Research Kit Usage Guide
Research Questions
- How are women represented in films?
- Has the representation of women in films improved overtime?
I developed my research questions based on the movies we have watched over the course of the semester. How we began with Viva Zapata which was released in 1952. They had 5 female characters and 25 male characters. Then we travel to the film Frida which was released in 2002. The film Frida is based on a woman and her love life as well as her artwork. Frida also is a woman.
Audience
I believe this information will be best fitting for individuals trying to find more information on how women were and still are being represented in urban films. Including classes such as this class which dives down deep into urban films and analysis each of the films.
Overview
Women’s Representation Through Film Overtime
Glossary:
This research kit is a collection of websites, video clips, and pictures to open the conversation about how women are represented through film. How women represented. through film plays a huge factor in the film industry. This class started with the Viva Zapata film which was released in 1952. The film had 25 male actors and 5 female actresses. Which as you can tell, is not a good representation of women because this film alone is controlled with male actors. The directors didn’t seem to care about trying to even out the actors and actresses. Our next film that we watched was Frida, which was released in 2002. This was a film made specifically about this woman and her artwork and love life. In that 50-year gap, we see a huge difference as to how women are represented in film.
The reason I became interested in this topic is because I have noticed over the years that women do not get as much credit as men do for the work they do and continue to do throughout the film industry. “10.7% of movies featured a balanced cast where half of the characters are female” (Pasquine). When I saw this statistic, I was in shock by how unbalanced the film industry is at making the casting for films somewhat balanced.
This research kit is made for individuals who are interested in film and gender studies. This kit is made for classes which dive deep down into analyzing films because students will see how much goes into making a film and the intersection of film and society. Users of this kit will pay attention to details of a film like music, casting, directing, makeup/blackface. This kit is made for individuals who are interested in the representation of genders in films because this kit shows how much and how little the representation of genders have changed over the years. They will be able to investigate how and why the representation of genders were never equal in films to begin with and how there have been improvements in the representation of women over time–but with more work to do.
Film and tv are important forms of media where people begin to form understandings of social difference. That is why it is important to have the skills to critically read films so one does not perpetuate stereotypes.
The urban film, City of God, which is a Brazilian film from 2003, only a handful of women in the films they probably saw. Which means, they saw women being underrepresented in films. If kids grew up watching films like the Frida film in 2002, then they noticed women being represented as a positive part in films because they had multiple women in them, but most importantly, sometimes women played the main role. The difference between the two films is Frida involves a more gender-neutral cast than City of God does.
The directors of City of God were Fernando Meirelles and Kâtia Lund. The City of God film is a crime film set in Rio de Janeiro and was released in Brazil in 2002 but was released worldwide in 2003. This film is about two young men who grew up in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro in the 1970s and who ended up taking two separate paths in life. One of which was a photographer who enjoyed documented his life and the life of the increasing drug-related violence of his neighborhood. The other is an ambitious drug dealer who uses the photographer to increase his business and fame until a war occurs in Rio de Janeiro. City of God had a large release having 143 combined releases worldwide. Women tend to be girlfriends of the main characters. There are very few scenes in the film which center female characters. The film City of God does not pass the Bechtel Test. Women are depicted as girlfriends but also the subject of sexual violence. Interestingly, there is also one female character who seduces the film’s protagonist, Rocket–but in all of these examples, women are the subject of male desire or action. There is a clear imbalance between the genders which shows how underdeveloped the favelas are. The reaction towards how women were being represented in City of God hasn’t really changed since it was released which is an issue. Some people who have seen this film have written about it, but many haven’t. They haven’t because it’s something expect to see in films like this. Where it’s not normal if you don’t see women being underrepresented in films like this.
In contrast to City of God, the film Frida, about the Mexican artist, Frida Kahlo, had a female director (Julie Taymor) and producer,Selma Hayek and, also, the Miramax studio head now convicted of a number of crimes against women, Harvey Weinstein. The film Frida is a biopic set in Mexico City and was released on August 29, 2002, in Venice, Italy and it was released in the United States on October 25, 2002. Frida is about Frida herself, who unfortunately got into a bus accident and was told she would never have the ability to walk again. Frida then found her love for art and eventually became an amazing artist. The film also traces her lifelong, tempestuous relationship with her art mentor. This is a huge portion of the film, her love that she had for Diego was enormous, however they continued fighting and this ultimately led to her having affairs with various women and Trotsky throughout her lifetime. This film also explored and pictured her forward-thinking and political attitudes as she was a hard-drinker and a passionate woman of the 1900s. Frida did have a large release of 94 combined releases worldwide. The reaction to how women were being represented in Frida were they felt empowered by a, how many women were in the film to begin with and b, by the fact that a women was the main role in the film. Although Frida representation on women was great, just like City of God, they as well didn’t pass the Bechtel Test either. The two films alone are two completely different films, however both films were shot in urban like areas.
Both films are two completely different films altogether, however they both take on similar qualities. One similar quality they both take on is the location of the film. These films both have an urban like setting. However, on the opposite side of things, both films are representing women differently. City of God is representing women in a negative way, by underrepresenting them. Whereas Frida is representing women in a positive way by having multiple women in the film and having a women be the main character in the film.
Annotated Bibliography
“City of God.” IMDb, IMDb.com, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0317248/releaseinfo.
“City of God: A Visceral Chronicle of Violence.” So The Theory Goes, 31 Jan. 2022, https://www.sothetheorygoes.com/city-of-god-a-visceral-chronicle-of-violence/.
“Frida.” IMDb, IMDb.com, https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120679/releaseinfo.
“Geena Davis Institute on Gender in Media.” See Jane, 11 Nov. 2020, https://seejane.org/.
Annotation (Text): This is a secondary source which was founded in 2004 by Geena Davis who was a previous actress before creating this institution. This is a nonprofit institute which is based solely on global research-based organization working collaboratively within the entertainment industry to create gender balance throughout the entertainment media.
This secondary source shows the message that their attempting to show the media and what their solution is to that issue. They’ve provided their own research they’ve done throughout the years to show that they also have a passion for why this is an issue. Most importantly, they have created events both virtually and in-person throughout the world to make everyone hopefully come together.
Griffiths, Lily. “The Male Gaze Theory.” Livunimarketing, 22 Mar. 2022, https://livunimarketing.wordpress.com/2022/03/22/the-male-gaze-theory/#:~:text=Quickly%20defined%2C%20the%20male%20gaze%20theory%20is%20the,depicted%20as%20sexy%20to%20satisfy%20the%20man%E2%80%99s%20scopophilia.
Hill Follow Teacher at Thurston Community College, Naamah. “Representation of Gender in City of God.” SlideShare a Scribd Company, 20 Nov. 2014, https://www.slideshare.net/naamah/representation-of-gender-in-city-of-god.
Miramax, director. YouTube, YouTube, 3 Mar. 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kicDhAUEV_A. Accessed 10 May 2022.
Ortiz, Eric. “What Is a Favela? Five Things to Know about Rio’s so-Called Shantytowns.” NBCNews.com, NBCUniversal News Group, 4 Aug. 2016, https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/2016-rio-summer-olympics/what-favela-five-things-know-about-rio-s-so-called-n622836.
Pasquine, F. (2018, May 14). Gender inequality in film – an infographic. New York Film
Academy Blog. Retrieved April 22, 2022, from https://www.nyfa.edu/film-school-blog/gender-inequality-in-film/
Annotation (Paragraph Text): This is a secondary source which was founded by Jerry Sherlock in 1992. Inspired by the idea of how to make movies, they blended different films together. He created a school that was affordable for his friends’ children to be able to learn about films as well. Their mission is to be able to education available through visual storytelling to diverse people.
This source shows multiple circle graphs that eventually gives percentages on how much of a difference it is between females and males in films. “It’s clear that Hollywood remains stuck in its gender bias” (2nd paragraph). This source doesn’t just go into the film alone, they also discuss the differences of how much they get paid as well much more such as gender bias in award winning, emerging females in film, and inspiring female roles and their ages they’re playing in those roles.
Price, Rande. “Female Representation in Filmmaking Inches Upwards.” Digital Content Next, 1 Dec. 2021, https://digitalcontentnext.org/blog/2021/01/11/female-representation-in-filmmaking-inches-upwards/#:~:text=Women%20in%20the%20media%20and,from%2021%25%20to%2023%25.
Annotation (Paragraph Text): This is a secondary source that was founded in June of 2001 as the Online Publishers Association (OPA). They produce proprietary research for their members including the public, to create forums to explore and advance key issues that impact digital content brands, offer an influential voice that speaks for digital content companies in the press, and they work to educate the public at large on the importance of quality content brands. They also hope to exist to pave the future for high-quality digital content.
This secondary source is discussing how women are slowly but steadily making progress showing up in films. In turn, they’re also slowly closing the Hollywood’s gender gap. “Women working behind the scenes in the industry’s top 100 films increased from 20% in 2019 to 21% as representation in the top 250 films grew from 21% to 23%” (1st paragraph). This shows that every day is a new day and regardless of if you think you’re not making a difference in the world, you are. They also list their key findings from the top 100 films in 2020, and in order at what women did the best at to what women did the worst at that year was “Women did the best at producers (28%), followed by executive producers (21%), editors (18%), directors (16%), writers (12%), cinematographers (3%). Important to know, female writers (12%) declined by 8 percentage points from 2019”. (3rd paragraph).
Renaud, S. M. (n.d.). Are casting calls for actors of certain races or national origins illegal?
Skoler Abbott. Retrieved April 22, 2022, from https://www.skoler-abbott.com/2016/09/28/are-casting-calls-for-actors-of-certain-races-or-national-origins-illegal/
Annotation (Paragraph Text): This is a secondary source that has been around since 1964. Their focus on law related activities having 200 employment law attorneys from top-level law firms in every state in the United States including Canada and has no relation towards gender or casting. Skoler, Abbott, and Presser, P.C. have two offices in Massachusetts. Skoler Abbott is one of the leading law firms in New England specializing in labor relations and employment law.
This source is about a women named Stefanie who previously was in the film industry, however, is now a current employment lawyer. While watching a Netflix film, a question came to her mind. She asked herself “How exactly do you cast actors on a show like Narcos” (2nd paragraph). When Hamilton came out, they posted a notice for any “nonwhite actors” (3rd paragraph) They go on to give background knowledge as to how they were legally getting away with this.
Sinclair, I. (2020, January 22). A decade of women in film: How gender equality in film has
changed from 2010 – 2020: Plymouth Arts Cinema: Independent Cinema For Everyone: Plymouth college of art. Plymouth Arts Cinema | Independent Cinema for Everyone | Plymouth College of Art. Retrieved April 23, 2022, from https://plymouthartscinema.org/a-decade-of-women-in-film-how-gender-equality-in-film-has-changed-from-2010-2020/
Annotation (Paragraph Text): This is a secondary source which was founded in 1947. The reason they made this is to inform people about cinema since cinema is their passion. Including creating their own festival in 2013 called Plymouth Film Festival. They go on tours throughout the years and encourage different schools as well as colleges to come to these to learn more about the introduction of film and what they have to offer.
This source reviews film over the previous decade. All the way from academy nominations, academy awards, and even how female directors are depicted. One of the biggest things that was discussed was how Wonder Women hit a big milestone. “One of the biggest achievements for female directors this decade was Wonder Women, in 2017, Patty Jenkins achieved a huge milestone when she became the second women to command a budget of more than 100 million for Wonder Women” (6th paragraph). “The film proved that women can direct mainstream action films once they are given the same opportunities and budgets as men” (6th paragraph). This proves that not only in casting do females not get the same opportunities that men have in film, but they also don’t in directing as well.
Welle, D. (n.d.). What Hollywood movies do to perpetuate racial stereotypes: DW: 21.02.2019.
DW.COM. Retrieved April 23, 2022, from https://www.dw.com/en/hollywood-movies-stereotypes-prejudice-data-analysis/a-47561660
Annotation (Paragraph Text): This is a secondary source that was created in 1953 by Deutsche Welle who is a German international broadcaster. He wanted to give people worldwide the opportunity to make their own opinions as to what their reading and or seeing. By doing so, he created this website that gives people the opportunity to read the content in 32 different languages. With this website already reaching 289 million user contacts per week in 2021, he believes he can go further than that, so he set a goal for himself. By the year, 2025 he wants to strengthen its position by inspiring a target group of individuals who encourage dialogue.
This secondary source gives details as to how Hollywood movies specifically perpetuate racial stereotypes. By doing so, they go through a bunch of different groups such as, Latino’s, Diversity, Blacks, Asians, and more. Showing us graphs from the 1940’s-00 and eventually explaining the frequency stereotypes in Hollywood films since 2000 by racial groups.
Wilkins, Herman. “How to Pass the Bechdel Test.” StudioBinder, 4 Nov. 2020, https://www.studiobinder.com/blog/the-bechdel-test/.
Yasin, S. (2013, January 21). What is Bollywood’s role in changing Indian attitudes to women?
Index on Censorship. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.indexoncensorship.org/2013/01/bollywood-india-gender-women-new-delhi-salman-khan/
Annotation (Paragraph Text):
This is a secondary source who’s been around for 50 years informing individuals “on current threats to free expression globally” (6th paragraph). They also aim to raise awareness about threats and feel as if free speech is the beginning step you need to censorship. Lastly, they use a “mixture of research, reporting, direct advocacy and media campaigning to achieve our goals” (9th paragraph).
This source describes how Bollywood film’s have changed over the years through an individual’s perspective. He begins describing a movie he saw when he was 12, and then 18. One point he made is “The larger point being made here is that even when a female movie character’s role is more than decorative, the heavy emphasis on men’s problems make it appear as though it is the Indian man who is complex with real problems and the woman only serves as a support system” (6th paragraph). No matter what role the female gets placed in, it seems as if they’re just there as a fill in piece and not a major part of the film.
Recent Comments