Explore the ways in which your chosen texts reinforce or challenge typical representations of gender.
~ Explore the ways in which your chosen texts reinforce or challenge typical representations of gender.
In the film 'Sin City' there are a few contrasting representations of gender, exploring typical representations and some showing signs of the opposing gender. For my first example I'll be looking at the opening story in the first scene. The strong connotations of the red dress on the first woman we meet, immediately introducing us to Maulvey's male gaze. The male tell her 'You're everything a man could ever want' this is shown and evident by her body language and dialogue, showing her objectification as she takes the cigarette the male hands to her. This is typical of a women's representation in most Noir genre films from the previous genre conventions. The non digetic jazz music in the background compliments her movements, by playing the notes loud and striking, then hearing them drift off quietly, representing the woman. The contrasting digetic police sirens could represent the danger that is going to occur, (him).
The next gender representation I'll be looking at is the females in the fight scene. There is a group of ten/fifteen women dressed in objectifying clothes all well trained and as tough a trained soldier. This is a contrast to the usual representation of women, unusually only portraying them to be mothers or innocent young girls and the men to be the strong, merciless ones but this is twist in the normality, gaining audience gratification. The women have a dominant role throughout the film, the representations of the prostitutes are far more deadly than other film scenes featuring the objectified women.
The final gender representation is the helpless child victim in one of the first scenes. One man loses his life saving the girl, (similar to the Malve scene where he loses his life trying to help Goldy) The girl is held hostile by the male. We then see near the end of the film where the child grows up and is working in a bar as a stripped for male based gratification. This is showing the audience that women are male dominated and that they maintain power through their sexuality and physicality the majority of the time. The main characteristics of women are either shown sexual, violent or criminals, common for a Comic book genre convention usually showing women to be the male's property or usually a strong sidekick, representing them both negatively and positively.
Notes: talk about women acting like men-young girl (weak)?-men in controll (opening scene)goldy having controll of maulve. The heart shaped bed showing 'she shivers in the wind like the last leaf on a dieing tree'Include some technical details (camera/lighting/sound)
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