Opinion

The three heroines of Japan

By Joseph LaPenta

"Women have changed ...," says a current ad on subway billboards. It may just be a catch phrase, but one thing is certain: The image of women in popular movies has changed dramatically.

In the last fifty years, three very different movie heroines have captured the imaginations of women in Japan: Audrey Hepburn in "Roman Holiday" (1953), Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman" (1990) and Renee Zellweger in "Bridget Jones's Diary" (2001).

The extraordinary popularity of these three female characters reflects the dreams, frustrations and fears of Japanese viewers. It also reveals the way Japanese women have thought and felt about themselves and other women.

In "Roman Holiday" (1953), a frustrated princess decides to play hooky. Japan was entering an era of high economic growth when the movie became popular. At the time, Audrey Hepburn was everything Japanese women (and men) dreamed about. Tall and thin, she had long legs and a neck like a giraffe's.

Hepburn also projected a mixture of adult sophistication and childlike innocence. In Japan, where most women's names used to include the character for "child" (ko), a woman pretending to be a child was (and still to a certain extent is) popular with men and the women who wanted to please them.

But the life of the princess in "Roman Holiday" is controlled at every turn by ministers, officials and other overbearing male figures. Like so many postwar Japanese daughters, wives and daughters-in-law, the princess dreamed of freedom but felt tied down and helpless. But interestingly enough, it is also a man, the newspaper reporter played by Gregory Peck, who comes to her rescue and protects her.

The prostitute played by Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman" is a member of the world's oldest profession. Vulgar and loud, she was the perfect heroine for Japan's "bubble" years when even a prostitute could dream of becoming a princess.

And that is exactly what happens to her. With the help of the men around her, she cleans up her act, and finally marries a rich, handsome millionaire played by Richard Gere.

Both the princess and the prostitute lead lives average women in Japan, or anywhere else, can only dream about, but both share the same dependence on men for their own self-esteem.

And so does Bridget Jones, the most recent of these heroines. However, she marks quite a change from the elegant princess or the flashy prostitute. Bridget, as played by Renee Zellweger in "Bridget Jones's Diary," is witty and kind, but also socially awkward and overweight, and she smokes and drinks too much. But by the end of the film, the man of her dreams decides he likes her just the way she is.

The film's popularity seems to reflect the romantic fantasies of an age of lower expectations. Forget the diets, the designer clothes and the pretense of sophistication. There's a perfect prince of a man somewhere out there who is looking for an ordinary, unexceptional person just like you.

Shukan ST: May 16, 2003

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