Bret Easton Ellis, ’80s literary icon, had this to say about why “women can’t direct.” ¬†Good thing that private school education didn’t go to waste.
What would that be?
“We’re watching, and we’re aroused by looking, whereas I don’t think women respond that way to films, just because of how they’re built.”
You don’t think they have an overt level of arousal?
“[They have one] that’s not so stimulated by the visual. I think, to a degree, all the women I named aren’t particularly visual directors. You could argue that Lost in Translation is beautiful, but is that [cinematographer Lance Acord]? I don’t know. Regardless of the business aspect of things, is there a reason that there isn’t a female Hitchcock or a female Scorsese or a female Spielberg? I don’t know. I think it’s a medium that really is built for the male gaze and for a male sensibility.
Translated as, movies are targeted mostly at 13 year-old boys.
I mean, the best art is made under not an indifference to, but a neutrality [toward] the kind of emotionalism that I think can be a trap for women directors.
Emotionalism? ¬†Oh, you mean like Cameron Crowe! And Steven “all that matters now are the people we love” Spielberg?
But I have to get over it, you’re right, because so far this year, two of my favorite movies were made by women, Fish Tank and The Runaways. I’ve got to start rethinking that, although I have to say that a lot of the big studio movies I saw last year that were directed by women were far worse than the sh***y big-budget studio movies that were directed by men.”
Gee, ya think?
Which are we talking about?
“I mean, do I want to say this on the record? Did you see The Proposal? Anyway, whatever.”
Do you want to say this on the record?  Hm.