Ask A Wench - Which Movie Character Would You Like to Be?

Nicola here with this month's Ask A Wench. For our question this month we’re trying to decide which movie character we would like to be. When we discussed this amongst ourselves this raised some interesting questions. Would we go all out in pursuit of adventure or would we prefer something more reflective of our own lives? What makes a super-hero(ine)? What qualities do we admire and would like to possess, on screen or in real life or both? The Wench thoughts on this are below. But what would your dream movie role be?

For me this is a difficult choice. My first inclination would be to take the part of a historical character such as Elizabeth I or Eleanor of Aquitaine in The Lion In Winter. However since I’d be playing the role and not the actual historical character this would probably be frustrating because I’d want to depict them as I see them, not as the part was written. I’m going for Yoda for two reasons. Firstly I love the way he constructs his sentences. He always gets his point across yet sounds poetic at the same time. Also, he is measured and wise and as I get older I value wisdom very highly and I would like to be more measured in my response to things sometimes. Yoda combines all this with agility, courage and skill with a lightsaber, plus he is keen on encouraging the younger generation to achieve their full potential – quite a role model.

Mary Jo: What movie character would I be?  Well, since Nicola has dibs on Yoda, I think I'll go for Wonder Woman.  Not just any of the decades-long evolving version of the character, but specifically the current manifestation as played by Gad Godot. 

I admit that I'm blending both role and actor together.  Israeli Gal Godot was not only Miss Israel 2004, but during her tenure in the Israeli Defense Forces, she was a combat instructor.  She said the military was learning about discipline and respect--and aren't they great traits to have?  Her Wonder Woman is powerful as well as beautiful, both idealistic and wise.  Gad Godot has also studied law and international relations. What a role model!

But give me half a chance and I might choose go for Princess Leia.  In the original Star Wars
movie, she shows up as a gravel-voiced rebel leader, kicking ass and taking names and far more competent than her male acolytes, Luke Skywalker and Han Solo.  She was not a female character we'd seen before, and while Carrie Fisher, who played her, is now sadly gone, Princess Leia has become a cultural icon.

Anne: I always find this kind of question -- one with lots of enticing choices -- difficult to answer. Will I choose to be some fabulous heroine, living an extraordinary life, having adventures with a handsome and charming hero?  No. So exhausting, having adventures. And besides, Cary Grant is dead.

So I'm choosing to be Maggie Smith's character in MY HOUSE IN UMBRIA. It's similar enough to my life, in that she is a romance novelist, but she lives in a beautiful and luxurious house, in a stunningly lovely part of the world, and her clothes in this movie are gorrrrgeous.  Chin chin.

Pat: I am a wimp. Give me a good comedy or maybe a nice character study, but I never watch action movies with bigger than life heroes. Give me Marian the Librarian or a singing nun, please (not just Maria in Sound of Music but how about Whoopie Goldberg in Sister Act?). My idea of a super heroine is a good librarian handing out culture, creativity, history, and education every day. Or a teacher trying to make kids THINK when all they want to do is arm wrestle. But I'd make a lousy librarian or nun. So maybe I should aim for the romance writer in Romancing the Stone? At least she got out of the house.

Jo: I wanted to say Xena, because I can really get into that Warrior Princess stuff and I’d like living in a Greek Mythos world. Kinda.
Then I noticed Xena isn’t a movie person. She’s a TV series. Rats.

My mind kept tossing up good choices and I kept batting them away. “That’s a Book!” I’d yell. “Book. Book. Book. Book. Book! Give me movies!” You see my problem.

Then it came to me. What would I like doing? I am not a woman given to bounding over the countryside, jumping on a horse, and setting off to battle demons whose halitosis alone would fell a Roman legion. I am not, in short, Buffy. Or even Willow. Confronted with Evil — note the upper case to say it’s a bad evil — my immediate impulse is to murmur “You do you, okay?” and back away to seek expert help.  That aforementioned Legion, perhaps. I’m more an “I’ll track ‘em down. You stomp on them.” kinda gal.

So. Jane Marple.
That’s me. Going through life, knitting and murmuring, “​Well, you know, Inspector, this poisoning reminds me of little Bobby Fisher in St Mary Mead.”

Andrea/Cara: I love the theme of strong women developing here! Okay, I’m not really sure I’d have the courage and determination to be this movie character, but I’d choose to be Katherine Johnson in the movie Hidden Figures, which is based on her true-life story. Johnson was a a brilliant African-American mathematician who went to work as a “computer” for NASA during the 1950s. With grace, wisdom, composure and quiet self-confidence, she overcame the dual prejudices against her race and her gender (NASA was a very high-testosterene place) to win the acceptance and ultimately the admiration and respect of all her colleagues. In those early days, the complex calculations for orbit trajectories and re-entry angles were done by individuals, using only an adding machine. The lives of the astronauts were literally in the hands of the “computers.” Johnson was so impressive in meetings that’s said that John Glenn refused to get in the capsule for the first U.S. space flight to orbit the earth until she okayed the numbers. She's a real-life super hero, an inspiration and role model for believing it’s possible to reach up and touch the stars.

Susan: So many great choices! Which movie character would I want to be? Wonder Woman and Princess Leia would be among my picks ... though I would also love to inhabit the characters of Lady Isabeau in Ladyhawke, or Merida in Brave. Both are strong female leads with courage, cleverness, integrity, compassion and heart--and both must find their own strength of character to face up to supernatural power. 

Isabeau's inner beauty glows even more than her outer beauty--her compassion and love for Navarre surpass everything for her, even her own life. What she endures, under the magic spell that makes her a hawk by day and a woman on her own at night, helps her discover true courage and independence, so that she is finally able to stand up to the evil and hatred that would have destroyed her and her love, and she steps forward as Navarre's true equal as well as true love. Movie or not, I think I could live as Isabeau, finding happiness at last ... and it would be amazing to fly as a hawk! 

Princess Merida in Brave is all that I love in a medieval Scottish heroine--strong-willed, independent, spirited, yet aware of the needs of others and capable of facing her fears, admitting mistakes and changing for the better. She's a fun, feisty, and adorable heroine, fearless and a bit reckless, handy with a bow ... and that great mane of curly red hair is gorgeous. An added bonus, if I could be Merida, would be the chance to live in the wild Highlands -- and someday (because Merida is a young heroine) find the perfect kilted, brawny, wonderful hero to share romantic Highland adventures....

So there you have it; a whole host of different takes on movie characters and what would make us want to step into their shoes. Now it’s over to you! Which movie character would you like to be and why?

Comments

[Quantum]

I have always admired Miss Marple as played by Joan Hickson, but disguising myself as a woman might be tricky so maybe I could be Lord Peter Wimsey. I would like to expand a bit on his attraction to Harriet Vane. Maybe I could add a little more charm and overcome her resistance to marriage .... never could resist a HEA!

[Francie Cissell]

Terry (played by Whoopie Goldberg) in Jumpin' Jack Flash.

[Lillian Marek]

I don't much care for superheroes, but I do like an exciting swashbuckler. I think I'd go for one of the characters Maureen O'Hara played—maybe the daughter of Athos in At Sowrd's Point, where she actually gets to do some of the fencing.

No sitting around waiting to be rescued for that girl!

[Faith Freewoman]

I can't believe what my instant choice was! And I'm stretching things a bit by choosing a TV character.

How's this for a corker: Maggie Smith as the Dowager Countess of Grantham in Downton Abbey.

She's powerful, feisty, insightful, funny, can spend a king's ransom on glamorous clothes and jewels, and gets away with saying and doing whatever she darn well pleases (at least until the end of the 3rd season).

Yep. When I get to be Maggie Smith's age, I wanna be the Dowager Countess!

Cheers, Faith

[Delia]

Wonder woman is a good one, but I always wanted to be like Endora, Samantha's mother in Bewitch. Although I have now a son in law and I love him as if he was my son. But I love Endora's character all the wicked things she would do ;)

[Nicola Cornick]

Good choice!

[Nicola Cornick]

Haha! What a wonderful idea, Quantum! There is something very dashing about a detective...

[Nicola Cornick]

Oh yes, fun! A bit of swash and buckle would be excellent!

[Nicola Cornick]

She certainly gets all the best lines!

[Nicola Cornick]

Ha! She is a fun character!

[Patricia Franzino]

Many characters flashed into my mind, but the one I settled on was Ellen Ripley from Aliens. This movie heroine is strong and tough as well as maternal. The men in the film are attracted to every side of her. She can take care of herself and all those she loves.

[Sue McCormick]

Since Andrea usurped Katherine Johnson, i'll pick another of the leads in Hidden Figures. Unfortunately, I am prone to forget names. This is the mechanically able, well oranization-minded de facto manager of the black computers. (I don't have the glamor to be the third lead, the first black lawyer in Virginia.)

This woman gets the new computing machines (main frame) going without anyone knowing it, because she knows how machines work. Then she "shop-lifts" a Fortran manual from the white section of the library (leaving the cost of the manual behind), and teaches Fortran to the women in her section. Thereby creating the first set of people in NASA's hire able to be computer operators.

I doubt that I have her courage, and I know I don't have her mechanical knowledge, but I do identify with her need to learn and to share her learning.

I may have forgotten her name, but I will never forget her actions.

[Joanne Bourne]

Lord Peter Wimsey.
*sigh*

Yes.
The keen mind. The zest for life.
And I'd really like to be rich, while I'm at it.

(jo gathers up the papers to do her 2017 taxes and realizes she has once again revealed how shallow she is.)

[Mary T]

Superheroes and action/adventure movies don't interest me much, so I guess I would go the comedy route. Although it is a TV production, I too loved Maggie Smith in Downton Abbey. She really did have all the best and funniest lines.

I also liked the role that Whoopie Goldberg played in Ghost. I think her name was Ruby. She was the fake spiritualist who discovered she really could communicate with dead people, and was instrumental in saving the day.

Oh, and almost any character that Rosalind Russell ever played - especially Antie Mame.

[Karen W.]

Tthat amazing woman was Dorothy Vaughan. I love Hidden Figures. And I love Dorothy's determination to not only learn the mainframe herself but to teach her fellow computers too.
But who would I be...? Hmmmm. As I can't do math, those women in Hidden Figures are out. My brain hurts thinking about it! :-D
I adore Gal Gadot ( and Wonder Woman) pretty much for all the reasons Mary Jo stated. You believe her portrayal!
But I love Black Widow. I don't want her back story, but her kick-ass abilities and her not shying away from her femininity at the same time makes me love her. Plus she's Hawkeye's kids favorite aunt! The whole package.

[Mary M.]

Sugar, Marilyn Monroe's role in Some Like It Hot. Just to be in the middle of my favorite movie ever would be great. But the stretch to match Monroe's sultry-but-innocent campiness, not to mention our completely different physicalities, would be a worthy challenge. (This IS just a thought experiment, right?)

[Nicola Cornick]

She sounds a brilliant character and role model, Patricia.

[Nicola Cornick]

Thank you, Sue. That is amazing and very moving. I can see I really must see this film.

[Nicola Cornick]

Thanks, Karen! Black Widow is a very interesting choice. I'm loving the ideas people are coming up with and their reasons for admiring the characters.

[Nicola Cornick]

Hi Mary! Oh yes, that Whoopie Goldberg character was great! I loved that.

[Nicola Cornick]

Haha! I like your choice, Mary, and definitely we can dream!

[Faith Freewoman]

Oh, this is a good one, Patricia!

[Annette Naish]

Maggie Smith seems to be an ongoing theme here.

I would like to be someone like Maggie Smith's character in the original Marigold Hotel film. She starts out as a really not very nice woman, but she learns to change and improve who she is. Her soul comes through. Her kindness shines brightly. Most of all, her intelligence creates a new world for other people as well as herself.

After reading all the comments, I would love to be Sugar...just wearing that one dress would be wonderful....but with me in it it would not look the same.

Isabeau is a wonderful character. Miss Marple would be terrific because her intelligence is so admirable. And at least her costumes would not make me embarrassed. Wonder Woman, again not sure the costume would work on me....just can't imagine all my crepey skin in those shorts.

There are just too many women to admire. So, when I grow up, I will have many choices.

[Jeanne Behnke]

What a great answer Mary! I absolutely love that movie.

[Maryellen Webber]

Here's one, Tess McGill in Working Girl. I loved Melanie Griffith in this movie. She ended up with Harrison Ford and a much deserved, high powered job.

[Margaret]

Wow, Susan, I'm amazed. I read the title of this column, and before I read anything else, my first thought was Isabeau in Ladyhawke! My daughters LOVED this movie when they were young, and our VHS copy was probably played a good 30 times over the years. I seldom (probably never) watched it beginning to end, but I was always moved by Michelle Pfeiffer's performance that conveyed the perfect blend of strength, vulnerability, bravery, and devotion. Thanks for starting such an interesting conversation!

[Teresa Broderick]

Or the one where she played a pirate queen, I can't recall the name. Gosh she was a great actress and I'm not just saying it because she was Irish.

[Teresa Broderick]

It's an amazing movie Nicola and the best one I saw last year. Well worth a watch.

[Teresa Broderick]

There are some great choices here and what a fun post. I wouldn't be much good as a superhero but if I was to pick a
movie character to be I'd like to be Lillian Sloan (played by Barbara Hershey) in the movie Last of the Dogmen. I LOVE this film and have watched it numerous times. She's feisty and kind and loving her job and when she meets the Indians she faces them head on. I love her decision to stay with them, her interest in saving them even though she had reason to go home. What an adventure!!!!

[Sue McCormick]

Thank you for supplying her name. I think my husband and I will watch Hidden Figures again and I will memorize the names!

[Karin]

I'd love to be Idgie Threadgood, the character played by Mary Stuart Masterson in "Fried Green Tomatoes". She is so totally fearless!

[Nicola Cornick]

I loved the first Marigold Hotel film as well, Annette, and it showed Maggie Smith's ability to play waspish characters very well! I do love the Miss Marple character. So understated but so wise!

[Nicola Cornick]

That was such a fun film! I loved that she was so determined to succeed.

[Nicola Cornick]

It is a beautifully-drawn character, isn't it, Margaret.

[Nicola Cornick]

I haven't seen that film, Teresa, but it sounds excellent and I will be looking out for it now. What a fascinating character Lillian sounds!

[Nicola Cornick]

Ohm that's such a great film. Good choice! Thanks, Karin.

[Karen W.]

From this time period, I'd love to be in Born Yesterday. I adored Judy Holliday's portrayal of Billie! My hubby often claims I 'go blonde' really well - those moments of "getting your point 'cluelessly' across so as not to offend but definitely making a point." (I'm a brunette so this description of 'going blonde' always amazed me until he explained it.)
My other favorite movie by her is "Bells are Ringing" an answering service worker who keeps getting involved in her client's lives. This one amuses me because I answer phones in our office. But I try very hard to not get too involved in the people's lives! It's enough to keep up with my own some days! :-D
But her portrayals always reminded me of just how much more people have going on under their surfaces and how we need to pay attention to those around us. Also that a little kindness and caring go a long way!
We lost her way too soon!