I am tired of movies telling me ‘women can’t have it all’
I recently finished watching the Netflix series GirlBoss, which is loosely based on the life of founder of Nasty Gal, Sophia Amoruso. When I finished watching the show I realized something… a pattern in all the shows and movies which portray the ‘strong independent woman’ character. And I appreciate the fact that there’s a lot of progress in the so called romcom genre. It has evolved from the cliched stories of a man saving a woman from her troubles to creating strong female leads who chase their dreams. But even so why are these movies always the same? Let me explain.
Now, what I don’t like about these movies is that they always end up portraying one way or another that, if you are a workaholic woman, you will end up having failed relationships and no social life at all. Every story has an almost similar plot, where we see our lead struggling with her life, followed by her realizing her dreams, then her struggling hard to achieve those dreams, with a side plot of her falling in love.. and then the transition of her turning into a self-centered narcissist when her dreams start turning into a reality, and that’s when you see her personal life going down the drain which mostly involves her boyfriend/husband cheating on her or leaving her saying ‘she’s too busy’, and finally her realizing her so-called ‘self worth’, moving on and working hard anyways. And that’s how Hollywood tells you there’s no such thing as a ‘work-life’ balance and a woman will never have it all.
Let’s consider some workaholic characters, you have Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada, Andrea Sachs from Revenge Wears Prada (it’s still a book), Sophia Marlowe from Girlboss, Jules from The Intern. All these movies have the same element I am talking about, their lovers leaving them because their career gets in the way.
All these movies give out strong inspiration to young girls out there to work hard, yes! But why do these movies also tell young girls that if you’re gonna be independent then you won’t have the time to be anything else? Now I am not the person who is trying to criticize someone’s writing but all I am trying to say is that maybe they need to evolve their ‘modern woman’ character a bit more? Because I believe a modern woman is someone who doesn’t need but wants a man.. who can love and as well as work, one who takes care of her friends and her work. She’s not the person who doesn’t care about anything.. She’s the person who cares about everything. For her, working isn’t a ‘defense mechanism’ to cover up her loneliness. She loves to work. A modern woman can have it all so stop telling them otherwise.
