\u00a0better women action heroes. But so far,\u00a0they seem pretty clueless.<\/p>\n

Hollywood\u00a0rolls out FFTs\u00a0every few years that\u00a0generally\u00a0don\u2019t perform well at the\u00a0box office (think\u00a0Elektra<\/em>,\u00a0Catwoman<\/em>,\u00a0Sucker Punch<\/em>),\u00a0leading executives to wrongly conclude that women action leads\u00a0aren\u2019t bankable. In fact, the problem isn\u2019t\u00a0their\u00a0sex; the problem is their portrayal as sex objects. Objects\u00a0aren\u2019t convincing protagonists. Subjects act while objects are acted upon, so reducing a woman action hero to an object, even sporadically, diminishes her ability to believably\u00a0carry a storyline. The FFT\u00a0might have an enviable swagger and\u00a0do cool stunts, but\u00a0she\u2019s ultimately\u00a0a bit of a joke.<\/p>\n

For a breakdown of why FFTS lack believability\u00a0and<\/em>\u00a0appeal, check out the\u00a0Escher Girls tumbler<\/a>, a site that\u00a0critiques the ridiculous physical contortions of FFTs that allow them to be both sex objects and action heroines. \u00a0Contortions like this:<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As Mark Hughes from\u00a0Forbes.com<\/a>\u00a0points out, movie studios artificially limit their profits when they target only male audiences (by, for instance, by portraying women only as FFTs). With\u00a0the phenomenal success of\u00a0The Hunger Games<\/em>, Hollywood\u00a0can no\u00a0longer\u00a0deny the bankability of believable women action leads.\u00a0Forty percent of the audience for\u00a0The Hunger Games<\/em>\u00a0is\u00a0male<\/a>, proving that a kick-ass woman lead who isn\u2019t reduced to a sex object\u00a0can appeal to all genders. That should put dollar signs in executives\u2019 eyes.<\/p>\n

Hollywood is now on a\u00a0quest<\/a>\u00a0to find the next Katniss\u00a0Everdeen. Whoever she is, the question will be: Do executives\u00a0know better than to turn her into a\u00a0fighting fuck toy?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at Ms. and Caroline Heldman’s Blog. The Hunger Games\u00a0should serve as a wake-up call to Hollywood that women action-hero movies can be successful if\u00a0the protagonist\u00a0is portrayed as a complex subject — instead of a hyper-sexualized\u00a0fighting fuck toy\u00a0(FFT). In its first weekend,\u00a0The Hunger Games\u00a0grossed\u00a0$155 million, making it the\u00a0third highest\u00a0opener of all time (behind the last […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1848,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[279,55,2093,343],"class_list":["post-45950","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-objectification","tag-gender","tag-gender-objectification","tag-tvmovies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45950","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1848"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45950"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45950\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45955,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45950\/revisions\/45955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45950"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45950"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45950"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}