THTRFLM 1T03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 8: Peripeteia, Shallow Focus, Essentialism
31 Oct 2017
School
Department
Course
Professor
Female of the Species
Presentation assignment:
• Your goal: a persuasive presentation that convinces the class of your groups perspective on the
play or film
• Key tasks:
o Define the social issue clearly
o Be specific in your analysis of the production elements
o Relate the analysis to the argument of the play or film as a whole
Female of the Species: A presentation
Film festival topic: "the Representation of Women in Film"
What about the representation of Indigenous people?
Female of the Species:
• Question: How does the film represent women?
• Argument: it offers an essentialist representation of women as mothers 'by nature' and argues
they are dangerous when guided by anything but maternal affection
Despite some positive features, the representation is thus problematic
Production Element: Action:
• Initial stages: women as strong & noble
o The girl refuses the husbands advances
o The husband dies/the women walk on across the desert
• Central section: women as prone to jealous violence
o The wife wants to kill the young girl in revenge
o Her sister eggs her on
• Final section: women as essentially maternal
o Key Peripeteia: sound of the baby makes the wife relent
o The three women unite in love for the baby
o The title page that follows reads: WOMENKIND
Production Element Set: Represented as Archetypal Women
• The women placed in relation to the tall palm trees - emphasizes their height - they are dominant
figures in an epic landscape
• The triangular composition of the figures increases the epic quality of the image
• In the film they become both associated with nature and locked in a battle against nature
• Griffith is encouraging us to see them as women that represent all women on some primal,
essential level
Production Element: Costume:
• Wife given 'masculine' quality
o The rolled-up sleeves (present from the start)
o The addition of the gun
• Initially, invites admiration
• Eventually connect to markers of irrationality
o Addition of black makeup around eyes
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