Sebastian Black A2 Film Studies
6. To What Extent Can The
Films You Have Studied For This Topic Be Accused Of Reinforcing Rather Than Challenging Stereotypes?
(35 Marks)
Plan:
Foreign Language Film:
|
Rust
& Bone (Audiard) 2012
Ali
- Male stereotype, strong powerful, fighter. Single father.
Stephanie
- Disability. Challenging stereotype of disabilities,
have a
relationship & can have sex. Independent woman. Dances
to lure in
men.
City of God (Meirelles & Lund) 2002
Lil Ze – Grew up in poverty. Overthrew drug lords.
Gains a lot of money however he doesn’t change his lifestyle.
Rocket – Also grew up in poverty. Honest. Quiet.
Wants to be a photographer.
Benny – Lil Ze’s partner in crime however later on he
wants to lead a good life instead of being like Lil Ze.
La Haine (Kassovitz) 1995
Vinz – White Jewish, angry, ‘gangster’
Said – Arab, middle ground between Vinz & Hubert.
Hubert – Black, sells weed, boxes, teacher kids how
to box.
Films
have the ability to challenge stereotypes & reinforce them. Mainstream
Hollywood cinema tends to reinforce the stereotypes because it is easy to do
however over time, foreign language films have started to branch out &
challenge stereotypes. Hollywood films
are starting to challenge stereotypes however it is still growing. The audience
are starting to get used to challenging stereotypes because we’ve been exposed
to too many films that reinforce the stereotypes & they have become
predictable. Having a film that
challenges stereotypes can have bad effects & good effects for example La
Haine (Kassovitz) 1995 is a film about 3 people living in an urban estate in
France. The main theme of the film is being anti-police. Despite this theme the
spokesperson for the former Prime Minister of that time stated that La Haine
was “a beautiful work of cinematographic
art that can make us more aware of certain realities.”
For
the time it was set in, La Haine reinforced & challenged the stereotypes of
what the police thought about the people living in the Banlieues. The police
themselves had power over the people living in the Banlieus & Vinz, Said
& Hubert were poverty stricken. Between Vinz & the police there was
conflict. Vinz believed that if he shot an officer his peers would respect him
as a gangster. Bearing in mind that all three of these protagonists are
immigrants to France, this reinforces the stereotype of immigrants coming to a
country to be terrorists of some sort. Another stereotype that is reinforced is
that Hubert sells weed. The stereotype is that all black people sell some form
of drug however it does not go beyond why they sell it. They don’t think about
the family Hubert has to provide money for. He is not doing it for his own
gain. Being the only man in his family, he feels that it is his duty to provide
for the family regardless of the process he has to go through in order to do
this. This stereotype however is challenged in La Haine because it shows the
reason why Hubert is selling weed, it shows his family atmosphere & the
responsibilities he has.
Vinz’s
character however is not a usual stereotype. Yes he is the stereotype of a
young male who is full of rage however; he is Jewish. It is unusual to see a
Jewish person in violent light in media. The role could have easily been Said
because he is an Arab however Kassovitz decided to go with Vinz (the Jew) to be
violent & Said (the Arab) to be the peacemaker. In my opinion, if it was a
different film, I’m pretty sure the role of the Arab would have been put as
violent or even as a terrorist.
Similarly
the same thing happens in City of God. We wouldn’t think there would be a
character that wants to break out of the poverty stricken area he once called
home. Growing up, I was always told to ‘watch out for the quiet ones’ & I
never really understood why until I watched City of God. Lil Ze & Rocket,
first introduced as quiet characters who seem to be outcasts. They both grew up
in the same area however they both took different roads as they grew up. Lil Ze
is the reinforced stereotype of a kid who grew up in the City of God. He is
born a natural leader who had become greedy due to the amount of poverty he was
exposed to as a child. When he grew up, despite all the money he had, he still
didn’t give up with his drug related crimes because in my opinion, he was
always scared to go back to square one. Lil Ze was afraid of failure. On the
other hand you have Rocket; again a quiet character who is honest. Instead of
indulging into drug related crimes, Rocket has a dream to become a photographer
however he won’t force it upon himself like Lil Ze does to get money. Rocket
takes his time & lets the opportunities come to him in it’s own pace. The
difference between Rocket & Lil Ze is that Rocket worked his way up the
ladder & this made him recognise each stage in case he had a fall back;
rocket was not afraid to go back to square one or any of the squares because he
got to know them through each experience. Lil Ze however went from the bottom
of the ladder & shot straight up to the top. This did not allow him to
experience each stage of the ladder so he is afraid of fall back because he
doesn’t know where he would end up. He is afraid of the unknown. Rocket is an
example of challenging stereotypes & Lil Ze is an example of reinforcing
stereotypes. They both grew up in the same area, they were effected by the same
amount of poverty, the only thing that changed was the route they chose as they
grew up. In their eyes their routes were the right routes because it helped
them escape their problems.
Filmmakers
have the ability to challenge stereotypes very easily because it was simply
done in City of God with Lil Ze & Rocket & in La Haine with Hubert,
Said & Vinz. It is up to the filmmaker if they are willing to take the risk
of challenging the stereotype because as I mentioned before, it is easy to
reinforce the stereotype because the audience always have the same reaction
whereas you don’t know how the audience will react if they are challenged. Most
of the audience don’t watch films to be challenged; they watch films for
escapism, entertainment or just to pass time. Film has been around since the
late 19th century however filmmakers are still trying to understand
the power that film has. Film changes every decade & soon it will become
normal for films to be challenging.
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