Keira Knightley won’t stop talking about the need for equality in the film industry and it makes us love her even more.
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Whether she’s going topless for the sake of showing her gorgeously unPhotoshopped body or opening up about her struggles with neuroses, the actress isn’t afraid to get candid about important issues affecting people today.
But maybe most significant is her vocalization of the need for a serious equality movement within the film industry.
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“I don’t know what happened through the ’80s, ’90s, and ’00s that took feminism off the table, that made it something that women weren’t supposed to identify with and were supposed to be ashamed of,” Knightley said in a recent interview for Violet magazine. “Feminism is about the fight for equality between the sexes, with equal respect, equal pay, and equal opportunity. At the moment we are still a long way off that.”
The actress also added in a few spot-on questions about what we’re not seeing enough of in entertainment. “Where are the female stories? Where are the directors? Where are the writers? It’s imbalanced so given that we are half the cinema-going public, we are half the people [who] watch drama, or watch anything else, where is that? So yes, I think the pay is a huge thing, but I’m actually more concerned over the lack of our voices being heard.”
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In fact, according to Variety, only 12 percent of protagonists in 2014 movies were females. Yet, female-led films like The Hunger Games: Mockingjay — Part 1, Gone Girl and Maleficent ranked among the biggest films of the year. So clearly fans want to see female-driven films. Why isn’t Hollywood delivering more?
Knightley, who is currently pregnant with her first child, has often made a point of portraying strong female heroines like her leads in Pride and Prejudice, The Duchess and A Dangerous Method. She has also worked on quite a few female-led projects, including Bend It Like Beckham and Seeking a Friend for the End of the World.
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