Justice For Smart Women

When I was in my teens I went through a very pretentious phase. That’s probably true of most people.

But for a good couple of years I derided films that had “happy endings”, I watched several indie films a week where the dialogue didn’t kick in until a good ten minutes in. At least.

It’s comical now that I think about how I would watch these films. I’d make sure my laptop was on full volume in case the lack of dialogue was simply a technical fault not an artistic choice. In my head I would say to myself “will the whole film be silent? What a brilliant idea. Great call back to the early stages of cinema” until the protagonist eventually said, “Hey, waitress, can I get some sugar?”.

I would immediately switch gears and think “well, the dialogue is still minimal. Makes you really concentrate on the symmetry in the cinematography and everything it represents”. I was desperate to make myself like these cool art house pieces and would twist myself into knots justifying my abject boredom with “but the cinematography is gorgeous. And linear storytelling is so typical.”

I was in denial and very annoying.

I wanted to set myself apart. From the stereotype of what a girl liked but also what I genuinely used to enjoy.

I don’t know if anyone comes out of the womb liking French New Wave films. I certainly didn’t. My parents often watched comedies with me growing up. Slapstick movies starring Steve Martin most of the time. My mum loved rom-coms so we watched a lot of them. In my house, everyone got together in the end and the music swelled as they kissed.

But as I became a moody teen I decided these movies I rewatched constantly were just not that cool. They were terrible movies. I hated them, now that I thought about it.

I had started to think this way because I wanted to impress guys. Sorry to every woman who does hate romantic comedies, worships at the altar of Tarantino and the Coen Brothers, and resents the insinuation that a guy got them into these movies. But, I was that girl.

I eventually decided to drop the act and realised that liking small indie films and romantic comedies could exist in the same realm. After all, I had kept watching episodes of Gilmore Girls daily during this phase. Some things you just can’t deny.

But when I look back at myself in that time I am amazed by the lengths I went to to make sure guys thought I was smart. I abandoned the act before I left my all-girls school where my “not like the other girls” bravado would have been most useful.

But the whole experience made me question what I considered to be “good”. Why did I feel such pressure to like certain films and not others? Why did disagreeing feel like an affront to the very history of cinema?

It’s still something I think about. The confidence I had proclaiming my opinions on films has mostly disappeared. Partly due to not being in such a female-dominated environment anymore. While my friends didn’t consider my word gospel back then, they considered it and would a lot of the time take my recommendations seriously. Not something that happens that often anymore. And I think who I’m talking to and what I am talking about has a lot to do with it.

I’m not trying to start a gender war. I think it’d all be a bit too much faff in all honesty.

But just as code-switching is a thing, I think there’s a certain way you have to talk about things you like around men.

The rules are very simple. Films like Superbad and Step Brothers are the height of comedy but films like 27 Dresses and Bridget Jones are chick flicks. The West Wing is one of the best shows ever made where everyone talks fast in grandiose monologues but Gilmore Girls is unrealistic and all they do is talk too fast. The Office UK may as well be evidence of the second coming and The Mindy Project has that woman from The Office US with the high voice.

When you talk about these things around men without the “guilty pleasure” defence and admit you like it and think it’s good, you have to resign yourself to the likelihood the man you are speaking to is highly suspicious of your taste now. You become boring and typical instead of the mythical “cool girl” who only drinks beer and watches Scarface on repeat.

This all didn’t come about by accident. Nothing is created in a vacuum. If all the jokes on TV use the thing women enjoy as the punchline, it’s no wonder that men (and a lot of women to be fair), through cultural osmosis, come to the conclusion that what women en masse like is deeply uncool.

I want to dismantle the patriarchy for a lot of reasons but not having to defend my love of Gilmore Girls is definitely up there with equitable pay in the workplace.

What kills me the most is that the women behind these shows and films people love to mock are so painfully smart and just as deserving of the label of “auteur” as their male counterparts.

Everyone can smirk and make their tired jokes about all the pop culture references in Gilmore Girls and they will continue to. However, if you have watched Gilmore Girls you’ll know how many of these references pass you by unless you have an encyclopedic knowledge of literature, 20th century Hollywood, music, classic and obscure cinema, history, politics, musical theatre, and the list truly goes on.

As a teen watching it I couldn’t comprehend how much insane intelligence it took to not only retain all this knowledge but make quippy jokes in perfect context about these facts. Amy Sherman-Palladino is a lot of things but unintelligent isn’t one of them.

And if male critics could apply the same unwavering loyalty to her well-crafted fast-paced dialogue as they apply to Sorkin’s they may find themselves put onto other works by women they hadn’t fully considered like Dawn Powell.

In the case of Nora Ephron, not only was she a great screenwriter and director able to expertly and seemingly effortlessly craft chemistry and emotional tension. Ephron also imbued all her work with this distinct warmth which makes it all feel instantly nostalgic. I read her essays this past summer and reading them on my commute every day I was bowled over by how comforting, resonating, and simultaneously sharp it was. I think about the quote “But it’s not love. It’s just where I live,” several times a week. A big impact for an essay about her leaving her old apartment.

Mindy Kaling, creator, and star of The Mindy Project went to Harvard, wrote on the critically acclaimed TV show The Office US, and not only wrote and executive produced The Mindy Project but starred in it. A show I consider to be the pinnacle of romantic comedy on television. Her treatment of her central couple made for one of the most compelling romantic arcs I’ve seen in a long time. The big blockbuster romantic comedy may not be thriving but the art of making a love story believable in all the dizzying, messy ways audience’s love is always alive in Kaling’s writing.

Kaling’s writing is even more relevant because her work tackles this very topic. Mindy on the show depicts a character who loves romantic comedies, celebrity gossip, reality TV, and pop music. She’s a shameless girly girl much to the chagrin of her male co-workers.

In one of my favourite episodes, Mindy dates Ben Feldman of Superstore fame, who in this universe is a pretentious Arts and Culture Writer for the New York Independent named Jason. Jason makes Mindy feel so insecure about her interests she lies about being interested in art to prove she’s good enough to date him. She eventually gives up and proclaims that she yes, isn’t as well read as she’d like but was very well-read when she was “literally studying to become a doctor.” Being a sitcom, Jason absorbs this and apologises by serenading her with Teenage Dream in front of her house. Obviously in reality his character would have been less than cordial about it all but that’s not the point.

The episode is a great example of women feeling pressure to uphold this facade and tailoring their interests to what men find desirable and intellectual despite knowing their smart. I mean not to put too fine a point on it but her character is a doctor, does she need to have a deep interest in obscure art too? Let a girl live!

I think it’s worth reconsidering why we hold the opinions we hold.

Who gets to decide what makes you intelligent? What makes your opinions valuable? Is the superiority you may feel about what you like versus what another person does, justified or just a personality defect you need to work on with some lengthy introspection?

I am not saying The Godfather isn’t a good movie. Or that Legally Blonde should get a retroactive Oscar, though now that you mention it . . . I just think it’s worth assessing what we consider to be “good” and what we are too eager to bin in the category of “guilty pleasure”. There’s no shame in re-assessing how we come to these conclusions and wondering if there isn’t some internalised misogyny afoot. Because there is a lot of time. It happens to the best of us. Maybe while you’re considering these questions you can try and keep your eye rolls and scoffs at bay.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to draft a letter to The Academy while listening to Katy Perry.