Portrayal Of Women On Screen Disturbing: Jessica Chastain

As Jessica Chastain completed her time as a jury member at Cannes, she exited by making a statement. Movies have been known to have male leads, and very few female-centric stories. Jessica watched 20 movies in 10 days and said that she found her discovery quite “disturbing”. In a press conference she commented,

“The one thing I really took away from this experience is how the world views women, from the female characters that I saw represented and it was quite disturbing to me to be honest”

When the press conference was viewed by the public, she was much lauded on twitter for making this statement. She urged filmmakers to portray more female characters and told the jury to include more female films by female filmmakers. She added, “I hope when we include female storytellers, they will be more like the women I know in my day-to-day life. They are proactive, have their own point of view and don’t just react to men around them.”

The Zero-Dark Thirty star has also always been vocal about the gender pay gap in Hollywood. She doesn’t accept any job unless she knows how much her male co-stars are making.

Jessica’s comments came after Sofie Coppola won Best Director at Cannes for her film “The Beguiled”. Coppola is only the second woman ever to win the award. This blatant discrimination and gender pay gap is not only present in Hollywood but is pretty evident in Bollywood movies as well.

Bollywood movies definitely need more strong women characters so that when girls watch these movies, they are inspired by the women acting

Instead, we have misogynist and sexist content that is making matters worse. Even though the problem is evident in both Hollywood and Bollywood, Bollywood definitely needs to learn a lot more about women from Hollywood.

Pic credits: Image Magazine

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