Do shut up, Zoe

There was an incredibly irritating article by Zoe Williams in The Guardian today, arguing that 21st century cinema is trash, whereas television drama is mature and courageous. I feel moved to present my objections one by one:

1. She's not making an even-handed comparison. She's comparing clever TV shows like The Wire to big budget silly blockbusters like Confessions of a Shopaholic. If she'd compared Mad Men and The Sopranos and Six Feet Under to The Lives of Others and The Reader and Away From Her, she might have been able to make a more interesting argument, even though of course she would have been wrong, because cinema and TV are equally capable of producing diamonds or shit.
   
2. And to elaborate on that point, let's have a look at some of the ratings 'success stories' of British TV: Deal or No Deal, Coronation Street, Holby City... I love television and I don't think there's anything wrong with enjoying a funny episode of Come Dine With Me or the EastEnders Christmas special, but let's not delude ourselves that the channels are packed with intellectual, challenging viewing options - a lot of it's just silly entertainment (and the same goes for cinema). You have to look quite hard to find all that 'emotional complexity and political texture' she talks about.
3. My final point is a small one. Zoe says, 'Changing cinematic presentations of women have been very well documented - we seem, as a gender, to have been getting stupider since about the mid-90s... on the big screen you have heroines such as the "journalist" in Confessions of a Shopaholic, the "lawyer" in Legally Blonde(s), the "lawyer" (again) in Sex and the City (the movie) - all putatively demanding careers, undertaken by people so thick they can't understand basic words.' I know Zoe likes to pass herself off as a leading feminist, but I think she's called it wrong in the case of Sex and the City. The lawyer character - Miranda - is clever and hard-working and serious. If you've watched it, you can't reasonably compare her to Legally Blonde. Also, the character originates in the TV show, which Zoe later goes on to praise. Here's a writerly tip for you, Zoe: it's always a good idea to read something through and check for consistency before you email it off to be published.
   

Sorry that I've got on my high horse for this one. As a freelance journalist who has to pitch for work, I find it irritating that such a nonsensical, ill-considered idea for an article gets commissioned just because it has the name 'Zoe Williams' on it. If she was unknown, she would never in a million years have got this published - and quite right too.