Theories

Mulvey's Male Gaze Theory: Laura Mulvey’s male gaze theory states that the camera takes the role of the eyes of a heterosexual male, and in doing so sexualise female characters, showing them in objectifying ways in order to attract the attention of a male audience. The theory was introduced in 1975 in Laura’s book, Visual Pleasure and narrative cinema. Examples of the male gaze are prominent in today’s media still, with music videos from mainstream artist like Pharell Williams and Justin Bieber for example featuring many images of women that appear in some circumstances to be in no way related to the song or the artist, and simply serve to appeal to males, with the fragmentation of the females bodies and the sexualisation of such, with breasts and bums frequently being accentuated.

Quotes from Visual Pleasures and Narrative Cinema

“ Woman, then, stands in patriarchal culture as a signifier for the male other, bound by a symbolic order in which man can live out his fantasies and obsessions through linguistic command by imposing them on the silent image of a woman still tied to her place as the bearer of meaning, not maker of meaning”

“ In a world ordered by sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female. The determining male gaze projects its phantasy on to the female form which is styled accordingly. In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness”


Female Gaze: The female gaze is a feminist film theoretical term representing the gaze of the female viewer. In today’s cinema, the female gaze is typically when the camera takes on the eyes of the female director to show the female characters in a more empowering and less objectifying light. On some occasions the female gaze does cater to heterosexual women and their desires, but the female gaze contrasts majorly with the male gaze in regards to the fact that it focuses more on empowering and allows the audience to feel attraction to harecters in a less literal sense, focusing more on emotions etc. instead of body parts and appearance, as it is seen that women’s desires are more emotional and their attraction less physical than the male counterpart. Examples of the theory feauture in films such as the Handmaids Tale and I Love Dick.