What
this plot summary doesn't mention is that the villain is secretly
in relationship with one of the D.E.B.S., putting the short/film
in the rare position of offering viewers both "good"
and "bad" lesbian characters in the same
story.
Director/writer
Angela Robinson describes the short as "a story about a
trio of super spies who are all chicks. I love all the comic
book characters: Charlie's Angels, Batman, Josie & the Pussycats....But
I always wanted them to be gay and they never were, so I wrote
my own."
Some
things are clearly different in the feature-film version:
there will be five DEBS instead of four, and
Tammy Lynn Michaels (who recently announced her engagement
to singer Melissa Etheridge) will not be reprising her role
from the short in the feature film, nor will most of the actresses
except Jill Ritchie (Ready to Rumble) and Clare Kramer
(Buffy the Vampire Slayer).
Although
the reasons for this have not been publicly stated, it looks
like Screen Gems wanted bigger names for the roles, since many
of the actresses in the short had yet to star in a feature film
(including Michaels). In addition to Ritchie, the rest of the
high school girls in the feature film will be played by Sara
Foster (The Big Bounce), Devon Aoki (2 Fast 2 Furious),
and Megan Good (Biker Boyz, Deliver Us From Eva,
Eve's Bayou).
Jordana
Brewster (The Fast and the Furious) has been cast in
the pivotal role of the villain, and rounding out the supporting
cast is Michael Clarke Duncan (Green Mile, Daredevil)
as the head of the agent-training academy, and Holland Taylor
(Legally Blond, Spy Kids 2, Keeping the
Faith) as the headmistress of the girls' school.
One
thing that clearly remains the same from the short is Robinson,
who makes her feature-film debut in directing D.E.B.S
the movie (making her one of the few out lesbians to direct
a feature film in Hollywood, and also one of the few African-American
women to do so). The cast of the movie version is even more
racially diverse than the short (and more racially diverse than
most Hollywood movies), which is an encouraging sign.
Although
sources indicate that the villain (Brewster's character)
and one of the D.E.B.S. (Foster's character)
will still be lesbians in
the full-length version,
it's not yet clear whether their sexuality will be downplayed
or portrayed significantly differently than it was in the short.
The
answer to this question will do more than satisfy the idle curiosity
of D.E.B.S. fans, it will indicate how much progress
we've really made in terms of lesbian visibility in mainstream
films, since Hollywood is well-known for serving up Fried
Green Tomatoes--movies based on stories with lesbian characters
in which the lesbianism is written out of the film.
The
quantity of high-profile Hollywood films with lesbian
or bisexual characters has increased in the last several years,
but there hasn't been the same dramatic improvement in quality.
Although it's more subtle now, we're still getting many of the
same stereotypical characters--depressed and/or married lesbian
and bisexual women, bisexual psycho-killers, lesbians who sleep
with men--that we faced ten years ago.
These
stereotypes can be seen in 2002 in The
Hours, Frida, and Femme
Fatale (not that these were bad movies, but the lesbian
and bisexual characters in them weren't exactly breaking the
mold), and 2003 and 2004 are shaping up to follow a similar
pattern so far: the mainstream Hollywood films with lesbian
or bisexual characters that are coming out in the next two years
include a prostitute/serial killer (Monster), a lesbian
who sleeps with a guy (Gigli)
and a bisexual woman in a relationship with a man (Head
in the Clouds).
The
upcoming film Eulogy is an
exception to this trend, however, as it has non-stereotypical
lesbian characters in a well-integrated storyline. And there
are indie films with interesting, realistic, and non-stereotypical
lesbian and bisexual characters coming out every year, of course,
such as the Gina Gershon-led indie film Prey
for Rock 'n Roll and the Italian film Gasoline,
but most of these films are confined to film festival screenings
and video and thus not readily available to a wider audience.
There
is danger, of course, in drawing over-simplified conclusions
about a film from analyzing what stays in the picture and what
gets cut, since there are many factors which influence the end
product (most of which come down to money). But as a film that
started out as a very lesbian-positive short, there is no way
not to see the final cut of D.E.B.S. the movie as a
litmus test of whether the studios believe the American public
is willing to embrace lesbian characters in lead roles that
don't adhere neatly to the usual stereotypes.
The
generally poor quality of lesbian and bisexual characters in
mainstream films means that even if D.E.B.S
the movie retains only some of the lesbian flavor of
the short, it will still offer better lesbian characters than
we're getting anywhere else in Hollywood in the near future.
But
the very fact that a short with this much lesbian flavor is
being turned into a feature film in the first place seems like
some kind of progress; if the film is successful at the box
office, maybe it will even start a new Hollywood trend--one
in which the lesbians stay in the picture, for a change.
July
2003 Update: In Angela Robinson's interview
with AfterEllen.com, she answers many of these questions and
indicates that not only will the lesbian relationship stay in
the film, it's even being expanded upon.
February
2004 Update: A review of the film is now available
here.
