Gender and the portrayal of gender roles in a film is an intriguing topic. It is interesting to uncover the way women have been idealized in our films, which mirrors the sentiments of the society of that period in time. Consequently, the thesis of this essay is a feminist approach that seeks to compare and contrast the gender roles of two films. The selected films are A few Good Men and Some Like it Hot.
A Few Good Men (1992) is a classic American film, with classic gender disparity. The name itself is indication enough. Set on a military and legislative backdrop, the hegemonic order between masculinity and femininity thrives. In an interview, Aaron Sorkin (the film’s screenwriter) was asked to elaborate on his worst experience as the screenwriter.
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The story boils down to two men, forced to dress like women in order to run away from the mafia. The fact that they dress like women makes it inevitable for the film to be brought up in the discussion of gender roles in film (Benshoff et. al, 2011). The film itself highlights the issue of gender roles in several ways. For instance, the iconic Marilyn Monroe plays the role of Sugar. Sugar’s character (unlike archetypical female characters in the then and now) rejects the protector portrayal of masculinity. She wants a man who can depend on her, instead of her depending on him. In a seduction scene, she is the aggressor (so to speak), completely blurring the gender stereotype of femininity. The cross-dressing romantic comedy destabilizes gender distinctions by virtue of man pretending to be a woman. The comic element provides a stable medium to alter the gender roles. The effectiveness of which is highlighted by Jerry’s apparent transformation into bliss, from the moment, he turned into a woman. Some Like it Hot does not just try to bend the concept of gender; it makes a great effort at obliterating the entire concept. It dismisses the stringent stereotypes, societies formulate to try to control or inculcate a desired social
Discriminating gender roles throughout the movie leaves one to believe if they are supposed to act a certain way. This film gives women and men roles that don’t exist anymore, during the 60s women were known to care for the family and take care of the house, basically working at home. However, a male was supposed to fight for his family, doing all the hard work so his wife didn’t have too. In today’s world, everyone does what makes them happy. You can’t tell a woman to stay at home, that makes them feel useless. Furthermore, males still play the roles of hard workers, they are powerful compared to a woman. However, in today’s world a male knows it isn’t right to boss a woman around, where in the 60s, it happened, today women have rights to do what they want not what they are
In the movie It’s a Wonderful Life, many of christian values were shown. Loving thy neighbor was displayed in several scenes. Also, the angel helping George Bailey relates to christians in so many ways. Plus, christian values were revealed when was praying to God. It’s a Wonderful Life has so many other ways christian values are exhibited , but those are the three main ones.
American commercial cinema currently fuels many aspects of society. In the twenty-first century it has become available, active force in the perception of gender relations in the United States. In the earlier part of this century filmmakers, as well as the public, did not necessarily view the female“media image” as an infrastructure of sex inequality. Today, contemporary audiences and critics have become preoccupied with the role the cinema plays in shaping social values, institutions, and attitudes. American cinema has become narrowly focused on images of violent women, female sexuality, the portrayal of the “weaker sex” and subversively portraying women negatively in film. “Double Indemnity can be read in two ways. It is either a misogynist film about a terrifying, destroying woman, or it is a film that liberates the female character from the restrictive and oppressed melodramatic situation that render her helpless” (Kolker 124). There are arguably two extreme portrayals of the character of Phyllis Dietrichson in Double Indemnity; neither one is an accurate or fare portrayal.
Most of you out there have jobs. But have you ever stop to think that what if someone in your job was gay? Have you also stop to think that these gay guys have a normal life like you? Well our story of Single Man begins when America was dealing with the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962. During this time our nation seemed to be on the edge of destruction, but before the sexual revolutions of the 1960’s. Gay activity was illegal. Gay men were put in prison for consensual sex with another man.
Second, the evolution of women’s roles/characters in film ranging from the 1920s-1940s and in the past
Good Will Hunting, directed by Gus Van Sant and written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, is a story of a troubled genius finding his place in the world. Will Hunting works as an MIT janitor until solving a math equation gets his talents in the eye’s of Professor Gerald, a math professor. After getting into a fight and potentially going to jail the character decides to attend therapy sessions regularly. Gus Van Sant is a well known director who is known to illustrate emotional meaning through his cinematography. In the specific clip between 1:46:29 - 1:51:45, the director conveys compassion and recognition through the use of the mise en scene.
In Spike Lee’s She’s Gotta Have It stereotypical gender roles are systematically broken down through the obvious reversal of the classical Hollywood narration technique concerning the delineation between the man’s function and the woman’s usually less meaningful function within a film. Throughout this inverted spectacle, the point that Nola Darling is an independent woman is continually made. This point serves to propel the plot forward because Nola’s sexual independence goes against all conventions of typical womanhood much to the ire of three men. The film arranges for a battle between Nola and women in film aspiring to be independent on the one side, with men supported by classical Hollywood narration on the other seeking to undermine their
stowaway. As the alien kills off the men at the refinery, she begins. to see the true enemy. Some Like It Hot stars Marilyn Monroe as Sugar Cane. Sugar Cane is a very typical blonde and is the stereotypical image of a blonde woman.
Like most popular gender-bending films, Some Like It Hot calls us to critique constructions of sexuality and gender both within the context of historicized moment of the films production and from the perspective of later generations. Every time the two men presented themselves as women several assumptions were made as to how women look, of their intelligence, and of how they act. This was the female image at the time; the high heels, the dress, and even the stereotypical “party girl” were all characteristics of the female. The film defines gender differences by portraying wo...
Many different depictions of gender roles exist in all times throughout the history of American culture and society. Some are well received and some are not. When pitted against each other for all intents and purposes of opposition, the portrayal of the aspects and common traits of masculinity and femininity are separated in a normal manner. However, when one gender expects the other to do its part and they are not satisfied with the results and demand more, things can shift from normal to extreme fairly quickly. This demand is more commonly attributed by the men within literary works. Examples of this can be seen in Tennessee Williams' “A Streetcar Named Desire”, where Stella is constantly being pushed around and being abused by her drunken husband Stanley, and also in Charlotte Perkins Gilman's “The Yellow Wallpaper”, where the female narrator is claimed unfit by her husband as she suffers from a sort of depression, and is generally looked down on for other reasons.
How does the film support or negate tgis point? In Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Mulvey states that, “Traditionally, the woman displayed has functioned on two levels: as erotic object for the characters within the screen story, and as erotic object for the spectator within the auditorium, with a shifting tension between the looks on either side of the screen.” (Mulvey 40). A woman’s role in the narrative is bound to her sexuality or the way she draws attention away from the narrative.
These movies allowed female characters to embody all the contradictions that could make them a woman. They were portrayed as the “femme fatale” and also “mother,” the “seductress” and at the same time the “saint,” (Newsom, 2011). Female characters were multi-faceted during this time and had much more complexity and interesting qualities than in the movies we watch today. Today, only 16% of protagonists in movies are female, and the portrayal of these women is one of sexualization and dependence rather than complexity (Newsom, 2011).
Women’s roles in movies have changed dramatically throughout the years. As a result of the changing societal norms, women have experienced more transition in their roles than any other class. During the period of classical Hollywood cinema, both society and the film industry preached that women should be dependent on men and remain in home in order to guarantee stability in the community and the family. Women did not have predominated roles in movies such as being the heroin. The 1940’s film Gilda wasn’t an exception. In Gilda, the female character mainly had two different stereotypes. The female character was first stereotyped as a sex object and the second stereotyped as a scorned woman who has to be punished.
Also, the film revealed women empowerment and how superior they can be compared to men. While demonstrating sexual objectification, empowerment, there was also sexual exploitation of the women, shown through the film. Throughout this essay, gender based issues that were associated with the film character will be demonstrated while connecting to the real world and popular culture.
Feminism is a movement that supports women equality within society. In relation to film, feminism is what pushes the equal representation of females in mainstream films. Laura Mulvey is a feminist theorist that is famous for touching on this particular issue of how men and women are represented in movies. Through her studies, she discovered that many films were portraying men and women very differently from reality. She came up with a theory that best described why there is such as huge misrepresentation of the social status quos of male and female characters. She believed that mainstream film is used to maintain the status quo and prevent the realization of gender equality. This is why films are continuously following the old tradition that males are dominant and females are submissive. This is the ideology that is always present when we watch a movie. This is evident in the films from the past but also currently. It is as if the film industry is still catering to the male viewers of each generation in the same way. Laura Mulvey points out that women are constantly being seen as sexual objects, whether it is the outfits they wear or do not wear or the way they behave, or secondary characters with no symbolic cause. She states that, “in traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote it-be-looked-at-ness.”(Mulvey pg. 715). Thus, women are nevertheless displayed as nothing more than passive objects for the viewing pleasure of the audience. Mulvey also points out through her research that in every mainstream movie, there is ...