Gloria Steinem: Women Have ‘Chick Flicks.’ What About Men?

NY Times ^ | March 2, 2017 | Gloria Steinman

[C19fan]

I was on a flight from New York to Seattle recently when a long delay on the tarmac prompted the airline to offer us a free movie. As the flight attendant read the choices aloud, a young man across the aisle said, “I don’t watch chick flicks!”

I knew what he meant, and so did the woman sitting next to me. A “chick flick” is one that has more dialogue than car chases, more relationships than special effects, and whose suspense comes more from how people live than from how they get killed.

I wasn’t challenging his preference, but I did question the logic of his term. After all, much of what we read as great literature in school may well have been called “chick lit,” especially if it had been written by women.

[Senator Goldwater]

I don’t mind chick flicks, as long as they make out.

[angryoldfatman]

Eddie Izzard said it pretty well I thought.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjC3R6jOtUo

[OttawaFreeper]

Oh my, certainly not a chick flick but written by a woman. BTW, that movie is celebrating it’s 40th anniversary.

[bigbob]

We have porn. And football.

[Hat-Trick]

Amen. If I could give one word of advice to the young men out there - marry a girl who likes hockey, especially playoff hockey. You’ll never have to worry about fighting over the remote when The Bachelor comes on.

[AnotherUnixGeek]

A “chick flick” is one that has more dialogue than car chases, more relationships than special effects, and whose suspense comes more from how people live than from how they get killed.

That also describes "Chinatown" and "Raging Bull", which are most definitely not chick flicks - they are films for grown men. The problem is that Hollywood doesn't make movies for men anymore. It makes movies for women - Steinem's "chick flicks" - and it makes movies for physical and mental adolescents based on comic books. The latter consist of fantasies full of explosions, special effects and heroic girls who are magically able to beat up men twice their size. I'm not sure what Steinem doesn't like among those two categories.

[PapaBear3625]

Maeve Binchy, Sue Grafton, Agatha Christy, Anne Rynd, Anne Rice, Harper Lee, need I go on?

There's also Mary Shelly, author of "Frankenstein". The book might qualify as "chick lit". At it's core, it's about a very intelligent person (in the book, "the Monster" is smart and literate) being upset over being unattractive. You can tell a woman wrote it.

[rhoda_penmark]

Two words:

Gladiator movies.

[Gamecock]

[CaptainK]

Meathead didn’t write the funny lines. The great screenwriter William Goldman did.

[Red Badger]

We have ‘chick-flicks’, too!
Deep Throat, Debbie Does Dallas, etc...............

[Red Badger]

GMTA!...............

[CaptainK]

I’ll throw in Edith Wharton.

[NewHampshireDuo]

Every now and then Mrs NHD catches a chick flick on the Hallmark channel. We chuckle at the plot line which is always the same:
1. Girl has serious relationship with a guy but something is wrong.
2. Some other guy shows up in town.
3. Girl takes interest in other guy and things start to get serious.
4. Doubt creeps in and girl goes back to first guy.
5. Not to worry, it’s only momentary.
6. Girl dumps first guy and goes back to new guy.
7. They get married and live happily ever after.

[wbill]

Mrs WBill was watching one of those women's channels awhile back. I walked in, saw what she was doing, and asked, "So.....is it a terminal disease, or an abusive husband?"

She threw a pillow at me. Turned out, it was both.

[PLMerite]

“True Lies.” Arnold kills lots of people with gratuitous violence and Jamie Lee Curtis dances around in her underwear. The perfect movie.

[mywholebodyisaweapon]

You owe me a new keyboard! ;)

LOL!

[thulldud]

I do have my NHL bench clearing brawls 1977 to 1984 compilation on VHS, as well as ones of New York Rangers fights 1978 to about 1982 or Boston Bruins 1968 to 1982, both also on VHS.

All that and a little ice hockey too!

[Bubba_Leroy]

Sam Baldwin: Well I’m not looking for a mail-order bride! I just want somebody I can have a decent conversation with over dinner. Without it falling down into weepy tears over some movie!
Greg: She’s, as you just saw, very emotional.
Sam Baldwin: Although I cried at the end of “the Dirty Dozen.”
Greg: Who didn’t?
Sam Baldwin: Jim Brown was throwing these hand grenades down these airshafts. And Richard Jaeckel and Lee Marvin
[Begins to cry]
Sam Baldwin: were sitting on top of this armored personnel carrier, dressed up like Nazis...
Greg: [Crying too] Stop, stop!
Sam Baldwin: And Trini Lopez...
Greg: Yes, Trini Lopez!
Sam Baldwin: He busted his neck while they were parachuting down behind the Nazi lines...
Greg: Stop.
Sam Baldwin: And Richard Jaeckel - at the beginning he had on this shiny helmet...
Greg: [Crying harder] Please no more. Oh God! I loved that movie.

Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

[Brooklyn Attitude]

Chick flicks are movies where women talk about their feelings, and other boring stuff.