When blogger/online reporter Nikki Finke wrote up Warner Brothers' president Jeff Robinov's alleged stupid mouth-off about his future plans for female stars, you can imagine the hoo-raw in the media world. The shock! The anger! The outrage! The denials! And Ms. Finke's follow-ups on the story did nothing to diminish a really idiotic piece of behavior from the Warner Brothers end. Finke has been doing her level best to get their side of the store, and they've been as coy as a gal of courtin' age at the rodeo Saturday Night dance, complete with biddin' on homemade box lunches by the gal herself.

I haven't said anything before this because, well, everybody else has been saying plenty. And I was on the road. But now I'm not on the road for a whopping two days, and there is something I would like to add, my current to the blogstream.

WHY IS ANYONE SURPRISED?

Have people not been listening to Barbra Streisand? Have they not been listening to the likes of Debra Winger and Rosanna Arquette? Have they not been paying attention?

How many top movies by any mainstream houses have female stars in the leads--and how many of those are not romantic comedies? (Bonus question: how many of said leads are not blond young lovely twenty-somethings?)

How many films with female leads get serious studio publicity support? (The Brave One sure didn't. TV ads for two weeks before the picture opened and the rounds of the late night talk shows? Please.)

How many top movies by mainstream houses have female directors and/or producers? How many have women behind the camera or women in charge of the script?

How many top films with lead women show them in active roles as something other than sex dollies, nurturers, or babes who kick ass as long as they wear something tight? (Hey, what about the tough woman in The Kingdom who traipses all over Saudi Arabia in a tank top?) You may now disqualify any and all Gibson and Cruise pictures: women only get to be nurturers, toys, and mothers of the Inheritors of the Sacred Sacs.

You know what surprises me? That anyone cared enough about Robinov's statement to pass it on. My opinion of the current film industry is that nobody cares about women in mainstream filmmaking; that the halls are filled with the film industry's equivalent of Occasional Superheroine's former comic book colleagues' cries of "Hey, the rape pages are in!", and the corresponding scramble for a good, drooling view; that the women in mainstream filmmaking are either desensitized or keep their mouths shut so they can continue to make the big bucks; and that everyone is shocked that anyone is making a big deal of this. I'm sure they're wondering who the hell cared enough about the common point of view to pass this along to someone who might get bent out of shape. Either that or they're wondering how Robinov was stupid enough to say it out of clubhouse doors, where someone who might care would hear.

These people have made it abundantly clear over the last twenty years that they don't give a flying fuck what real women think, or what real men who are tired of the same old shit think. Over and over they keep pumping out the same old crap for adults, and wondering where their market share goes. HELLOOOOOO. It's going to independent movies, cable, foreign, and Netflix, where people with brains watch entertainment that engages them. The best young talents are going foreign, indie, and cable, suckas. And instead of trying to do something about it, you blame the women who lead your same batch o' crap churn `em outs, or the writers who give you precisely what you asked for, but never your own cowardice in refusing to break from the crumbling molds. You don't blame your over-paid, over-indulged, heel-dragging man-stars. You don't blame your over-paid and over-indulged hack directors, or your kick-boot producers, or your heads of corporation. You don't blame your own cowardice in trying the same old dying film formulas. You blame your second-class citizens, cut their salaries, pump up your own, and cry into your so-called martinis. A pox on all of you. Go turn out a zillionth "Halloween" or "Lethal Weapon" (if your star doesn't embarrass you again). Or go make another kiddie blockbuster like all the other kiddie blockbuster. The kids aren't wise to you, yet.

And does this entire rant feel familiar? Does it feel like I've said all this before, about another branch of the media?

Naaaaaaaaah.