Comments on: Free Julie Delpy!!!

By: Mark Miller

Mark Miller — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 23:32:04 +0000

I would love to see more movies like Blade Runner and Close Encounters get made. As far as I’m concerned this decade has sucked for science fiction movies. It’s not that they aren’t being made. They’re just not that good. I say give the lady a shot!

My mom and I watched “2010: Odyssey Two” on TV together several months ago. She has a tendency to not like science fiction movies, though there are some exceptions. I think it’s mainly because most sci-fi films out there have male-oriented themes: action and sexiness.

Anyway she liked this one. At some point she asked me, “When was this made?” I said, “The 1980s.” At the end she said, “Wow! They don’t make movies like this anymore.” With a tinge of regret I said, “Yep. They don’t.”

Anyway it would be great to see sci-fi revived in the movies.

I dream of the future.

By: ERS

ERS — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 17:16:56 +0000

Yeah, this kind of thing makes me see red. Have you seen the Guerilla Girls posters on the subject? Oscars Unchain the Women Directors Sticker Campaign I love those ladies!

By: Peggy

Peggy — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 16:59:16 +0000

Maybe the financiers are concerned that she’ll make an action/sci-fi movie without the requisite token female eye candy. You wouldn’t want a strong female lead to scare away the desirable 18-35 male audience. Meanwhile, George Lucas spent gazillions to create the awful Star Wars episodes 1, 2, and 3. Sigh.

By: Anne

Anne — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 05:43:07 +0000

The comparison with Spielberg is unfair – he gets money to make godawful trash because he’s an established director (I think the technical term is “bankable”) that the studios can count on making money with. A relatively untried director cannot of course compete.

The depressing examples of sexism are all the much less competent male directors who get a shot at making any movie they like. Though directing is a hard world to break into, I think, lots of them have pretty restricted options too.

The “women directors can only make romantic comedies” idea is just another example of the “men are from mars women are from venus” idea. I really don’t like it, and it’s a self-reinforcing notion: women can’t direct anything but romantic comedies because nobody lets them. Time was when I refused to believe there were any differences at all between men and women, other than the physical. Now I’ve had to accept that there are differences, though how much are cultural and how much are biological I couldn’t say. That’s no excuse for judging people on their gender rather than their talent, though: even if only a few women have the right kind of brain to make a scifi movie, it’s quite likely that Julie Delpy is one of them, and it’s an injustice to assume she’s not.

By: Annalee

Annalee — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 04:27:08 +0000

Argh!!!

By: Zuska

Zuska — Mon, 09 Jul 2007 03:54:52 +0000

goddammit. That really totally hacks me off.

Then morons go around saying things like “well, why aren’t there any great women directors, huh? All the great directors are men. Women must not be very good at directing.”

Or, substitute for “directing” your favorite field where women are excluded and their participation is hampered by similar discrimination. Like, say, any science or engineering discipline.

So many shoes, needing so much puking; so little time.