Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Away We Go

Ahhhhhhhhhh. Usually, when I go to the theater, I want to love a film. I really like going to the movies, and I can be entertained by almost anything you put in front of me. However, as much as I may have enjoyed what I just watched, I almost always leave at least a little frustrated about the portrayal of gender. I think, "If they had only NOT done this," or "If they had only been less stereotypical about THAT." After Away We Go, I got to walk out totally happy.

Women are just people in this film, not foils for mens' hijinks or mannequins for clothes or wives, girlfriends, or mothers to more dominant male characters. They actually play roles equal in screen time and complexity to males' parts. Sure, there are flawed female characters. Allison Janney's ridiculous, offensive "Lily" and Maggie Gyllenhaal's judgmental "LN" provide models of the kinds of mother Verona decidedly does NOT want to be. However, in a wonderfully equal way these women are paired with flawed male characters who represent the kinds of fathers Bert also wants to avoid becoming. AND the movie pays as much attention to his conflict as it does hers!

A more interesting, less stereotypical take on gender permeates the film. For example, Verona drives most of the time (and the characters spend a lot of time in the car, so that's not insignificant). In other movies, it's almost always the guy who takes wheel. Also, in a lot of other films (such as Up, the last one I reviewed), the woman is the one who gets upset over fertility troubles and excited about parenting. In Away We Go, the filmmakers undermine that idea again and again. A couple Bert and Verona are friends with seem equally sad about a series of miscarriages and equally committed to raising the children they've adopted. Verona is the one who's hesitant to get married. Bert does most of the preparing for the baby (most adorably, he takes a "family defense class") while Verona just kind of rolls with it. She even says at one point that she doesn't really feel different now that she's pregnant. I could go on and on.

The only conversation I kind of cringed at was the one between Bert and his brother right after the brother had been left by his wife. The brother went on about the kinds of things mothers notice and how his daughter had no chance of being popular because she didn't have her mother to teach her how to dress and to wipe carrot juice off her face before school pictures. It was definitely a little stereotypical, but I realize that he is only one character in a tough moment who expresses one slightly objectionable view of women. Since so many interesting and diverse views of parenting are already represented in the film, I feel okay about his being included as well.

This is a great film for a lot of reasons: great acting, great music, great cinematography, and, most important to this blog, great fairness in its portrayal of females. It's a movie that makes me, a viewer who's very difficult to please when it comes to women in film, feel good on a lot of levels.



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