By Claire



It’s time to talk about one of the biggest trailblazing female directors of today: Ava DuVernay. 

In 2012, DuVernay was the first African-American woman to win Best Director at Sundance Film Festival for her film Middle of Nowhere. In 2015, she was one of the only female directors nominated for an Academy Award, for the civil rights film Selma, which was nominated for Best Picture.

In addition to her directing, DuVernay uses her prominence, and filmmaking, as a way to promote stories and people of colour.  

Earlier this year, DuVernay announced ARRAY, an organisation dedicated to the distribution and aid of independent films by people of colour, and women. Born out of the African-American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM), which released two films a year, ARRAY now expands to an added focus to women, and distributing more films on the art house festival circuits and streaming platforms.  

Along with ARRAY, DuVernay continues to spearhead inclusive stories with Queen Sugar, an upcoming television series produced by DuVernay and the one and only Oprah Winfrey for Oprah’s OWN Network. The series is an adaption for the book of the same name by Natalie Baszile, and tells the story of two sisters who have moved back to Louisiana to claim their inheritance of their recently deceased father, a large sugarcane farm. She is the writer, producer and director of the series, and she vows every epsiode will be directed by a woman. You can view the trailer for Queen Sugar below.

Another trailblazing project is the recent announcement that Ava DuVernay will be directing Disney’s upcoming film A Wrinkle in Time, making her the first woman of colour to be directing a $100 million film.

Here at Cause a Cine, we like to promote intersectionality, which is why I love Ava DuVernay so much. What she is doing for people of colour, women of colour, and women in general, is beyond compare. Her vision and drive bring to the forefront talented women and people of colour into the industry and every project she works on. What we must never lose sight of is, as hard as it is for women in the film/entertainment industry, it is even harder for women of colour. 

Ava DuVernay continues to close this gap and focus on inclusion, and I am so excited to follow her journey.

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Cause a Cine do not own any pictures or videos used in this post.

By Claire

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I want to share some things with you:

Number 1. I love this movie with my entire life, and nothing I could write would ever be what this movie deserves. 

Number 2. I have not see the original 1984 Ghostbusters.

And while you gasp in shock, let me tell you that I probably will watch it one day. It has always been on my radar, but I just never got around to it. However, I can't help but also think that I no longer need to watch the original, because now I have this fantastic all-female version.

The most prominent reactions, when I share this point of view, are scepticism, confusion and judgement. I realise the first film is probably great, but you need to let me have this moment.

Directed by Paul Feig (Bridesmaids, The Heat, Spy) and starring some of America’s funniest women, Ghostbusters (2016) is one of my favourite films of the year. 

From left: Leslie Jones as Patty, Melissa McCarthy as Abby, Kristen Wiig as Erin and Kate McKinnon as Holtzmann

First, there is the amazing cast: Melissa McCarthy (who is no stranger to being directed by Feig, with Bridesmaids, The Heat and Spy) as paranormal researcher Dr Abby Yates; Kristen Wiig as particle physicist Dr Erin Gilberts; SNL’s Kate McKinnon as nuclear engineer Dr Jillian Holtzmann and Leslie Jones as New York historian and MTA worker Patty Tolan.

These women are hilarious together. Their ability to play off each other and their chemistry is perfect. In press junkets, Kate McKinnon describes the set as summer camp, because of how much fun they had on set. For a comedy film, it is important the cast have fun with each other, because it shows so well on screen.

The new Ghostbusters are extremely smart and kick ass without their gender explicitly being mentioned, or called out in a negative or blatant way – except for the villain, who is never shown to have any redeeming qualities, and in a call out to internet misogynists in a YouTube comment gag.

This film means a lot to young girls, and women, who love STEM. According to director Paul Feig, the film inspires women and children to pursue STEM, which is an issue discussed previously in [THIS] blog post.

It was so refreshing for me to be able to sit back and not feel uncomfortable about the way the women were being represented. I didn't have to fill the role of voyeur and constantly worry the heroine was going to break an ankle wearing heels in action scenes. Their “uniforms” were sturdy and practical: safety over style. Abby and Erin are allowed to have their hair in ponytails, rather than allowing it to whip around their heads in action sequences. How often do you see women allowed to have their hair out of their face in battle?

Busting some ghosts

Favourite moments include Abby’s love of wanton soup, Holtzmann explaining her gadgets to the group, her slow-motion take-down sequence in the battle of Times Square (Holtzmann’s general everything, actually. McKinnon’s deadpan delivery of lines and reaction comedy is bar to none), and Patty versus the possessed mannequins.

Finally, as much as I loved Chris Hemsworth’s character Kevin, as hilarious as he is (my sides were hurting during the scene we first meet him, in his job interview as a receptionist for the Ghostbusters), I do agree, to some extent, how regressive the dumb blonde trope is. It is overworked and was used to an epic scale in the film. To my understanding, the receptionist in the original films was not a dumb blonde, so why make Kevin one in this film?

HOWEVER, I think the use of Kevin as a dumb piece of eye candy is a good device for highlighting the sexist trope and forcing viewers to reflect on the absurdity of it.

Chris Hemsworth as Kevin 

Ghostbusters is not perfect. We need more women of colour in lead roles, playing a variety of characters. This film, though, is an excellent start, and paves the way for more female-led, non-sexualised action and science franchises in the future.

Compare it to the original films all you want, but we must not forget this film’s cultural significance, and how much this film means to women and children everywhere. 

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Cause a Cine do not own any of the images in this post.

By Claire

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Women--and humans--are complex by nature. We run with our emotions, seek adventure, love and grieve, and have a tendency to lose ourselves. When life gets us down, it's not uncommon to seek isolation, and nature, to figure ourselves out and reset.

You know what I'm talking about. In every movie or tv show, there's that scene when life gets to be too much, the sad or wronged protagonist gets up and drives or runs away, and sit's on the hood of their car or on a hill, looking out into the ocean pensively as the sun sets around them and a familiar song plays in the soundtrack. I often like to recreate these scenes on the train back to my hometown, ipod playing the perfect song to set the mood as I stare out the window.

Wild (2014) is all of this, and yet so much more.

Reese Witherspoon as Cheryl Strayed in Wild (2014)

Directed by Jean-Marc Vallee (who is a male, but bear with me, this is relevant), 'Wild' is the second film produced by all-female production company Pacific Standard (Reese Witherspoon and Australian Bruna Papendrea).

When Pacific Standard was announced, I flipped. Reese Witherspoon and Bruna Papendrea saw the lack of strong female characters in films, and decided to center their production company exactly around that, by optioning for books with strong and interesting female leads, starting with 'Gone Girl' and 'Wild' in 2014.

Originally a book, 'Wild' is like the female counterpart to solo-adventure book, 'Into the Wild'. 

Into the Wild is a book predominantly read by young men, and is herald as a must-read book for all men in their 20s. First published in 1996 by Jon Krakaeur, 'Into the Wild' is a non-fiction novel, telling the story of Christopher McCandless, who in 1992, not long after graduating, he gave away all his money and possessions and started to hitch-hike across America to Alaska. He was then found dead after 100 days. Now, this book has received much critical acclaim, and is used as a high school text.

In 2007 Sean Penn (ew) directed the film adaption starring Emile Hirsch as McCandless. The score was written by Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam and the film won awards across the national and international film festival circuit, as well as two Golden Globe and two Oscar nominations. 

Theatrical poster for Sean Penn's adaption of Into the Wild (2007)

The whole thing, as a girl, seems a bit wanky to me. From what I've seen, Into the Wild is probably a beautiful movie, but I can't tell if the story is inspiring or a cautionary tale. Let's not forget, this kid was found dead in Alaska. He came from a "well-to-do family" (which is stressed in the first sentence of the blurb, and even on the front cover of the book because this is Very Important Information), and one day decided to give away all his possessions, donate his entire savings ($24, 000)  to charity (which was actually very nice of him), burn the rest, and just decide to go on his wilderness trek with 10-pounds of rice and a rifle. 

How is 'Into the Wild' a story to look to re: finding yourself and great solo adventures? This guy was unprepared and died. It feels like a very male indulgence, believing you can give up everything and just live in the wild with no preparation. 

As a woman, when I was feeling lost and felt the itch for adventure, 'Into the Wild' seemed less than ideal.

This is why I am so thankful for 'Wild'.

'Wild' is an adaption of Cheryl Strayed's memoir of the same name. Published in 2012, Strayed shares her story, motivations and experience of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, a hike spanning form the Mexican-Californian border all the way up to Canada, solo. After the rapid loss of her mother to cancer when she was 22, Strayed distanced herself from her family and husband. Moving constantly around the country, Strayed started taking heroine and got a divorce form her husband. One day she comes across a book about the Pacific Crest Trail, and uses the journey as a way to "walk [herself] back to the woman [her] mother thought [she] was." 

Witherspoon in Wild

The PCT is a space away from conventional standards of beauty placed on women. The first time we meet Witherspoon as Strayed at the very beginning of the movie, Strayed is ripping dead toenails off of her battered feet. Here is a female character without makeup, without her hair glamourously done, covered in dirt and sweat and grime. Her body is not sexualised while she is hiking, her body is bruised, battered, grazed, tortured: her body is a warrior. 

'Wild' is a story of self-discovery, of a solitary woman hiking a trail predominantly walked by men. The scenery is beautiful, the sound-track nostalgic for a life lost, and exactly what I need as a woman in her 20's. 

When I was feeling lost, like I was floating and in need of an anchor, I had Cheryl Strayed, and 'Wild' and the PCT to look to. I need to go on my own journey. Admittedly, not to the extent that Cheryl did, but just a quick train ride through regional Victoria to my home town and watching 'Wild' a couple of times was more than enough to help me find that anchor, and satisfy this restless feeling, if only momentarily. Something that I do not believe 'Into the Wild' can provide. 

My favourite part?

Cheryl survives the journey. 


** Cause a Cine do not take any ownership of images used

By Zoë

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Carol was beautiful. While watching it in the cinema, I wanted to throw myself through the screen and into Carol and Therese’s world. Cate Blanchett as Carol was intoxicating, and it wasn’t hard to understand how Rooney Mara’s Therese could fall in love with her. It felt like a revelation to see a film about lesbians that was both exquisitely made and featured a happy ending.

On Monday, during the Oscars ceremony, Chris Rock referred to Carol as the “third best” “girl-on-girl movie” he’d seen this year.

When I heard that, I cringed. Because here was a movie I had loved not just as a cinemagoer, but as a bisexual woman. Carol, for me, captured the beauty and terror of being a woman attracted to a woman, something I’ve experienced. I saw myself reflected in Therese. So when Chris Rock referred to the film as “girl-on-girl”, linking it to lesbian pornography, I too felt denigrated.

It was shame that I felt, a feeling well known to same-sex attracted women. In fact, you can see this shame depicted in Carol. In the scene where Therese first meets Carol at the department store, her attraction to the older woman is instant. But immediately after her wide-eyed, starstruck attraction, Mara depicts Therese’s confusion, her anxiety over what she has just felt. Did I just feel that? Surely not. But she’s a woman. I can’t feel that way about a woman. In Therese’s flushed cheeks and nervous gestures is not just the delightful shock of being attracted to someone, but the panicked confusion of attraction that is taboo. How could I feel that? What’s wrong with me?

 Cate Blanchett (left) as Carol and Rooney Mara (right) as Therese in Carol

Both the film’s director, Todd Haynes, and writer, Phyllis Nagy, are openly gay. Together they capture same-sex attraction with all of its complicated emotions: wonder, joy, confusion, fear, shame. With Carol, I saw for a film that represented lesbian love as being as valid as any other romance, while also acknowledging its separate challenges. I saw represented on screen the feelings I too have known, the shame I too have felt.

Carol is of course set in a different world to our own. Lesbians and bi women obviously face significantly less oppression now than they did then. But the shame still persists because the prejudice against us does. Every time I mention being bisexual, no matter how liberal the company, it is prefaced by at least thirty seconds of anxiety. Because for every ten situations where it is accepted without question, there is one that goes badly: The date who immediately asked me if I’d ever had a threesome, the friend’s father who called me a “dyke”, the middle-aged man who propositioned 17-year-old me and asked if I could “turn straight” for him. These instances are rare, and without doubt, others have it much worse. I am lucky. But these rare instances are the ones that haunt me, that make the words catch in my throat the next time around.

Chris Rock’s remark is yet another comment that brings that shame to the fore. It’s a reminder that female same-sex attraction is mocked and fetishized, still, in 2016. Even when it occurs within an elegant, romantic, critically-acclaimed film, lesbian sexuality is discussed as something hyper-sexual, seedy, pornified. The description “girl-on-girl” suggests that our very identity is a porn category. Apparently, we still cannot find other women attractive without lecherous men assuming it is for their benefit.

Mara and Blanchett in Carol

When Therese reacted with shame over her attraction towards Carol, I first felt amazed: here was my experience reflected up on the big screen, in a mainstream movie, by an A-list actress. Here was the rapid heartbeat and sweating palms, the confusion, the incredulousness that you could be attracted to her. I am so thankful to Haynes and Nagy for representing this, for allowing all the lesbians and bi girls still wracked by insecurity to feel a little less alone. But at the same time, I’m immensely sad that we still feel this shame felt sixty years ago. We are still made to feel ashamed, and we should not.

Our sexuality still cannot exist on its own terms. It is bound on all sides: by politics, by societal prejudice, by the leers of men who think they’re far cleverer than they are. When Chris Rock called Carol “girl-on-girl”, I felt that shame, that feeling that there is something inherently weird and exotic about our sexuality. That it is something to be gawked at and sexualised by spectators. Society has evolved greatly since the time period of Carol. Things are definitely much better than they are. But while comments like Rock’s persist, shame, the legacy of our deviant existence, lives on. 

By Claire

Last night, I watched the Australian broadcast of FOX’s production of Grease Live, and boy oh boy did it resurface some emotions. 

Obviously, these emotions started with my love of live theatre and the bitter realisation that I’ll most likely never be in a production of Grease now that I’m 2 years out of high school. Then arose my new-found love for Jordan Fisher, the guy who played Doody (Hello babe, where have they been hiding you?). All of these emotions are evidently displayed in my live-tweets of the 3 hour broadcast, (including one that was broadcasted on the television—Mumma, I’m famous!) where the most potent and obvious emotion I was feeling was, OH MY GOD, I FREAKING LOVE GREASE.

This isn’t new, I have always loved Grease, and this love would come and go, resurfacing from time to time. In Year 11, studying for my Studio Art exam, in Year 12, backstage at West Side Story gossiping on the rumours of doing Grease the next year (note: I wouldn’t have been able to do it anyway, since I was heading to University, but the excitement was still there.  They actually ended up doing Legally Blonde instead. CAN I LIVE?!) And this glorious picture of the Pink Ladies, which represents most of my emotions, has been my cover photo on Facebook for about two years now.

 So obviously, my Grease-lover card is in check.

Grease, however, is a Feminist Nightmare. The backdrop of 1950s America is the hub of blatant sexism, particularly amongst the T-Birds. The T-Bird side of Those Summer Nights perpetuates rape culture and the sexist notion that girls are only good if they put out. The song is also riddled with the damsel in distress trope. Furthermore, the T-Birds pressure Danny into thinking he can’t show his true emotions for Sandy when they reunite, turning him into an outright dick. Let him love his girl, dammit.

The T-Birds during Those Summer Nights

There is also the constant reminder that you need to change in order for people to like you: Sandy at the carnival in the infamous black spandex number, Danny joining the track team; naming and shaming Frenchy for being a Beauty School Drop Out like Frenchie is a wounded animal and needs to scurry along back to high school because Ya Blew It, Kid; slut-shaming Rizzo for being a promiscuous woman, and virgin-shaming Sandy for being a “good girl”…

Sandy's famous transformation is complete

And I could go on.

Grease has many faults, but despite acknowledging this, I can’t help but to love it. It seems hard to justify, but bear with me.

Is it the dreamy 1950s costuming and aesthetic that I have always loved (sexism aside)? The catchy songs that I seem to know all the words to and will always make me happy? It’s definitely both of these things, but most of all, I love the Pink Ladies.

Not only did I need a Pink Ladies jacket, like, yesterday, but no matter how flawed they are, they have redeeming qualities which I have always remembered and carried with me.

Frenchy, who is nice to the new girl without the bat of an eyelash, and continues to root for her despite Rizzo’s immediate distaste for her. And who can forget the legendary “Men are rats” wisdom I hold with me to this day?

Jan, who loves to eat and sing along to the toothpaste ad, and ends up going to the dance with a guy who likes her just as she is (“I think there’s more to you than fat” even though she is not fat at all, thank you very much Mr. Putzie).

Sandy, who sticks up for Rizzo when Patty Simcox slut-shames her, despite Rizzo being less than friendly previously. The girl who is teased for sticking to her “good girl” values, and feels like she has to change in order to be worthy of Danny, in a country that isn’t her own.

Rizzo, who is unfairly treated because she likes to have control over her body and take charge of her destiny. There Are Worse Things I Could Do, while perpetuating heteronormativity and the idea that men-and-women-need-to-be-together-and-that’s-the-end-of-that, is heartbreaking, demonstrating the pressures and stereotypes placed on Rizzo as a woman who enjoys fooling around, who, like Danny, feels like she can’t display her true emotions.

I love these women. And I will hold them dear to my heart, flaws and all. I will resume my search for a Pink Ladies jacket on Etsy or EBay, try to wear as much pink as I can and be singing the entirety of the Grease soundtrack for the rest of time, because Grease may be inherently flawed, and problematic, and made in the 70s, set in the 50s, perpetuating antiquated gender-roles but gosh darn it, I love it so.

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Cause a Cine do not own any pictures used in this post.

By Zoë

Mad Max: Fury Road and Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens. It’s hard to dispute that the two films were both critical and commercial successes. Furthermore, they both achieved this while featuring well-written, complex female leads.

Both films could be considered ‘feminist’ in that they starred female characters who were not sexual objects, were multi-dimensional, and whose narrative arcs didn’t revolve solely around men. However, Fury Road and The Force Awakens had completely different approaches to the representation of gender and sex, and I want to explore this further.

In The ForceAwakens, gender does not matter. By which I mean, you could swap any of the male characters to female, or vice versa, and they would remain largely the same. The plucky desert orphan with a knack for piloting could have been a man. The runaway Storm Trooper could have been a woman. The characters’ defining traits were their skills, their personalities and whether they were on the side of good or evil. This is excellent, in my opinion, because it sends the message that it’s not your gender that is important, but what you do. Considering the number of children who watched this film, it’s a wonderful message for them to absorb.

This ‘gender-blind’ approach is often utilised in science-fiction, a genre which, owing to its fantastical nature, can disregard the prejudices of our own society. Jane Espenson, a writer on shows including Firefly, summed it up thusly: “If we can’t write diversity into sci-fi, then what’s the point? You don’t create new worlds to give them all the same limits of the old ones.”

Fury Road, however, takes a completely different approach. In Fury Road, gender – or rather, sex – does matter. It matters entirely, because the oppressions faced by the women in Fury Road occur explicitly because they are women.

Sure, Furiosa is never treated differently because she’s a woman. There’s no holding back from Max when they fight each other, and Immortan Joe’s men respect her command until they realise she’s gone rogue. But let us be clear – Immortan Joe’s kingdom is a patriarchy. It is ruled by men, and women suffer from their abuse. The abuse of the women that Furiosa rescues cannot be separated from their status as women. They are raped and forced to bear children, kept in sexualised outfits and essentially treated as chattel. Their inferior status is inscribed upon their female bodies. You could not swap the characters from male to female and retain George Miller’s highly political message about the abuse of women.

While The Force Awakens eschews gender politics, Fury Road confronts them head-on. The heroes of The Force Awakens fight the Dark Side, the heroes of Fury Road fight the patriarchy. They escape male oppression and search for a female-only utopia. Furiosa is a member of the “Vulvalini”, honestly.

I enjoyed both films immensely, as a film-lover and as a feminist. The difference was, The Force Awakens made me forget about sexism for two hours. (What a glorious two hours that was.) Fury Road demanded that I think about it. When it comes to gender equality, The Force Awakens shows us a world we’d like to live in. Fury Road, by contrast, shows us a representation of the world we live in now and just how devastating it is.

The oppression of women is an issue that we all need to be paying attention to. So thank-you, Fury Road, for making it the focus of a big, popular film. But sometimes, thinking about it all is unbearable. So thank-you, too, The Force Awakens, for giving us a fantasy to escape into. When it comes to female-centric films, we need both kinds. 

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Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens is now showing in cinema.
Mad Max: Fury Road is nominated for Best Motion Picture at the 2016 Academy Awards. 

Cause a Cine do not take any credit for the images used in this post. 

By Claire

It's why were all here, really, but female directors are seldom talked about in mainstream media. In effect, the more casual viewer often say to me that they do not know of many women directors. Even in one of my cinema studies classes last year, students, too, had trouble making a list of female directors. 

I stumbled across this list of essential films by female filmmakers last year, and as a budding women in film activist, more titles surprised me than I would care to admit. 

When you really think about it, you may have seen more female-directed movies than you know:

Across the Universe (2007)

Directed by Julie Taymor

The Matrix (1999)
Directed by Lana and Lily Wachowski 

Whip It (2009)

Directed by Drew Barrymore

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Directed by Valerie Faris & Jonathan Dayton

Thirteen (2003)
Directed by Catherine Hardwicke

You've Got Mail/Sleepless in Seattle
Directed by Nora Ephron

Bend It Like Beckham (2002)
Directed by Gurinder Chada

Wayne's World (1992)
Directed by Penelope Spheeris

Clueless (1995)/
Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982)
Directed by Amy Heckerling

An Education (2009)
Directed by Lone Scherfig

We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011)
Directed by Lynne Ramsay

American Psycho (2000)
Directed by Mary Harron

Selma (2014)
Directed by Ava DuVernay

You can check out the rest of the list here

Or join the pledge to watch #52FilmsByWomen, along with more lists and resources

What's your favourite film by a female filmmaker?

By Claire

I almost didn't want to write this post, because I feel like I am just constantly repeating myself, but if we don't get angry, how will The Academy learn?

Last night the 2016 Oscar nominations came out, and people can say all they want about "awards don't matter" or "the Oscars aren't relevant anymore", they really, really do, because it highlights and showcases what the industry deems "worthy" and "important." 

Last year the Oscars received backlash for their blatant omission of people of colour and women in their nominations with the hashtag #OscarsSoWhite. You think they would have learned by now, but if you can believe it, this year is worse!

Every actor nominated in either a lead or supporting role is white.

No women were nominated for Achievement in Direction, and none of the 8 films nominated for Best Motion Picture were directed by a woman (a drop from last year's Selma, directed by Ava DuVernay, which even then, was only nominated for two awards).

It has been six years since a woman was nominated for the direction category, which was Katheryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker. 

This is all a major issue, as it actively demonstrates the systematic oppression of women and people of colour in the film industry. If women and people of colour aren't nominated, celebrated or acknowledge for their work in the industry, how can any women or people of colour know that they can direct, write, star in a movie, and be recognised for it? 

And it's not like 2015 didn't have the talent. 2015 was an amazing year for women in film, but the Academy don't seem to recognise it. 

I was talking to my latina friend, getting angry about the nominations. Like me, she is by no means surprised, but nonetheless disappointed in this years selection. As she pointed about, apart from the foreign films, Alejandro González Iñárritu is the only latino nominated, and no latina women are there at all, "I'm so TIRED of Latina women not being nominated for things because THEY'RE NOT IN THEM." 

Which therein lies the importance of viability and representation, which The Oscars, arguably the most important awards for mainstream Motion Pictures, constantly denies. 

People of colour aren't being nominated because they aren't being cast in any films, because they aren't being nominated and the cycle goes on. Or at least the films aren't being supported, because they are deemed "too risky" to take on. Which is stupid. 

Women driven and diverse cast movies make money in the box office, and are successful (never mind beautifully made, impactful and a CRAFT). But The Academy ignore's this, and thus the industry ignores this.

You can read the whole nominations list here, and Congratulations to Room, Brooklyn and Mad Max: Fury Road for their Motion Picture nominations, and to the following female directed  documentaries and foreign films nominated, which seems to be the only place we're seen: 

“What Happened, Miss Simone?” by Liz Garbus for Best Documentary Feature. 

“Chau, beyond the Lines” by Courtney Marsh, “A Girl in the River: The Price of Forgiveness” by Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy and “Last Day of Freedom” by Dee Hibbert-Jones and Nomi Talisman for Best Documentary - Short Subject.

“Mustang” France* by Deniz Gamze Ergüven for Best Foreign Film.

I am so rooting for you. 

By Claire

Rowan Blanchard is one of the most important young feminists of our time, and one of my top inspirations and role models for 2016.

At only 14, Rowan plays popular tv couple of the 90’s, Cory and Topanga’s, daughter, Riley Matthews on the Disney Channel hit Girl Meets World, (a spin off from the ABC 90s classic Boy Meets World, and discussed on the blog in this post).

In the world of constant connection and social media, Rowan uses her Twitter account to tweet and re-tweet articles and inform her 330 thousand followers of intersectional feminism, LGBTQ+ rights (which extends beyond being able to marry), depression in teenagers and the Black Lives Matter movement. She writes about these issues in the captions on her Instagram account, which has a staggering 3.3 million followers. 

Her writing provides an insight and eloquence I hope to one day achieve myself. 

At the start of this year, in the caption of a short video posted on her account, Rowan mentions going through depression in the past year, her lesson to live unapologetically, embrace her teenage emotions and support for all teenagers. In a society where teenagers are condemned for being emotional, are pressured into having their lives figured out, as young and foolish, Rowan embraces teenager’s right to be exactly who they are, complicated and full of emotions as they are, including herself. 

However, it seems that every day I am more and more inspired, and fall more and more in love with her.

In 2015, Rowan spoke on “gender inequality in youths” at the US National Committee for United Nations Women Annual Conference with Team HeFor She. The video of this speech is linked in the profile of her Instagram account, highlighting the importance gender equality is to her. 

You can read the transcript of her speech here, so expertly written and spoken, as well as other responses such as her mini essay on the term “white feminism”, and sexism on the red-carpet. 

Alongside friend and feminist trailblazer Amandla Stenberg, Rowan was named Feminist Celebrity of the Year by the Ms. Foundation for Women. These two were placed number one, an top of an impressive list of ten including Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Lavern Cox and Viola Davis. 

Rowan Blanchard is a stunning, eloquent, educated, mature and beautiful girl who inspires me to do better every day. You can catch her on the Disney Channel show Girl Meets World, and follow her on Twitter, Instagram and Tumblr.

by Claire


Disney Channel Original Movies and TV Shows have always had great feminist moments. The importance of friendship, self-acceptance and growth all being reoccurring themes.

While I don’t keep up with Disney Channel as much as I used to (RIP 00s Disney), and I assume you don’t either, I have stumbled across Girl Meets World, which has become my current obsession, and for good reason.

Girl Meets World is a title that may sound familiar to you (mostly in northern America, but it depends on how hip you are with 90s television). This is because Girl Meets World is a spin-off of ABC’s 90s hit Boy Meets World. If you’ve ever heard of the legendary TV couple of Cory and Topanga, Boy Meets World is where they are from. Fourteen years after the final episode in 2000, Disney has released a spin-off series, based on Cory and Topanga's family, but mainly on their 13 year old daughter Riley.

As the daughter of the fierce Topanga Lawrence, it is no surprise Riley has picked up her mother’s feminist spirit in the most recent episode (now in Season 2), titled Girl Meets STEM. For those who don’t know, STEM stands for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, all subjects that have little female representation. 

In this episode, Riley’s class (along with her friends Maya*, Farkle**, Lucas and Zay) are divided into boy-girl pairs to conduct a science experiment. The instructions are simple: One student must return at the end of the day to drop a marble into a beaker, and the other student is to return the next day and figure out what the mysterious substance created by the marble is. 

In a move that is unsurprising, but nonetheless shocking, all the boy students automatically delegate their girl partner to drop the marble, while the guys “do the science.” This act is unquestioned, nor argued against, except by one person: Riley Matthews.

(From left) Lucas, Maya, Riley and Farkle hear about their science midterm. 

This episode looks deeper into what is on the surface (girls losing interest in science), questions why this is, and challenges it. Riley’s anger is used to awaken her fellow female students and fight back.

Riley refuses to drop her marble.

It is revealed that the science teacher has conducted this experiment every year for the past 35 years, as Middle School is the age where he notices girls start to lose interest in science—because the boy’s aren’t letting them.

Girls in STEM subjects is an issue Amy Poehler’s Smart Girls has discussed a lot in the past year, and is an important issue everywhere. STEM are male-dominated fields, for no reason other than girls feeling like they can’t, as demonstrated in this GMW episode.

While the episode was full of great lines, such as Riley listing the history of feminism after Farkle faints, one of the most memorable would be this: 

“By relegating me to a second class marble dropper, you are stopping me from realising my full potential.” 

Not only is this language very self-aware and sophisticated for an 8^th grader, it reveals the problem with the system, and why there are few girls in STEM in one line. Boys take charge and girls are too often stopped form realising their potential. Girls don’t hear about other girls in STEM and thus do not know that they can.

Riley's mother Topanga and Riley help educate her fellow classmates on being feminists.

This episode is full of many joys, which had me cheering to myself on the couch more often than not. However, one of the most ground-breaking (in my opinion) things about this episode is the use of the F word. 

That’s right, on this Disney Channel show about 8^th graders (currently), Riley and her best friend Maya ACTUALLY say “We’re feminists now.” Because guess what? ‘FEMINIST’ ISN’T A DIRTY WORD.

I love this show, and I loved this episode. Girls in STEM is hardly a topic covered in mainstream media (as far as I know) so it was really special to see it done so wonderfully here.

Rowan Blanchard, who plays Riley, is a feminist trailblazer herself, who will be featured in an upcoming post.

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Girl Meets World airs on Disney Channel, Foxtel, weekends at 7.50am 

For all you Boy Meets World fans:
* Maya is the Shawn to Riley’s Corey
** Farkle's last name, Minkus aka Stuart Minkus’ son, but he is actually a core character and not a punchline, so yay team