Five Faves: Female Movie Characters

By Less Lee Moore

Not the Ultimate Top Five perhaps, but the five I return to over and over.

5. Nora Baker, from White Palace
Many might cite Susan Sarandon’s take-no-shit character from Thelma & Louise as the ultimate feminist: one who’d rather die a free woman than live as a prisoner. But such an over-the-top ending is patently unrealistic. I prefer her as Nora Baker, the waitress with a heart of gold veneer. She’s trashy and raunchy and a slob (think of the sandwich scene) but she calls it as she sees it, crushing the notion that love only comes to women who change themselves for someone else.

4. Carrie White, from Carrie
Every time I watch this movie, my heart breaks for Sissy Spacek as Carrie White. She is luminous, beautiful, fragile, and dangerous, the definitive outsider with the worst kind of crazy, abusive mother. I remember what it was like to be tormented by the cool, popular girls for being different and I can’t say I blame her for flipping out and having her revenge at the end. Still, every time I watch this movie, I want it to end with Carrie happy and whole. It never does.

3. Enid, from Ghost World
Enid reminds me a lot of someone I knew over a decade ago, which makes me laugh and cringe simultaneously. Her cynicism is deadly, funny, and frequently perfectly suited to exposing the hypocrisy of daily life and pop culture. This dark wit backfires on her, destroys people, and ruins friendships. Her eventual realization of her flaws makes me like her even more. It’s too bad real life doesn’t always have such satisfying endings.

2. Chris MacNeil, from The Exorcist
Despite portraying a famous actress, Ellen Burstyn is not glamorous in the role of Pazuzu’s adopted mother. She looks tired, haggard, and disheveled throughout most of the film (even sporting a major shiner at one point), but still displays the kind of beauty that only courage can reveal. Terrified of what’s happening to her daughter Regan and frustrated by the lack of answers from the medical and scientific community, she doesn’t curl into a ball of weakness; she swears and screams to be heard. And it works.

1. Lieutenant Ellen Ripley, from the Aliens series
I know it’s shocking, but there are people out there who do NOT think that Sigourney Weaver’s character in the Aliens franchise is awesome. I shall try to educate them as to why they’re wrong. Unlike many modern female action/sci fi movie characters, Ripley is tough, brave, smart, and feminine even while wearing frumpy jumpsuits and without makeup. (And in the third installment, without hair.) Sure, we do see her in underwear at the end of the second movie, but it is not the kind from Victoria’s Secret and it’s actually plot-related. She might be extremely attached to her cat, but if Ripley is a crazy cat lady, then we should all strive towards that goal.