Some of the rankest sexism of the past several decades of Hollywood comedy can indeed be slickly resolved with a gender swap. The very idea of writing over these movies with hot-pink graffiti supplies a thrill. The few roles for women in the originals were as love interests (Julia Roberts in “Ocean’s” is the crown jewel in Danny’s heist) or helpmates (Annie Potts as the “Ghostbusters” receptionist). But compared to the awkward white male geeks and leering white male boors that constituted underdogs in many of these films, women now fit more cleanly into the disadvantaged position, whether they’re fighting for respect from the scientific establishment (“Ghostbusters”), seeking lost educational opportunities (“Life of the Party”) or suffering under the conditions of low-wage work and single parenthood (“Overboard”).

Even “Ocean’s 8” conjures the current corporate-feminist imperative of women seizing capital, like a kind of equal-pay initiative for female thieves. Debbie pumps up her girl gang on the evening of the heist by telling them: “Somewhere out there, there’s an 8-year-old girl lying in bed, dreaming of being a criminal. Let’s do this for her.”

Then there’s the sex stuff. Eighties comedies routinely built bits around men harassing, stalking and sexually humiliating women. By giving women the sexual upper hand, these remakes neutralize the most offensive aspects of the originals. When Mr. Russell kidnaps an amnesiac Ms. Hawn and convinces her she is his wife in the 1987 “Overboard,” he threatens her and amuses himself by gesturing at raping her. But in the remake, it’s the playboy played by Mr. Derbez who attempts to initiate sex with an uninterested Ms. Faris, the woman who has tricked him into thinking he’s her husband.

Similarly, when Mr. Dangerfield arrives on campus in “Back to School,” he barrels into a sorority house, throws open a shower curtain and leers bug-eyed at a naked and screaming sorority girl. (“Take it easy, honey! I didn’t see a thing!” he says as he whips the curtain closed, before opening it once more to add, “You’re perfect!”) Compare that with Ms. McCarthy’s mid-divorce mom in “Life of the Party,” who hits it off and gets it on with a college boy at a frat rager, breaking a taboo without actually becoming a creep. Because middle-aged moms are coded as sexless, Ms. McCarthy’s character needs merely to nudge the sexual envelope in order for her antics to feel unruly.

And when the women of “Ghostbusters” gently sexually harass their ditsy hunk of a receptionist (Chris Hemsworth in glasses), it lacks the malicious edge of Bill Murray effectively stalking Sigourney Weaver under the guise of busting her ghost. Because real women are physically and socially vulnerable to men, granting sexual power to them on film feels harmless and a little cute.