pOST wORLD wAR ii: Representation: Women
A lot of affairs also happened around this time, due to all the Americans coming over with their nice and charming accents, and due to the women feeling so empowered they felt they had the confidence to do it. This is portrayed in films such as 'Brief Encounter', as the main female has had an affair. In 'Brief Encounter' the film is completely central around Laura's affair. It's portrayed as a very thrilling, love filled event, however at the end of the film she goes to confront her husband. Due to the time that it was filmed, her husband is very forgiving and has a "it could have been worse" attitude towards it, as the war was going on and things simply could have been worse.
Something else in film that evolved from the empowerment of women during WW2 is the femme fatale character in film noir. The femme fatale character, as stated by the Merriam Webster Dictionary is: "a very attractive woman who causes trouble or unhappiness for the men who become involved with her". You can see this kind of characters in films such as: "Pulp Fiction", "Sherlock" (2009 film) and "Under The Skin". A femme fatale will often be very aware of how much power they have and use it to their complete advantage. In Under The Skin for example, the femme fatale is a sort of succubus type alien creature, who seduces men and has sex with them. After she has done that, she then proceedes to kill them. This to me is a very literal and prime example of a femme fatale.
Contrasting to the strong females of femme fatale are the female characters from films pre WW2 such as Ilsa from Casablanca who is a very two dimensional character who relies heavily from the support of her partner(s). She can't make any decision for herself, she has to run it past others first. This isn't a very positive image for a woman, as she doesn't seem to have any independence or confidence.
POST ATOMIC
Here are some statistics from the blasts that I found on the Telegraph website on an article from July 2005 titled: "Children Of Hiroshima": http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/jul/24/secondworldwar.japan
Technology
WWII Compared to Today
When you look at films from WW2, the lead females are often very two dimensional and need to rely on someone (usually a man) like Ilsa from Casablanca. They don't have much of a personality and seem to only feature in the film for the lead mans purpose to be a love interest. In the film Easy Rider, the only females that feature in it are prostitutes which doesn't really provide a very healthy image for women.
Today in films there are a large amount of strong female characters in film and TV. You can test how far this movement has really come by conducting a Bechdel Test, which is where you see if: 1. there is more than one woman in the film, 2. they talk to each other about something other than men.
An example of a TV show that passes the Bechdel test is Jessica Jones, as Jessica has regular conversations with her boss about things over than men. Another thing with this TV show is that there are a lot of good (but uncommon) relationships which aren't usually featured in films and TV all that often: there is an interracial relationship and a lesbian relationship. Lesbian relationships in film and TV are becoming more common, however they're usually between the younger generation, whereas in Jessica Jones, the lesbian relationship is between two middle aged women, and not only that but one of them is also having an affair. In my opinion, this TV show is one of the few helping to bring more equality to TV and film due to the diversity of all the characters. It's insane how different this series is compared with films from WW2.
In recent years, editing is getting easier and easier, which means that films can be released much sooner, as most editing is now done digitally using computer programmes and software. Along with ease of editing, today there are special effects. There are explosions and CGI. The quality of the picture is grater, and people can film virtually anywhere, which means there is an incredibly wide variety of films available to watch.
Films from WW2 were very static and almost false, like in Rebel Without A Cause. The acting from the time of Rebel Without A Cause was also drastically different to how it is today. With most films you will loose yourself in the acting, and sometimes forget that it is just a film. Whereas with Rebel Without A Cause, you are very conscious of the fact that it is a film.
Films today are a lot more realistic, not just with their acting, but the themes and events taking place within them. Films today are sometimes based on actual events, or future events which not only makes them more believable, but more realistic. An example would be the film 2012, which is an action disaster movie centring around the fact that one day our film will cease to exist. Some of these disaster films are sometimes a bit repetitive and predictable, however you can't deny the difference between them and the films from WW2. WW2 films were often about love or war, as those were the current events.
However today, due to the wide availability of the internet, people are able to see what is happening allover the world around them, which means that a wider variety of films are available.
How It Impacts Me
I have lots of control over what I watch these days, as there are so many platforms to consume material. If there is a certain show that I want to watch and all the episodes are available, I can watch it for as long as I like and as many episodes as I want. I don't feel as though I am being influenced too much, as I have a choice over what I watch. I used to just watch what was on TV, especially before we got Freesat and just had the standard 5 channels. You just had to watch what was on the television, or nothing at all (unless you put a video or a DVD on). It's amazing how much content there is available to us now.
http://www.imdb.com/search/title?count=100&keywords=femme-fatale&num_votes=3000,&title_type=feature&
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/jul/24/secondworldwar.japan