Hi, this is in reference to the tags in your recent post about the Pixar news. Since it's in the tags rather than the post itself I felt it more appropriate to do a direct ask than to take away from the post by asking on the post itself.
Could you please elaborate on the culture of misogyny that led to Brave? If you don't feel like it, could you please point me in the right direction of where I can read more about it?
Unless I've misunderstood you, my understanding was Brave was an attempt to centre the conversation on women's autonomy and a reaction against the woman-as-prize narrative. There's an argument for how successful that was, but my understanding was the movie was made in good faith.
None of this is to argue with or against you, I'm asking out of a genuine desire to know more about it.
I'd be happy to elaborate! I was referring to the troubled production that went behind Brave, which I talked about on here from a similar ask. There's loads of links for further reading on the culture of misogyny that Lasseter era Pixar cultivated, and how it resulted in the firing of their first female director: Brenda Chapman.
But the tldr is; Brave was the original pitch of Brenda Chapman. It was sold as a fairytale story inspired by Chapman's relationship with her daughter. Chapman may be listed as the co-director of Brave in the final product because it's her pitch, but she was ousted from her own project and replaced with Mark Andrews.
In an interview Andrews gave about the changes he made to overhaul Chapman's story (an article filled with pictures of men collaborating and practicing archery together, nary a woman in sight might I add), he talks about the firing like it's a normal occurrence. "every film goes through this and we've had director changes here before, so it's not new." The interviewer comments that this seemed like a very public case of a directional change. And Andrews response was:
"Yeah, because of whatever the hype is with all of the firsts that this film had. But you know, Pixar will do what is necessary to guarantee that the films that come out of here just have a fantastic story."
He's so nonchalant about how bad it looks to have the first female director replaced by a man in a story about her relationship with her daughter.
It really shows in the final film, where there are occasional glimmers of that heartfelt woman-led project, and the frat bro boy's club energy of Pixar that took over it once she was fired. Andrews explained that his overhaul of Chapman's story involved putting more focus on Merida and her mom along with streamlining the magical elements that were "affecting the environment". And while that might sound like a good call at first, I think it took away from what Chapman's intention was.
Brave wants to be a story about women finding autonomy that is robbed of them under misogyny. It wants to be a fairytale about changing the status quo so that your fate doesn't lie in being an object married off and passed between men. But how can you tell this story when your company just ousted the very woman who wanted that kind of change to happen?
Simple! Put all the onus and authority of bigotry and control on to Merida's mom, Eleanor the Queen. Portray every man as a bumbling, well meaning idiot who needs to be led by a woman to be competent. It'll look flattering to girls if we do that. I personally think this is what Andrews meant by putting more focus between Merida and Eleanor. By placing all the flaws of sexist society on the Queen who just needed to change her mind to reverse all misogynistic tradition, the story seems like it has more focus to Andrews.
I can only wonder what context is missing from Chapman's original pitch. Eleanor mentions having reservations about marrying King Fergus at first. Is there some kind of generational issue with her own mom? Something we actually get to see demonstrated in the woman-led film Turning Red?
Men are never shown to enforce misogyny. They're just kind of like lost confused children who play along with the rules because that's how it's always been. If anything, they think Eleanor could use a chill pill. King Fergus gifts Merida a bow because he believes everyone should know how to fend for themselves. He serves as the mediator between Eleanor and Merida's conflict. Despite being the literal king himself he shouts "none of you are fit to marry my daughter!" to the suitors near the end of the film, but he needed permission from his wife to break tradition I guess. The only moment the king exhibits control is to lock Merida in a room so he can kill a bear. It's an out of character moment because most of the characters in this film run on plot device energy.
Part of Andrews' streamlining of Chapman's worldbuilding seems to be that he turned everything into a mechanical plot device. At least this is how I interpret his streamlining of characters, magic and environment. The magical wisps in the final film are just directional plot devices that tell our characters "the story needs to happen! Go here!". The only other 2 women in this story are The Witch who gives Merida the transformation spell and Maudie the comic relief woman with big boobies. They're not characters with themes and relationships, but plot devices designed to make the plot happen.
Merida's 3 forgettable triplet brothers? Plot devices that help Merida escape the castle twice. Once to sneak out Bear Eleanor and then to rescue her from her father's out of pocket imprisonment of her. These brothers feel like a later addition. Without voice acting, they exist like animal sidekicks because they eventually turn into bear cubs themselves. But they have no thematic relationships with anyone. We get an offhand mention that they can do whatever they want compared to Merida. But the Pixar guys did something clever. They made the brothers little kids. It's a Boys Will Be Boys moment instead of something that could've potentially talked about how even a younger brother to the princess would have more agency over his life than she does. Not that it would work in this final film, since Merida was armed with a bow since she was a child.
The Pixar guys saw how Disney's Cinderella had a climax involving Cinderella being locked in her room and rescued by her animal friends and said "what if we took that whimsically tense rescue mission and made it into a comedic scene where 3 little boys harass a woman with big boobs". Are you telling me Merida's freedom hinged on her little brother diving headfirst into a woman's breasts to retrieve the key she put in her cleavage. With the camera diving first-person into her boobs for full comedic effect? Can you tell this movie has been taken over by frat boy culture. For Cinderella, her rescue is driven by the pathos of her kindness towards the animals. For Merida, her rescue is driven by nothing.
To bring this back to the movie's conversation about female agency, Brave feels so mean spirited and half baked. They awkwardly decontextualize how political Merida's resistance to betrothal is (since marriage is a political act of peace keeping between clans) with "You're the queen, you can just tell the lords, 'the princess is not ready for this. In fact, she might not ever be ready' [...] so we expect your declarations of war in the morning!" from Merida's non-conformity and "Legends are lessons" from Eleanor's enforcement of the status quo.
I remember finding Eleanor and Merida's bonding via survival and fishing to be so awkward and half baked. This isn't Freaky Friday 2003 where Mother and Daughter get actual understanding and self discovery. Merida and her mom just... had a nice time when Eleanor is unable to speak. It wasn't until years later when the Me Too movement got people to speak up about misogyny at Pixar did it all click for me.
Brenda Chapman was considered difficult to work with, unconfident and indecisive to the culture of Pixar. And now we have her representative analog in the story experience growth only if she learned to shut up and be looser with the rules. They try to show balance with Merida learning to take responsibility in fixing a spell her selfishness caused- but her selfish non-conformity was never the actual problem. And why would it be? It's a justifiable selfish desire for liberation. If only the other woman in charge of her oppression would just chill out. Men are fine though, they're too dumb to be capable of anything harmful.
That's how the misogyny of Pixar was able to have it's bear-transformation cake and eat it too. They got to market their feminist fairytale on top of firing the person who would've been their first female director and shit all over her pitch. The film can't help but wear its troubled production on its sleeve. It's 2 movies fighting for dominance. The result of which laid the ground work for "we can make something conservative sell well if we decorate it with seemingly progressive elements" just pay no attention to the men behind the curtain.
