Critical Investigation - First Draft

The issue of gender inequality has long been debated in the media, especially in regards to how genders are represented in film. Through the years, it has become common knowledge, to some extent even the status quo that all characters in film have specific roles with specific criteria that audiences expect them to follow, based on the fact that they are male or female. My main argument, supported by my primary text, is that as time goes on, gender representations are evolving to the point where they are indeed being increasingly subverted, subversion that has been maintained and successfully publicised by the 'The Hunger Games' films. Throughout the four films, Katniss Everdeen the protagonist exhibits not just behaviour but a personality that ordinarily would be strongly associated with men. In her 2016 book 'Hunting Girls', Kelly Oliver says that "our prepubescent protagonist, a tough no-nonsense teenager, is more comfortable wearing hunting clothes and boots than a prom dress and heels", the latter of which would generally be expected. Journalist Samantha Ellis thinks much the same and in a 2014 article says “Katniss doesn’t melt because of love. She melts because she sees injustice and it burns away at her until she decides to risk everything to bring down the system.” These are clear examples of how over time, following on from films like Disney's first feature film, 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' from 1937, female characters have successfully subverted the gender stereotypes they've been labelled with and we're seeing growing numbers of films doing the same thing.

As much as this film franchise celebrates the evolution of strong female characters, one must acknowledge a time when female characters were characterised using socially assigned stereotypes. ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ brings this to light, as throughout the entire film, the eponymous character encompasses every female stereotype that society reinforces. When we are first introduced to Snow White, she is seen dressed in rags, cleaning the castle steps and humming to herself. She proceeds to sing out loud, including the line “I’m wishing for the one I love to find me today.” When she later arrives at the Seven Dwarfs’ cottage, which is in a complete state of disarray, she instinctively leads her animal friends in a cleaning song, during which she cleans the entire cottage, excitedly exclaiming “We’ll clean the house and surprise them, then maybe they’ll let me stay,” implying that a woman is only worth living with if her housework is competent. When she meets her male hosts, she promises to “wash, sew, sweep and cook”, things that hadn’t been done before her arrival - "They do not cook, clean, take care of each other or themselves. They go to work and take advantage of Snow White’s ability to appear to be a homemaker," - further emphasising the lack of a female role, and how crucial one is. Our first impressions of Snow White after this first twenty minutes are that while she is waiting for her Prince, she (quite happily) has no other purpose than to clean and live under the rules of her superiors.  Even from the beginning, she is under forced domestic servitude to her stepmother the Queen, while simultaneously yearning for her much desired Prince Charming in song. Ellie Abbadessa and Derek Jenkins argue that through this, "Snow White gives the message to young girls that your duties are cleaning and enjoying it, taking care of others, and waiting for a prince to save you."

It’s through such historically poignant characters like Snow White that we, as a 21^st Century audience are able to acknowledge the contrast in the representation of female characters in today’s film industry. ‘The Hunger Games’ and its succeeding films are perfect examples of this. Their strong female protagonist represents everything women haven’t been portrayed as over the years and Kelly Oliver says that - in reference to Katniss’s character and the other female characters who subvert the stereotypes forced on them - "their own status as prey is camouflaged by their position as predators in relation to the animals upon which they prey,” meaning that women’s general representation as weak individuals over the years is overruled in this franchise by Katniss and her fellow heroines, including: President Coin, Cressida, Johanna Mason and many others. Natalie Dormer, who plays Cressida in the final two films comments on both her role and President Coin and she notes that, “the beautiful thing about Julianne Moore’s role in this movie, President Coin, as well as Cressida, is that they both could have easily been played by men.” The point being made here is that President Coin, Cressida and most definitely Katniss all exhibit behaviour that society would label as ‘masculine’, yet the producers decided to further the evolution of gender roles and cast women as characters with masculine attributes. In terms of Blumler and Katz’s Uses and Gratifications theory, I think a female audience would get a lot out of these films, especially in regards to Personal Identity. There may well be members in an all-female audience who have experienced degradation as a result of their gender. Therefore, seeing a narrative unfold in which multiple female characters triumph over an evil male oppressor could be extremely empowering and may encourage them to find the strength, physically and mentally to confront their own societally inflicted oppression, and to honestly believe that “the new generation is showing us that they can look past the gender roles we are trying to force upon them.”

In one particular scene in the last ‘Hunger Games’ film, we see female characters take an especially heroic stance while escaping the enemy. In this scene, Katniss’s group of rebels, the Star Squad are being chased through the city’s sewers by lizard mutts, released by President Snow in order to kill them. In the previous film, Peeta was hijacked by President Snow and now he is in a very vulnerable position, something an audience wouldn’t expect of a character who had previously shown such bravery and strength. When they are cornered by the mutts and Peeta is struggling to fight them off, it’s Katniss and Cressida who ultimately save his life; Cressida runs in, fighting off all the mutts herself shouting “GO, GO, GO, GO, GO!” to Peeta, grabbing him and sending him up the ladder, letting him go before her. In a world where the status quo dictates the man rescuing the woman, this could be considered one of many pivotal cinematic moments where the roles are completely reversed.

It is very true that ‘The Hunger Games’ has been a turning point for the film industry in terms of giving women a genuine, realistic representation rather than what Stuart Hall would refer to as the preferred reading of femininity. However, it is worth mentioning that there were films attempting to do the same thing almost half a century prior to this. One of these films is ‘Calamity Jane’ (1953), a western comedy musical which is loosely based on its titular character, a historical Wild West heroine Martha Jane Canary. In post-war America, it was expected, required even, of women to ensure that the house was kept in order, the children were looked after, the meals were cooked, in fact a 2013 article called ‘Gender Roles in A Post-War America’ stated that, "Women were now expected to stay at home and take care of the kids while the husband went to work to financially support the family." In ‘Calamity Jane’, when we first meet her and indeed for the majority of the film, she could not be more contrary to those expectations. After the opening song, sung by Calamity herself, she hears about her love interest, Danny being captured and probably killed by a group of Native Americans. He is a lieutenant in the army, and most audiences, especially a 1950s audience would always associate soldiers with strength and bravery. Therefore, with the knowledge of how both men and women were expected to act in that era, when Calamity scares off the Indians and rescues Danny with no apparent fear, the opposite roles would have been a massive shock for audiences. Furthermore, although Katniss’ rebellious independence is a source of empowerment for today’s women, the discrimination and restrictions against women now are far less debilitating than they would have been 65 years ago, so the liberation female audiences must have felt after seeing Calamity Jane doing all these things that would have been exclusively available to men in a time that was “often identified as the pinnacle of gender inequality” must have been incredible. However, in order to give audiences some satisfaction and normality, Calamity does end up marrying a different man, Wild Bill Hickok, as would have been expected of all women, and when she cries to him about how she feels, he says, “Go on, bawl, admit you’re female,” so there are still moments to suggest that women, no matter how tough they may be perceived as, still have essential attributes that make them female, in this case, showing emotion.

The representation of women in film is discussed a lot, but the representation of men tends to get overlooked. In ‘The Hunger Games’, most of the male characters including Gale, Finnick, Haymitch and even some minor characters are represented in a way that reinforces stereotypes. For example, Gale and Finnick are both incredibly physically strong, they get Katniss out of danger when she can’t, they’re physically attractive, which links to Lara Mulvey’s Male Gaze theory, and they rarely show their emotions. Alternatively, Peeta is the anomaly amongst main male characters. Although he shows great physical strength, he also shows a certain vulnerability and tenderness that generally wouldn’t be expected from a male protagonist in an action film, so Peeta definitely represents the male characters in film who are increasingly subverting gender stereotypes. However, there is another stereotype that is brief, but evidently reinforced in the first film. When Katniss is taken to The Capitol, she gets her own stylists who get her ready for the tribute parade, one of whom is male, and extremely effeminate and camp. I found it interesting that after casting a man to play the role of a fashion stylist/makeup artist, the decision was made to make him camp and presumably gay. And I wondered why that was necessary. Does a man’s interest in fashion and makeup automatically make him gay? In an almost identical way to men and women, gay characters are given their own traits and attributes to make them socially distinguishable and recognised by audiences.

Whereas the issue of male identity is very minimal in ‘The Hunger Games’, in 2000, Stephen Daldry made ‘Billy Elliot’, the story of an 11 year old boy from 1980s Northern England who, while taking boxing lessons, dreams of becoming a ballet dancer. Growing up amidst the coal miner’s strike meant that he would have been expected to follow in the footsteps of his coal miner father, who we see frequently going and protesting against the strike. Billy however, while he loves his father, has little interest in his career and the politics behind it and soon finds that he has a passion and a talent for ballet. He joins the local ballet class and eventually dedicates all his time to it, which doesn’t sit well with his father. This is clear when he says, “lads do football, boxing, or wrestling — not friggin’ ballet!” It’s clear that Billy’s dilemma leaves him angry, anger which he expresses through dance. Similarly to the preceding films that have been mentioned, Blumler and Katz’s Personal Identity would fit well here, since there may be boys watching Billy Elliot who are afraid to do what they love, perhaps dancing, because they’re afraid of the repercussions. Another character in the film is Michael, who we later find out is gay after kissing Billy on the cheek. He only does this because he thinks Billy’s ballet means he’s gay as well, but as Billy rightly puts it, “Just because I like ballet doesn't mean I'm a poof, you know.”

As the two step flow model would suggest, films like the “Hunger Games” series do influence audiences, especially younger audiences. For example, when the films were released, cast members elected themselves as the opinion leaders and used social media to promote the films and even got audiences involved through the use of social media. Things even got to the point where the films were encouraging young people to become more active, as Kelly Oliver remarks, "Women and girl hunters account for the growth of hunting sports.” This shows just how significant the character of Katniss Everdeen is in the lives of young girls in the 21^st Century. The same could also be said for the likes of ‘Billy Elliot’, since just after the release of the film, "The Royal Ballet has succumbed to the Billy Elliot effect. For the first time in its 76-year history, the establishment that spawned such stars as Dame Margot Fonteyn and Darcey Bussell has accepted more boys than girls."

I think with the evolution of gender roles on the rise in the film industry, things will be much the same, if not developed further in 5 years time. Social media definitely has a huge impact on how genders, especially female characters are represented in film. I think one has to acknowledge the aftermath of the Harvey Weinstein scandal and how the women who were subjected to his oppressive, threatening power are coming together and fighting back against him, many with the use of social media, having now regained their voices. This is how Katniss is represented in ‘The Hunger Games’, as the woman who is unjustly persecuted, physically and emotionally by a manipulative tyrant in possession of a substantial amount of power, power enough to destroy her and everything that is important to her, yet she doesn’t hide away. She fights back, gathers allies and speaks out for her fellow victims, declaring with utter conviction, “Fire is catching! And if we burn, you burn with us!”

In my opinion, I think that with the release of films like ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ and films that were released in similar years, gender roles were undisputedly based on stereotypes and the opinions of powerful figures e.g. Walt Disney. However, as the film industry has developed, there seems to have become a positive correlation between the evolution of women’s roles in society and female characters in film, like in ‘Calamity Jane’. Similarly, thanks to films like ‘Billy Elliot’, the freedom of identity, preference and sexuality has blossomed, particularly for males, and therefore in film, this freedom to act and feel exactly how they want to is all the more prevalent. Finally ‘The Hunger Games’ has one of the strongest female protagonists Hollywood has ever seen. She is "a fighter, a killer, a survivor”. And she doesn’t need anyone else to tell her otherwise.