Feminist Film Theory and Audiences

Laura Mulvey is a feminist.
She argues that the theory develops logical arguments:
1. Cinema reflects society
2. Therefore cinema reflects a patriarchal society
3. How does a patriarchal society manifest into cinema?

The Gaze
The gaze of the camera, so what the audience see through the camera is from a male prospective. Within the narrative male characters direct their gaze towards female characters. This suggests that the male gaze is active and the female is passive

Therefore the audeince is made to identify with the male gaze and see the film through that perspective. The camera films from a optical as well as libidinal point of view. Thus three levels of the cinematic gaze- camera, character and spectator- that objectify the female character (the triple gaze)

The audience see through the eyes of the camera... the camera sees through the eyes of the male character... the male character is objectifying a woman. Eg. James Bond Dr No.






Another example is Megan Fox in transformers. She is seen as a sex object and one of the main attractions in the film, she serves no purpose but for boys/men to fancy her and try to persue her.

 Look at the way the male is viewing her, instead of looking at her face he is looking at her sexual body parts. Therefore objectifying her.

Also look at the angle in which the camea views her, the mise-en-scene also shows a male gaze.

Therefore he audience is constructed in a may compelled to the male gaze. Women are forced to look at the text as though they were a male member of the audience as you can see above. This occurs through the process of Suture.

Agency
Agency means the power to change the narrative, the power to move the plot onwards. In the classical hollywood film, the male is the agency, he is active and powerful. He is the one whom all the dramatic action unfolds around and the female character is just there, being passive and powerless. She is an object of desire for the male and for the audience.

Mulvey argues that women have two roles in film:

1. They are an object of erotic desire for the characters.
2. There are an object of erotic desire for the audience.

Our Video
Bailey Morgan- Let Go does not conform to these feminist ideas. In actual fact our character is homosexual so our aim was the opposite to wanting men to look at her like an object. Also our aim was that the camera was through a woman's prospective and not a mens. Therefore demonstrating this idea of the 'male gaze' being challenged.