# What are the womanest(?) moments in movie history? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [March 1, 2012, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415 "2012-03-01T02:01:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/41 "2012-03-01T19:39:14Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Yeah, I don’t really like either measure. Men fight, women seduce? Blegh. Well, if there is such a thing as “manliness”, then there must be such a thing as “womanliness”, otherwise manliness makes no sense, and is really something else. My contribution: [Jessica Rabbit sings](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yy5THitqPBw) ---
**Author:** ![Mrs.Cake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/2acd7d/32.png) [@Mrs.Cake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mrs.Cake)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/42 "2012-03-01T19:47:24Z")
The entire movie _The Ghost & Mrs. Muir_. Lucy refusing to be manipulated or bullied by her dead husband’s family, moving with her child to a place everyone thinks she will regret, refusing to be chased off by a ghost, and later forming a lucrative partnership with him to keep her independence, sort-of reluctantly choosing a live man over a spirit, then refusing to be overcome when he turn out to be a cad, and generally keeping her strength and sanity over the course of a long life alone. Hard to pick single moments out, but the opening scene with her refusal to yeild to her weak, manipulative mother-in-law and bullying sister-in-law trying to force her to stay under their thumbs/protection is a very good one. Shows a variety of women acting in a variety of ways - Lucy strong, mother-in-law weepy and whiny, sister-in-law full of threats and dire pronouncements, and in the wings, Martha and Anna relying on Lucy to stay strong and get them the hell out of this house. ---
**Author:** ![magnusblitz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@magnusblitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magnusblitz)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/43 "2012-03-01T19:51:01Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > We shouldn’t have to tell you what the most womanly moment was. You should know. Are you thinking When Harry Met Sally? Cuz that’s what I’m thinking. ---
**Author:** ![Sister\_Vigilante](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Sister\_Vigilante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sister_Vigilante)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/44 "2012-03-01T19:56:14Z")
Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman. Extremely womanly out of the suit. Ass kicker in it. ---
**Author:** ![OtisCampbellWasRight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/d78d45/32.png) [@OtisCampbellWasRight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OtisCampbellWasRight)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/45 "2012-03-01T20:01:14Z")
When Nurse “Dish” (Joanne Pfluegg) threw a mercy screw to “Painless” the dentist with sexual ambivalence in the original movie M_A_S\*H. True human kindness on many levels. But I’m a big softy for that kinda thing. ---
**Author:** ![janis\_and\_c0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/janis_and_c0/32/21_2.png) [@janis\_and\_c0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/janis_and_c0)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/46 "2012-03-01T20:01:53Z")
> [@Drain\_Bead](#): > > The post-funeral scene in _Steel Magnolias_ was what instantly popped into my mind upon reading the thread title. I came in to say this movie. Although I was thinking very close to the scene you mentioned is a moment when they’re all laughing at Ouiser (Are you _high_, Clariee??) And they’re laughing and crying and together as women and friends and sisterhood and solidarity that chokes me a up a little to think of. A moment of perfect girlfriendship. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Made\_French\_Toast\_For\_You](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/858c86/32.png) [@I\_Made\_French\_Toast\_For\_You](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Made_French_Toast_For_You)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/47 "2012-03-01T20:11:31Z")
The first thing that came to my mind was the final scene in Quentin Tarantino’s _Death Proof_: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYt9AlsgPCo](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EYt9AlsgPCo) (Warning: Violence, dubbing.) ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 8:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/48 "2012-03-01T20:37:45Z")
Not a movie moment but would make a great one if done properly, at least, I see it in my mind’s eye as a movie moment: Molly Bloom in “Ulysses” saying “Yes!” to a lover, and more generally, to life itself: > [@James Joyce](#): > > "…I was a Flower of the mountain yes when I put the rose in my hair like the Andalusian girls used or shall I wear a red yes and how he kissed me under the Moorish wall and I thought well as well him as another and then I asked him with my eyes to ask again yes and then he asked me would I yes to say yes my mountain flower and first I put my arms around him yes and drew him down to me so he could feel my breasts all perfume yes and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes. " ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/49 "2012-03-01T20:57:16Z")
Shirley MacLaine going batshit in the hospital because her daughter is in pain and no one is helping her. ---
**Author:** ![SykoSkotty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c0e974/32.png) [@SykoSkotty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SykoSkotty)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 9:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/50 "2012-03-01T21:04:22Z")
Sally Field in Norma Rae. ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [March 1, 2012, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/51 "2012-03-01T21:12:32Z")
> [@bup](#): > > Ilsa in Casablanca: “I can’t fight it anymore. I ran away from you once. I can’t do it again. Oh, I don’t know what’s right any longer. You’ll have to think for both of us, for all of us.” > [@BrotherCadfael](#): > > Grace Kelly’s entrance in _Rear Window_. > [@Mrs.Cake](#): > > The entire movie _The Ghost & Mrs. Muir_. Agree with all of these. _The Ghost and Mrs. Muir_ is one of my fav movies. Rex Harrison is THE epitome of masculinity in it, too. They are a great couple in this film. Are there any young actresses (under 50) with this kind of womanly presence? ---
**Author:** ![Sigmagirl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c89c15/32.png) [@Sigmagirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sigmagirl)\ **Post date:** [March 2, 2012, 12:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/52 "2012-03-02T00:14:45Z")
I’d say Diane Lane squeaks in. ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [March 3, 2012, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415/53 "2012-03-03T23:50:23Z")
In _Gone with the Wind_, where Melanie is on her deathbed speaking to Scarlett: “Ashley…take care of him…but never…let him know…” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-the-womanest-moments-in-movie-history/614415.md?page=2)