Passion Gender/Women and Femininity

If you were to ask us, we'd say Grace felt a little stifled by the expectations society placed on her simply because she was a female, and it sounds like she saw the same thing happening to ol' Liz Taylor in this movie—albeit with little resistance from Taylor's character. Do movies (especially romantic comedies) still present the kind of female character that Grace professes to hate? Why might that be the case? 

What are girls "supposed to be like"—at least according to movies like Father of the Bride? We wonder what Grace would think of some of the movies we see today—would they still inspire the same kind of rage? Or have her passions been pushed behind the washtub with age? Also, we never see her outwardly express this inner rage she feels. Why might this be the case? 

It's interesting that Grace rails against this idea, yet she once had a fantasy in which a handsome Prince Charming figure comes into her life and falls in love with her. Maybe those stories are impossible to ignore.

How does Grace want to be judged? How much of a factor is physical appearance in how people judge us?

This stigma—that boys are better suited to study science and math—still seems to exist today. This goes to show that even though some of the gender roles and expectations that we see in this story may come off as dated or old-fashioned, there are several that still exist today. Maybe change doesn't always happen as quickly as we'd like. 

Maybe Mrs. Travers doesn't feel the same way about these signs of independence that Grace has attached to her. Who ever thought muumuus would be so admirable?