In the contemporary world, the public delights themselves in films that contain violence, action, and sex. Initially, such movie genres were traditionally aimed at male audiences; thus, the hero was often male. However, as women are now gaining more and more social opportunities in the workplace, politics, arts, and entertainment, the way the world perceives women today has changed. Hence, in response to the female archetype of this time, many moviemakers have started to employ female heroines in films. Nonetheless, majority of the movies with male heroes still portray women characters as less significant. Women’s roles are often manipulators, helpless victims, and/or sex objects. Thus, this paper aims to explore the usual women’s role in action movies. I chose this topic because I believe that women’s identity in action films, specifically in Western cultures, should be established in a different angle. When they hear “action film,” the viewers automatically expect that the women’s role is associated with manipulation, toughness, and sex. However, one can make a good action movie even without satisfying the audience’s need to see sex and violence. Thus, the moviemakers should explore various characters of women in action films and experiment on putting female characters in different angles. Even though a film is made for the best entertainment value, filmmakers should be careful on how to portray women because in real life, they might be stereotyped.
Women in action films usually play the romantic interest or accomplices of the male hero, although contemporary action films feature strong and independent female to make a wider appeal to the liberated minds of the people. While there have been phenomenal changes in the roles of women in Western films, especially after the philosophy of feminism emerged, there are still a lot to be done before the representation of women becomes accurate. The representation of women across all media tends to focus on beauty, sexuality, emotions (as opposed to intellect), and women’s dependence (as oppose to freedom and independence). Action films with male heroes use “the images of women for the gratification of men” since the female characters are significantly employed in order to highlight the heroic tendencies of the male hero (Gauntlett 66). Meanwhile, action films also use seduction as a way to provoke the weakness of the male hero. After all, seduction is the one great power that women have always had over men. Although the number of self-sufficient and independent females in action films has increased, their roles are still often associated with their attractive bodies. Thus, they are still portrayed as sex objects.
Meanwhile, female roles have definitely become tougher- not least because executives have realized that the audience of movie-going young men, in general, do not insist on the action heroes being male; on the contrary, if the traditional thrills of the action genre can be combined with the sight of Angelina Jolie (or other tough female characters) in shorts and tight top, for example, then the deal is sealed. (Gauntlett 66)
So long as there is still a strong portrayal of attractive female bodies even though the female character is tough, most of the male audiences would not really care. However, while empowered, the characters of tough women in Western films only become as dangerous sex objects—in such a way that they will get the attention of the male heroes due to their difficult character and oozing sex appeal. While the concept of damsel-in-distress in Western films is no longer a trend since most male heroes’ leading ladies are confident, empowered, and independent, they are still portrayed as “ass-kicking attractive babes” who manage to look perfect even after a few minutes of physical fight. For instance, one of the stereotypical female characters in present day is the character of Lara Croft in the film Tomb Raider (Gauntlett 66). Although she is the main character, she represents beauty and promiscuity. Croft’s sexuality as a sexy woman is apparently emphasized in the film.
Since most leading ladies should be attractive and sexy, white women are often the ones who get the character than African American women. Their blond hair, strong features, and fair skin look appealing on screen. Since white females are the ones who are often seen in urban action, gangster, and other fiction films, their identity even in real life is inevitably associated with glamor, toughness, and independence. It is no wonder that in Western culture, women adapt these kind of independence and mind setting. There is an apparent rise of self-sufficient women, male-defying women, single mothers, working class females, and female bosses in the Western world. While the white leading ladies in Western films are portrayed as strong women, most action films still highlight their physical advantage (in terms of beauty), add some emotional content to the plot, and stretch the hero’s success a bit (Goren 162).
Female characters of another racial descent such as Africa American women are also depicted as tough characters, but they are not usually acquired for a leading lady role. Most of the time, the black women are instead initiators or victims of exploitation (Lawrence 93). However, female characters that belong to other races especially in the Eastern part of the world are still stereotyped according to their traditional social roles. In Asian countries for example, female characters in action films are still in touch with their sense of motherhood and femininity. In Chinese action films, leading ladies like Zhang Zi Yi and Michelle Yeoh, though involved in martial arts, stunts, and gun play, are still portrayed as the hero’s love interest (Tung 114).
The portrayal of subsequent female heroines in films such as Charlie’s Angels, Tomb Raider, and Resident Evil as “masculine proxies…. women clearly cross over into the traditionally masculine terrain of toughness” (Brown 48). The ultra masculine and hard body type that is dominant in action film-making during Reagan ’80s is no longer a trend. It has become a trend in contemporary cinema that female actresses take on roles that used to be typically suited for men. Yet, these new roles for women as figurative males and “masculinized-female bodies” only “lead to misconception that heroines are only enacting masculinity” (Brown 48). Instead of providing legitimate and concrete examples of female heroisms, these films only enact and justify that an action heroine is based on masculinity and toughness. Apparently, there is a strict categorization of gender traits nowadays that films portray in exaggerated ways. Filmmakers try to integrate female characters in action films by making them manipulative and physically strong. However, in the end, they only send the wrong message as they only affirm the usual idea that film heroes are associated with physical action and aggressive behaviors. In terms of gender issues in retrospect, I realized that people tend to be so conscious of how to treat women in fear that they might offend the feminist idea that men and women should be treated equally.
I learned that in most movies especially in action films with male heroes, women are portrayed as sexy, available, and mischievous that create chaos in the entire story. Since the movie is for the male audiences, women are portrayed as sex objects; thus, they are clearly not presented as equal to the hero. Meanwhile, the female characters especially those leading ladies in action films are often female whites since they fulfill the standard of attractiveness and seduction. In turn, they are often misinterpreted. Nevertheless, as the idea of gender roles progresses as well, women actresses will acquire wider opportunities in action films. However, even in films where they are the main character, their heroic tendencies are still attached to the common belief that to be hero depends on one’s sense of masculinity and aggressive behaviors. In retrospect, I believe that women should be treated as it is and that they should depend on one’s cultural and social identity and not so much on how to affirm the latest philosophical idea (just like feminism).
Work Cited
Brown, Jeffrey A. “Gender, Sexuality and Toughness: The Bad Girls of Action Film and Comic
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Inness. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004. 47–76
Gauntlett, David. Media, Gender, and Identity: An Introduction. New York: Routledge, 2002
Goren, Lilly J. “Supermom: The Age of the Pregnant Assassin.” You’ve Got a Long Way. Ed. Lilly J.
Goren. Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, 2009. 159–176.
Lawrence, Novotny. Blaxploitation Films of the 1970s. New York: Routledge, 2008.
Tung, Charlene. “Embodying an Image: Gender, Race, and Sexuality in La Femme Nikita.” Action
Chicks: New Images of Tough Women in Popular Culture. Ed. Sherrie A. Inness. New York:
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