Discuss: The Manic Pixie Dream Girl - Love Her or Hate Her?

I have to preface my comments here by saying, Yes, I'm male, so my opinion doesn't really count in this discussion, but I'm going to voice it anyway.

I've known many females that have watched, and loved Garden State & Elizabethtown, and in both films, have loved the characters portrayed by Portman and Dunst.

At least the females I've been with while watching, and I do have many that have watched Garden State with me and my fiancee, have enjoyed the quirkiness of Portman. While she may not be completely realistic, you could say the same about the entire cast, and not just Portman. A guy with a psychiatrist as a father who prescribes every type of Lithium substitute known to man because he thinks that he killed his mother?? Are you kidding me??

There wasn't a single character who was depicted in a realistic manner in the entire movie, so to pick one performance out as being cliched is being too narrow minded about a good film about fantasy.

As for the mention of Penelope Cruz, she's brought depth to every character she's played, there's more to her than the MPG every time she's on the screen. Including The Good Night, where she plays the dream girl of the main character, but in the same performance plays the horrific truth of what that person really is compared to his fantasy. A wonderful example of being both the MPG, and the complete destruction of the MPG fantasy. It's a good performance in a relatively mediocre film.

Dunst's character in Elizabethtown is probably the most useless of the three, as she is just quirky for the fact of being quirky. But I would ask, wouldn't it be great to be that happy all the time?? Wouldn't it be a fun life to live like she does?? Is it really that bad to have actresses portray characters that show some form of love for life?? If actresses can only portray people that have been "damaged" or struggle with life, then I think we've lost sight of what cinema does for people. It lets them escape the realities they have and fantasize about having a better life, and that starts with having a better perspective on life. That's what these girls show.

On the flip side they're way less damaging to society than the "hooker with a heart of gold" where ladies are taught that it's OK to be a hooker as long as you have good intentions.

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Wow. I've read this exact article before.

http://www.avclub.com/articles/wild-things-16-films-featuring-manic-pixie-dream-g,2407/

http://livingromcom.typepad.com/my_weblog/2008/08/the-pixie-and-the-snidekick.html

Can we please be original for two seconds?

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You know, I wouldn't say it's a complete myth, they're out there and are really fascinating (and F'ed up) people...I dated one for close to a year...and I can tell you that it does NOT end well. The things that are exciting and fun for the first few months do not adapt nicely to day to day life.

Let's just say in the end they may have a nervous breakdown in your living room and you may end up having to call the police on them and pray that they don't think to make up something about you hitting them or something.

So I'm not sure it's a complete myth or invention...or that it's that overused. But it makes for a much more interesting story than one of a guy who meets a girl who's receptionist at a trucking company who in her evenings collects hockey cards and watches 'Dancing with The Stars'.

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Whether they are harmless dream-girls on the big screen, or not, seems to depend on the story being told. In North Country, for instance, Charlize Theron’s husband is cliché and not much of a real person; but, the story isn’t about her husband. Her husband isn’t vital to the story, he’s only valuable for telling her story more completely, so her husband is a cardboard-cut-out cliché of a man.

Now, if on the other hand, North Country was about Charlize Theron’s husband (which it isn’t) then Charlize Theron would probably need to be reduced to a cardboard-cut-out cliché in order to tell her husbands story more completely.

Harmless dream-girls (or cardboard-cut-outs of clichéd men) on the big screen, aren’t merely a trend in storytelling; they’re (male or female) necessary (used) to tell a more complete story in the fewest words possible.

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I think this is the first time I've heard "Penelope Cruz" and "pixie" mentioned in the same sentence.

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I always liked that Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind took this character who looked every bit like a Manic Pixie Dream Girl, and took that it to its much more painful and realistic conclusion. Although I don't find the Natalie Portman embodiment of MPDG painful or offensive, I can't really watch Garden State without thinking about the line in Eternal Sunshine when Winslet talks about how guys always think that she's going to save them. It's exactly the paper-thin, always there to sit in a tub with you, Shin's listening dream girl like Portman's character that convinces men in more realistic movies that the Blue haired Clementine they just met on a train is adorably quirky rather than severly damaged.

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I was about to write the exact same thing Rachael wrote about comparing Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind to garden State and how Spotless Mind explored the MPDG more.

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I've read a lot of the talk about MPG, since Rabin created the label. I have often wondered about Ruth Gordon in Harold and Maude? Is she a MPG? As much of a backstory as she has is one mention of a dead husband and a concentration camp tattoo. Maude only seems to exist to teach mopey Harold that if you want to sing out, sing out. Is Ruth Gordon the grandmother of this new generation?

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Can we, for just a second, be a little more consistent with the acronyms? MPDG, I can get behind. But MPG makes me think of something a little more militaristic... Like it's short for "Magic-Propelled Grenade" or some such.

We can criticize Natalie Portman in Garden State for having a character that lacked a story or development, but what exactly about that movie DID have story or development? There was barely enough plot in it to string together sight gags and non sequiturs. I think she served her purpose well, she showed up, was instantly likable, pitched for "The Shins" and then... wait, where was I?

Oddly enough, I do love that film. Any-who.

Scourge? No. There's a time and a place for all things: sometimes you just don't have the time to get to know every single character--sometimes you have to look at someone and know instantly who they are and what purpose they serve. That's a useful tool, and the MPDG is just the latest in line behind the jock, the uptight businessman, the mentor, et al. Why are we angry at them when we can be angry at Cameron Crowe for abusing them?

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Erik, when you add nothing to the discussion, it's just redundant.

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Maybe it's because I am that sort of "brooding young man" but - Samantha from Garden State is altogether amazing. I don't find her annoying in the slightest. She's is quirky and awesome.

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'm female and I despise the MPG in a movie. Imo, this character
makes the entire film too whimsical, too fluffy to take so seriously
even if the main character is going through an epic, life changing
metamorphosis as in Garden State.

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They might be a myth, but I love them in movies. And I agree with Andyll, they are hard to date in real life. Let's not forget that great line from John Hodge's screenplay in "The Beach".

"When you develop an infatuation for someone you always find a reason to believe that this is exactly the person for you. It doesn't need to be a good reason. Taking photographs of the night sky, for example. Now, in the long run, that's just the kind of dumb, irritating habit that would cause you to split up. But in the haze of infatuation, it's just what you've been searching for all these years. "

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By the way, if you reverse the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, you get Jack Nicholson's character in As Good as It Gets.

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Meaningful Post Fail.

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