Joe Wright is a feminist. Yes, he’s a man– but men can be feminists too, obviously. And yes, maybe he hasn’t been seen burning any bras recently– but that’s a stereotype. He’s a feminist because his films put male and female characters on an equal level– and believing that men and women should be equal is what feminism is all about.
The major films of his career– Pride and Prejudice (2005), Atonement (2007), The Soloist (2009), and Hanna (2011)– have achieved varying levels of success, and are variable in their genre. Pride and Prejudice and Atonement are certainly his most successful (and given that this is a piece about female protagonists, the ones that will be primarily featured in this article), but The Soloist also achieved relative commercial and critical success.
It’s interesting, however, that arguably the least well known of his films– The Soloist – is the one that does not feature a female main character. It also followed P&P and Atonement, and was less heavily marketed towards women than those two films (although Hanna is even less so, again). Joe Wright seems to choose to direct films that appeal to female audiences; and he directs them well. Joe Wright gets women. And the reason women get his films in return, is probably because he respects his female characters.
Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice was the original ‘feisty female chick lit’ novel. The main character is Elizabeth Bennet, a young woman dealing with manners, morality and marriage in 19th century England. Unwilling to marry a man she will not be happy with, Lizzie initially rejects the advanced of the rich yet arrogant Mr Darcy – before realizing that they are perhaps more compatible than she initially thought.
Joe Wright’s adaptation of Pride and Prejudice had a lot to live up to. The BBC mini-series (1995), starring Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth in that infamous ‘walking out of the water wearing white leggings’ scene, was a faithful and thus fan-beloved adaptation. Joe Wright’s film retains the heart of the original novel – Lizzie is still a strong, female character – but managed to create a significantly different film, so that the two can be considered separately. Wright’s P&P is slightly grungier (there are pigs! There’s mud! This is, after all, the 19th century), and also more modern (Darcy and Lizzie kiss, during his first proposal. Oh my!).
What I admire about Joe Wright’s version of the film was that he wasn’t afraid to bring out the sex-between-the-lines of the original text, and thus doesn’t deny his female character, Lizzie, her sexuality. It certainly wouldn’t have been Jane Austen’s desire to do so, but her writing is subtle on that front because of the time she was writing. In the BBC version of the text, the desire between Darcy and Lizzie is expressed primarily in longing glances and smoldering eyes. But Joe Wright clearly wanted to make the passion more palpable, and he does. I maintain that a scene where Darcy holds Elizabeth’s hand for a mere moment, while helping her into a carriage, and then flexes his fingers as he walks away, remains one of the most erotic scenes on film in 2005!
Atonement, also featuring Keira Knightley (and with good reason– Knightley does a good job of acting sprightly, strong women) and Saoirse Ronan, has significant and strong female characters; flawed, disappointing, unbearably human, beautiful– but strong nonetheless. Another adaptation, based on the Booker Prize winning novel by Ian McEwan, Atonement features the young Briony, a girl who changes the lives of everyone around her when she accuses her older sister’s secret lover of a crime he did not commit. Atonement deals with the way different people interpret different events; how they differently deal with guilt and how they might try to atone for their past.
Atonement is not a feminist film, per se, but it does give its male and female characters equal respect. Characters from both genders are fleshed out, and despite the very major mistakes some of them make, with far-reaching consequences, Wright does not encourage the audience to judge them, nor make a spectacle of their regret or repentance.
Hanna might seem like an unusual film from the director, given that he is best known for Pride and Prejudice and Atonement. Romances. Dramas. Period pieces. Hanna is an art-house action thriller about a 16-year-old girl (Saoirse Ronan) who has been raised to be an assassin by her father (Eric Bana), so that when she comes of age she can have final showdown with a cruel and cold-blooded intelligence agent (Cate Blanchett). The film is interestingly directed, with beautiful and visually stimulating cinematography and features intentionally jarring sound design with a thumping soundtrack. If the script leaves a little to be desired then, well, it’s a testament to Joe Wright’s ability as a director that still makes it such a good film overall.
When Wright and his young star Ronan were doing the press tour for the film, Zack Snyder’s Sucker Punch had just been released – and Wright made some rather disparaging comments about the film, criticizing its quasi-feminism and overly-sexualised version of female empowerment. Instead, Wright said, Hanna was a much better role model for young children. A highly-trained assassin, who has trouble with empathy certainly – but a resourceful young woman who is portrayed as being worthwhile because of her smarts and her skills, not because she is a sex object. It’s hard to fault Wright for his assessment of Sucker Punch (its attempt to sell girls in schoolgirl outfits as being ‘empowered’ was a bit rich – this was certainly not a film made to make women feel good; but rather, a film made to titillate the frat boy sensibility) and it’s true that Hanna’s character is strong, sympathetic, and complex – a very real portrayal of being a young woman, despite the science-fiction elements of the film.
Joe Wright has, throughout his career, made films that respect his characters- but perhaps his female characters, especially. His mother certainly must have raised him well – so I feel perfectly comfortable saying that Joe Wright is a feminist.
