Just found this trailer for a terminator film that is all about the character Sarah Connors, I could possibly look at this film rather than Terminator Two. What do you think Sean?

Little bit about Sarah Connors

Sarah Connors - Terminator Two


The images above show how in the film she takes on tasks that in our society were originally masculine, in the film she is an assertive independant woman. However in the film she does ahve to rely on the terminator to save and rescue her when she needs help. This I think is a portrayal of how woman are moving forward into becoming characters that don't need to rely on men to rescue them as her character does has alot of power and strength to be able to fight but not enough to do it successful, which is the reason for her needing to be saved.

Possible questions to ask.

When watching the films for my critical research study these questions have come to mind and I think they would be useful questions to ask or answer in my study...possibly ask in the interview or questionnaire.
1. The early examples (Terminatore two and Alien) show tough and unobjectified women, is this a positive representation?
2. Does making women stronger, more masculine and less 'womanly' mean they become better representations?
3. Why is it better for women in action films to be less traditionally womanly (coming second to men) and more authoritive and independant?
4. Would woman becoming more womanly (i.e. sexier and feminin) lead to being objectified? If so, is this then a bad or negative representation?

Promary research ideas

Primary Research Ideas

* Not a survey because this is a quantitative way of carrying out research and wouldn’t be much use as I am looking for research that is more qualitative.
* Interviews:
- Could be informal and conversational... ask in generalised questions before going into detail about topics which could develop productive discussion.
- Could have a group of people of varied ages and an equal number of men and women. Show them roughly 5 minute clips from Aliens and Terminator Two and ask them their opinion on how the women have been represented. Then Show them clips from Lara Croft and Resident Evil and ask them their opinion on the representation. After that we would discuss whether they think the change in representation of the years has been a positive one or a negative one or is simply something that doesn’t matter as it doesn’t signify anything, or when watching films where women protagonist feature that it doesn’t matter whether or not the representation is realistic and correct.
* Another way of undertaking research that I think would be affective would be to produce a questionnaire about women protagonist and ask a wider selection of people their opinion on woman protagonist. Could possibly ask them which films have the best representations of women rather than just simply looking at the all ready stated films.

Women in action movies

The changing role of women in the genre.

1. Look at the "classic" role of the female in action movies etc - the helpless victim whose sole function in the narrative is to be saved by the male hero, or to be sexually conquered by the male hero (Bond girls for example) - who therefore are simply accessories to his masculinity.

2. Look at the development of the female protagonist - early examples such as Alien (sci-fi horror action) or Terminator 2 (sci-fi action). These protagonists are often hailed as a really positive representation of gender as they are main protagonists, tough, and NOT objectified - ie not objects of male voyeuristic sexual pleasure.

3. What about more recent female protagonsist in non-traditional female genres (ie not romcoms)? Are they still carrying on this positive representation or are their representations more ambiguously positive? Think about Lara Croft, or Charlie's Angels, or Pirates of the Caribbean (the last one where Keira Knightly becomes a sort of protagonist), Resident Evil...

4. These more modern protagonists are clearly more avaliable as objects for heterosexuual male voyeuristic pleasure/the male gaze etc. SO they are both subjects and objects. For primary research you could investigate with female audience members their responses to these differences. PRIMARY RESEARCH: Analyse a range of clips from each era comparatively to reveal the differences in the reps of femininity, and then explore with a real audience of women their responses to these differences...

Hello [:
I've changed my mind since the last blog I put up because I think that it wont fit in with the brief and also I just don't want to to that anymore. In stead i think that so that my hypothesis has a time thingy to it I might look at how women's roles in films has developed to them becoming stronger, more masculine and more successful. If I am going to do this I think that I should look at different films from different eras. But ATM I'm really lost and confused about what I should actually be doing!! HELP!!!

I have started to read the first part of chapeter 3 of that book you told me to read. And I was wondering whether I can mention TV in my critical research study. Because the first section in the chapter is about woman and men on TV and there is alot of point made that are similar to the ones that i wanted to make about the film industry and how women are represented, and arent usually the main protagonist in action films.

In the TV part it says that 'in action-adventure shows, only 15 percent of the leading characters were women.' and then a decade later the results had almost doubled 'to a still low 20 percent of characters'. Would I beable to in my research compare the tow, or sort of like say this is what has been found out in TV and then say and this is what i have found out in film and then say something like whether these two examples are similar or the same as how women are represented in all medias. What do you think?

BTW I'm really confused with this whole blog thing, is this just so I dont have to talk to you for advise? instead you post it on here, what you think i should do next? Soooo confused!

Lastly, I dont really know what to do next, Im just reading two bits about women in film..then what? make points about what I have read?