I love a good movie as much as anyone, and as the resident feminist blogger, I especially love a movie that features female lead characters combating the male status quo. Nothing gets me to a theater faster than the promise that I might actually see a well-written female character who does something, anything, other than act sexy for the male audience and get rescued by an uber-masculine hero. Hollywood has marketed a few “empowerment” films lately (I’m looking at you, “Sucker Punch”), but too often the veneer of female power masks a one-dimensional, oversexualized treatment of women that espouses the same stereotypes as always (I’m still looking at you, “Sucker Punch”).

So when I heard about Whit Stillman’s “Damsels in Distress,” I was understandably hesitant. The title was enough to set me on edge, and the plot description didn’t help. Set in a male-dominated East Coast university, “Damsels” is the story of Violet, Rose, and Heather, three preppy women who crusade to elevate the coarse culture of their school through—get this—hygiene training, tap dance therapy for the suicidally depressed, and dating loser boys in order to educate them. When they meet transfer student Lily, they take her under their wing, and the four flounce off together to pour their hearts into unhealthy romantic relationships and joke about how bad frat boys smell.

No one is surprised that I was unimpressed. The movie gets all its laughs by stereotyping both women and men: the girls are so obliviously bookish and prissy that they receive little to no actual human sympathy, and the boys are either sex-hungry con artists or so stupid they don’t know the names of the primary colors.

No, really, there’s a guy who doesn’t know colors. Rainbows are so confusing he panics.

But no one, not even I, was prepared for how angry this movie was about to make me. While investigating the movie online to see how other people perceived it, I came across distributor Sony Pictures’ plot synopsis, quoted everywhere from Wikipedia to IMDB to Rotten Tomatoes. In typical summary fashion, it describes each character with a single modifier:

Violet, well-spoken social arbiter who welcomes constructive criticism from her friends and has a passion for international dance crazes, is described as “group leader Violet.” Rose, honest and cultured, protective of her friends and quick to spot sleazy male deceptions, is “principled Rose.” Neither modifier is technically wrong, and the oversimplification is to be expected in context.

But Heather, simple-minded and naïve but tender-hearted and gentle with her friends, whose frustration with frat boy ingratitude gave me my one moment of sincere affection for a character in this movie, is “sexy Heather.”

Sony Pictures, you won’t like me when I’m angry…

The sexiest thing Heather does in the whole movie is get a kiss on the forehead from her boyfriend. “Damsels” does nothing to sexualize its characters, but Hollywood just can’t allow a movie to hit the screens without the promise of sexy women. And to cheapen Carrie MacLemore’s innocent and honest portrayal of Heather by relegating her to the status of “the sexy one,” just to use the word “sexy” in the synopsis, is a crime.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, I suppose. Recent blockbuster “Cabin in the Woods” commits the same exact crime. If you believe Joss Whedon (please don’t), the only archetypal roles women can fill are “virgin” and “whore.” In the eyes of Hollywood and a regrettable number of real people, the only trait about women that matters is their level of sexual activity, and whether they’re “innocent” or “easy,” they better be sexy about it. And if “Damsels” doesn’t promise that at least one female cast member will take her top off, the movie must not be worth seeing.

I’m pretty sure I turned into She-Hulk for a minute when I read that blasted synopsis. I may have rampaged through the streets a little bit and overturned a few taco carts. So if you see me on the news swatting planes out of the air from the top of the Capitol… now you know.