Netflix's new film "Girls Want Revolution", a movie about high school girls engaging in affirmative action on campus, caught my eye.
The new film is online on Netflix and is based on the best-selling novel of the same name, Moxie.
Directed by renowned comedian Amy Poehler. Amy is active in many funny shows such as "Saturday Night Live", and the movies she has starred in are mostly comedies, such as "Mean Girl" in 2004 and "Surrogate Mother" in 2008. After 2019's Wine country, this is the second film directed by Amy Poehler, and because he is a comedian, the director likes to work on the subtleties of his lines and inadvertently give people jokes.
The film tells the story of the heroine Vivian because Lucy was bullied by Mitchell and Mitchell gave the girls a nickname/ranking, so she recognized the serious gender discrimination on campus, so anonymously set up the moxie organization, which triggered a feminist revolution on campus by distributing magazines.
The heroine of this film, Vivian, is played by Hadley Robinson, although she is a newcomer actor, her superb acting skills are really eye-catching. It is hard to imagine that she is the initiator of this feminist movement, from the beginning of handing out leaflets worried that no one will see, painting stars on her hands is a blatant rebellion against inequality events, and finally she bravely stood on the podium, from the beginning to persuade her girlfriend Lucy to count the girl to grow up to eventually grow into the leader of the "can't count" feminist activities, she used her role to stimulate her enthusiasm for acting, and performed what adolescent girls should look like when they grow up.
It is also worth mentioning that the actor who plays the villain Mitchell in this film is Patrick Schwarzenegger, who is Schwarzenegger's eldest son, but he does not want to use his father's prestige, but only wants to work hard in the film and television circle with his own efforts. Patrick is handsome and handsome, has been interested in acting since he was a child, has been auditioning continuously, and finally got the opportunity to play the main role. But in this film, he plays a villain role, which is completely opposite to his appearance, in order to play this role well, he repeatedly deliberates on the character, heart, and behavior, tries to tear off the original label on his body, tries to understand this new role, thinks from his point of view, stands on the united front with the role, gets close to him, understands him.
The beginning of the film is dominated by blue-green tones, the heroine Vivian seems to be chased by something terrible, the heroine is in a hurry to escape in the forest, she wants to scream in deep fear but can't shout at all. This shot is very wonderful, through the heroine's dream to externalize the description of the heroine's psychological activities, directly revealing the theme of the film: blooming female strength, brave voice, but also shows the heroine's sense of depression in the campus afterwards, and she can not find a way to make a sound. Next, we will also follow the steps of the heroine to explore how girls go to the revolution?
The heroine Vivian, a slightly introverted girl, has been compassionate since childhood, but she likes to protect spiders at an age when children take pleasure in stepping on spiders. Her mother was a former member of the Violent Women's Movement, and under the inadvertent influence of her mother, Vivian was very sensitive to gender discrimination in schools, and she had always suppressed herself to ignore unfair behavior on campus, but as she shared her past experiences with her mother, she began to want to take the initiative to change the unfair behavior on campus.
At the beginning of the new semester, the heroine's girlfriend Claudia told the heroine Vivian that all the girls in the school were ranked (the ranking here refers to the score of the girl's figure), and at the same time, the cheerful background music slowly stopped, perhaps the beautiful campus life for the heroine ended from the beginning of the ranking.
The beginning of the girls' revolution
Originally, these days will continue, but it is different because of the appearance of lucy, a new transfer student. Lucy's perspective in class pointed directly at the patriarchal society, which stimulated Mitchell, who debated with Lucy on the spot.
After class, Mitchell tries to take advantage of Lucy's stubble when she buys drinks, but Lucy is not a mud doll that can be pinched casually, and a distraught Mitchell takes Lucy's Coke and spits inside.
Vivian knew that Mitchell had always been so annoying, but she could only comfort Lucy, and if she couldn't afford it, she could only hide a little, but she was woken up by Lucy: "You know that sometimes annoying people get inches, right?" Maybe he'll do something even more excessive later." Lucy confessed that this was not a challenge to Mitchell, it was just a struggle for Lucy to keep her right, she looked Vivian in the eye and said: "... Despite this, I will always hold my head high", Vivian couldn't help but shudder, and her mother often said this to her, and she seemed to understand something.
Vivian sat at the table, a "keep my head up high" slowly flowed out of the music player, she found her mother's once beloved book, lovingly flipped through the chapter about women's revolution, and the words Lucy said during the day also came to mind. Vivian is immersed in a new world that her mother has brought to her, and has found a new direction for her own future life.
I would like to interject that almost all the music that appears in the film comes from Riot Girl, of which Bikini Kill's "Rebel Girl" is the most impressive.
Rebel GirlBikini Kill - The First Two Records
Bikini Kill was the number one band in the Riot Grrrl movement in the nineties (see I Love Rock 'n' Roll Vol.3). With burning feminist ideals, guided by the core essence of punk rock, they hold musical instruments and spit wild words, opening up their own world in the indie rock world dominated by men. Under the banner of the "Girls' Revolution," their wild and intense music created a new generation of rock women armed with new ideas. This is also very much in line with the theme of this film.
The next day at the pre-competition mobilization meeting, the students received the ranking list on their mobile phones. The content of the list is almost the same as what Claudia said to the heroine, and the good figure is rated as "the most beautiful buttocks", "the most worthy of the top", "the most praiseworthy breasts", the bad figure is viciously said to each other, "the most disgusting", "the ugliest", "the most damned". Vivian was not spared the "most obedient".
After the list is released, the boys who pass by her will also cast a reviewing look. Lucy's prophecy succeeded, and Mitchell did go further than in the past. The ranking list was a complete awakening to Vivian. She decided to call on all the girls in the school to rebel against Mitchell's actions.
Reckless youth, brave voice
The more Vivian thought about it, the more angry she became, and the ranking list completely awakened Vivian. "Why do we all accept silently and not say a word?" Her mother's experience in the violent women's movement made her understand the need to mobilize all the girls in the school to face the disrespectful behavior against girls on campus.
So Vivian anonymously printed a lot of homemade moxie magazines and distributed them to the girls' toilets, and moxie was formed.
Each issue of Moxie's magazine revolves around events on campus, from Mitchell's list of nicknames for girls, to school rules that prohibit girls from wearing tank tops, to unfair elections for scholarship candidates.
In fact, until now, "freedom of dress" is still a difficult thing to achieve, as if no matter what clothes girls wear, there will always be people who judge and point fingers.
The "Reiza Incident", which was very popular a while ago, was because Reiza wore a yellow suspender with a low neckline at the airport, coupled with her relatively plump figure, she was criticized by many people for "showing too much skin", "not being decent" and so on.
Many girls are very angry about this, and Reiza herself said that wearing what she likes is the most important thing.
In fact, whatever clothes you want to wear should be the freedom of girls.
This real-life problem is mapped to the film, and most of the girls on campus feel the same way about the content in Moxie magazine, so the manual quickly spread around the campus.
Vivian also learned from her mother, boldly rebelling against the discriminatory rules that exist on campus, starting with the support of girls who identified with Moxie by painting stars and love motifs on their hands, to calling on girls to wear tank tops to go to school to resist discriminatory school rules, to selecting Kira and Mitchell to compete for scholarship candidates.
Those things that evaluate women's physical appearance, restrict women's freedom of dress, and deprive women of the right to compete on the same stage with men have become the reasons for the girls in the film to speak out boldly.
Girls have also contributed to moxie and participated.
The only way to grow – learn to take responsibility
The good times did not last long, and Kira, the female captain of the rugby team, won the game but did not receive a scholarship in a match against the male captain of the rugby team, Mitchell. Even more tragically, it was The headmaster, Shirley, who was also a woman, who made this decision.
The girls angrily labeled the campus with the words "bastard" as a sign of displeasure. Things got big and needed the founders of moxie to take on those responsibilities. Before Vivian could react, her girlfriend Claudia had already been dropped out of school for starting the moxie society.
In order not to let her girlfriend be wronged, Vivian must take on her due responsibility, sacrifice the ego, and save everyone.
Unexpectedly, everyone supported Vivian and said that she was also a revolutionary girl. Everyone is a revolutionary girl.
This scene and the beginning of the film, the heroine Vivian hurriedly escapes in the forest, she looks scared and wants to scream but can't shout at all. It was a good echo, and in the shouts of the crowd, the girls' revolution finally achieved a stage victory.
I believe that the shouts of the crowd can also wake up you and me watching the movie. I hope that if there is such an opportunity, everyone can choose to be a hero.
The film is not so flawless, it is easy to feel too idealistic, and the film finally forcibly arranges a letter of help to usher in the ending, which is completely unforeseen, resulting in a rough turn in the final plot. Before the heroine chose to take responsibility, there was no gradual growth process, but Claudia said that she was timid, and she became bold. But its main purpose is very good, encouraging everyone to dare to speak out if there is something unfair, and then solve it.
In fact, the goal pursued by the girls in the film is very simple. It is less for the body of girls to examine, less for girls to regulate.
Although some places are more radical, there must always be a movie like this, after all, youth is energetic and sharp. And women should not be defined, insist on speaking out, you are not alone.
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