Rita Vrataski (Emily Blunt) |
She’s
called The Angel of Verdun. You also
see another name scrawled in bright red over a London bus: Full Metal Bitch. When we first see her, angry and fierce in her
battle gear (which resembles a modern-day knight’s armour) she’s heading out to
battle, stomping out of the bunker, surrounded by an entourage, and summarily
knocks an acolyte down who gets in her way. She’s badass. She’s the Full Metal Bitch.
She's no angel.
She's no angel.
Her real
name is Rita Vrataski. She wields a sharpened helicopter blade as her weapon of
choice and serves as the poster girl for the United Defense Force to recruit
more into the fight.
Rita (Emily
Blunt) is a very different kind of poster
girl for the war effort of the recent SF action
movie Edge of Tomorrow,
directed by Doug Liman and written by Christopher McQuarrie. There is an “edge
of tomorrow” in this military SF story that explores how much we’ve changed
since the time of World War I and II.
And that change is most apparent in how women are seen and act.
Edge
of Tomorrow makes subtle and not so subtle reference to both world
wars: from its June 6th release (70th
anniversary of D-Day and the massive and decisive Normandy landing) to its
reference to the trenches of Verdun in WWI, the Nazi or German Empire forces as
the original seat of the Omega entity and many more.
The premise
is straight-forward science fiction stuff: Earth is under attack by
an alien species, who have seeded themselves with a meteor shower. The aliens
have conquered Russia and China and now threaten France and England. Evoking
echoes of World War II’s Normandy invasion, the United States joins the fray in
support of their allies.
American Major William
Cage (Tom Cruise), who is with the PR staff of the war effort, gets unwillingly
drafted to the front as a rookie private and dies in the first five minutes of
landing on the shores of Normandy—but not before he kills an alpha alien, which
covers him in blue blood. This sends him into a vicious time loop, where he
must relive and die over and over in that horrendous bloodbath. Each time, he glimpses
the Angel of Verdun repeatedly
killed. On one occasion, Vrataski runs across him, lying injured in the mud. He
can’t move, sure victim to the aliens.
She snatches his battery pack and moves on, leaving him there to die. Astonished at the Angel’s apparent lack of compassion, Cage will later mimic her “let him die” attitude when he knowingly lets fellow soldier Kimmel get crushed.
She snatches his battery pack and moves on, leaving him there to die. Astonished at the Angel’s apparent lack of compassion, Cage will later mimic her “let him die” attitude when he knowingly lets fellow soldier Kimmel get crushed.
WW2 Pin up girl |
In a later iteration he
finally meets Vrataski on the battlefield, where she realizes (having gone
through the time loop and lost it) that he is now in a time loop and therefore the
key to their victory; she tells him to find her when he wakes up just seconds
before she lets herself get blown up and they begin their looping journey
together. To his complaint, “I’m not a soldier,” Vrataski replies, “No, you’re
a weapon.” That’s how she sees him. And to that end, she mentors him in the art
and science of soldiering. When things go awry she time and again unflinchingly
shoots him dead to reset the time. Cage tries to engage her in casual
conversation and finds her taciturn. “You don’t talk much,” he observes, to
which she quips, “Not a fan.” She’s all about the business of defeating the
enemy before the human race is wiped out.
Edge of Tomorrow provides a refreshing
kind of woman hero; someone who is equal to her male protagonist in skill,
intelligence and heroic stature. What I mean by heroic stature is that her
heroic journey of transformation does not play subservient to her male
counterpart’s journey. This almost happens on two occasions when Cage gives her
an “out” to stay behind and let him take over. She declines. In fact, Cruise
lets her character take the lead, even though this it truthfully Cage’s story
of metaphoric transformation from “onlooker” to “participant”.
In so many androcratic storylines, the female—no matter how complex, interesting and tough she starts
out being—must demure to the male lead; as if only by bowing down to his
superior abilities can she help ensure his heroic stature. Returning us right
back to the cliché role of the woman supporting the leading man to complete his
hero’s journey. And this often means serving as the prize for his chivalry. We
see this in so many action thrillers and action adventures today: Valka in How to Train Your Dragon, Wyldstyle in The Lego Movie, Neytiri in Avatar, Trinity in The Matrix, and so many more. There’s even a name for it: the Trinity Syndrome.
Tasha Robinson writes in her
excellent article entitled, We’re losingall our Strong Female Characters
to Trinity Syndrome: “The idea of the Strong Female Character—someone with her own identity, agenda, and story purpose—has thoroughly pervaded the conversation about what’s wrong with the way women are often perceived and portrayed today, in comics, video-games, and film especially…it’s still rare to see films in the mainstream action/horror/science-fiction/fantasy realm introduce women with any kind of meaningful strength, or women who go past a few simple stereotypes.”
to Trinity Syndrome: “The idea of the Strong Female Character—someone with her own identity, agenda, and story purpose—has thoroughly pervaded the conversation about what’s wrong with the way women are often perceived and portrayed today, in comics, video-games, and film especially…it’s still rare to see films in the mainstream action/horror/science-fiction/fantasy realm introduce women with any kind of meaningful strength, or women who go past a few simple stereotypes.”
I give
Cruise, Liman and McQuarrie full marks for not doing this. For example, after Cage makes his case to his Squadron to
go find the Omega in Paris, they remain reluctant until Vrataski emerges. “I
don’t expect you to follow me,” says Cage. “I do expect you to follow her.” The Angel of Verdun—or better yet, the badass Full Metal Bitch. And why not? Who wouldn’t follow her?
Is this one
of the reasons that this movie didn’t do so well in the North American box
office as it did overseas, whose audience may reflect a more mature, open and
enlightened audience?
When a
female lead is stronger than the male protagonist, some reviewers (OK—male
reviewers) treat and categorize that movie as a “woman’s story”. I’ve been told
by some of my male friends that they couldn’t possibly empathize with such a
character—mainly because she is a woman and she is stronger than the male lead
“they want to be”. Invariably, in many
of these, the male counterpart is so much “milk-toast” compared to that awesome
female-warrior. And have you ever noticed that, while the male hero gets the
girl, the female hero usually ends up alone? Great examples include: Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Xena: Warrior Princess; Sarah in The Terminator and of course Vasquez in Aliens. These women are amazons; they
stand apart, goddess-like, unrelenting, unflinching—untouchable. It’s actually no wonder that my ex-husband dislikes
Sigourney Weaver to this day—she could crush him underfoot and eat him for
breakfast at a moment’s notice. And probably would!
In a superb
article in NewStatesman entitled I hate Strong Female Characters, Sophia
McDougall
says:
says:
“…I want to point out two things that Richard (the II) has, that Bond and Captain America and Batman also have, that Peggy (Carter of Captain America), however strong she is, cannot attain. They are very simple things, even more fundamental than “agency”.
1) Richard has the spotlight. However weak or distressed or passive he may be, he’s the main goddamn character.
2) Richard has a huge range of other characters of his own gender around him, so that he never has to act as any kind of ambassador or representative for maleness. Even dethroned and imprisoned, he is free to be uniquely himself.On the posters [women are] posed way in the back of the shot behind the men, in the trailers they may pout or smile or kick things, but they remain silent. Their strength lets them, briefly, dominate bystanders but never dominate the plot. It’s an anodyne, a sop, a Trojan Horse - it’s there to distract and confuse you, so you forget to ask for more.”
There is
another type of female hero. She is equal
to her male counterpart. Her story is not secondary to his story; her heroic
status and hero’s journey is equal to his; in fact they may share the same
journey. Examples include: Bonnie and
Clyde; Peter Chang’s Aeon Flux; Farscape; Battlestar Galactica…
And now Edge
of Tomorrow.
As with the above examples, Vrataski and Cage form a team, in which together they are more than the sum of their parts. A marriage of independent autopoiesis, combining skills, abilities and vision. This is also why, in my opinion, the ending of Edge of Tomorrow is totally appropriate: not because it’s “the happy ending”; but because it carries the message of enduring collaboration of equals in a gylanic society.
As with the above examples, Vrataski and Cage form a team, in which together they are more than the sum of their parts. A marriage of independent autopoiesis, combining skills, abilities and vision. This is also why, in my opinion, the ending of Edge of Tomorrow is totally appropriate: not because it’s “the happy ending”; but because it carries the message of enduring collaboration of equals in a gylanic society.
Other Relevant Articles of Interest:
Female Heroes in Literature and Pop Culture
Gylany: a social system based on equality of men and women
Androcracy: a form of governing system in which rulers are male
Riane Eisler (in The Chalice and the Blade) provides examples of sociobiologists who draw on nineteenth-century Darwinism by citing insect societies to support their androcratic (social and political rule by men) theories. If we are to truly rise victorious over the scourge of climate change—a function of our current lifestyle and paradigms—we will need to adopt a cultural evolution that embraces a partnership society heralded by new and renewed symbology, language and “myth”.
Gylany: a social system based on equality of men and women
Androcracy: a form of governing system in which rulers are male
Riane Eisler (in The Chalice and the Blade) provides examples of sociobiologists who draw on nineteenth-century Darwinism by citing insect societies to support their androcratic (social and political rule by men) theories. If we are to truly rise victorious over the scourge of climate change—a function of our current lifestyle and paradigms—we will need to adopt a cultural evolution that embraces a partnership society heralded by new and renewed symbology, language and “myth”.
Nina Munteanu is an
ecologist and internationally published author of novels, short stories and
essays. She coaches writers and teaches writing at George Brown College and the
University of Toronto. For more about Nina’s coaching & workshops visit www.ninamunteanu.me. Visit www.ninamunteanu.ca for more about her writing.
2 comments:
i am so glad i found this article!! you made me realize the one big reason why i love this film so much: gender equality!! :)
(and like you, i found that happy ending totally appropriate both logically and philosophically.)
brb spreading your article around ;)
Thanks, Ishneak, for your comment AND for spreading the article around.
Best,
Nina
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