Shortly after May 5th, 1979, I stood in a line that circled twice around the block in Manhattan, waiting to see the new British-American movie Alien. It was causing one hell of a ruckus. When I finally squeezed into my center row seat, I settled in to watch a movie which, for the first time in my experience, featured a badass and supremely competent female in the starring role. That I couldn’t hear the dialogue because of audience screams didn’t matter. I was watching history be made.
Sigourney Weaver, in the franchise that became the Aliens series, rewrote for all of us Boomer women what had traditionally been stupid woman falls in forest while running from monster, is saved by Great White Man story. Every image I had seen up to that point on Saturday afternoon sci-fi flicks taught me that girls couldn’t hack it. We had to be saved or we were the victims served up to the swamp monsters in quasi-religious offerings. Woman as edible feast. Fodder for the monster, the virgin sacrifice. It was a perfect analogy for the times: women were for eating, consuming, pillaging, mutilating. We were weak and useless, therefore disposable. Men were the real heroes.
Weaver, and Alien, rewrote the genre, and for my generation of Baby Boomer women, set us on a different path for understanding powerful film heroines. When I saw the movie I’d just left the Army after five years. I’d been a warrior and I bore many scars, internal and external. Alien came along at just the right time. The movie legitimized a messy life. Here on the big screen I saw a heroine I’d be proud to emulate. Badass.
The Changing Hollywood Heroine Landscape
For the last few years, my movie collection has begun to reflect the changing zeitgeist of Hollywood’s recognition that women can be, and are, immensely attractive- and profitable- as powerful heroes. After Alien changed the conversation, slowly but surely the film industry began to offer us women we could rally behind.
From movies like The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo to Lucy, to Atomic Blonde to Unlocked, to Wonder Woman, we now see potent, powerful heroines we can believe in. These days we see women…