From weepies to chick flicks download

Meanwhile, the point-of-view of the newborn boy is narrated through voice-over. PG min Comedy, Romance. Intertwining couples and singles in Los Angeles break-up and make-up based on the pressures and expectations of Valentine's Day. PG min Drama, Fantasy, Romance. When Bella Swan moves to a small town in the Pacific Northwest, she falls in love with Edward Cullen, a mysterious classmate who reveals himself to be a year-old vampire.

A political consultant tries to explain his impending divorce and past relationships to his year-old daughter. After finding love, Bridget Jones questions if she really has everything she'd ever dreamed of having.

R 97 min Comedy, Drama, Romance. Bridget Jones is determined to improve herself while she looks for love in a year in which she keeps a personal diary. Forty-something and single again, Bridget decides to focus on her job and surround herself with friends.

In a twist, she finds herself pregnant, but with one hitch - she can only be fifty percent sure of the identity of her baby's father. An Irish immigrant lands in s Brooklyn, where she quickly falls into a romance with a local. When her past catches up with her, however, she must choose between two countries and the lives that exist within. PG min Adventure, Family, Fantasy.

In a countryside town bordering on a magical land, a young man makes a promise to his beloved that he'll retrieve a fallen star by venturing into the magical realm. PG min Adventure, Drama, Family. When her father unexpectedly dies, young Ella finds herself at the mercy of her cruel stepmother and her scheming stepsisters.

Never one to give up hope, Ella's fortunes begin to change after meeting a dashing stranger. The story of a bride-to-be trying to find her real father told using hit songs by the popular s group ABBA. Mary Fiore is San Francisco's most successful supplier of romance and glamor. She knows all the tricks. She knows all the rules. But then she breaks the most important rule of all: she falls in love with the groom. A pushy boss forces her young assistant to marry her in order to keep her visa status in the U.

Five years after the events of Mamma Mia! Tania Modleski Tania Modleski. Oxford Academic. Google Scholar. Select Format Select format. Permissions Icon Permissions. Extract I think it was Playboy 's posting of the 10 worst chick flicks that clinched it for me—the decision to do a project on male weepies. And that is the point.

It is my contention that in Issue Section:. You do not currently have access to this article. Even today, film branding starts at the conception of a pitch and ends years after the theatrical release, when ancillary products have flooded the market, texts have been repurposed up and down the conglomerate food chain, and series, sequels, and spin-offs are in the pipeline. A critically lauded film is not noteworthy if it opens with a box office whimper.

Neither is a film that blows up on opening week- end, but does not have legs, secondary products, sequels, or tie-ins to back it up. With the box office affected by and managed in tandem with style and iconography, celebrity and star, music, fashion, and the entire global commercial complex, women's films have a chance in the new millennium to compete for success among the grosses and the rankings. Women's genres of yesteryear, forties' "weepies," seventies' romances, eighties' heroine action adventures and contemporary chick The Journal of Popular Culture, Vol.

The new women's blockbuster competes on bottom line and overnight has turned a genre filled with sleepers or domestic hits into global powerhouses. The new women's film is defined by a combination of elements of women's films from over the decades; for example, they continue to touch on topics of consumerism, romance, beauty, and escape; however, overriding this subject matter is a theme of validation.

In addition to a change in subject matter, this new genre is marketed in the same way that all blockbusters have been in the past: with spectacle aesthetics and a focus on ancillary marketing and foreign box office. Rather, they are advertised in a manner similar to Jaws , Independence Day , and Titanic and often compete with and eclipse male-driven, big-budget vehicles in their total earnings.

In , Mamma Mia! This new breed of women's giants may best be described as "women's blockbusters" and touted as the newest conglomerate trend; however, fat bottom lines and climbing industry rankings aside, they are, as yet, cited as neither.

Nevertheless, it is clear that the film industry is busy spinning female-driven narratives into gold. Whatever new front this indicates on the global filmic landscape, the study of the millennial women's blockbuster deserves careful con- sideration and adequate study among contemporary industry scholars.

History of Women's Films Movies have become more than stories; they connote lifestyles that foreign and domestic audiences both appreciate and aspire to. Nearly overnight, the commercial push of women's films has helped chick flicks move out of the niche project category and catapult up the grosses and the rankings.

In , the number of women-headlined movies among the top worldwide grossers is fifteen, including Mamma Mia! In , The Devil Wears Frada ranked twelfth on that list. Now, with a category of women's film consistently competing among the short list of sure-fire winners, not only is Hollywood's box office affected, but the way women's films are made and distributed are also impacted in two main ways.

First, films like Sweet Home Alabama , 13 Going on 30 , and Working Girl —one-offs that make a nice domestic run yet have no impact outside the text—do not represent the blockbuster-styled storyline and marketing package of Sex and the City or Mamma Mia!

In the future, films such as these may be bypassed in favor of women's films with franchise and ancillary marketing potential. Second, in synergizing the theme, aesthetics, and marketing of global women's hits, the texts themselves have changed.

No longer sad or complicated storylines that appeal to a domestic few, today's women's blockbuster present a focused package of image, ad- vertising, and text beyond the chick flick audience of 18 —year-old heterosexual women.

Therefore, such films appeal to a wide demo- graphic that brings older and younger heterosexual women, lesbians and gays, heterosexual men, and transnational viewers together to transform what was once a small domestic following into a large, sutured, global audience.

Like blockbusters of all genres, millennial women's blockbusters adhere to certain characteristics that mold them into success cases. First, women's blockbusters are high concept. Their storylines can be summed up in single sentences that easily translate across cultures and borders. Second, they offer a millennial women's theme of validation, physically reaffirming this message in product placements, commercial tie-ins, cross-promotions, and the general culture of consumerism that is shepherded around these projects.

Third, women's blockbusters, like all high-concept commodities, need only be tweaked with a shift in emphasis or attached to a different star to be refashioned into novel vehicles over and over again. However, the real drive behind the success of this category of women's films is a new push in the direction of ancillary marketing and foreign box office. By marketing them as blockbusters from their conception, the women's films of today offer something beyond story; that is, they offer a millennial-themed 6 Ashley Elaine York narrative together with blockbuster aesthetics and a global marketing complex that drive them to newfound levels of success.

In addition, the new women's blockbuster stands differentiated from women's films of the past in the various components included in its recipe for success. It is nevertheless important to look at the historical significance of the films that preceded it, as many successful elements have been borrowed or updated from the past.

Hollywood first mar- keted films to women consumers in the s with the advent of the Women's Film. These "weepies," movies such as Mildred Fierce , Letter from an Unknown Woman , and Now Voyager , evolved as a marketing strategy and a tie-in to consumerism. Meant to inspire the material ambitions of a generation just past two world wars and the Great Depression, these films symbolized the possibility of a better life, but on the backs of a class of women positioned and represented as either afflicted or that of self-sacrificing mothers, leaving little room for women protagonists no less women consumers to negotiate space out- side the categories of wife, mother, and victim.

Within thirty years, newfound economic promise, the "free love" generation, and the women's liberation movement encouraged Hollywood to take a turn toward the romantic, and the prime-time soap opera was born, first with ABC's Peyton Place and in the s with many successful series, including Dallas, Dynasty, Knot's Landing, and Falcon Crest.

In the s and early s, female action-adventure heroines moved droves of women to the box office. But Titanic , the number one grossing film of all time, changed Hollywood and the complexion of the women's film forever. The mix of narrative style, thematic elements, spec- tacle aesthetics, and concentrated effort on the franchise is an approach to women's film that was not conceived of before that time.

Hence- forth, the success of Titanic would serve as an indicator to Hollywood of the true potential of the franchised women's picture. After Titanic, Hollywood dabbled in creating a new formula. Setting the dramatic category to the side, Hollywood's initial attempts at turn- ing chick flicks into mainstream hits met with only lukewarm success. Even though each of these films met with limited franchise success, Legally Blonde is one of the first chick flicks built around a limited franchise and also one of the first to break free of a niche style of Hollywood production.

In contrast to the women's films of the past, Legally Blonde put forth the theme of wish fulfillment. As part of its positive message, it conveyed a theme that anyone could achieve Elle Wood's level of success.

The movie, nevertheless, fell short of becoming a blockbuster. Thus, when the potential sitcom was dropped from its television development deal, the fate of Legally Blonde was sealed. Although Legally Blonde did not become a women's blockbuster, it is noteworthy that by , four years after Titanic, the chick flick had gone mainstream and done well at least domestically.

In Film Theory Goes to the Movies, industry scholar Tom Schatz describes the qualities that turn feature films into mass market successes. These blockbuster hits are, for better or worse, what the New Hollywood is about, and thus are the necessary starting point for any analysis of contemporary American Cinema" 10— With the success of precursors Titanic and Legally Blonde, today's chick flicks have the potential to go beyond even Schatz's imaginings and turn mainstream hits into global box office sensations.

In a constantly evolving industry, in which power has shifted to the dealmakers who can package talent around individual projects on a film-by-film basis, blockbusters of any genre—women's or otherwise—are the "mainstream" films of the future.

The Women's Film Incorporates Blockbuster Elements One of the tenets of filmmaking in the new millennial Hollywood is spending more and more money on fewer and fewer films, thereby 8 Ashley Elaine York requiring big budget features to recoup not only their costs but also the outlay of the studio's flops. Hollywood has long evolved past the film text as the sole resource necessary in the war over box office; more than any other ingredient today, the key to global success is the fran- chise.

This essay argues that the twenty-first- century women's film is the women's blockbuster, and that it pro- foundly impacts the infrastructure of which Hayes and Bing speak.

Any assessment of contemporary entertainment should take into con- sideration this new category as a change agent to both millennial women's pictures and the current Hollywood industry. The millennial women's blockbuster contains three key character- istics that set it apart from women's films of the past. First, its story is high concept, and its narrative is easy to translate. Additionally, it offers a theme not of affliction or of sadness or even primarily of romance, but rather of affirmation that viewers too can "have it all.

Finally, there is a newfound focus on the franchise. Like the male-dominated power- houses to come before, women's blockbusters also maximize potential ancillary marketing efforts, from the soundtrack to the foreign box office, in order to gain more momentum and develop an infrastructure that reaches further and wider to lure potential moviegoers the world over and thus increase the total lifetime intake of the franchise. Three key characteristics define this new women's blockbuster and thereby set it apart from the various women's genres that came before.

First and foremost, women's blockbusters are high-concept vehicles. From Jaws to Titanic to Sex and the City, Hollywood has utilized the strategy encapsulated as "the look, the hook, and the book" to market and sell franchises the world over.

In characterizing the difference be- tween these and other Hollywood films, industry scholar Justin Wyatt writes, "High concept films are differentiated within the marketplace through an emphasis on style and through integration with their marketing" The image, narrative, and advertising are conceived, pitched, and marketed in one fell swoop: in a single-sentence catch- phrase that easily translates among cultures and across borders.

And, finally, the Sex and the City TV series is such a well-known commodity that simply describing the movie version as "where Sex and the City meets one of the Dreamgirls" would amply describe the logline to Carrie Bradshaw fans at every port.

In addition to high-concept storytelling, women's blockbusters rely on genre and story elements that have immediate and wide-reaching appeal. For example, Mamma Mia! The Devil Wears Prada interweaves two genres i. Sex and the City is tied into consum- erism. Thus, when mixed with a dash of slapstick humor reminiscent of screwball comedies past, this millennial women's blockbuster out of New Hollywood produces an explosive recipe of hybrid-genre success.

Further, the global setting of all three of the texts discussed herein is also appealing. And it feels. This is even the key to his strength: if the super hero is so unique, we are told, it is thanks to his ability since childhood, despite being ridiculed masculine, to stand alone.

Spider-Man: No Way Home fans have been waiting for this sequel, and yes , there is no deviation from the foul language, parody, cheesy one liners, hilario Spider-Man: No Way Home one liners, action, laughter, tears and yes, drama!