According to polls, around half of the US population identifies with feminism and feminist activism (though, this stat is in steep decline among Gen Z men). But if this is truly the case and there is such a large population of feminist allies out there in the ether, why don't they ever show up to movie theaters to support films with blatant feminist messaging?
The obvious conclusion is that the public has been lied to and there is no vast feminist movement. It's a paper tiger, a fantasy, a mirage.
We have seen this reality play out time and time again over the past few years as the American populace has now awakened to Hollywood's woke propaganda agenda. Almost every instance of a new film or streaming series being exposed as far-left in its content results in financial failure. There is no audience for these projects.
The entertainment industry has resorted to masking feminist propaganda behind popular branding and false marketing in order to trick consumers into theater seats (the Barbie movie comes to mind), but these successes are few and far between. Such projects might have a small, niche market on militant progressive streaming services like Netflix, but they still call for a bare bones budget and minimal marketing on dedicated woke media platforms.
Around 20 years ago, feminist art house flicks, LGBT dramas and race based commentaries were made for around $10 million a pop and were relegated to festivals like Sundance and Cannes. At these exclusive events they would garner ample and pompous applause from uppity New York and LA socialites and then fizzle into obscurity where they belong.
Today, major studios are spending upwards of $150 million in production and marketing costs to make and distribute the same kinds of film school garbage, and they are losing their shirts.
A recent example is aging actress and amateur director Maggie Gyllenhaal's feminist monster film "The Bride", which latches onto the public domain story of Frankenstein (every movie must be a remake or a reboot to get greenlit these days).
The project was given a production budget of $90 million and a marketing budget of $65 million - A total of $155 million spent to bring the dead plot to life. In its opening week, The Bride has brought in around $14 million in global box office receipts, and keep in mind, half those revenues go to theaters.
It's a unmitigated disaster; the biggest theatrical flop of the year and it probably won't beat in 2026. That said, anyone with any sense could have predicted this movie's downfall.
The story follows a woman possessed by the spirit of Mary Shelley, who is back from the dead to tell the story of "the bride" she had always meant to tell. She says she was "held back by the patriarchy" from writing the tale, but now you get to see it on the big screen for $20 per ticket and $50 for popcorn and soda. Lucky you.
The woman is, of course, murdered by evil men and then brought back to life by a scientist who is seeking a companion for the Frankenstein Monster (played by Christian Bale), who is lonely after 100 years of being an angry incel.
The story then devolves into a college girl's self indulgent fan fiction of the Bride of Frankenstein, mixing elements of Sid and Nancy with Bonnie and Clyde. The main character and her male sidekick go on a killing spree, which inspires other women across the country to commit copycat crimes and murder the "men who wronged them".
There is nothing new or groundbreaking about the concept. From "Thelma and Louise" to the movie "I Shot Andy Warhol", there are hundreds of movies and TV shows affirming the feminist notion that women are immune to accountability. In other words, if a women does something evil, we must assume she has a good reason. Or, women are allowed to do evil as long as they perceive themselves to be victims.
The Bride is yet another tired version of this ongoing feminist trope of women being "empowered" by psychopathy. Not only that, but it regurgitates the leftist extremist fantasy of becoming some kind of Marxist martyr and triggering a bloody mob frenzy. The fundamental motivation of these stories is narcissistic in nature; a desperate desire to be so adored and worshiped that people would gleefully destroy or kill to honor your name.
The theatrical apparatus is still being bombarded with woke content into 2026 despite dismal audience attendance because most of these movies were approved and started filming during the Biden Administration when studios thought the woke indoctrination machine was well protected. The Bride received approval in January of 2024 and started filming that same year. A lot has changed since then.
For now, entertainment productions are plummeting (down 60%) and Hollywood is lost. They centered their entire business model around the woke agenda and now they have no idea how to restructure and create real content again. It is likely these companies will collapse in due course, making way for newcomers with better ideas, greater talent and less political zealotry.