Women Roles In Film

Feminist Film Theory

All of the films we have watched in class this semester have shown a considerably less than positive female image as in comparison to what I thought the class would be like. Feminist film theory is the theoretical film criticism that comes from feminist politics and the feminist theory. The way we approach women in cinema is inspired by second wave feminism and women's studies in academics. As early as the 1970s people have been trying to analyze film and come to terms with what the function of women characters really are. They go over things like what different genres they play in and what their stereotypes are. Which at the time that each film is made you can see this image as a reflection of the time period and how women are viewed in society. In England they also used critical theory and gathered their information from things like psychoanalysis, semiotics, and marxism. America picked up on this around the late 1970s to 1980s. What they call the "male gaze" is a concept many use to describe when a films audience is only seeing the film through what a heterosexual man would see it as. Now we have what is called "counter cinema" which is films made by women that give us an alternative to traditional old Hollywood films. That would be a breath of fresh air. Women in films that are not crazy, sex crazed, suicidal, cradle robbing, whores.