According to multiple reviews on the film—such as this one, and this one, and this one—the answer is undoubtedly yes.
Ignoring the film’s many transgressions (such as being incredibly racist, uncomfortably awkward, tactlessly self-promoting, overall offensive to watch, one of the worst 2015 films, etc…), Pitch Perfect 2 does contain well-written female characters (minus the one-note stereotypes) played by solid actors. My argument, however, is Pitch Perfect 2 isn’t a feminist film, but rather a female focused film. But what exactly is a female focused film, and how does it differ from a feminist film? For starters, let’s actually define what the term feminism means. Feminism, as defined by the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, means, “The theory of the political, economic, and social equality of the sexes.” Oxford defines feminism as, “The advocacy of women’s rights on the grounds of political, social, and economic equality to men.” The key word here, in both definitions, is equality—nothing on single gender superiority, or a need for inequity between sexes, but a fair balance in equal rights between males and females. The irony here, is how the principle of equality I’m discussing is the very one that both definitions leave out: culture. And while there’s no unanimous term for feminism in media, it most likely works similarly to the other three principles: a fair balance between male and female portrayals regarding quantity (stability between gender cast numbers), character (both genders being well-written and portrayed), role (both genders being fairly presented in primary and secondary parts) and importance to plot (how much both genders matter to the storyline).
When examining the film, Pitch Perfect 2 doesn’t meet any of these requirements. Excluding cameos and one-scene wonders, the film has double the female to male ratio, with fourteen females and seven males—making balanced quantity immediately out. Out of the seven males noted, three are one-note joke characters, three are supporting love interests, and one (Keegan-Michael Key) plays the comical boss character for the protagonist’s subplot—meaning balanced character, role, and importance can also be crossed off. Pitch Perfect 2 is anything but feminist—it is, however, a female focused film: a film that focuses primarily on a female cast of characters. A female focused film may have male characters, but features them less in terms of quality, character, role, and/or importance to plot. A film can even have a strong male character as its protagonist, yet still be female focused if the remaining cast is imbalanced towards a significant amount of female roles. The same concepts apply to male focused films (only with the genders switched)—in fact, a good way to check if some form of media is either feminist or male/female focused is to mentally reverse its gender roles. If Pitch Perfect 2 was about a male a cappella team going to the world championship with supporting female love-interests, the film would obviously not be considered feminist—so why then should the reverse imbalance be considered so?
A recent film that is an actual example of feminism is Mad Max: Fury Road. Now, at first this doesn’t seem to be the case: the film starts off with a primarily male cast, male protagonist, male antagonist, and a single woman (Furiosa) who appears to be playing the token action female trope. Yet as the film progresses, the focused cast of characters become much more gender balanced: introducing the smuggled five wives, and then later the badass, female-only Vuvalini clan. Take into account Furiosa’s character development, in addition to becoming as much the protagonist, if not more, than Max himself, and the R-rated action film becomes an unexpected balance between gender quantity, character, role and importance to plot.
An ideal example to use when differentiating between feminist and female focused media is The Legend of Korra series. The series has four seasons total; the first season (known as Book 1: Air) features a strong female lead, along with several well-written, female secondary characters. Nonetheless, the first season consists primarily of a male cast, which includes the protagonist’s mentor, antagonist, best friend, and love interest—making Book 1: Air a male-centric story featuring several strong females. Jump to season three (Book 3: Change) and the series’s diversity changes a lot: featuring a larger female cast with more prominent roles—such as female villains, an upgraded female role from minor to important secondary, subplots revolving around female cast, both a new female mentor and best friend for the protagonist, and overall better writing for the female characters. Book 3: Change is a prime example of feminist media: featuring balanced quantity, character, role and importance between male and female cast. Season four (Book 4: Balance) ironically imbalances the story from a being feminist to a female focused plot. Try and name another TV show or season (other than Book 4: Balance) that features: a female protagonist, female antagonist, female mentor, female best friend, and female love interest. I have yet to find another show to complete such feat.
While many would agree a story should thrive to create a feminist plot balanced between strong male and female roles, there is, and I cannot emphasize this enough, nothing wrong with stories featuring a male or female focused cast as long as said story is well-written. Perhaps a writer feels inexperienced about writing the opposite gender and doesn’t want to create poorly written characters. Maybe the story’s focus is centered on a specific gender, or its setting makes adding opposite gender cast difficult (such as a monk monastery or female-only college). Is it better to force in opposite gender characters for the sake of equality, or naturally write a story as originally conceived? There have been hundreds of male-centered stories in the past that are considered the greatest ever made; likewise, in recent years, there’s been an upsurge in great female-centered stories. Several great female focused films have released in 2015 alone, two which made my top ten of the year. Would it not be hypocritical to hold well-made, male-centric films at fault, yet praise well-made, female-centric films? Some will say no, possibly referring to the imbalance cinema has had over a century of filmmaking. I say yes, however—a well-written story is a well-written story regardless of its focus on gender, race, and/or sexuality. Nonetheless, I will more than enthusiastically praise any media for well-written, progressive ideals, including both feminist and female focused films that are slowly, yet surely, closing the gap regarding cinematic gender inequality.
In Part II, I’ll unveil 20 films that made 2015 the strongest female year in at least a decade!
