As some of you might have noticed, female characters in movies suck. They don't just leave room for improvement, they fail miserably (with some exceptions). Even when women are in positions of power in the creative parts of a film, the female characters fall flat (coughcoughAcrosstheUniversecough). But why? Is it impossible to convey the humanity and wholeness of a woman in moving pictures?
Of course not! Why, I can think of several wonderful depictions of women in television! Buffy from Buffy the Vampire Slayer comes immediately to mind, as she struggles with her humanity and work, and she certainly is not alone. The Desperate Housewives cast, while feminine and housewifeish, are all interesting, different, and human. Elliot from Scrubs is a competent female who has insecurities and makes for interesting watching. The list goes on and on, and the shows are not all "chick shows" that focus only on girls. These are widely accepted shows with merit and decency.
So why can't we get these types in movies? My theory is that it all comes down to time. A TV show has anywhere from 13 to 26 hours to develop characters and plots and how they interact. And that's just in one season. Movies have at most 3. TV writers and directors can spend time carefully adding layer upon layer on each character, making the audiences identify with and care about the characters, regardless of sex. Movie writers and directors can't. They are reduced to using emotional shorthand on all characters, doubly so for the secondary characters (Which most women are, since movies are made for the 18-25 male crowd, and guys can't identify with women as easily). The writers look at each other and go, "Quick, how do we make this girl seem real?" "Ooh! Make her really afraid of something! Girls have insecurities, right?" "Great! Then the guy can save her or fix her, and the girls will like the guy more!" With that characterization done, the writers can focus on figuring out how the man will change over the course of the film.
And this ties in with a previous theory of mine, that it's harder to separate women from their women-ness than it is to separate men from their man-ness. Rather than spend time characterizing the female characters from scratch, writers and directors use the emotional shorthand/archetype of Woman for female characters. They can't get away with this with male characters as easily (Because alpha male characters get boring and annoying really quickly). TV directors and writers have time, so they can make female and male characters fit new or less-used archetypes, thus creating more interesting characters.
At least, these are my theories. And they help me justify the fact that I rent TV shows much more often than I rent movies. Any thoughts?