By how much male roles dominate Hollywood movies?

This statistical analysis of Hollywood movie's dialogue is very interesting:

https://pudding.cool/2017/03/film-dialogue/

So instance, in 80% of this set of 2,000 popular Hollywood movies over the past 30 years, men have more than 60% of all lines spoken.

Interesting study thanks for posting the link. I had a hard time reading the page as it responded odd with my browser. I gues that page uses floating frames? It made it impossible for me to read...so I can't commit on all of it. So I'll focus on this:

60/40% split between male and female spoken dialogue is better than I would have guessed. It's only 10% off for each gender from the 50/50 mark, so I don't see a problem. And the study goes back 30 years. I like to see a side by side study of films in the last 10 years vs last 30 years.

Interesting stuff, thanks Guap

I'd be more interested in seeing these same dialogue statistics but with films written by females.

"Shut up and just be beautiful!"

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Look, I'm not judging you - after all, I'm posting here myself, but maybe, just maybe, if you spent less time here and more time watching films, maybe, and I stress, maybe your taste would be of some value. Just a thought, ya know.

I would also like someone to do that same for anime.

This one is also interesting:

https://pudding.cool/2017/03/bechdel/

Look at this quote:

Yeah, a study like this needs to be done for just this decade.

Or, if you are talking about male characters these days,

"Shut up, be flawed and just die!"

Actually, I don't think it needs to be done at all. It doesn't really serve a purpose, in fact, it's misleading. It references Mulan and mentions that the dragon has more words than her, but he's a blithering, cowardly idiot, and Mulan is a stoic and reserved hero. Yet, the article focuses on the fact that the dragon has more words said than Mulan. Mulan is the strong, silent type archetype while the dragon is the mouthy, cowardly sidekick archetype that Eddie Murphy would do in the Shrek movies as well. I haven't seen Mulan in ages, so perhaps I could be less than 100% accurate here, but Mulan is a film about female empowerment and trying to make the claim that a strong woman can do anything a strong man can do. I don't think it's inclusion in a study trying to prove male dominance is a good idea unless your idea is just to provide a raw set of data with no context.

Perhaps it would be best to consider that this study is analyzing larger trends in industry representation, and is not an act of criticism toward any specific film on an artistic level. Naturally there will be films, like Mulan, where the word disparity has a reason that relates to the film itself, but this is not what the study is trying to argue. It's getting at the fact that, on a systemic level, we tend to give larger roles to men more often, as evidenced by the fact that male characters speak more than female characters across the board. For that to be the case, it wouldn't matter that some of the individual films have a reason for the disparity, but that all of the films, or at least a supermajority of them, do, and calls attention to the types of films we tend to see made, with the types of roles and the size of roles given, on a larger scale. The fact that Mulan is a strong silent type and the Dragon is a blabbermouth is irrelevant to the larger industry trends.

Now, on a rhetorical level, choosing that film as an example of the problem they are examining would be a mistake, if that's what they had done. However, it isn't. They even go out of their way to explicit make the point I have, and use Mulan as an example of how the study's methodology is not a critique of the films studied.

They realize that Mulan is an example of positive representation for women, they used that example to show that the data is only useful as a way of discussing the issue, not as an arbitrary barometer for good representation. In the methodology section, they even go on to talk in more detail about their methodology and its limitations. The researchers fully recognize that the study isn't above reproach, but also clearly state that their intent isn't to comment on the quality of each individual film, but to provide context through data that explains trends about representation of women in film. If you continue to scroll down they also have data sorted by genre, data about the age of women (how women over 40 face unique challenges when it comes to getting roles while roles become steadily more available with age for men) etc. The study is actually surprisingly comprehensive and aware of it's limitations.

As with all studies of this nature, the data collected only can point us in the direction of a larger discussion of an issue, it's up to the researchers, and ourselves, the readers, to determine exactly what that data means and what we should do with the information. When I read a study like this, it illustrates using data the larger problems mainstream cinema has with gender representation, and suggests a real concrete effect of those problems, an effect the industry and the audience can look to correct, by actively seeking to create more opportunity for women-led projects, both in front of and behind camera, and supporting those projects. Now, you may not consider this to be an issue at all, and that would be unfortunate but I suppose right now I'll have to just agree to disagree, but it would be more productive to be upfront about that disagreement and talk about why you feel it isn't an issue, than to misinterpret a study by focusing on one data point in a much larger trend as a way of deflecting from the real issue.

This is to balance out woman having more than 60% of all lines spoken in real life.

Oh also they included an FAQ where they address further concerns about their intent and the methodology in even more detail, which can be found here

This, interestingly, is also not true. There are a variety of studies out there on the topic (though unfortunately I do not have the link to one handy and I need to go to sleep like 3 hours ago) that suggest that throughout the day, men and women speak on average roughly equally, and that in speaking environments involving groups of people like conferences and such, men talk on average far more than women.

Also for what it's worth, as a very talkative man, in my experience listening to myself in conversations and as far as my male and female friends are concerned, anecdotally, men seem to speak far far more often. As for where the 'women talk so much' stereotype came from, it's complicated, but the answer essentially stems from the way on a systemic level women's speech is seen as an infringement in many environments (being 'naggy' etc.) and thus, being unwelcome, is noticed more than male speech, so while they speak less in reality, it is registered as speaking more. This isn't to say that the individual people who believe in this or whose life experience suggests this to be true are like, raging misogynists who want women to shut it, or whatever, because that's obviously not the case, but more that the culture we all live in affects are perception of things on a level that's more subtle than active, conscious bigotry, and this level of cultural impact can affect the way we view each other and lead to things that seem to be 'common knowledge' ideas that are not supported by reality.

Also true for the "dames cant drive" stereotype which also has been proven to be wrong when tested.

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Farewell and adieu to you fair Spanish ladies...

It's interesting how Kathryn Bigelow directs movies with 100% male dialogue. You'd think getting more female directors would correct those statistics.

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Have you ever been to college/an office? Sit in a room with men and see how they never shut up or let you talk and when you do they just talk over you as if you haven't said anything..

It sounds like she has them correct if men don't let women talk.

I don't think that's really true....

she made females act like males...the james cameron trick...actual female protagonists are in movies like iron lady or august osage county...those are actual females...

I like it when they write women like persons rather than stereotypes
I love how Sofia wrote Scarlett in Lost In Translation. Just a smart woman who doesn't have it all figured out. I like Strong Women too but sometimes they overdo it and forget that women can have their flaws and insecurities too.

I was expecting something like this and I'm not talking from studies I have read or grasping on to a stereotype etc, I am talking from my own experience in the country where I lived for 30 + years and as a not very talkative male.. neither is it a slight or meant to be good or bad in anyway but thanks for educating me on what is true because you read some things.