Friday, 10 March 2017

Margret - Gender representation

In this extract one of the ways they show gender representation is through camera movement. The use of long zooms are used to create tension and awkwardness in parts where the woman, Margret feels undermined, ridiculed or outnumbered. For example as the man was speaking there seemed to be an increasing zoom on Margret suggesting the pressure the man is putting on her. The fact that other men were laughing and Margret remained stern faced conveys what the traditional man may truly think about an unconventional woman of power and suggests that it's hard for woman to not conform to gender roles. The scene is dominated by traditional men and the only female dennoted is Margret which falls under the gender stereotype of the lesbian woman as, she has control and authority and traits of a man however is still a woman. For example, when the camera was looking at a downwards angle at her feet, the mise en scene were her heels and she was walking quite fast which connotes purpose. Then when the camera turns into a slanted mid shot we could see other men following her which connotes leadership and power which is unconventional for a woman. Then we later see signs that she 'hates men' from the dialouge in the other room when all the men were discussing what just happened and she doesn't seem to care about their thoughts or act friendly, gentle, light and easy towards them, which are typical conventions of a woman, however she interrupts them shouting, passionately and aggressively explicitly offended and in conflict with the first traditional man that was speaking earlier.
On the other hand it could be argued that she also bares a gender role of the traditional woman as we see a quick cutaway to her hands clenching or fidgeting, which not only connotes anger and tension but the mise en scene dennoted 2 expencive rings on her marriage finger which suggests that shes a wife or soon to be married which conveys a stereotypical role of a woman to get married and have children

1 comment:

  1. Hi Victoria, I like the way you use relevant media terminology in terms of camera movements and shot types and the way they work together to construct the given representation. Your response clearly indicates that you are able to identify and use these elements, but the one thing I'd recommend is that you develop a structure to your answer, so far you jump from one scene to another and then back to a previous scene without letting us know where we are or what's happened. By doing this you'll pick up editing elements or other MES elements to build upon.
    Also, try to apply a media theory to your answers.

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