I'm gonna use the word "female" a bunch of times in the next paragraph. I apologize for the reductive elements of that kind of writing, but I'm in a mild hurry.
It's self-perpetuating at this point, but it's also due to the fact that most other genres are masculine-centric, which causes us to divid our attentions more. Most sci-fi, action movies, crime dramas, etc. are made by dudes. The same is true of romances, but it's one of few genres with a strong contingent of female creators (the other major outlet for female creators is comedies, though that honestly might be a mostly post-Tina Fey development.) With more female creators, there's more female perspective, which leads to a larger female audience. But, perhaps more importantly, that's one of about three fanbases that ever intends for women to be the primary audience, while dudes divide their attention across pretty much every other genre. There are a ridiculous number of fanbases that are male-centric, meaning it's easy to delve deeply into just about any of them.
It's very similar to our situation in games; a big reason the games industry is so white dude-centric in the American industry is because the majority of American devs are white dudes. It's true of pretty much any kind of content.
@believer258: For the record, my mom thinks Die Hard, Die Harder, and Executive Decision are three of the greatest movies ever made; I'll agree on Die Hard, at least. Even I don't really like The Expendables. Or, well, I only saw Expendables 2, which people seem to say is better, and I really didn't get much out of it.
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