Today in my lesson I have read a article written by Daniel Chandler about Laura
Mulvey's gaze theory
which represents visual pleasure and narrative in
cinema. This is because it relates to out film and how the female protagonist is represented in our production.
For example, Laura says "Men do the looking; women are there to be looked at"
This shows how Women are represented in films today which has helped us in
the making of our film and how we need to represent our female character.
This article is about how a film which has
been called an instrument of the male gaze, producing representations
of women, the good life, and sexual fantasy from a male point of view'.
The concept derives from a seminal article called Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema by Laura Mulvey, a
feminist film theorist. This is because in the past films use
and objectify women in relation to 'the controlling male gaze' , presenting 'woman as image' to satisfy the audience.
Whereas, Mulvey argues that various features of cinema viewing conditions
facilitate for the viewer both the voyeuristic process of objectification of female characters and also
the narcissistic process of identification with
an ‘ideal ego’ seen on the screen.
Films such as James Bond have had a big impact on the way women are treated on
screen. This is because they are known in the films of being 'Bond girls' which
are mainly there to satisfy the male audience
as the male protagonists are controlling subjects
and treat women as passive objects of desire for men in both the story
and in the audience which supports the theory of 'the
male gaze'.
