Blog Post No.2

Uma Thurman is angry. She has reasons to be.

Maureen Dowd, a New York Times Op-Ed Columnist, gives actress Uma Thurman a platform in this recent piece. Thurman open up about her experiences with sexual assault and misconduct in the workplace. Incidentally, the workplace is Hollywood, and like most other businesses, it is male-dominated, cutthroat, and can be a young, beautiful, up-and-coming starlet's worst nightmare. Uma Thurman, alongside many young women in show business at the time became the victim(s) of film producer Harvey "The Robe" Weinstein. And, although Thurman speaks in depth about her sickening experiences with Weinstein, the majority of the article focuses on Thurman's relationship with her long-time collaborator, Quentin Tarantino. Thurman recalls a moment on set during the filming of "Kill Bill Vol. I", in which Tarantino pressured her into performing a stunt that she wasn't comfortable doing; Tarantino instructed her to drive a malfunctioning car, on a sand road, at forty miles per hour so as to achieve the perfect shot of her hair. Of course, Thurman crashed the car during the stunt and suffered permanent damage to her knees and neck. This, unfortunately, was Thurman's only abusive encounter with Tarantino. As Dowd writes, "Thurman says that in 'Kill Bill,' Tarantino had done the honors with some of the sadistic flourishes himself, spitting in her face in the scene where Michael Madsen is seen on screen doing it and choking her with a chain in the scene where a teenager named Gogo is on screen doing it."

The #MeToo movement is in its prime and this article could not have been more appropriate. As more and more women in Hollywood come out and talk about their experiences of abuse, mistreatment, and injustice, the more people will recognize how widespread this problem, at least in Hollywood, really is. This also brings to light a twisted pattern in some films with female leads or with female driven narratives. Abuse is not empowering. And yet, so many men in Hollywood create stories where women become empowered and realize their potential through their abuse. In Kill Bill, Uma Thurman's character is beaten, raped, nearly killed, and that experience inspires her to blossom and grow. As Thurman herself states, “Personally, it has taken me 47 years to stop calling people who are mean to you ‘in love’ with you. It took a long time because I think that as little girls we are conditioned to believe that cruelty and love somehow have a connection and that is like the sort of era that we need to evolve out of.”