Feminism at the Movies

by Hilary Radner (editor), Rebecca Stringer (Editor)

Feminism at the Understanding Gender in Contemporary Popular Cinema examines the way that contemporary film reflects today’s changing gender roles. The book offers a comprehensive overview of the central issues in feminist film criticism with analyses of over twenty popular contemporary films across a range of genres, such as chick flicks, teen pics, hommecoms, horror, action adventure, indie flicks, and women lawyer films. Contributors explore issues of femininity as well as masculinity, reflecting on the interface of popular cinema with gendered realities and feminist ideas. Topics include the gendered political economy of cinema, the female director as auteur, postfeminist fatherhood, consumer culture, depictions of professional women, transgender, sexuality, gendered violence, and the intersections of gender, race, and ethnic identities. The volume contains essays by following Taunya Lovell Banks, Heather Brook, Mridula Nath Chakraborty, Michael DeAngelis, Barry Keith Grant, Kelly Kessler, Hannah Hamad, Christina Lane (with Nicole Richter), JaneMaree Maher, David Hansen-Miller (with Rosalind Gill), Gary Needham, Sarah Projansky, Hilary Radner, Rob Schaap, Yael D Sherman, Michele Shreiber, Janet Staiger, Peter Stapleton, Rebecca Stringer, Yvonne Tasker, and Ewa Ziarek.

Genres: Feminism, Film, Nonfiction, Pop Culture

320 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2011

About the author

Hilary Radner is associate professor in the Department of Film, Television, and Theater at the University of Notre Dame.

Reviews

[Alexandra ✨ · Rating 3 out of 5]

2,5/5

[Sharon · Rating 3 out of 5]

A wildly uneven collection of essays-- including it title-- which should more accurately be "Gender at the the Movies." That's not a criticism, but since this book very aggressively asserts that it is more interested in the umbrella of "gender" than simply "Feminism," then the title is a bit misleading. The biggest strength of the book is that the essays all focus on films that are readily accessible to its readers-- with the exception of two of the studied titles, I had either seen the movies in question or had read access at my public library. Of the two I didn't-- I was very familiar with one of them from other essays. Some of the stronger essays were the ones focusing on "A Single Man," "Michael Clayton," and most especially, "The Brave One." Others-- like the role of music in the "Sex and the City" film and "lad flicks" in general weren't as engaging. The other main strength of the book was its tendency to shy away from jargon and overly academic meta-criticism. A couple of the essays I had high hopes for-- like "No Country for Older Women" or "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" franchise disappointed. All in all, it's worth picking up from the library where you can pick and choose from its offerings and spend a great night at the movies and at the essays.

[Belinda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really interesting collection of film theory articles on recently released movies. Very accessible and easy to read.