Essay \"Gender roles in films\" - grade A PDF

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November 16, 2012 English 1010 Gregory Souza Gender roles in film Stereotypically, the male plays the more dominate role in the relationship. The saying goes, women take care and men take charge. Going along with stereotypes, the males are also the ones that have higher paying jobs, are involved in leadership positions, and show less emotions compared to women. However, the movie No Strings Attached challenges these gender roles. Adam and Emma agree upon getting into a sexual relationship without any emotional attachments and through the qualities of each character, the director is able to depict the topic of gender role reversal. The female lead Emma actually takes on the male role in their relationship rather than Adam which destabilizes our expectations to whether certain roles belong to solely a certain gender. Psychologist, Holly Brewer offers a list of stereotypes for both men and women. She states, “Women are supposed to have "clean jobs" such as secretaries, teachers, and librarians. Women are nurses, not doctors. Women are not as strong as men. Women are supposed to make less money than men. The best women are stay at home moms and women are not supposed to be in charge.” As for males, she states, “Men do "dirty jobs" such as construction and mechanics; they are not secretaries, teachers, or cosmetologists. Men do not do housework and they are not responsible for taking care of children. Men are in charge; they are always at the top. As husbands, men tell their wives what to do and men do not show emotion.” These are the basic stereotypes that the movie No Strings Attached is working with, but shows them in a reverse way.

As stated, women stereotypically are more emotional and carry more emotional baggage than men, thus making the idea of getting into a relationship with “no strings attached” rather difficult. Emma is presented as a character that is the opposite of this stereotype. She is a character that does not allow herself to fall in love, thus getting into this kind of relationship is much easier for her. She easily refuses to create an emotional bond with anyone. The director shows this trait through the use of dialogue. In a specific scene, Emma is having a conversation with her co-worker Shira in the cafeteria of the hospital they both work out. Shira is pointing out different men that she thinks Emma would like to get to know, but Emma has no problem with rejecting each man due to just any little thing wrong with them. Emma does not think any guy is capable of her love, and she often calls them out by their flaws. As each guy is passing their line of vision, Emma says they’re either “too short, too tall, or looks like a jerk”. The development of Emma’s character shows that she has a hard exterior, something that women do not typically possess. She shows little emotion, a characteristic that makes her more man-like thus making this character more appealing to venture into a no string’s attached type of relationship. Compared to Emma, Adam possesses more womanly traits. In the first couple of opening scenes, it is revealed that he has just gone through a breakup with his latest girlfriend and is moping around the house. At the bar with his friends, he vents about his problems and they suggest that he finds another girl to help him get over his ex-girlfriend. Adam refuses this advice because he tells his friends that he is truly interested in falling in love rather than fooling around. This is also a gender reversal that the director shows through this scene. Adam acts rather sympathetically towards the breakup, while men typically are known to be passive about these types of events. Crying and wanting to fall in love are qualities that women seek out for, thus showing that Adam is definitely more emotional than Emma, making his character for feminine.

In a case study done on men and women at Dartmouth College, a group of men and women were asked a serious of hypothetical questions to “assess prevalent stereotypes regarding men’s and women’s emotional expressivity as well as self-perceptions of their emotional behavior” (Cognition and Emotion, 1). “Specifically, women were expected to be more likely to react with sadness to negative emotion-eliciting events in general. They also expected themselves to be more likely to react with sadness as well as to cry and to withdraw more when experiencing negative emotional events. In contrast, men were expected to react with more happiness/serenity during negative emotional situations. Also, they expect themselves to react more frequently this way as well as to laugh and smile more and to be more relaxed in negative situations” (Cognition and Emotion, 14). This movie shows that typical gender stereotypes do not hold true for all situations. Adam is an example of a male who reacts with more sadness when experiencing negativity in his life, thus revealing that not all fit into the mold that are expected of them, and stereotypes do not always influence emotional reactions. Going back to traditional stereotypes of men and women, men are expected to have higher paying jobs and jobs with more authority than women. “Despite dramatic increases in the female labor force participation rate over the past 30 years, other statistics suggest that women still have not been fully integrated into the labor market,” according to John G. Marcis and Kay W. Lawrimore of Francis Marion University In the movie, this statistic holds to be false. Emma is a doctor while Adam is a film director, thus showing the advancement of women in the work field and disclaiming stereotypes that are hold upon women and working. This proves that Emma is more educated than Adam and is involved in a higher lifestyle than he is. A scene in the movie depicts this just so. Dr. Metzner, a co-worker that Emma seems to be friendly with pulls Adam aside during a company picnic and insults Adam’s career. Adam becomes jealous of Dr. Metzner,

which shows another more feminine trait he possesses. The doctor admits to trying to win over Emma’s heart, and warns Adam straightforwardly that he is the better man for Emma. He says that he has a “real job” compared to Adam’s directing job, and by that he can provide Emma with financial security. While insulting Adam’s job, Dr. Metzner also insults his masculinity because he mocks the fact that Emma would be the breadwinner of their relationship. Dr. Metzner also takes it as far as saying that Adam is the type of guy Emma only has fun with, and he is the type of guy that Emma will end of marrying because he is the more practical choice. This offends Adam because he is considering a serious future with Emma and now doubts whether he is a suitable fit for her. This makes him reflect upon his own career path and wonders if he should pursue a more secure job. Even though Dr. Metzner was trying to put down Adam’s job and insulting his masculinity and relationship as well, Adam was only solely concern with being good enough for Emma. Adam does not care nor is embarrassed that Emma has a better job than he does, but he does wonders if he can compare to Dr. Metzner, because realistically, he could take care of Emma better than Adam can. The careers that the director gives to both characters strengthen the argument that not all men must hold jobs in position of power. Even though it would be more typical for Adam to have the higher positioning job, the screen writers chose to give Emma this job to show the prevalence of women advancing in a field where men are dominant and that it is acceptable to be a relationship where the man does not put his ego first and is okay with not being the breadwinner in this situation. Typically, males would let this situation get to them, but Adam does not showing that he isn’t allowing himself to fit into the gender roles that are placed on men by society.

The use of the camera movement throughout the film highlights which character of the two is more dominant. In one scene, Emma and Adam are lying in bed together and Adam gazes into Emma’s eyes. In this scene, Emma is the camera’s main focus, creating a more dominant feel. Whenever she is in a shot with Adam, he is always looking up towards her, idolizing her in a sense and she talks down to him like a child almost. This seems to be a general trend throughout most of the movie. Whether the two are on a date or Adam is visiting Emma at her workplace, he is always talking up towards Emma and she seems to be looking down towards him. The director places any shot of Emma higher than Adam revealing over and over again that she is the nontraditional dominant character in this relationship. Once again, women are not supposed to be in control, but this movie is a depiction of how this stereotype is proven to be false. A rather pivotal point in the movie is when the plot changes and Emma actually falls in love with Adam. Her original plan of telling Adam to stay away from her backfires. She falls victim to jealousy when she sees Adam dating other girls. She follows him to his apartment and kicks out the girls he brought home. The director of this movie turns the gender roles around, when in the end, Emma does fall in love with Adam, which allows her to define with the normal stereotypes as a woman. Adam too embodied more masculine stereotypes with his time apart from Emma. He dated other girls whom he did not feel any type of emotional connection with and was more passive in the relationship. Even though both characters goes through a tribulation towards the end of the film, once they get back together with one another, Emma still wears the pants in the relationship. She is allowing herself to fall in love with Adam, but the closing scene of the movie shows her setting the rules for their relationship. She states which nicknames she likes to be called and Adam is back to his emotional self with Emma. This creates a balance at

the end of the film, and highlights that one can choose to act upon their emotions and this can or cannot be independent of typical stereotypes. This film challenges the norm none the less, but it still highlights that a stable, monogamous relationship is still a more desirable goal rather than a no strings attached type of relationship. A no strings attached relationship is looked to be a type of experiment in the film, but a monogamous relationship is still the model to strive after. Even though the two end up in this kind of relationship, nothing has changed between the two characters. Emma is still the dominant person in the relationship, setting guidelines as to where she wants this relationship to go and what pet names she can have. Even igniting this kind of relationship was Emma’s decision thus highlighting a sense of dominance. Getting into a monogamous relationship does not change the reverse roles between the two which allows the audience to see that gender roles in a relationship can still be switched. No Strings Attached is a movie that works with an unusual situation. It is not ordinary that one finds a relationship where the female holds so much power, but the director of the movie creates one doing just so. This movie highlights that typical gender roles are not often the norm for today’s society, but they often play a part in what defines one as a male or female. Females are rising in power and this film shows just that through Emma’s position in the relationship and her job, thus showing that what we consider the norm, might not be so normal after all. For future references, gender role reversal might even become a general trend that we see in other movies.

Works Cited

Brewer, Holly. List of Gender Stereotypes. < http://www.healthguidance.org/entry/15910/1/Listof-Gender-Stereotypes.html> . Web. 14 Nov 2012. Gender Roles and Stereotypes. < http://chiron.valdosta.edu/dbriihl/introwood12.htm>. Web. 8 Nov 2012. Herrera, Pedro, Hess, Ursula, Kirouac, Gilles, Kleck, Robert E., Philippot, Pierre, Senecal, Sacha. “Emotional expressivity in men and women: Stereotypes and self-perceptions.” Cognition and Emotion. 14 (2000): 642. Print. 8 Nov 2012. Lawrimore, Kay W., Marcis, John G.. “Current Occupational Stereotypes.” Atlantic Economic Journal. (1994): 87. Print. 14 Nov 2012. No Strings Attached. Dir. Ivan Reitman. Paramount Pictures, 2011. DVD....