{"id":37212,"date":"2011-07-05T14:24:25","date_gmt":"2011-07-05T19:24:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/?p=37212"},"modified":"2011-11-02T19:42:26","modified_gmt":"2011-11-03T00:42:26","slug":"review-of-transformers-3-machines-are-subjects-women-are-objects-and-female-leadership-is-a-joke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/2011\/07\/05\/review-of-transformers-3-machines-are-subjects-women-are-objects-and-female-leadership-is-a-joke\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Transformers 3: Machines are Subjects, Women are Objects, and Female Leadership is a Joke"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at Caroline Heldman’s Blog<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201c<\/em>Transformers: Dark of the Moon<\/a>,\u201d the third installment\u00a0in this\u00a0$1.5 billion franchise<\/a> that just set a new record\u00a0for\u00a0a Fourth of July weekend\u00a0opening<\/a>, follows what has become a\u00a0Hollywood action movie tradition<\/a> of virtually erasing women, despite the fact that women buy 55% of movie tickets<\/a> and\u00a0market research<\/a> shows that films with female protagonists or prominent female characters in ensemble casts garner similar box office numbers to movies featuring men.<\/p>\n

Only two featured characters in the large ensemble Transformers cast are women, and none of the Transformers (alien robots, for the uninitiated) are female.\u00a0And the two\u00a0female humans consist of an unmitigated sexual object and a caricatured mockery of female leadership.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with “the object,” Carly (Rosie Huntington-Whiteley<\/a>), the one-dimensional, highly sexualized\u00a0damsel-in-distress<\/a> girlfriend\u00a0of protagonist Sam Wikwiki (Shia LaBouef<\/a>). Carly wears stiletto heels, even when running from murderous machines (except when the filmmakers slip up and her flats are visible), and she is pristine\u00a0in her white jacket after an hour-long battle that leaves the men filthy.<\/p>\n

The movie opens with a tight shot of Carly\u2019s nearly bare ass as she walks up the stairs:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=YC32Bw9uYho]<\/p>\n

In a later scene, Carly is reduced to an object as her\u00a0boss (Patrick Demsey<\/a>) compares her to an automobile in a conversation with Sam:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=p2WI7f9eeUM]<\/p>\n

And in case the audience doesn\u2019t know to leer at Carly, they get constant instruction from a duo of small robots\u00a0that look up her skirt and Sam\u2019s boss (John Malkovich<\/a>) who cocks his head to stare at her ass:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=byC8cmWg6K8]<\/p>\n

Sam\u2019s \u201cfriend,\u201d Agent Simmons (John Turturro<\/a>), also ogles Carly and suggests she be frisked against her will:<\/p>\n

[wpvideo ojm7ZvjZ]<\/p>\n

In\u00a0a disturbing scene of sexualized violence, Carly\u2019s (robot) car sprouts \u201carms\u201d and threatens to violate her:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=t-yEghxhpMk]<\/p>\n

Normalization of female objectification causes girls\/women to think of themselves as objects, which has been\u00a0linked to<\/a> higher rates of depression and eating disorders, compromised cognitive and sexual function, decreased self-esteem, and decreased personal and political efficacy. Ubiquitous female sexual objectification also harms men by\u00a0increasing\u00a0men’s body consciousness<\/a>, and causes both men and women to be\u00a0less concerned about pain<\/a> experienced by sex objects.<\/p>\n

Transformers 3 is pitched as a \u201cfamily movie\u201d and the film studio carefully disguises it as such with misleading movie trailers\u00a0showing a story about\u00a0kid’s toys. (Okay, I still have an Optimus Prime robot\u2026) Young kids were abundant at both screenings I attended, taking in the images with little ability to filter the message.<\/p>\n

************<\/p>\n

It would have been easy for Michael Bay to positively present the second female character, Director of National Intelligence Charlotte Mearing (Frances McDormand<\/a>). Instead, she is a tool to openly mock female leadership and promote female competition.<\/p>\n

McDormand does her best to breathe some realism into\u00a0Director Mearing, but the script calls for a caricature\u00a0with\u00a0“masculine” leadership traits<\/a> \u2013 arrogance, assertiveness, stubborness, etc. \u2013\u00a0who is\u00a0ultimately “put in her place”\u00a0at the end of the movie\u00a0with a\u00a0forced kiss. Women continue to be\u00a0vastly under-represented<\/a> in positions of corporate and political leadership, partially due to the double-bind of women\u2019s leadership where, in order to be considered acceptable leaders, women have to project a “masculine” image for which they are then criticized.<\/p>\n

Director\u00a0Mearing’s authority is\u00a0challenged by virtually everyone she encounters\u00a0in a way that simply wouldn’t make sense for a male character in her position. Sam openly challenges her in this scene:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=BYahdFFjZXk]<\/p>\n

Director\u00a0Mearing’s authority\u00a0evaporates when Agent Simmons\u00a0comments,\u00a0“moving up in the world, and your booty looks excellent”:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=eb4m0JuROnU]<\/p>\n

Director Mearing\u00a0is even challenged by a transformer. [SPOILER ALERT:\u00a0Director Mearing is the\u00a0only<\/em> one to challenge this transformer\u2019s intentions, and\u00a0she gets no credit when it turns out she was right.]<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=aEz8DOa9I78]<\/p>\n

This\u00a0Transformer\u00a0again puts her in her place with the dual meaning of “I am a prime. I do not\u00a0take orders from you”:<\/p>\n

[wpvideo EDGYfp2T]<\/p>\n

Director\u00a0Mearing also has a running theme of not wanting to be called “ma’am.”<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=srsWDT6w8HI]<\/p>\n

The \u201cma\u2019am\u201d theme doesn\u2019t\u00a0readily make sense since\u00a0Director Mearing isn\u2019t young and doesn\u2019t appear to be trying to look young. But it does make sense\u00a0when viewed through the lens of\u00a0director Michael Bay intentionally mocking women\u2019s leadership. Remember the flap when Senator Barbara Boxer at a hearing requested that a general use her professional title\u00a0instead of\u00a0\u201cma\u2019am\u201d?:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=f0CprVYsG0k]<\/p>\n

The \u201cma\u2019am\u201d theme resurfaces in a particularly troubling scene where\u00a0Director Mearing meets with Sam and Carly, who, in good double-bind fashion, challenges whether she is even a woman:<\/p>\n

[youtube=http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=VIZOWPaoiDk]<\/p>\n

Bay does include a few minor female characters with lines \u2013 Sam\u2019s mother, the\u00a0nagging mother\/wife; Director\u00a0Mearing\u2019s subservient Asian assistant; a scene with both the\u00a0“Olga” and “Petra” Russian woman stereotypes<\/a>; and a Latina with a bare midriff who has a \u201cLatin meltdown\u201d:<\/p>\n

[wpvideo pLgrLBNm]<\/p>\n

If Michael Bay can buy off the most\u00a0accomplished actors and even musician\/social activist Bono\u00a0to participate in such harmful media, what hope is there in the war that pits girls\/women (the Autobots) against unrepentantly sexist movies makers (the Deceptacons)?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cross-posted at Caroline Heldman’s Blog. \u201cTransformers: Dark of the Moon,\u201d the third installment\u00a0in this\u00a0$1.5 billion franchise that just set a new record\u00a0for\u00a0a Fourth of July weekend\u00a0opening, follows what has become a\u00a0Hollywood action movie tradition of virtually erasing women, despite the fact that women buy 55% of movie tickets and\u00a0market research shows that films with female […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1848,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[279,55,2093,2094,2098,343,85,283,120],"class_list":["post-37212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-objectification","tag-gender","tag-gender-objectification","tag-gender-politics","tag-gender-prejudicediscrimination","tag-tvmovies","tag-politics","tag-prejudicediscrimination","tag-sex"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1848"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37212"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41337,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37212\/revisions\/41337"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/socimages\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}