I just read an article about Manic Pixie Dream Girls on NPR. The term was coined by film critic Nathan Rabin to describe Kirsten Dunst's character in Elizabethtown a couple of years ago. Essentially the Manic Pixie Dream Girl is the joyful girl, with amazing quirks and sensibilities, that changes the men she meets into better people. Now, this is all supposed to happening in the realm of cinema. Think Natalie Portman in Garden State.
It has occurred to me that the MPDG (yes, it has an abbreviation that sounds like a disorder) has become so commonplace that I wonder if 1) girls want to become MPDGs and 2) people want to have MPDGs in their lives, especially in a relationship. However, anyone who truly observes the MPDGs in movies realizes that these girls are perfectly imperfect. They have vaguely interesting quirks and irrelevant pasts that never, ever seem to come up.
Different websites cite some MPDGs over the years: Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany's, Penny Lane in Almost Famous, Annie Hall in Annie Hall, Judy Maxwell in What's Up Doc?, and Susan Vance in Bringing Up Baby.
The startling thing to me is that I love these movies and especially the characters listed above. It appears to be a true question of reality versus cinema. I know these are merely characters and if girls were anything like the people above, they wouldn't be multi-faceted individuals. Is there an unresolved inclination to be these girls in society?
Any thoughts?
Here is the article for reference, which has all the appropriate and interesting links:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95507953&ft=1&f=1008
2 comments:
Yes! Exactly! (I'm not sure if it's disturbing or not that I used to really relate to the MPDG in Elizabeth town.) These girls are everywhere in film, with their glorified quirks and size 0 blue jeans. I love to hate them. I can't tell you how long I obsessed with Penelope Cruz in Vanilla Sky. I'm not sure it's just a man-thing. I think they are just as impacting on women everywhere. I am and have always been fascinated by body image, and that side of these girls has always interested me. It seems with the onset of the MPDG that personality image--that imperfect-perfect that does not really exist--may be the next achilles heel for women everywhere who have finally managed to come to terms with their body...and now have to worry about personality bulemia...hmmmm.
I think MPDG girls make me feel inadequate somehow; like I simultaneously want to be them and hate them all at once.
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