In the navy

Ridley Scott talks about G.I. Jane

by MATTHEW HAYS

It was 17 years ago that Goldie Hawn made audiences laugh with Private Benjamin, but times have certainly changed; since then a series of headline-grabbing incidents have rocked the military's gender divide. Increasingly, women have proven themselves capable of numerous different positions in the forces, with the military letting the barriers down slowly and unwillingly. And when women make it to the higher ranks, there are often allegations of lesbianism, sexual harassment or rape.

G.I. Jane, Ridley Scott's tenth film, is a torn-from-the-headlines take on sexism in the military. Demi Moore co-produces and stars as a Navy SEAL wannabe, a female officer who realizes her chances of getting ahead are greatly reduced by her restriction from training with the SEALs. She's allowed in as a precedent, but the suits start to sweat when she actually manages to make it through the training, holding her own with the men. Word of this female fighting machine makes it to the press, who immediately dub her G.I. Jane. The military embark on a smear campaign in an effort to get Moore to drop out of the exclusive training force.

G.I. Jane comes at a pivotal time for both Moore and Scott. Moore has had a string of flops, including last year's Striptease; Scott last directed White Squall, which was a technically brilliant but otherwise empty tale about trouble for a boys' school at sea. The director behind such landmark films as Alien, Blade Runner and Thelma & Louise spoke to the Mirror from Los Angeles.

Mirror: This film is part of a cycle you have in terms of gender: Alien and Thelma & Louise, for example. Has anyone ever asked you if you're preoccupied with gender?

Ridley Scott: Clearly Thelma was a feminist film. In this instance, of course it's feminist by definition in that it's a female central character, but we tried to stay off that as the tone because she talks more about her career, like a man. Saying for me to move up, I have to have this and that experience. At the moment she's just being turned down right, left and centre, not just because she's female but because financially it's more expensive. Particularly at this point in time, with government cutbacks and base closures and so on, the last thing they want to do is adopt a new stance on females, where suddenly you've got more expense in coping with the inclusion of females in the process. I wanted to make it really about a female wanting to do a guy's job. For reasons of career. It's a career--a choice.

M: There's a scene in G.I. Jane where they try to smoke her out of the forces through false charges of lesbianism, which is really common. Jane is clearly straight. Was there ever a point during which you thought it would be a more radical film if Jane had been a lesbian?

RS: Yeah, we actually talked about it. But she's also breaking the rules when we meet her at the beginning because she's conducting a relationship with another officer in the same department. Which is also taboo.

M: So the lesbian angle was discussed, but you felt it might overtake the film in some way and make it a gay-themed film?

RS: Yeah, it would become a completely different kind of movie. "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" is weird. Of course gay elements are in the services; they prefer to turn a blind eye. They don't want to ever be confronted with it. Because there are difficulties with that, probably more from a male perspective than from a female one.

M: Demi wouldn't have had a problem playing a lesbian, you don't think?

RS: At some point, no.

M: The other interesting thing about this is that many of the cases that are coming up in the military right now surround harassment and rape. In the brutal scene where she's being beaten up by the chief, there's never a point where you introduce any rape tension.

RS: I didn't want to. Even the shower sequence is asexual.

M: But that's a real common thing in the military, that women end up getting raped.

RS: I wanted to make her superior a kind of supreme advocate of what he does as a human being. I wanted to make him a real professional. Him walking into the shower was another test of her ability. If her natural inclination was to cover herself, in a way it would have been a weakness. It was a test.

M: The pivotal line in the torture scene is when she says "You can suck my dick." Do you think women have to act like men to get ahead?

RS: In certain aspects of certain professions... why do females now climb Mount Everest?

M: Some feminists argue that men can't direct feminist films.

RS: Sure they can. I've never had that problem. In business terms, I've always tended to employ the best person for the job. Two of my companies have been run by women. I've never had that problem. If you haven't got that problem, then you tend to look into the centre of the argument and find it inconceivable: what the hell's the argument about?

M: So that's why you're fascinated with these gender disparities?

RS: I think so. I find that women naturally are equal. Why not? Women's intuition is very specific. This part of a woman is probably stronger than those of men. Who knows why? Part of being female, probably. Those intuitions are often very valuable, in every respect.

G.I. Jane opens Friday, Aug. 22. Check film listing for showtimes