September 17th, 2020 marks ten years since the hit teenage rom-com Easy A was released (and yet somehow breakout star Emma Stone hasn’t aged at all since then. No fair). After another decade of progressing feminism, is Easy A a story that holds water in a post-Me Too world, or is the modern retelling of The Scarlet Letter simply another exaggerated version of male-gaze stereotypes thrust upon young girl characters?Premiering as a Special Presentation at the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival, Easy A told the story of Olive Penderghast (Stone), a clean-cut high-schooler who, after fibbing about losing her virginity, sees her reputation spiral like Hester Prynne’s in The Scarlet Letter, which she is studying in school. But Olive is no shrinking violet and decides to use the rumour mill to advance her social and financial standing. For a small fee, Olive agrees to let downtrodden high school boys tell everyone they got to second base with her but things quickly start to spiral out of control. The pun in the title (“Easy A” being a euphemism for classes that are easy to ace) takes center stage when Olive, like Hester Prynne, embroiders a red "A" on her clothes and wears it to school, downright daring her classmates to shame her. Unlike Hester Prynne, she’s not forced to do anything—she chooses to spread the lies to help these boys. Which begs the question—why exactly?

Girl Power

We as an audience might feel pathos for the first couple of boys who approach her with this indecent proposal—Brandon who is being bullied for being queer, and Evan who's dealing with body-image issues—because growing up as an outsider is truly difficult. We can see ourselves acquiescing to the same scenario simply due to our innate sense of human solidarity and a wish to end their suffering.But it is not a girl’s job to manage the pain of strange boys and make them feel better about their lives. In fact, she nearly destroys her own life because a boy's happiness is deemed more valuable than her own.The reason why the film works in a feminist framework is because Olive refuses to be slut-shamed. She walks the school corridors like it’s a catwalk in her new corset with the scarlet A brandished over her chest and tells everyone exactly what she thinks of them and their pedestrian morals. It just makes ya wanna stand up and cheer. And we don’t care what anyone says, we will use that “Oooo, burn!” moment as a meme-able GIF for all eternity.

Her Body, Her Choice

While we cannot fault the film for showing sex work (albeit imaginary) as something totally within a woman’s control, we forget that A) Olive is not a woman, she’s a young girl, and B) the film doesn’t question in any manner why sexual activity is considered a reputation-boost for boys and reputation-killer for girls. The film just plays into that stereotype as a cultural-given and asks us to run with it.Throughout the film, the story toes the line on the issue of girl’s bodies being used as bargaining chips. We see, when boy after boy asks her to pretend they fooled around, that Olive’s body is seen as something to obtain, to use, and to discard for bragging rights or popularity points amongst the boys. The only reason why the film ultimately works and withstands the test of time is that Olive never loses autonomous control over her own body. This is key. She’s not actually doing anything non-consensual, and fiercely defends herself when it comes to appropriate payment and inappropriate sexual advances.[video_embed id='2036305']MORE MOVIE NEWS: Madonna to co-write and direct her own biopic[/video_embed]

Diverse Representation

We definitely need to spill the tea when it comes to Easy A’s depiction of minorities, since it’s a very cis-het white movie that doesn’t seek to address issues outside of a cis-het white teen experience. White women’s sexuality and the policing of it is historically very different from that of Black women other WOC, and people with different sexual orientations.Case in point, for the entire second act of the film, we see Olive both engaging in and even benefitting from upholding queerphobic stereotypes. She tells Brandon to act “more straight” in order to fit in. She even blurts out in exasperation at one point, “What is it with you gays?”Bisexuality is used as a running joke throughout the film, when both Olive’s parents, played by Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson, admit separately at different points that they dabbled in bisexuality as if it were a phase. “I was gay once for a while,” Tucci’s character Dill says. “We all do it.” Yikes.When it comes to Black and POC characters, the film completely drops the ball. There is only one Black character who has a name and appears in more than one scene with lines, and that is Olive’s younger brother Chip. Even then, each scene revolves around his Blackness and otherness, with his father Dill jokingly asking him, “Where are you from originally?” It’s a cute bit that is knowingly tongue-in-cheek, but we cannot give the same passing grade to how Black people are referenced in the rest of the film.A running joke throughout the movie is Olive’s affection for Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn, whom she describes as a boy who runs away with “a big hulking Black guy.” Well that didn’t age well. If that description isn’t enough to put you off, at the end of the film, we learn the aforementioned Brandon has run away to be with the man he loves, who is described as—you guessed it—“a big hulking Black guy.” And wouldn’t you know it, they’re seen together on screen watching a movie version of Huckleberry Finn! It’s just... baffling.And we cannot ignore that, were Olive not a white girl, her experience of (imaginary) sex work, high school rumours, a destroyed reputation, and even wrecking the marriage of her favourite teacher Mr. Griffith (Thomas Haden Church), wouldn’t result in just a (SPOILER ALERT!) few tears and a happy web-cast reveal in the end. Olive would most likely be brutalized either socially or actually physically for her actions. She would most definitely be expelled at the behest of Mr. Griffith or his guidance-counsellor wife (Lisa Kudrow). She might even end up kicked out of her home. It's a terrifying reality, but it can't be ignored in a discussion of feminist nuances in what's supposed to be a fun film.[video_embed id='2036581']MORE MOVIE NEWS: Tracey Deer is paving the way for Indigenous filmmakers [/video_embed]

A Guilty Pleasure

In the end, while many of these flaws show just how dated a film can become in just 10 years, we cannot ignore that it was written and directed by two white men. So if you haven’t heard it before, let us remind you—we need more women and Women of Colour telling our stories and helming stories about young girls! There are so many other small bits within the movie that we didn’t even get in to (the superficiality of the girls' friendships, the emphasis on girls wanting big boobs, etc.), that smacks of a male lens rather than a woman’s voice.But for what it’s worth, the film is a fun (if sometimes tone-deaf) romp into high school politics and the way strong girls standing up for themselves within society can change communities. So because of that, Easy A will continue to have a guilty-pleasure spot in our hearts... until some other modern adaptation of The Scarlett Letter appears in cinemas and takes its place.[video_embed id='-1']BEFORE YOU GO: Pit Bull gently plays with tiny Chihuahua puppy [/video_embed]