Gendered Limits on Our Collective Imaginary

"And I say...how do I bring you into being?

Then I hear only silence.

But even in the silence I dream of answers. I imagine new structures and mythologies born from the choreography of female bodies, non-gendered bodies, bodies of color, disabled bodies.

...The moment we start imagining a new world and sharing it with one another through story is the moment that new world may actually come."

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These words from Brit Marling evoke a longing often attached to cinematic worlds that flicker across theater and TV screens alike: we long for these on-screen worlds to both reflect the darkness of our current realities as well as provide imaginative hope for new worlds.

Filmmaker and actress Brit Marling released a The New York Times op-ed at an especially opportune time, mere days before the 92nd Academy Awards Ceremony on February 9, 2020. Her article, "I Don't Want to Be the Strong Female Lead," cuts to the heart of an institutional problem through her very personal lens. Frustrated by the lack of available roles for female actresses (roles she found herself auditioning for included “Dave’s wife” and “robot girl"), Marling decided to hit the keys herself, penning scripts that have circulated through independent festivals, major theaters, and, most recently, the king of all streaming services, Netflix.

"Our narratives tell us that women are objects and objects are disposable, so we are always objectified and often disposed of" (NYT). Marling's characters (usually played by the writer/directer herself) did not reflect to the typical tropes left for women to mold to (sexy model, frustrated housewife, sexy secret agent, slashed teenager, sexy boss, shrill girlfriend, etc.), but they also veered away from the overly-masculinized "strong female leads" that have found their way into recent on-screen stories. Rather than forcing her female experience into a male mold (and restricting the potential of the female imaginary), Marling "turned toward science fiction, speculative fiction and lo-fi fantasy," gaining inspiration from prolific writers like Octavia Butler, Ursula Le Guin, Toni Morrison and Margaret Atwood (NYT).

Suddenly, a new creation emerges. Not the patriarchal view of women-as-objects (sexy/dead/old), nor the pseudo-feminist attempts toward the hero's journey (masculine strong female lead), but a wholly different approach that "excavat[es], teach[es] and celebrat[es] the feminine...new structures and mythologies born from the choreography of female bodies, non-gendered bodies, bodies of color, disabled bodies" (NYT).

Another creative powerhouse who has leaned into this approach is Greta Gerwig, lauded for her recent directorial works Ladybird (2017) and Little Women (2019). In a podcast interview with The Economist, Gerwig discusses how on Laurie, the central male character in Little Women, is particularly special not for his masculinity, but for his curiosity toward the feminine: "That projection into a female space and a female consciousness is what I think makes him such a beautiful character...he loves them in a way that is not possessive or looking to change them or bring them into his world. He wants to be part of theirs.”

Laurie (played by Timothée Chalamet) provides not only a refreshing way for women to be seen, but also a vital example for how men can see women.

“That projection into a female space and a female consciousness is what I think makes him such a beautiful character...he loves them in a way that is not possessive or looking to change them or bring them into his world. He wants to be part of theirs.”

Not only are films from Gerwig and Marling providing nuanced characters, they are also speaking in nuanced ways to the current contexts they find themselves in. In response to the the all-male directorial nominees for the 2019 Oscars (therefore excluding Gerwig, among other deserving directors), Little Women actress Florence Pugh told Entertainment Weekly that Gerwig "literally made a film about...women working and their relationship with money and their relationship with working in a man's world." In her frustration, Pugh "reinforces the urgency" of the film, both content and context.

Films that create their own kind of virtual and imaginary space are an opportunity for "imagining new worlds" (as Marling puts it). Or, in the words of Donna Haraway, “it matters what stories we tell to tell other stories with” (Staying with the Trouble).

In consideration of alternative imaginaries, I am reminded of Marilynne Robinson’s essay on Humanism, which addresses the “neo-Darwinist” tendencies of modern neuroscience; tendencies that (much like the hero's journey) are “affixed to a model of reality that has not gone through any meaningful change in a century” (The Givenness of Things). Robinson’s appeal to “pause and reflect” on “mystery” encourages deep introspection, one that questions assumptions regarding creativity, grace, and what it means to be human.

We should welcome imaginative storytelling from minds like Marling, Gerwig, Butler, Le Guin, Morrison, Atwood, Haraway, and Robinson. In fact, we should crave it, rather than swallow the mediocre morsels of a single patriarchal flavor served to us over and over again.

These minds awaken the human stories we repeatedly overlook, abandon, and suppress, inviting us to a much richer feast.