Bryce Dallas Howard happy for scrutiny of women’s roles but says views not miss mark in Jurassic World
BRYCE Dallas Howard never expected her footwear to become the major talking point of her role in Jurassic World.
Howard, who played park operations manager Claire Dearing in one of the year’s biggest films, was criticised because her character fled from a rampaging Indominus Rex in high heels.
Some took the wardrobe choice as an affront to feminism; another damsel desperate to be rescued by the film’s alpha-male lead, played by Chris Pratt.
While Howard rejects the argument in this instance, the 34-year-old said she encouraged scrutiny of female roles in film.
“There was a purpose for Claire’s decision to wear what she did, to show how unprepared this woman was for the jungle. It should have been illogical,” she told Confidential’s Matt Bamford.
“Conversations around female roles in films like this are important because a lot of times there are female characters that exist to service the male lead or the plot.
“That enrages me, so the heightened sensitivity around female roles is something that I am relieved by and grateful for.”
Howard took solace in Pratt’s approach to his own experience of objectification.
“Chris was always being asked about his weight loss and I became frustrated because there is more substance to him,” Dallas Howard explained. “He said, ‘I think to end the objectification of women we should just start objectifying men’.”
Both Dallas Howard and Pratt will return for the next Jurassic film adventure, due out in a couple of years.
She was a spellbound 12-year-old watching Jurassic Park, one of the millions of people to be captivated by the global box office smash hit when it premiered more than 20 years ago.
It was a memory that came flooding back when she was offered to play one of the leads in Jurassic World.
Dallas Howard sat down with Confidential on the lush Hawaiian island Oahu, where much of the film’s jungle scenes were filmed, Howard said the recollection loomed large in her mind.
“Of course, I remember how crazy and huge it was, I saw it opening weekend,” she said.
Before Jurassic World surpassed its predecessors, achieving the third highest box office sales ever, Howard said the enormity of her decision to join the hit series hit home her early on.
“I didn’t want to let down the 12-year-old version of myself down — the child whose life was changed and imagination was expanded in an instant when I saw Jurassic Park,” she said.
She attributes the franchises success partly to our insatiable fascination with dinosaurs that spans all ages.
“They were real. Dinosaurs were these mythical, fantastical creatures that existed and dominated the planet. It is incompressible to us, let alone the idea of them coexisting with humans especially when humans consider themselves to be the dominant species. That’s really the what if that has continued to sustain our imaginations over 20 years.”
(source)
