How to Train Your Dragon 2 is fun for all the family – action-packed, enjoyable and even capable of jerking a few tears. But, even in animation, women get roles no bigger than that of female accomplice or long lost relative that looked after herself for 20 years before immediately needing to be saved by the men in her life the moment they enter it again.

How to Train Your Dragon 2The female roles get no bigger in 'How to Train Your Dragon 2'

Kiera Knightley is the only female flying the flag in lead roles at the cinemas at the moment. In the romantic comedy Begin Again, she’s plays a heart broken women who finds love with a little help of her music. Predictable perhaps but it’s all the ladies have got.

In reality, women are forcing their way into the foreground by screaming for equality in the workplace, on the street and in the home. We’re in the 21st Century and women are refusing to be mere background figures anymore.

It’s about time Hollywood caught up.

Keira Knightley
Keira Knightley is one of few female leads in Hollywood this summer