Calling for a Boycott of Warner Bros. (Films)

[25 O'Clock]

Nikki Finke reported this on her blog. As I've mentioned at dd female writer gatherings, I have myself experienced blatant sexism as a female screenwriter... we're talking A-list female producers rejecting my material b/c it had a female lead (this is when her top exec loved the piece). Oh, and the producer is known for producing one of the top rom com's of the 90's. Nice! Is everyone gonna put up with this crap!?
Warner's Robinov Bitchslaps Film Women; Gloria Allred Calls For Warner's Boycott

This comes to me from three different producers, so I know it's real: Warner Bros president of production Jeff Robinov has made a new decree that "We are no longer doing movies with women in the lead". This Neanderthal thinking comes after both Jodie Foster's The Brave One (even though she's had big recent hits with Flightplan and Panic Room) and Nicole Kidman's The Invasion (as if three different directors didn't have something to do with the awfulness of the gross receipts) under-performed at the box office recently. "Can you imagine when Gloria Allred gets hold of this? It's going to be like World War III," one producer just told me. (I put in a call to Glo, who comments below.) Of course, Warner Bros has always been male-centric in its movies. But now the official policy as expressly articulated by Robinov is that a male has to be the lead of every pic made. I'm told he doesn't even want to see a script with a woman in the primary position (which now is apparently missionary at WB). Oh yeah, the fact that so many Warner Bros movies have been sucking at the box office for the last two years is all the fault of females. (Then again, Robinov's poorly performing Superman Returns was criticized for its girlie-man portrayal of the superhero.) As regular readers of my own box office reports know, chick flicks haven't been doing well at the box office lately. But Robinov's statements aren't about women's movies as a genre, they're anti Hollywood actresses. Besides, neither The Brave One nor The Invasion were classic chick flicks, either. "It's a phenomenal thing to say. What are we in the 1700s where women are back to being barefoot and pregnant?" a producer railed. "What's next -- fire all the Warner Bros women executives?"

[cvolante]

Am I mistaken or are these the people that own the rights to Wonder Woman?

Lovely.

[kintnerboy]

Sorry, but I’m not going to boycott anything. Nikki Finke doesn’t give a rat’s ass about women in Hollywood. If she did, she would use her blog to promote films by female writers, directors and actors. But she doesn’t, because that doesn’t drive traffic to her site (which is all she really cares about).

I remember the last time Warner Bros was the target of protests. It was when they released Million Dollar Baby. They were being boycotted by groups opposed to euthanasia.

The funny thing is there was another film released the same week as MDB (called The Sea Inside) which dealt with the exact same subject. No one boycotted that movie, because it wasn’t a big enough film to get the protesters names in the paper (again, this is all they care about. Attention and momentary fame).

I’ll continue to do my part by going out to see quality films made by women. And ignoring Nikki’s blog.

[grapeape]

That is a great point!

Also, I smell a rat on this one. It is just too stupid to believe. He's denied that he said it several times. Sounds like a smear campaign to me.

[SCanfield]

Originally Posted by kintnerboy

Sorry, but I’m not going to boycott anything. Nikki Finke doesn’t give a rat’s ass about women in Hollywood. If she did, she would use her blog to promote films by female writers, directors and actors. But she doesn’t, because that doesn’t drive traffic to her site (which is all she really cares about).

I remember the last time Warner Bros was the target of protests. It was when they released Million Dollar Baby. They were being boycotted by groups opposed to euthanasia.

The funny thing is there was another film released the same week as MDB (called The Sea Inside) which dealt with the exact same subject. No one boycotted that movie, because it wasn’t a big enough film to get the protesters names in the paper (again, this is all they care about. Attention and momentary fame).

I’ll continue to do my part by going out to see quality films made by women. And ignoring Nikki’s blog.

Exactly. Rabinov may be a moron for expressing his thoughts in such blatant terms, but it's not like he's saying "women are horrible", he's saying "our pictures with women in the lead aren't making money".

Hell, if there was a hot streak of movies about paraplegics making hundreds of millions of dollars, and then one day 6 in a row tank, he would probably make the same type of stupid comment saying "no more movies about wheelchairs" and get some group all riled up. However, studios make these same decisions all the time, pretty soon they are going to stop making films about Iraq, because they're doing so poorly. That doesn't mean they're anti-Iraq, it just means they aren't making the money they want to make.

I agree it was a stupid thing to say, but I'm sure they've made similar decisions before, they just didn't have anyone open their big fat mouths about it.

[wcmartell]

I think the guy may be a moron, but he's making a business decision based on facts. FLIGHTPLAN and PANIC ROOM were *not* hits - they did okay, but I don't think either broke $100 million (and that's the average cost of a flick after marketing).

Now, I think FLIGHTPLAN was a mess - it began as a terrorist hijacking script and got turned into a Jodie Foster movie... and BRAVE ONE just plain sucked. That film would have flopped with a male lead, too.

I think (as usual) the problem is the suits are looking at what the flops have in common and not seeing that they are bad films, only seeing that they starred women. But suits do that. They see the creative stuff as magic, instead of understanding the craft.

You know what INVASION and BRAVE ONE had in common? Both were genre films that tried to be arty (in the most pretentious way) and forgot to supply the genre juice. So they ended up boring, pretentious crap. Both were "soft".

Like I said in some other thread - I though it was funny that he made this comment the week that a female lead action film was #1 at the box office.

- Bill

[wcmartell]

The Matrix.

[Trutopian]

What about Cate Blanchett in ELIZABETH: THE GOLDEN AGE? The woman is in almost every scene! Certainly seems like at least one actress CAN carry a film.