Cliff.Booth said:
The racial identity or gender of the main characters(s) should be like 10th on the list of what matters about them. But studios keep churning out these projects which obviously started with "we need a Marvel movie starring a ____" and they build a weakass generic movie hoping that ______ will care that there's representation of ______. Just write a badass movie that *anyone* would want to get out and see. If it doesn't seem to have a compelling plot, great visuals (not a freaking greenscreen fest, and something original to set it apart, who gives a damn who is being represented. It's crazy that studios can't seem to understand what America's moviegoers have had enough of.
I don't disagree with this general sentiment. IMO, American culture/the left/younger generations place far too much importance on race, gender, and sexual orientation. Or, rather, they let it all define themselves to such a degree that it can often ironically end up limiting their potential, while further boxing us off into even more siloed groups.
But the simple fact remains that, by and large, women want to watch women in prominent roles on screen, black people want to watch black people in prominent roles on screen, Indian people want to watch Indian people in prominent roles on screen, Jewish people want to watch Jewish people in prominent roles on screen, gay people want to watch gay people in prominent roles on screen, etc, etc, etc.
This is an inarguable fact of human nature.
That doesn't mean these groups want see ONLY their experiences and their experiences alone reflected back to them. But in a medium where storytelling has been dominated by depictions of white men for the better part of a century, I completely understand and empathize with other demographics wanting the same experience I've had as a white male born in the 1980s, where nearly every major blockbuster I watched growing up starred another white male, many of whom were roughly my same age, many of them sharing some of exact same experiences I've had.
Yes, the entire point of the cinematic experience is to experience what it would be like to walk in
someone else's shoes. But after nearly a century of walking in the shoes of mostly white males on screen, I totally get minorities wanting just a few more experiences of their own depicted on screen. No one is asking for the world here. They're simply testing the waters as to would be like to go from a blockbuster landscape where white males have dominated, say, 85% of the content to, say, only 70% of the content.
And from a financial standpoint, I get why studios have been willing to experiment more and more in that regard, seeing if any of these previously underserved audiences can bring in more $$$. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't
What I don't understand is why a number of people here and on the internet at large absolutely lose their minds at having to give up only a 15% share (give or take) of their storytelling dominance, when it's beyond clear that A) the vast majority of blockbusters still feature white male leads, and B) this is clearly a period of experimentation/growing pains, as the studios - and society - figure out how to better-accommodate undeserved demographics. Yes, these experiments have clearly resulted in subpar storytelling. Yes, these experiments can dive too deep into identity politics. But in the end, $$$ is still king, and you can at least bet that after the financial disasters of
The Marvels and
Birds of Prey, they won't try this particular experiment again. So just let them continue to learn their lessons. In the meantime we can go back watching basically every other movie, the vast majority of which are still geared towards the people they've always been geared towards.
