Mean Girls - Queer Theory

In the movie Mean Girls we can see two Queer Theory stereotypes, these are the characters Damien and Janice. They play opposing roles, as Damien is much more feminine than Janice who in terms of Damien is much more masculine. Damien can be considered this type of a queen homosexual, because he acts in a feministic way and can also be considered a drama queen at times. This stereotype can be assigned to him because of his body language. This doesn't mean that he acts just like a female but you can see, feminine characteristics in the way that he walks, moves and gestures. Also, the way that he talks could connote that he is more of a feminine character, this is because his voice is much higher than any other male characters which are shown. Moreover, if comparing him to any other male characters, they are much more attractive than him which strengthens the stereotype, as he is different than all the other males. Another thing that makes him more feminine is the way that he acted when he and Janice took Cady through the corridors, he was protective in some way shouting to everyone to move out of the way, just like a mother figure. Furthermore, he is carelessly staying in girls toilets, just like he would feel that he belongs there, and while being in the toilet we learn that he has pink clothes. This is especially weird and unexpected because the two girls with which he talks to, don't own any pink clothes. The last aspect that I think makes him this type of homosexual guy is the way in which he reacted when Janice and him started to talk to Cady. The first part of her that he saw and taken into consideration was her hair; the colour of it. I suppose that it is very rare for a man to notice the women hair and say that they want exactly the same colour.

On the other hand, Janice is much more masculine and aggressive character. We can see this especially when someone walks next to Janice and makes a rude comment about her hair, and she, instead of feeling humiliated talks back at him. Moreover, we can see her mostly in black clothing, this could connote that she rebels against some kind of idea about people being considered in the same way where they should really be seen individually to who they really are. This clothing makes her stand out from the crowd and convey this idea that everyone is different. Also, the way she wears her clothes; she is nearly always covered from top to bottom by the clothes, which is not rally considered to be a feminine way to wear something, especially if we have a comparison. She can be compared with the so called 'plastics' which were shown wearing their sports kit in a very feminine way, with most of the legs showing and tops so short that you can see the belly. This is considered to be more feminine way of wearing clothes in that movie, than how Janice wears her clothes. The last aspect that makes Janice that kind of a soft butch is her hair. This is because they are black and she always wears them tied up, whereas 'plastics' have this rule to wear the hair tied up only once a week. This looks like, they would want to keep their feminine status by having their hair loose most of the time rather than look tie their hair back and look like guys without anything on their heads. These stereotypes would consider all the homosexuals to act in this way, whereas some will be more masculine or feminine regardless of their gender.

I don’t suppose that these stereotypes are used correctly, this is because not all homosexual people behave this way, just because some are more masculine or feminine, it doesn’t mean that their behaviour is exactly the same as it was portrayed in that movie. Although, I don’t think that these stereotypes are used entirely correctly they were added into the movie for a specific reason. This is because people like to laugh at situations or people which behave differently, and not meaning this in a bad way, it is funny to see a guy which is excited about the colour of someone’s hair or a girl which is sassier than guys. But I think that the use of these stereotypes was essential in this movie, otherwise it would be just another teenage problems movie, which isn’t really interesting but, if the characters are portrayed in a different way than they would be shown usually then the whole storyline is much more interesting, like it was seen in this film. So even if the film is showing stereotypical behaviour of homosexuals, I wouldn’t change anything in the way they were portrayed. This is because it made the film really funny and worth watching, whereas if it was just about the life of normal teenagers and their problems then it would be really boring.

I have looked at one of Queer Theorists, Judith Butler. She has written a book Gender Trouble in 1990, where she talked about feminism and how women are wrongly seen in the community as a group that has common characteristics and interests. She argues that there is no clear line that separates the characters or behaviours of men and women. All of them have their own individual identity. She also, says that feminists reject the idea of biology to be the destiny of each person. But as the patriarchal culture developed, it left no choice for males and females but to live according with the socially accepted behaviours. Butler prefers the idea of gender being something that varies from one person to another and there are no set similarities between them. And she argues that the only reason that people can say that they feel more like a man or a woman is because of the cultural identity which set some kind of standards for both of the genders. But in the movie Mean Girls, these standard boundaries are extremely violated. First of by Damien which behaves more like a woman should with his pink shirts, walking into girls bathroom, being the only man on the meeting which only the girls had to say sorry to each other and by simply his feminine behaviour. The second example is Janice which behaves in a more masculine way as she wears mostly black and the clothes cover her nearly from top to bottom, not like the other girls which wear skirts or t-shirts. Also, by her sassiness to other people, and there are no other girls shown which behave like this.

Girls Against Boys - Feminist Theory

When the woman is sitting in the bathroom we can see an empty stare on her face, she seems to be looking into the space and thinking about something. When the man from the other room calls her, she gets up and walks to him in a way that would mean that she isn't really interested in him and does what she has to do. During that scene we can also see an interesting reflection as the woman named Lu walks next to a mirror, but instead of seeing her reflection we can see a reflection of another woman, Shea, which cannot be at the same place as Lu because she was left behind at the police station by her. I suppose that this might have a deeper meaning which is shown in the whole movie, it could connote that these women get so close together that they start to become one another. But going back to the clip, when Lu comes out of the toilet, we can see a policeman gazing at her even before she appears in the doorway. This can be seen till the moment when she puts material round his head to cover his eyes. But meanwhile, the gaze that we can see from the policeman isn't a look which would be seen from a man in love, it looks more like he would treat Lu like a sexual object which can be used to his likings and then left behind like an old toy. This stops when Lu shows her true face, that she is more like a Femme Fatale character that uses her attributes to get what she wants, like she has done with the policeman. This gives her an advantage because the policeman didn't expect such a turn of events, but Lu knew from the very beginning what she was doing and why she wanted to do that. In addition, Lu is wearing red lipstick, this could pass a strong sexual message to the policeman as red is the colour of passion, heat and love, but also death, aggression and blood; which in this case is more relevant. As it is visible in the video, Lu wears only a black short dress, which shows a lot of her body, this connotes that she isn't afraid of her sexuality and is able to use it to get whatever she wants. This shows the situation in which they are, it is shown how the policeman is a bit nervous about what is happening, but Lu is shown like she knows what she is doing and controls the whole situation. And even though it is a bit awkward situation for the policeman, Lu doesn’t stop but even pushes him to continue by taking more of her clothes of.

This film is closely related to feminist theory, that’s why I wanted to look at a feminism theorist Laura Mulvey. She is best known for her essay, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, which was written in 1973. This article was influenced by the theorists Sigmund Freud and Jacques Lacan. This is one of the first essays that helped to shift the orientation of film theory towards more psychoanalytical. Her contribution to this theory gave a more feminism look at it. She said that the classical Hollywood cinema put the viewer on more of the male position, and the women only appeared as an object of desire and male gaze. According to Mulvey, women were and still mostly are put in films for the visual pleasure. She argues that the only way to fight with this stereotype is to produce films which challenge this idea and show woman in a completely different way. This is what is shown in the film Girls Against Boys, Lu is portrayed as an attractive woman which uses her qualities to the ends of moral extent and during that process she kills men, because she thinks that all of them want to use women, and that they mean nothing to men, just like they would be toys for them. This is why she wants to get rid of them, which is a completely different way in which the women are portrayed, because if they were just a target of visual pleasure, harmless and always in trouble, needing saving then the picture that Lu shows of women is completely different. This is because Lu isn’t harmless, she is the complete opposite of it, she is dangerous and can unscrupulously kill all the men that will stand in her way, or if they have something that she desires, like the policeman. He had a gun so she used her attributes to get the gun and then kills the only witness.

Scream Openning Scene

While watching the opening scene of the film Scream we can see and hear many codes and conventions which communicate the horror genre of the whole film. The first one is the title itself. This is because scream might have various connotations; some of them might be fear, pain or agony. So by seeing the title on its own we can imagine that the film might be based on these subjects. But going into the scenes, firstly we can denote that we see an innocent blonde woman. Why innocent? It's because she is wearing a white top and light coloured trousers; the colour white connotes purity, goodness and innocence which is how she was supposed to be presented to us. I think that her clothes were chosen on purpose so they would signify these ideas to us. But, I also, mentioned that she is blonde, this is also an important aspect, because we associate that blonde women might be less intelligent, which would signify that she might not be able to escape from the person that would be trying to get her, as they might be more intelligent than her; this would mean that they would have a plan how to catch her and she might panic, act in a way which would make her more vulnerable and not be able to think clearly which wouldn't help her with the escape. While we are introduced to the character we can hear the telephone ringing; it seems like a normal action to pick up a ringing phone to know who calls, but I think that the stranger felt like he would be invited by her, to her life, when she picked up the phone, because after she picked up the phone the first time, he kept on persistently calling her. I suspect that if she wouldn't have picked up the phone then he might have let go as he might have felt like she had rejected his request to be part of her life. But because she did pick up he kept on calling her; in the first call we can hear his voice which is really calm, strangely too calm, we can't hear any surprise in the tone of his voice that he has heard a voice of a woman which he never heard before, this might connote that he has called her on purpose and is just lying to her that he doesn't know what number he has dialled. And although he is trying to make the woman think that it is just a coincidence that he has called her by acting like a fool and asking her 'what number is this', the tone of his voice contradicts it all. These aspects might connote that he has a plan that is related to her because he isn't surprised that she doesn't want to talk to him, but still keeps on calling. The action is taking place at night which is an iconic time for the horror films, as a great majority of them are surrounded by darkness, this is because we can't see anything at night and people are usually scared of what they can't see or understand. Also, because we can't see much in the dark, the objects that we see, or rather their outlines seem to be more scary because our imaginations is making these objects look like something similar to the objects that scare us, or what we are expecting to be there. So within the arms of darkness, there is one shot showing the swing moving. The swing might have been moving because of the wind, but as we are introduced to the characters and the beginning of the storyline, the swing might suggest to us a very crucial part of the narrative, that the calling stranger might be within the woman's property. After that shot the film shows us scenes from the kitchen which has its own mise en scene that reveals as the narrative progresses. The first important aspects of the kitchen are the knives which are taken out by the woman and they make this symbolic sharp metallic noise which can only be associated with killing. Also, popcorn is very important through that scene because it grows along with the rise of the climax, this could symbolise that when the popcorn will blow up the narrative might be resolved. During the kitchen scene they start to talk about scary movies and the stranger makes her guess which is his favourite scary movie, while they talk we can hear satisfaction in his voice, as though he would be pleased to hear her talk about brutal and maniacal monsters from those movies. This might indicate that he likes the thought of pain and death and when he can find someone to talk about it he is really pleased. After that they start to kind of flirt with each other, at least she thinks that this is what he is doing. Who in the right mind flirts with a stranger that has called them and tells them that they don't have a boyfriend even though we learn later that she really does have a boyfriend? This action might show the blonde woman stereotype, because I think that she has forgotten that he is a stranger and persistently calls her even when she told him that she doesn't want to talk to him. When he stops asking her about her boyfriend, he tries again at getting to know what her name is, when she asks him why he wants to know he replies 'I want to know who I'm looking at', at that point a mysterious soundtrack is played. His words might signify what I wrote before, that he is right outside her house and doesn't plan to leave without doing what he has planned. Also, after he says that, we can hear a dog barking outside which might connote that someone strange is outside, because dogs usually bark when they see a stranger walking past their property or when they are walking onto it. This information makes her feel insecure in her own house and she starts to lock the doors in the house even the glass doors. While she does that a tense soundtrack is played to make the scene look scarier than it really is, because nothing is really happening during it, we are just told that he might be outside the house. The soundtrack stops when she locks all the doors to make it seem like she is now safe because she has locked herself inside. But, really how safe can she be? She has glass doors all over her house, it just takes someone to have something heavy on them and they can easily break the glass and enter the house, so it is foolish of her to think that she might be safe, and locking the glass doors. It would have been better for her if she left the doors unlocked, because, by now we are sure that the stranger will enter the house, and she, if she wanted to escape, would have to open at least one of the doors that she closed, to escape, so this will take her time which she could have spent on escaping rather than opening the doors, this makes her more vulnerable. So after she locked all the doors she talks with the stranger again, and a tense soundtrack is put back on when he says 'to see what your insides look like' in relation to what he wants from her. There is also another sign that purely tells us that he is outside, because all the others might have suggested that, but when he says 'turn on the patio lights, again', and knows the name of her boyfriend we can really get scared for her life, as it seems that he is some kind of maniac because he really tortures her mentally during the last minutes of the opening scene.