Recent studies from the Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media highlight that when older women are present, their portrayals are often limited by tropes.

, are amassing large followings by promoting aging as a "prime time" of power and strength.

The shift is visible in the stories being told. Look at the fierce, brittle fury of Isabelle Huppert in Elle ; a woman in her sixties who is neither victim nor hero, but a complex force of will. See the volcanic tenderness of Olivia Colman in The Lost Daughter , unraveling the secret ambivalences of motherhood. Watch Michelle Yeoh, at sixty, become a multiversal action star in Everything Everywhere All at Once —not in spite of her age, but because of it. Her character’s exhaustion, regret, and stubborn love are the very engines of the story.