Chick Flicks: Contemporary Women at the Movies

272 Pages·2007·1.67 MB·English

by  Suzanne Ferris

Chick Flicks
From An Affair to Rememberto Legally Blonde, “chick flicks” have long been
bothchampioned and vilified by women and men, scholars and popular audiences.
Like other forms of “chick culture, ” which the editors define as a group of mostly
American and British popular culture media forms focused primarily on twenty-
to thirtysomething, middle-class—and frequently college-educated—women, chick
flicks have been accused of reinscribing traditional attitudes and reactionary roles
for women. On the other hand, they have been embraced as pleasurable and
potentially liberating entertainments, assisting women in negotiating the challenges
of contemporary life.
Acompanion to the successful anthology Chick Lit: The New Woman’s Fiction,
this edited volume consists of eleven original essays, prefaced by an introduction
situating chick flicks within the larger context of chick culture as well as women’s
cinema. The essays consider chick flicks from a variety of angles, touching on issues
of film history, female sexuality (heterosexual and homosexual), femininity, female
friendship, age, race, ethnicity, class, consumerism, spectatorship, pleasure and
gender definition. An afterword by feminist film theorist Karen Hollinger considers
the chick flick’s transformation from the woman’s films of the 1940s to the friend-
ship films of the 1980s and those of the “return to the classics” trend of the 1990s,
while highlighting the value of the volume’s contributions to contemporary debates
and sketching possibilities for further study.
Contributors: Deborah Barker, Carol M. Dole, Suzanne Ferriss, Holly Hassel, Lisa
Henderson, Karen Hollinger, Myra Mendible, Lisa M. Rüll, Margaret Tally,
Maureen Turim, Kate Waites, Mallory Young.
Suzanne FerrissisProfessor of English at Nova Southeastern University. She has
co-edited two volumes on the cultural study of fashion: On Fashionand Footnotes:
On Shoes. She is also co-author of A Handbook of Literary Feminisms. Most
recently, she co-edited, with Mallory Young, Chick Lit: The New Woman’s
Fiction,also published by Routledge.
Mallory Youngis Professor of English and French at Tarleton State University.
She has published on a variety of topics, from the Odyssey to Texas women’s
literature and, with Suzanne Ferriss, has co-authored several articles on chick
culture. She co-edited, with Suzanne Ferriss, Chick Lit: The New Woman’s Fiction,
also published by Routledge.

Chick Flicks
Contemporary women
at the movies
Edited by Suzanne Ferriss
and Mallory Young
First published 2008
by Routledge
270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016
Simultaneously published in the UK
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library,2008.
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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN 0-203-93555-1 Mastere-bookISBN
ISBN10: 0–415–96255–2 (hbk)
ISBN10: 0–415–96256–0 (pbk)
ISBN10: 0–203–93555–1 (ebk)
ISBN13: 978–0–415–96255–1 (hbk)
ISBN13: 978–0–415–96256–8 (pbk)
ISBN13: 978–0–203–93555–2 (ebk)
For Steven and Craig

Contents
List of images ix
Acknowledgments xi
1 Introduction: chick flicks and chick culture 1
SUZANNE FERRISS AND MALLORY YOUNG
2 Women’s films: comedy, drama, romance 26
MAUREEN TURIM
3 Fashioning femininity in the makeover flick 41
SUZANNE FERRISS
4 The return of pink: Legally Blonde,third-wave feminism,
and having it all 58
CAROL M. DOLE
5 Asoundtrack for our lives: chick-flick music 79
LISA M. RÜLL
6 The southern-fried chick flick: postfeminism goes to
the movies 92
DEBORAH BARKER
7 Something’s gotta give: Hollywood, female sexuality
and the “older bird” chick flick 119
MARGARET TALLY
8 Simple pleasures: lesbian community and Go Fish 132
LISA HENDERSON
viii Contents
9 Chica flicks: postfeminism, class, and the Latina
American dream 158
MYRA MENDIBLE
10 Chic flicks: the new European romance 175
MALLORY YOUNG
11 The “babe scientist” phenomenon: the illusion of
inclusion in 1990s American action films 190
HOLLY HASSEL
12 Babes in boots: Hollywood’s oxymoronic warrior woman 204
KATE WAITES
13 Afterword: once I got beyond the name chick flick 221
KAREN HOLLINGER
Selected filmography 233
Selected bibliography 239
Contributors 245
Index 248
Images
1.1 Bridget Jones (Renée Zellweger) attracting her boss’s
attention 6
1.2 In Bride and Prejudice Austen’s Jane and Elizabeth Bennet
are transformed into Jaya and Lalita Bakshi
(Namrata Shirodkar and Aishwarya Rai) 10
1.3 The Asian-American romantic comedy Saving Face
subscribes to and subverts chick-flick conventions 11
3.1 Before: Dick Avery (Fred Astaire) photographing
Jo Stockton (Audrey Hepburn) and Marion (Dovima)
in the Embryo Concepts bookstore 46
3.2 After: the “gamine” turned “bird of paradise” 46
3.3 Before: Mary (Parker Posey) strutting her stuff on the
improvised “runway” in the library 49
3.4 After: “Party girl” turned librarian 50
3.5 Before: Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway) reacts to the first
step in her makeover: Jimmy Choo stilettos 53
3.6 After: the “fashionista” applies finishing touches 53
4.1 Elle (Reese Witherspoon) arrives at Harvard in
“Malibu Barbie” attire 65
4.2 Elle appears at a law-school party inappropriately
dressed 69
6.1 Washing windows for Shelby’s wedding 99
6.2 Idgie’s (Mary Stuart Masterson) bad influence on
Ruth (Mary-Louise Parker) 104
6.3 Frank (Nick Searcy) claiming his wife 106
6.4 Sidda’s (Sandra Bullock) initiation 111
7.1 The “Calendar Girls” (Helen Mirren, Julie Walters,
et al.) are temporarily seduced by the bright lights of LA 126
7.2 Erica (Diana Keaton) finds an age-appropriate mate in
Harry (Jack Nicholson) 128
9.1 The Latina maid (Jennifer Lopez) gushes subserviently
at the white, male senator (Ralph Fiennes) 163