Representation Of Gender

The notes below have been taking from the episode of 'Cutting It'.

Camera:

• The man is above the women once she gets run over: she is powerless and women are dominated by the male sex.
• Shot is high-angle on the women but an mid shot on the man: women are dominated and overruled by men.
• The camera slowly tilts up on the man's face, parallel with sad music: he will receive bad news which will take time to get over and recover from.  Also foreshadows his wife's upcoming death.
• Camera is mainly on the man's 'point of view', never see the women's 'point of view', therefore we are segregated from what she is feeling, but we know how the man feels and what he sees: suggest women are over spoken, there feelings are brushed aside, the man is the main focus and we begin to feel empathy for him although the dialogue hints he cheated on her.

Mise-en-scene:

• The light is shining on the woman, but shadowing the man: light suggest the women is of an innocent nature, yet the man is guilty of something (in this case most likely unfaithfulness).
• In the taxi, the woman is in control, she knows where they are going, he doesn't, she pays for the taxi: this suggests she is in control of the situation and she is subverting her gender stereotype by paying for the taxi and knowing where they are going.
• Theme of marriage is repeated: suggest they are forcing the happiness into their relationship.
• The flowers are the colour white next the women when she is dying: this colour is a representation of peace and innocence, suggesting she has this in her nature.

Sound:

• The slow music: foreshadows the impending doom of her death.
• Music is parallel to the scene: bad news
• The man tells the woman to 'Shhh': patronising the woman, telling her to be quiet, he is weak and doesn't want to hear her feelings of him being guilty.
• The song lyrics in the song when the man is fiddling with his ring sing 'You know you are free': this foreshadows her death again, suggesting he wants to be out of the relationship and that he is going to be free from her when she dies.
• When she dies at the end of the scene, the whole sound is muted apart from the car crash Foley sound: this focuses on the crash, as this is the bad news he was going to get

Editing: (to be completed)