Introduction
Until recently audiences at the cinema, viewers of the television, even readers of newspapers and magazines, the media had been too indulged with an “expected” yet terrible many similar faces of women. Based on the various interpretation of how women “dealt” with numerous circumstances on screen, not excluding the noteworthy and including the despiteful ones, sometimes women have been called a “feminist.” However, we cannot immediately define whether this term means good or bad. Instead, it is more reasonable and fruitful to try answering if the term’s appearance has gotten worse or better concerning how women characters on screen have evolved over the last few years.
This paper will examine how the perspective and idealism surrounding feminism or feminist character in films have changed from the past era. It will try to explain the direction of change regarding its underlying factors such as the advanced reality of representation and status of women.
Appearance
One of the earliest memories of recognizing the women characters on-screen dates back to the 1960s. And these women characters were not all favoured by people watching the screen or more generally the society itself didn’t appreciate them as much as it would do for ordinary male characters. One of the possible reasons is that there were many effective “codes” in order to protect the society against any kind of actions or efforts that were identified as threats, by negating them far away. As Debra (1998) says, for feminists, being cast as outsiders, trouble-makers, even evil women, is inevitable since they challenge the very basis of a patriarchal society. Patriarchal society is a form of cultural code, which in return encodes what women have to become or to be seen. Fiske (1987) states that a code is a system of signs, whose rules and conventions generate meanings for that culture, so the reality is always already encoded, it is never raw. In other words, patriarchal society and its paradigm are encoding what should be favored or right to be perceived in that society. This statement is well supported by some examples from Wallis (1989), Debra’s (1998) arguments of how women avoid the presumed difficulty of labeling themselves as feminists. They passively endorse the idealism and teaching behind feminism, but they simple avoid being called feminists because they believe in the existence of threat under this dichotomy of patriarchal society. Marilyn Crafton Smith (1993) accentuated the boundary of how the viewpoints of feminism are presented publicly, which she named “field of allowable images.” She describes that even though the mass media tries to provide a location for feminist issues, it will end up conforming to dominant values and representation of the society. It will be more evident to see some descriptions of how the feminists or their efforts were stereotypically spoilt in the media. For instance, bra-burners, a bunch of man-haters out to destroy family values (Creedon: 1993b), Amazons, lesbians, angries, and more severe ones. The benefit of labeling them as such names was an effective method of silencing supporters and scaring away others who share feminist views, especially young heterosexual women (Jones 1992, 59).
As the fight for greater status by women, or how the presses undermined it as a “catfight” was keep progressing, the response of the film industry to feminism has become more ambivalent in the 1960s. “The Feminine Mystique”, a book by Betty Friedan, remarked that the combination of old and new stereotypes of women was turning into some strange hybrids. For example, Morticia Addams from “The Addams Family,” Samantha Stevens from “The Bewitched,” Rosemary Woodhouse from “Rosemary’s Baby.”
Debra (1998) mentions that those previously mentioned far from friendly portrayals of feminist characters are brought up to deal with their issues in the 1970s. Strong female characters such as Mary Richards from “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” Maude from “Maude” and shows like “All in the Family,” “Green Acres” were occasionally dealing with feminist themes.
At the same time, D’Acci (1994) detected some films in the 1970s and 1980s such as “Charlie’s Angels,” “Wonder Woman,” “Three’s Company” which fall under her “jiggle” category. According to her, in this category’s films, the women protagonists ultimately were either rescued by male colleagues or used superhuman capabilities to resolve their predicaments (D’Acci 1994, 15). However, in the early 1980s, the wind started to blow in different directions, in an opposite direction of what was expected. D’Acci’s (1994) book, “Defining Women: Television and the Case of Cagney & Lacey,” focused on a series that questioned the dominant media codes. The series depicted nonconventional career-seeking women who succeeded while holding off the resistance from male coworkers. It also portrayed two not-so-charming, normal women who seem to not care about satisfying the hunger lying in the gaze of men around them. They are simply there to keep their strong friendship and Christine Cagney and Mary Beth Lacey are also there to grab the world of chances, completely outside the sphere of being sex objects. They are basically trying to be “real.”
In the 1990s, television broadcasted more tv shows having diverse messages and much more characters bearing the sense of real life. “Home Improvement,” “Grace Under Fire,” “Cybill,” “Roseanne,” “Something So Right” (Debra 1998): these shows demonstrated many types of households like two-parents, single, divorced, and blended and yet also showed how women can have multiple jobs such nursing, teaching, writing, outside the household, just like how normally women have in reality.
By today, we have much more realistic and diversified characterizations of women ever shown on the screen before. As the patriarchal society’s demeanour has altered from the past and its severe cultural codes have been disintegrated through the expansion of how society started to change its perspective of women in the past, women characters are representing more detailed, complex structures in both mannerisms and conflicts, same way men have been facing in the past. The boundary of mainly occurring household scenes, the clerk’s office room behind the boss’s room, or any kind of room that had limited their story and identity is now quickly vanishing and it would not be a false statement to argue that in some genres, it has completely disappeared and redefined the culture of the genre. “The Handmaiden (2016)” is one of the striking representatives of how the underestimated perception of power and resources that women possessed in the past is now justified by a juxtaposition of power and intelligence in women and men that has irreversibly dictated an answer for clarity. The main characters, Sook-Hee and Lady Hideko, two showed how their love and fondness for each other during the difficult times overwhelm the imminent power of men who try to oppress them. Their characters did not gain any instant, magical assistance from others or they did not have any access to resources. On-screen, the only element that saves them is the extremely real torture and pain they are facing in order to win what they love, as everyone would do. Amélie from a 2001 romance-comedy genre film, is a character who has the exotic taste and the nature of inquisition. A carefully planned storyline exhibits an exploration of character by showing how her inquisition in everything around her leads to a surprising, marvellous adventure of seeking her identity as an individual. A wide variety of distaste in everything that seems to be normal or not despising but passing along the men he met on his journey, enriches her so much the way it lacked in the past. “The Favourite,” “Black Swan,” “Arrival” and many others are indicators of how women characters developed beyond the hope of the 1960s.
Theory
In terms of film theories, Patricia White (1998) has examined feminism in relevant to existing film theories. From her analysis, it is relatively easier to see some interesting patterns from women characters of the modern era and how the theories may or may not apply to the reality of those characters.
In reflection theory, Molly Haskell and Marjorie Rosen assumed that film ‘reflects’ social reality, that depictions of women in film mirror how society treats women, that these depictions are distortions of how women ‘really are’ and what they ‘really want’, and that ‘progress’ can be made (Petro 1994). These standards led to a strong feminist critique of certain image-making and typologies such as an array of virgins, vamps, victims, suffering mothers, child women, and sex kittens (Patricia 1998). Moreover, emerging film criticisms of lesbians, women of color rejected negative stereotypes mentioned before like homicidal, man-hating lesbians, tragic mulatto. And according to the theory, it provides more chances to advocate more complex representations. The rise of women’s autonomy and the right to ‘choose’ is perhaps one of the grandest recognition in current women characters.
“Portrait de la jeune fille en feu” in English translated as “Portrait of a Lady on Fire” is a genuine example of emancipation of women from the societal dichotomy in the past, in the 18th century has led to the reality of enjoying freedom, to completely satisfies with the existence of themselves, despite the fact they are in a same-sex relationship. The historical element of the film fully opens the distinction between two different classes of women, one is an aristocrat and the other one is a painter who assists the aristocrat. The slowly diffusing disparity between the different ranks of women expands the viewers’ imagination of how they usually see men as an aristocrat. The complexity of the level of denials and approvals endorses the character much more deeply to relate and reflect oneself.
In semiotics and ideology critique, the film must be seen as a language and woman as a sign — not simply a transparent rendering of the real (Claire Johnston 1975b). In 1973, Claire Johnston combined Roland Barthes’s concept of myth as the rendering natural of ideology with auteur theory to decode the function of women in Hollywood (Patricia 1998). This set a pattern for subsequent feminist studies of Hollywood genres such as film noir, the musical, and the indie drama which demonstrated how a woman as a signifier performed precise iconographic and ideological functions, either constituting a genre’s structural dimensions or exposing its ideological contradictions (Kaplan 1978). For example, a woman representing home in western films, femme fatale figure in film noir.
In the year 2021, probably more over the last two decades, “The Lost Daughter” directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal whose directing debut film qualifies her as a woman auteur, has shown a strong and sensual woman character. The main character, played by English actress Olivia Colman, Leda’s dualism of past and present consciousness portrayed an unprecedented figure of motherhood. As the past decisions of life haunt her, she becomes the central symbol of the film. Her generic yet solid representation of motherhood in a suburban temporary lifestyle indicates that she is functioning as an unreachable icon of mother in a bigger sense. Even though she is a mother herself, her extension of affecting the younger mothers’ circumstances in a seemingly imaginary scope prevails that she ascended into a deeper level of being a mom. She is almost there to guide and represent others as a figure that is assumed only to be in mind.
Reality
In Jeffrey S. Longacre’s (2002) review of “Feminism and Film by E. Ann Kaplan,” it delved deeper into the development of feminist film studies and the problems that race poses to feminist theory and film studies. It raises some questions on Laura Mulvey’s idea of the psychology of the male gaze, how “woman is still tied to her place as bearer, not maker, of meaning.” He also mentions Kaplan’s statement of “rigidly defined sex differences have been constructed around fear of the other, we need to think about ways of transcending a polarity that has only brought us all pain” (Kaplan 2000, 130) and pondered the question if that polarity has yet been overcome in feminist critical theory. Binaries such as signifier/signified, oppressor/oppressed, and male/female have mostly been exacerbating the perpetuation of oppression of women. However, as the reality of representation comes to a closer level with each side of duality, it is not necessarily a regression in the oppression of one another. As the women characters are more closely met with what is really the reality of things, doesn’t it mean that polarity is at least at balance, even though it has not been overcome?
In “Lady Bird” film, a girl calls herself a desiring, wishful and imaginary name she wants because at that level her reality is met with what is not expected from her peers or boys at her high school. Lady Bird demonstrated a strong opposition toward “the others” who are her close friends and others in order to truly find her identity. The sacrifice of losing the current others gave her a unique chance to escape from infidelities she does not want to pursue and finally comes to reality.
Conclusion
Perspective and expectations surrounding feminism in the past have evolved from an “encoded” to “decoded” in the modern era. Women characters today have relatively more represented in reality and disintegrated the boundary of what is a cultural norm. Film critiques and theories such as reflection theory as well as semiotic and ideology critique immensely aided to explain the expansion of women characters’ ongoing diversification. However, by further studying in the future, the Freudian, Lacan psychoanalysis theory and Marxist theory of film will provide more opportunities to understand this more thoroughly on this subject. What I couldn’t also attribute to this paper but considered it would have expanded the comparison on appearance section is the period of subculture influences to media. In the near future, it will be the unavoidable target to focus on.
References
- Jeffrey S. Longacre. Tulsa Studies in Women’s Literature 21, no. 1 (2002): 129–33. https://doi.org/10.2307/4149221
- Debra Baker Beck. “The ‘F’ Word: How the Media Frame Feminism.” NWSA Journal 10, no. 1 (1998): 139–53. http://www.jstor.org/stable/4316558.
- Patricia White. “Feminism and Film.” Oxford Guide to Film Studies (1998): 117–131. https://works.swarthmore.edu/fac-film-media/18
