When this film came out, I thought it was good lightweight fun – with some mildly disturbing stereotypes not worth worrying about. After rewatching it on TV the other night, I’m starting to think it’s a masterpiece of gender and class dialectics.
It actually bothered me even more this time, perhaps because my daughters are now 10 and 13, alternately trying on and resisting their emerging femininity. As my wife and I discussed why it bugged me, though, I realized that the film was uncovering and probing a lot of my own stereotypes and judgments about girlyness.
The genius of Legally Blonde is that it fully embraces the silliness of certain girly trappings while communicating their fun – and quietly observing that guy trappings just might be every bit as silly. Yes, Elle Woods spends an awful lot of obsessive energy and intelligence mastering arcane details of fashion and makeup. But is it any more “serious” to master indie rock, video games (which my daughters love, by the way), or football strategy? No one calls a young guy dumb for spending his free time on these.
Without dipping into feminist jargon or preaching in any way, Legally Blonde (directed by a man, written by two women) illustrates how the things men like are considered the norm (and important), while femininity is treated as exotic and frivolous.
Yet science demonstrates that in physical terms at least, women are the norm. The XY chromosome is not enough to create male genitalia; it just (usually) triggers male hormones that do that. With intersex conditions such as CAIS, PMDS, and 5-ARDS, the lack of hormonal effects leaves XY individuals with vaginas and clitorises. In other words, females are the real normal, and males are the variant -- a hormone-triggered mutation, you could even say.
It’s true that the film makes one deft, if statistically unlikely starting assumption: that an insanely privileged white girl from Bel Air could be totally obsessed with the most expensive designer clothes and cosmetics without harboring an ounce of superiority toward those who can’t afford or appreciate these luxuries. Even that now looks to me like a clarifying master stroke.
Elle is basically Cinderella in reverse, as my wife observed. She shows that, with a pure enough heart, a girl can overcome all the advantages of wealth, beauty, blondness and boobs to remain humble, smart and true to herself. No matter what the boys think.
