Mr Gray's essay- Analyse the ways in which the media represents one group of people you have studied?

In this essay I have chosen to focus on representation of Women in the UK by using contemporary British film in this case study. I will examine the film Wasps and Fish Tank. I will also consider feminist theories of gender.

Historically women were seen as wives, prospective wives or married lovers. They were judged to have held back the men’s ambition and drive. An instance of this films such as “Saturday Night Sunday Morning” and “A Kind Of Loving” but their has been women who have got out of this image. New Realism is a contemporary movement in British film. People like Andrea Arnold are trying to paint a different picture of women. A more honest picture where they have aspirations and goals in life which they try and fight for.

Dogme 95 is where the rules or the “vows of chastity” make sure that films do not distract from the central theme. Andrea Arnold try and use the feminist perspective using these types of rules. The awareness of the vows of chastity as it is being used more and more often in Modern British films.

In Wasps, Andrea Arnold uses the “vows of chastity” to show women are trapped. An good example of this is when the start of Wasps shows the mother dragging the kids down the stairs is these block of flats down these gloomy staircases. Then seeing the baby not dressed properly or when she makes the kids wait outside the pub and she talks about not having a life outside of the bubble she is in. What Andrea also did was make it feel real when for example at the end when the wasp was coming into her they had shaky cameras it made us feel like we were there. The audience is also made to feel sorry and sad on her behalf as she feels trapped but also the audience feels annoyed at the same time of having the children comes with a lot of responsibilities that she sometimes sys away from.

In Fish Tank we see the mother take no care towards her kids especially with Mia. When she does anything wrong she would be violet and aggressive towards her and throughout gave the impression that he would not care if anything happened to her. An example of this is when Zoe holds a house party and Mia opens the door to some guest she is aggressive to her by grabbing her arm and forcing her upstairs.

But in all this mix up right at the end we do see a different side when Mia was about to leave the house. They have this dance the whole family did together which was a rhythm dance some connection with the whole family.

Fish Tank is driven by the family by the boyfriend (Conor). There seems to be a sexual rival between the Mother and the Daughter Sigmund Freud Oedipal triangle which illustrates that the Mum is jealous of the daughter as she is the younger sign of her and the Daughter is Jealous of her as she wants to be loved by the mum’s lover. But during the film it takes unprecedented turn when Mia swapped the role of a Jealous daughter into the “The Mother” role in kidnapping Conor’s daughter and now the roles have changed into a harmful Mother when she throws the little girl into the river but then turns into caring mother when he saves her life and takes care of her.

Due to the lack of care from the elders on the family the older sisters are taking on the responsibilities of the mother’s job. In Fish Tank we see Mia taking care of younger sister Tyler. Tyler looks up to her and you can see there chemistry when big Mia is leaving the house where Tyler gets upset. There are times when she gets her job when wrong given cigarettes and alcohol to her younger sister but overall she is much of a role model than her mum is. In Wasp we see much younger girls acting as responsible and possible. I say as much as possible because she is too young to take care of 2 children and a baby at her age and understand what he going on all the time. An example of this is when she fed food from the floor and gave it to her sisters.

Both of these films confront traditional representation of female uniqueness. As well see all these magazines around trying to sell women off like they are objects and always trying impress men. Even Women magazines are being shown off in such a way that is also to try and impress all the men. The fantasy is shown in both film for example in Wasp the women wants to be like Victoria and David Beckham and goes so far that the man he went out with was David and that means he must be perfect and she would do anything to keep him happy including going against her kids. In Fish Tank this happens when Mia dances for Conor to impress him and eventually ends up having sex. All of this shows off what the media has on these girls where they have to be what ever the magazine says its hot and what’s not.

In conclusion I believe British Films should carry on using new realism as it gives an proper look on life and not that the Hollywood type of showing everything everywhere is good cosy. It gives out a more positive message to out there for good than having this world where we think everything is all good. If more of these films are brought out it would slowly change people’s mind out about women and the sales of magazines would start to drop and women are on a more even float to men. The “Vows of chastity” rules have helped with this as they almost force the director into making their film more realistic and more a truer picture of society than a fantasy world.