Posted on 09/15/2018 5:58:16 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Paul Feig, director of 2016’s female-led Ghostbusters reboot, says the movie was caught in the same misogynistic “vortex” as then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.
“I have been dying for somebody to look at Hillary Clinton’s campaign and us, because we were caught in the exact same vortex,” Feig told The Telegraph when speaking about new Anna Kendrick and Blake Lively mystery-thriller A Simple Favor.
“It was shocking. I still think about it a lot, honestly — sometimes I’m like, ‘OK, stop thinking about it.’ Because I’m really proud of the movie, and while people still send me mean things, overwhelmingly more people tell me they love it.”
Feig said the film has since inspired young women to enter into scientific fields, most pointing to nuclear engineer specialist and inventor Jillian Holtzmann, played by Saturday Night Live standout Kate McKinnon.
“Parents and their children, women in their 20s and 30s who were inspired to go into science, or are in love with Kate McKinnon,” he said. “But I definitely felt like we were the icebreaker going through the Arctic. People weren’t yet used to the idea that this could happen.”
The director, who waged a real-life battle on online trolls who harassed both himself and his cast before and after production on the controversial re-imagining, separates Ghostbusters fans, a.k.a. Ghostheads — “the ones who have clubs where they dress up, do all this charity work, the most amazing people” — from those who lashed out at the reboot with venomous misogyny.
“It ignited these passions that were already around because Trump was stirring them up,” Feig said. “I think these guys felt they were losing control.”
Its villain — Rowan (Neil Casey), a perennially-bullied bellhop-turned-occultist who sought to bring about an apocalypse as result of his seething hatred for all of humanity — was viewed by some as an in-universe take on the real-life vitriol-spewing type of troll, but Feig said the character was always envisioned as a God’s Lonely Man type “because that’s always the most dangerous guy in the world.”
Feig believes the Clinton-versus-Trump match and Trump’s eventual ascendancy to the presidency helped push along the fall of ousted Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein and ushered in the #MeToo movement, which sees women stand up and speak out against sexual harassment and assault in the movie-making industry.
“Because the misogyny out there was in everybody’s face,” he said. “It was this boiling cauldron of so many contributing factors that made women go ‘Enough,’ thank God.”
Ghostbusters scared up a mixed-to-positive response from critics and a tepid response from audiences, pulling in just $229 million worldwide on a $144 million-plus budget — likely dashing Feig’s hopes for a sequel. He said previously the movie was hampered by it taking on a second life as “a cause,” saying the movie “was only supposed to be there to entertain people.”
No, man, your movie just plain sucked.
I actually watched it on the internet.
Not even funny.
Oh BS - this stupid idiot refuses to take responsibility that his movie SUCKED that he hyped the misogynist angle to cover up his lack of talent and/or to pull good performances out of his actors and to try to at least draw an activist audience to cover the cost of production.
It failed on ALL ATTEMPTS.
It’s an awful movie that doesn’t understand the source material let alone all the traditional ghost hunting/paranormal movies out there to begin with. Worse - it’s NOT funny.
But please, continue to double and triple down. Maybe, like Al Gore, you can keep blaming your failures on imaginary ghosts.
The Ghostbusters reboot with a female cast was unnecessary.
Hillary is also unnecessary, but more to the point, she is an unindicted criminal. Feig is an ass to want to draw equivalence between the two.
And they didn't know it wasn't funny or they wouldn't have made it.
It's not just misogyny. Many male comedians just aren't that funny either.
Examples: Tom Arnold and Andy Kaufman.
He said previously the movie was hampered by it taking on a second life as “a cause,” saying the movie “was only supposed to be there to entertain people.”
Please you and the studio Played this film up as a “cause”, that was core to its marketing. To claim it just got caught up in it is a flat out lie.
Nothing to do with misogyny. People hate reboots, especially reboots of great movies.....just leave it alone! Who cares that you’re replacing women instead of men in Ghostbusters. This made be less likely to see the movie because you tried a political gimmick...”let’s get more women”....I just wanted a good movie, not a gimmick and it sucked anyway even with the women in major roles
The Ghostbusters Gals sold 20% of our Uranium Supply to Russia and also left four Brave Americans to die in Benghazi?
Who knew???
I am a woman and I am fed up with women getting accolades/support simply for being a woman. I had friends asking me why I wouldn’t vote for Hillary, as she is a woman. I told them I always vote for the best person for the job. I don’t care about any identity politics.o
I liked Latka Gravis in Taxi.
Paul Feig shames and blames like a woman.
I watched the original Ghostbusters as therapy after watching the garbage sequel that this dip**** made.
This dreadful remake was tremendously unfunny. That is the summary in a nutshell.
Bad humorless comedy. No viewers. Buck up…you made a craptacular movie.
Yeah, the reason people don’t like Hillary is because she’s a woman. Wait, Hillary’s a woman?
Well, Hitler’s campaign and his movie DID have something in common: they both sucked.
Nothing to do with misogeny
The 80s cartoon was rather good.
OHMIGAWD. Sexism, racism, misogyny, is there anything that just stands on it own to be judged totally objectively? Mr Feig, you made a lousy movie, a bad movie. Now some bad movies, even atrociously bad movies, still make a lot of money (hey I rewatched Flash Dance the other night. Now that was a piece of garbage, but it made a ton of money). Your remake of Ghostbusters, however, was a bad movie that didn't make any money. Accept it and in the future, make better movies.
I dont recall John Ford or Howard Hawks or William Wyler ever saying one of their flicks bombed because of some external -ism. When they made a bad flick they admitted it.
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