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Go, girl! Fierce chicks dominate the flicks

Photo By John Horn, Associated Press entertainment writer
Girls and young women don't go to movies. They go out with guys who take them to movies.
Call it sexist, shortsighted and stupid. Whatever the label, it's still Hollywood's logic. The film business is run by -- and seemingly for -- boys and men, leaving female film fans vainly scouring movie listings.
Until this summer.

Five years after "Thelma & Louise," a sudden flood of movies from and about strong, independent women are landing in the nation's theaters. Not surprisingly, most of the works were made without major studio help.
The films' bare-budget origins don't seem to bother moviegoers starved for human stories free of tornadoes, space aliens and impossible missions.
Among the options:
  • "Walking and Talking," writer-director Nicole Holofcener's snappy portrait of two young women, one on the verge of marriage, the other on the verge of spinsterhood.
  • "She's the One," a new movie about failing and failed relationships from Ed Burns, the maker of "The Brothers McMullen." Unlike his first film, the women call most of the shots this time around.
  • "Foxfire," adapted from Joyce Carol Oates' account of four young women whose lives are transformed and empowered by a female drifter.
  • "Manny & Lo," a look at two adolescent runaway sisters who kidnap a store clerk as a surrogate mother when Lo becomes pregnant.
  • "Girls Town," in which three tough teen-age girls take on their fears and an abusive boyfriend in a largely improvised but coherent script.
    Upcoming: The lesbian thriller "Bound," the tell-all spouses of "First Wives Club" and the female bank robbers in "Set It Off."
    The summer's strong women aren't always all that old. The anchor of "Harriet the Spy" is still too young to wear earrings, as is the star of "Matilda."
    Filmmakers say the strong women aren't an anomaly -- it's just that most movies treat the gender as little more than disposable love interests and sexily attired window dressing.
    "I don't think there are much movies out there that are honest," says Annette Haywood-Carter, the director of "Foxfire." "There are a lot of powerful women who want to make movies -- but they just haven't had access to the medium. So girls don't have movies that reflect their generation."
    Hollywood executives continue to be intimidated by the very thought that audiences could consider a young girl a role model.
    "I think 'Harriet the Spy' is a good base hit, but it will be agony to get the next girls' movie done," says Debby Beece, whose Nickelodeon Films made "Harriet."
    Unlike the overwhelming pyrotechnics of most summer movies, women's films are more likely to connect emotionally, not just visually.
    Ms. Holofcener says that after a New York showing of "Walking and Talking," she overhead two young women assessing her film. "I loved that movie so much," one of the women said to the other. "I wish I knew the writer so I could be her friend."
    Let us know when you hear somebody saying that leaving "Escape from L.A."

    Photos by The Associated Press
    A new crop of films, largely independents with small budgets, celebrates strong, independent women, including "Girls Town," starring Lili Taylor, above. In it, three tough teen-age girls take on their fears and an abusive boyfriend.
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