Real Wild Women

The movie Heartbreakers, starring Sigourney Weaver and Jennifer Love Hewitt, shows this idea of “Real Wild Women”. The movie is about a mother-daughter team who deceive men into marrying the mother, while the daughter comes into the relationship and gets the man to cheat on the mother with her, and the mom catches them together. The mother then divorces the man and gets a grand divorce settlement with a lot of money headed in their direction. The movie opens with the mother, Max, marrying a guy named Dean. The next day Max goes to visit him at work, but catches him fooling around with his secretary, and her daughter, Paige. Max then divorces Dean and her and Paige get a couple hundred thousand dollars in cash. After that con, Paige admits that she is getting tired of all the conning. Max however, is not ready to let Paige go out on her own. She decides to con her daughter by making her think the IRS is after them and that they need more money. With this knowledge, Paige agrees to one more con with her mother, which becomes problematic. The last con is with an old man who is a billionaire. During the con, Dean hunts Max down in attempt to win her back, but he finds out about the mother-daughter con that her and Paige have been doing.

This movie has different societal roles than the usual accepted norm. It has more of a women’s independence idea than what is usually portrayed. Max is a man-hater and doesn’t believe they can do any good for a woman. That is why she is always out conning them. In the article by Jack Boozer titled, “Seduction and Betrayal in the Heartland: Thelma and Lousie” he explains that the title “femmes fatales [is a woman] who betray[s] the male protagonist and the family ideal out of greed” (Boozer 3). This “femmes fatales” role describes the character Max perfectly. She betrayed Dean who actually loved her and wanted to be married to her out of greed for her own personal benefit. She also betrayed her family, Paige, and tricked her into doing this final con with her. I think the filmmaker wanted to show the idea that women can be independent, but he is also showing a negative aspect of this woman through her deception and trickery. They also show the role of Dean contrary to normal societal assumptions about men. He is shown as more of a “softy” and a hopeless romantic. He chases after Max because he loves her and caves in easily to any of her requests. Usually male roles are shown more as a “manly man” and not as a romantic, heartbroken softy.