I don't understand why we didn't get any unemployment money... We've never even been employed. Doesn't that mean we should get more unemployment? "Tanzie Marchetta. [1] How has the stereotypical view of women been reinforced throughout the film "Material Girls"?There are many ways in which the film, Material Girls (2006) is able to conform and emphasise to the main stereotypes which are given towards young blonde females in society. This therefore has a way in which it is emphasising to the fact that women are being underrepresented and shown in ways to conform and to meet the needs of the "male gaze".[2] This shows to the audience what their main roles are in the film for women and what is expected from the stereotypical blonde female characters to do throughout the film. Tuchman [3] asserts that women were shown to be working were portrayed as "incompetentents and inferiors"[4] this therefore may justify the reasons to why women are represented in a certain way in films. Women therefore from the statement made basically were shown to have no place or have any roles or main responsibilities within the film.The media tend to exploit the faults in which particularly blondes make highlighting them to be degrading to all blondes. Having blonde women constantly in the media such as Paris Hilton can only justify the label in which blonde women are given which makes it evident that they would be the perfect roles to have in comedy films such as the chick flick Material Girls (2006).Films which include the same type of conventions of the Material Girls (2006) film genre are Mean Girls (2004) and Legally Blonde (2001). These films are able to show the audience the familiar roles in which particularly blonde girl have within films of this genre. Their roles are often comical and heavily stereotypical. Compared to the 1940s film "Double Indemnity" (1944) the female role differs to the one in which is shown in material girls. Even though the character is blonde she is very powerful in terms of the way in which she is able to manipulate the male character with her good looks.The main focus of this essay would be to analyse the ways in which stereotypes have been reinforced and presented throughout the film and relevant texts, also looking at different ways in which the representation of women in film have changed over time and how the way they are represented can influence the ways in which the audience consume the text.
The ways in which film texts are produced by the directors can show certain ideologies to the audience watching about the film. It could be made evident through the use of characters used and the plot of the film about the message in which the director is putting across to the main target audience. However an important factor which needs to be addressed is that there is a lack of female directors producing films compared to the large number of male directors which are. There could be many reasons to why there are a limited amount of well known female directors producing films and there are many factors which may influence a female directors decision to want to go continue into directing.
Some of the issues which influence female directors decision into not to wanting to pursue their career and submit their ideas is due to the fact that is that some want to concentrate on looking after their children. Directing can be time consuming therefore it would mean that there would be no time for them to take a break and spend time with the family. The film Material Girls (2006) is directed by a female director called Martha Coolidge. The fact that it was a female director who produced the film shows that the ideologies of the film must be accurate due to the fact that the film is being directed from a female point of view. Therefore I would be her decision to the ways in which she wants the characters to appear to the audience.
The film Material Girls (2006) follows the typical conventions expected of a typical chick flick genre film therefore it meets the possible expectations in which the audience already have of the film. The Material Girls (2006) film presents to the audience with a view of the lives of the two main female characters Tanzie and Ava Marchetta who at the start of the film are shown to only shown to be the typical teenage girls, who only enjoy going to parties and looking good, hence the reason why the film is called material girls. This can link to Walters study in which he had found out that “women enjoy fashion and beauty” [5]. This can therefore then makes it evident from the ways that the women represented in Material Girls (2006) are because they in fact both enjoy those two things in life and that they are expected by society to act the way in which they do.
An issue in which the film is able to deal with is that it portrays the lives of two young female characters that enjoy their easy lifestyle, without fully realising the responsibility in which they have. The story is outlined through the tag line of the film being “It's A Short Trip From The Penthouse To The Poorhouse”[6] This is able to emphasise the main plot of the film. It implies and gives an indication to the audience that these two girls who enjoy the material things in life and all of the luxuries, comes a point in which they would be no longer able to enjoy it as their lives change dramatically. The film is able to show the close relationship that the two sisters have with each other and express the importance of the familial ideology.
Other films in which they conform to the typical chick flick genre conventions are Legally Blonde (2001) Mean Girls (2006) and the sitcom The Simple Life (2003) which most importantly stars two blonde bombshells Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie. These two films and the television series links to the film Material Girls (2006) due to the fact that they all show females to be presented in a similar way following the same characteristics and show a heavy amount of stereotyping with the films and sitcom. In legally Blonde(2001) the main character of the film is played by Reese Witherspoon. The character in which she plays “Elle” as the plot is mainly centred around her, and throughout the film her character is stereotypically made to look as the stupid blonde by wanting to study law in order to win the affections of her boyfriend. However the audience would find this funny due to the fact that the film is aiming to use this in a way to encourage people to want to go out and watch the film. “Going to Harvard is the only way I'm going to get the love of my life back” [7 ] This quote taken from the film can suggest the attitude of the blonde character as she only wants to be successful in order to win back the love of her life.
In Mean Girls (2006) the film portrays the actions of a group of young females highlighting how competitive and bitchy they can become. It is typical of a film like this to have girls falling out over a male character and failing to show female unity.
The Simple Life (2001) is able to give the audience a real life view of two well known celebrities who in fact are both rich celebrity blondes trying to fit into the world which they seem to no nothing about.
An important fact which outlines and makes evident of the changes in history for women appearing on screen is that during the 1950s 1960s and 1970s only 20 to 30 per cent of characters in television were female.[8] However by the mid 1980s more women were placed in leading roles but men had continued to dominate and fulfil the main roles.
The roles in which women have had throughout film have changed dramatically throughout history. Films would often show women fulfilling the typical roles, which were expected by women at the time to have. These roles would include the typical housewife, looking after the children and meeting the needs of her husband.
In film, during the 1950s, the male characters were shown to be the heroes and most importantly having most of the central roles in the films. Therefore this evidently means that women who are watching the film are forced to cross gender identify with the men. The male characters were presented powerful and assertive, as making more, and almost to the most influential decisions which would affect themselves and the women. Women on the other hand, were presented as being frightened and in need of constant protection from the male characters. Women were represented as being more passive, weak and “merely token females”[9]. Gaunter implied that women in film were just there in order to show, and create a sense of equality in the film. The women may not have had a specific role in the film however showing one or two female characters would make the audience believe that they in fact have an important role in the film. In the 1960s there was still no change in the way in which women were presented in film. Men continued to dominate the main screen and were portrayed as being intelligent and assertive. Representations of women were still the same during the 1970s, however a study from McNeil (1975) found out that housewife’s continued to be the main female role on television.[10]. Women therefore main concern was with romance or family. The 1980s saw a change in the way women were in television drama as Gillian Dyer found out that “the number of women in central roles in police and crime drama had increased”[11] This would have seen to be a huge change in the way in which women were shown particular in television due to the fact that it allowed the audience to see a different representation of women. The roles in which women would have been shown to have in these dramas would be strong and independent women. "The 1980s and early 1990s saw the emergence of a few female action heroes defined by a quality of masculinity"[12] During this time period women in film began to be presented in a more positive and independent way. This can fully be shown in the film Tomb Raider (2001) which stared Angelina Jolie, a female actress staring as the main role in the film. Changes at this point in time began to show these female characters in films like this one being in more dominate roles and not in the shows of their male counterparts.
“Stereotypes are labels that categorize people largely in negative terms, and that can be applied to whole social or cultural groups”[13]. In this case the main focus of the cultural in which are being stereotyped in the films are blondes. Stereotyping within films places much importance in the way in which the film can structure the way the characters are presented to the audience. The ways in which certain groups in society are represented can be made evident throughout films offering the audience a more comical view of the particular group or groups which are being represented however the audience may agree that the way that they are being represented is an accurate one. The main group in which is being presented in the film are blondes. The blonde characters would often portray a sense of “dumbing down”. This is shown throughout film texts as it is able to create humour for the audience and makes it easier for them to be able to understand and to consume the text which is given. An example from the text is “I don't understand why we didn't get any unemployment money... We've never even been employed. Doesn't that mean we should get more unemployment?.As used at the start of the essay, this quote from the film Material Girls (2006) from one of the main protagonists in the film Tanzie Marchetta is able to fully justify the ways in which the language of the characters is used to be able to create humour, therefore meeting the audience expectations of the typical blonde female.
The fact that films like chick flicks and reality television sitcoms such as The Simple Life (2003) showing a real life account of rich, young and good looking blondes, Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie are now able to show this links to Scheibes (1979) view of women that there main concern in life was “beauty, cleanness, family and pleasing others”[14]. This is made evident through the fact that they both are already concerned with two of those factors also suggesting that they are essential for them to have. Without them they result into having to live and have a fairly average and simple life.
The stereotypes in which are given to a particular group or persons within society can therefore lead to it having a negative effect to those that may be associated with that particular group in society. Once given a negative label by those in society it can therefore lead to a self fulfilling prophecy. This is when a social group beings to act upon the label in which they have been given by society. In this case the main focus would be with blonde women. Stan Cohen had argued in the case that “the media labelled youth culture in a stereotyped and negative way”[15] This can then lead to a moral panic occurring within society. A moral panic can take effect once “a person or group of persons become defined as a threat to societal values and interests[16 ] People can them make assumptions about that particular group in society and begin to believe whatever they hear about that group mainly published through the media is the truth.
Women in film could have been categorised into either one of the two groups in a film based on the character that they had adopted within the film. These categories would position female characters to either adopt the role as The Madonna or The Whore. The Madonna is almost made to be presented as the good women who are always shown to be pure and maternal whereas compared to the whore, her characteristics would be sinful and almost everything she would do would be sexual.
The whore however compared to the bimbo, would use her sexual prowess to often manipulate the male characters to almost doing anything that they want them to do. The bimbos main characteristics would be flashy make up, have large breasts and would wear high heels. Her characteristics would suggest that she should be wearing high heels. These images can then be made throughout films due to the fact that the film directors are just giving the audience what they want from the film. This is a way in which they want certain audiences to want to go out and watch the film. This is made evident through the film Double Indemnity (1944). The film is an example in which shows the way the representation of women, playing a particular focus on blonde women, have changed from this time period. This film is able to exploit the ways in which the representation of blonde women have changed over time. During the 1940s therefore from this film the blonde women is shown to have fully control of the decisions in which the male character is able to make. The film presents a more dominant ideology of the blonde female as she is shown to be easily able to manipulate the male character. The whore and the bimbo however do share similar characteristics as aspects from both are shown through the main female protagonist in the film Double Indemnity (1994) played by Barbra Stanwyck. Her character in the film Phyllis Dietrichson is able to cleverly get the male character to kill someone for her. We have gone through with it, Walter. The tough part is all behind us. “We just have to hold on now and not go soft inside. Stick close together the way we started out...I loved you, Walter, and I hated him. But I wasn't going to do anything about it. Not until I met you. You planned the whole thing. I only wanted him dead”. [17] The quote from the film is able to exploit the sort of character she is as she is able to manipulate the male into help her then to find a way which suggests that it was his idea in the first place. An example of another strong an independent women on screen was buffy the vampire slayer. Buffys creator Joss Whedon stated that buffy “is a good role model for not just girls but for everybody”. [18] They way in which her character is presented compared to the way in which they are from material girls is that she is strong and is almost looked up to for protection by both the female characters and the male.
Women in film are often stereotyped in order to create humour for the audience. Different ways in which the film is able to comply with these stereotypes of different social groups within the society is because it is what the target audience wants to see. If the audience want to see dim blondes within a film then that’s what they would be given within the film to see. However it is an effective way of promoting the film as it does offer the audience a lot of humour and could appeal to a large number of people
Word Count 3,051
[1] http:imbd.com/title/tt0433412/quotes - Tanzie Marchetta dialogue
[2] male gaze, Laura Mulvey
[3] Tuchman, G
[4]The Symbolic Annihilation of Women by the Mass media (1998), Tuchman, G
[5] Walter (1998)
[6] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0433412/ - Film tagline
[7] Legally Blonde (2001)
[8] Representations of Gender In the Past, David Gauntlett
[9] Gaunter (1995)
[10] McNeil (1975)
[11]Gillian Dyer
[12]Media Gender and Identity, Gauntlett, David
[13]Stereotyping
[14]Scheibe (1979)
[15] Stan Cohen (1975)
[16]Stan Cohen
[17]Double Indemnity quote from film(1944)
[18] Media Gender and Identity
