On Friday, July 15th, I had every intention of spending my night watching the new "Ghostbusters" movies. And, of course, I did. Before seeing this movie I saw many mixed reviews of good and bad. A lot of the bad reviews included "man hating", "useless male characters", "the only evil characters were men", etc. Going into the movie, I had a neutral view. With watching any reboot or sequel, you definitely have to go in having already lowered expectations. But through the bad views, I was still excited to see the reboot/sequel of a movie series I really enjoy (mostly because of Bill Murray).
Now, what I want to talk about is not a movie review. I don't need to discuss the CGI, the scientific dialogue, the acting abilities shown or even the comedy (no matter how much I genuinely laughed). I want to talk about the feeling "Ghostbusters" gave me. Regardless of the anticipation I felt before seeing and during this movie, I smiled the entire time. At first, I thought my smiling was from the movie. I thought it was from my laughter and joy of finally seeing this movie. I have been waiting since the first trailer. I also thought a lot of my smiles were from the actresses who I've enjoyed for years.
It wasn't until the end of the movie that I realized what a majority of my smiles were from. Female. Characters. I know! Crazy. But it wasn't just because seeing female characters do cool things and being science nerds showed me that I, as a female, can also be a cool science nerd. But my smiles were from their characters characteristics. Crazy.
What "Ghostbusters" made me think about for the next 48 hours and continuing was that female characters, and any characters in general, can have dimensions. Women don't always need to be the sexy, but ditzy girls that just want to get married. And just the same goes for men. Men don't always need to be the hot, toned man that gets the sexy woman and saves the day with guns and other forms of violence. Seeing Chris Hemsworth as the ditzy secretary caused a good portion of my laughter, but also made me think about how lazily we write characters and how people wouldn't be so outraged if he was probably a female (sad, yet true).
What I took from "Ghostbusters" was more than a good reboot and a good night of laughs. "Ghostbusters" made me realize that we don't always need our stereotypes and gender roles. Girls can be science geeks and boys can be hot and stupid. Well rounded and well written characters is what we need. Now and forever.
(Lastly, the movie was pretty good. I give it a 7-7.5/10! You should totally go see it.)
