Elizabeth Banks disappointed at her Charlie’s Angels reboot being labelled ‘feminist manifesto’-Lucy Norris-Entertainment – Metro

Elizabeth Banks insisted Charlie’s Angels isn’t ‘just for girls’ (Picture: Getty)

Elizabeth Banks has aired her frustration at the feedback she received for her 2019 reboot of the Charlie’s Angles franchise.

The actress-turned-director is unhappy with how the anticipated remake was marketed, and has insisted the action film was not ‘just for girls’.

Starring Kristen Stewart, Naomi Scott, and Ella Balinska, the film follows Charlie’s three angels as they work together to take down a dangerous technology.

The action-packed flick was intended to reboot the famous franchise that started with a TV show in the 1970s and the 2000s movie that featured Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz, and Lucy Liu.

Instead, however, Banks (who also played Bosley in the film) felt her direction was misinterpreted to be an attempt at creating some kind of ‘feminist manifesto’ that spoke exclusively to a female audience – something she heavily denies being the case.

Speaking to The New York Times, the filmmaker – who is set to release her new comedy-drama film Call Jane – said: ‘It was very stressful, partly because when women do things in Hollywood it becomes this story.

Banks says there was a ‘disconnect’ on the film remake’s marketing side (Picture: Getty)

‘I was just making an action movie. I would’ve liked to have made Mission: Impossible, but women aren’t directing Mission: Impossible.’

The Hunger Games star further explained that she thought the only reason she was given an opportunity to direct an action movie was due to the largely female cast it featured.

‘I was able to direct an action movie, frankly, because it starred women, and I’m a female director, and that is the confine right now in Hollywood.

‘I wish that the movie had not been presented as just for girls, because I didn’t make it just for girls. There was a disconnect on the marketing side of it for me.’

Not her first time in the hot seat, Banks made her directorial debut when she worked on Pitch Perfect 2 in 2015, a similarly female-focused cast and script.

She expressed the fact she wanted to see more change in what she called a ‘male dominated world’.

The Charlie’s Angels reboot was released in 2019 (Picture: Splash News)

It seems she wasn’t the only one to address the glaring gender gap in Hollywood, as critics praised the film for having a subtext of inequality and acknowledged Banks’ attempts to level the playing field through her work.

Reporter and critic Beandrea July thought the release was a ‘a wildly entertaining action flick that also happens to expose the systemic ways that men are overvalued and women are undervalued in society, and daringly connects this pattern to nothing short of planetary annihilation.’

Banks’ latest film, Call Jane, will see her play a conservative housewife working for the Jane Collective, an underground movement helping women have abortions before Roe v Wade was in effect.

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Set in 1960s Chicago, the drama happens on the cusp of huge political change as Banks’ character fights an all-male medical world that refuses to terminate a life-threatening pregnancy.

Similarly to the film star’s other acting credits, the script is written to balance political ideas with entertaining scenes.

Call Jane hits screens October 28 and also features Kata Mara, Wunmi Mosaku, Sigourney Weaver and Chris Messina.

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