Gender in TV and Films

In class, we looked at films and gender roles in films.

This was really interesting because of the difference in male and female roles and their stereotypes, but also because this has changed over time.

For instance, there have been many major female characters in films in the past, like Satine from Moulin Rouge (played by Nicole Kidman).

In this film, which was released in early 2000's but set in the late 1800's, Ewan McGregor and Nicole Kidman are the leading characters of this tragic love story.

However, something to notice is, even though there is a leading lady, the other women in this film are all under control by male characters. Especially in the song 'Roxanne', where men are leading the tango with the women, but also you sense this because the entire theatre is under the control of a man, and even he is under control of another man.

This gives you a feel of how women were portrayed to men is those times, but how we have moved on from that.

Nowadays, we have films such as The Hunger Games, Divergent and even Devil Wears Prada where there are leading female actresses - or even an almost entirely female cast in the Devil Wears Prada's case. This shows how we've moved on from a time of women being controlled, to women taking a stand.

However, there are still limitations in films today that concern both women and men. This flaw is stereotyping in films, like how men are perceived as either stupid or horny or the heroes, and how women are perceived as dumb or frigid or the damsel.

I made a list of examples of stereotypes and films that either lean away or towards the notion.

Finally, we discussed the Bechdel test in films, and we were told to find a movie where two women were talking to each other (that had character names) for over sixty seconds about something other than men. At first it was hard, but then I found films like Confessions of a Shopaholic and The Devil wears Prada were actually pretty easy to use as they were about, well, other stereotypical girl things like shopping.

Apart from that, there were short scenes I found, like inThe Hunger Games between Katniss and Primrose, which passed the test, but others like scenes in Juno that didn't.