Legally Blonde and How Fighting Amongst Women Never Goes Away
I recently watched Legally Blonde after seeing someone on Twitter praise Elle Woods for being an absolute icon, as well as showing how supportive her sorority sisters were by helping her study to get into Harvard Law. Legally Blonde was truly ahead of its time, subverting the blonde bimbo girl trope, and allowing women to be academically successful while still embracing their feminine side. For those who have never seen Legally Blonde, the protagonist, Elle Woods, studies hard to get into Harvard Law after her boyfriend, Warner, breaks up with her, because she believes that a graduate of Harvard Law is the type of girl Warner wants to be with. During her time in school, she takes on a case and has to prove the innocence of one of her sorority sisters, who has been accused of murder.
Legally Blonde is empowering: it subverts the idea that pretty girls are stupid and are unable to do anything aside from being someone’s trophy wife. In fact, it was Elle’s knowledge of beauty products and how perms work that allowed her to win the case at the very end of the film. Elle saying, “Any cosmo girl would know this.” only serves to empower women who like reading beauty tips and engaging in girlier or more feminine activities.
However, as much as I’d love to praise Legally Blonde and talk about my favourite moments in the film, it has also shed light on a concern I have.
See, much like every other movie, there’s a character who serves as a character foil to Elle, and in this case, it would be Vivian Kensington. Vivian is preppy, intelligent, and is not as girly or feminine as Elle. When compared to Elle, Vivian is not as (conventionally) pretty as Elle, and yet she was able to become Warner’s fiancée simply based on her smartness alone. Throughout the film, we see Elle get underestimated and shot down by everyone around her, with people telling her that she is already pretty, she does not have to work hard and can cruise by on her looks alone. The idea of someone being both pretty and smart was almost too much to comprehend, in most people’s minds. However, if Elle is the definition of pretty and smart, what does that do to the self-esteem of less conventionally attractive people like Vivian?
We’ve all heard the phrase, “I’m not like other girls”, and we have definitely seen that trope repeated time and time again, where less conventionally attractive girls are able to become successful in other areas, a common area would be in terms of intelligence. I’m no stranger to this concept– heck, I worshipped it when I was 13, thinking, “It’s okay, those girls are pretty for now, but I’ll be smart forever.” Then I proceeded to be severely devastated when those girls who I envied so much were also smart, because if I can’t win on the attractiveness scale, and those girls have proved that you can be both smart and pretty, then aren’t I losing in every aspect?
When thinking about this from a dating perspective, most girls tend to feel insecure if they are unable to secure a boyfriend, especially during their youth, because youth is sold to us as a time filled with whirlwind romances, and if we don’t experience that, then are we really living our best life? So, in a desperate attempt to snag a boyfriend for ourselves, we look at what we could possibly work on. If I’m someone who is not conventionally attractive, I have to work on my knowledge and humour, and use those aspects of myself to paint me as a desirable girlfriend. This leads to the stereotypical female characters we see in Netflix teen romance films– they are not popular, or conventionally pretty, but hey, they’re really witty and the guys are super intrigued by their lack of enthusiasm towards girly things!
By having representation of these witty girls on screen does motivate girls to study harder and work on their personality, and it validates them, telling them that it’s okay to not be conventionally pretty. However, it comes at the expense of making the pretty, popular girl seem like a rude bitch who only cares about her looks and is bad at studying. This leads to movies like Legally Blonde, where the protagonist is conventionally pretty and is also smart, but it also comes at the expense of the witty girls, who are now losing in every single aspect.
This isn’t to say that Legally Blonde is a bad film, or that it tears other women down just to boost some women. However, it is worth noting that Vivian is not exactly painted in the best light either. She comes off as snooty, scoffing at Elle, and constantly thinking that she is better than Elle because Elle is a pretty girl who is not exactly the brightest bulb. Of course, Vivian is characterised that way because it is part of Elle’s character development to subvert all those expectations, but Vivian also thinks it is Elle’s fault when their professor tries to make a move on Elle. This scene comes after Elle and Vivian bond over everyday sexism in the office, and it makes no sense that Vivian would pin the blame on Elle, especially after a conversation like that.
It is interesting to me that we can never have a good representation of different kinds of women in one space. One side must always be torn down in order to boost the other, and for what? For the average straight man to revel in the idea of women fighting over him? It is worth noting that Warner bought his way into Harvard Law, whilst Elle worked hard and got in through her grades alone. Both Elle and Vivian are way smarter than Warner, and yet the first half of the movie features the two women attempting to tear each other down. Vivian is arrogant, and Elle recalls the four hours her and Warner spent in a hot tub… What’s the point? Ultimately, none of them marries Warner, and the two girls become close friends, but the bitter taste that came with both women fighting and competing against each other just to be someone’s wife continues to linger.
