Female Bonding Practices - Essay Example

Female Bonding Practices: “Sense and Sensibility”, “Little Women” and “Fried Green Tomatoes” Throughout the history, the establishment of civilization necessitated certain social frameworks of conduct, which eventually took the form of relationship regulation. These today are often discussed in terms of fixed and thus commonly prejudiced connections between people. Contemporary development of human rights and freedoms perspective especially looks at historically oppressed groups of people, such as women. Between them, the relationship that are demonstrated today through variety of means of mass media still can be viewed through the messages that the creators had in mind. Yet, with the evolving of filming techniques and tastes of the audiences, the messages about female relationship have become more varied and closer to depicting real life, which can be seen on the example of the movies shot in the last decade of the twentieth century. For this essay, three films “Sense and Sensibility,” “Little Women” and “Fried Green Tomatoes” were chosen in order to study the female bonding practices that the directors translate to the audiences. In the tradition of cinematography that often depict the stories of women, the messages that are conveyed to the audience are very formalized and conventionalized. There are several characteristics that can be derived from the analysis of these messages: “Code of beautiful behavior. Conformity. Containment. Conservatism. Confines.” (Niewiadomska-Flis, 2011, p. 25) However, female bonding practices are different since they break through these conventions and establish new type of relationship that do not fit within the framework of the messages outlined above. The three movies chosen for analysis demonstrate different disconnection from these conventions yet all of them have a different focus on what relationship between women are like outside of the social mindset and perspective on this issue, even though each of these stories has certain traditional plot and rhythm to them. “Sense and Sensibility” was directed by Ang Lee in 1995 and it was based on the novel of the same name written by Jane Austen that tells the story of two Dashwood sisters and their quest for happy future. “Little Women” based on the novel of Louisa May Alcott and directed by Gillian Anderson in 1994, follows the lives of four sisters and their stepmother during the Civil War. “Fried Green Tomatoes” also based on the novel of Fannie Flagg and directed by Jon Avnet in 1991, tells the story of friendship between two women while showing the development of a new friendship. Mostly, all of these stories deal with interpersonal relationship incorporating only small amount of elements of other relationship between women, either public or professional to further the plot. However, female bonding practices depicted in these films all have familial tender spirit to them, combining the family bond in “Sense and Sensibility” and “Little Women” with friendly affection, and bringing women into forming almost a family through their friendship in “Fried Green Tomatoes.” The roles of female bonding depicted in the films are different. First there are friendship and sisterhood that are often so intertwined it is hard to tell one from the other. This is seen in “Sense and Sensibility” (bond established between Elinor and Marianne) and “Little Women” (with the four girls Jo, Beth, Meg and Amy), where the female protagonists are simultaneously sisters and friends. Similarly, in “Fried Green Tomatoes,” Ruth and Idgie act as if they were sisters, even they are not bound by blood. Then, there is the role of “[t]he tough-minded, savvy, sexually knowing older women who counsel, look after, and support.” (Greven, 2011, p. 52) In “Little Women,” the role is clearly given to Marmee, and in “Fried Green Tomatoes,” it is Ninny who tells the story that develops relationship between her and Evelyn and allows the latter to obtain important life lessons. These roles have maternal nature to them, however, they do not fall under this category completely, as they also tend to be closer to friendship than mother-versus-daughter relationship. Noteworthy, outside relationship are also forming between women in the movies, however, they are never as significant as those in the center of the stories, and only serve to promote the plot or develop the characters. Curiously, among the frameworks that female bonding in all the three films breaks is the one that reflects the world as a place “in which only moderate expectations are honored and only moderate feelings are tolerated.” (Hoberg, 1999, p. 143) With this, the leading female characters are able to introduce sensational notion in order to develop the plots of the stories. In “Sense and Sensibility,” the two sisters respectively introduce each of the traits, and it is the combination of both that allows the characters to be combined and balance and thus mature. In “Little Women,” each of the sisters presents some kind of sensitive trait: Jo is temperamental and turbulent, Amy is romantic, Beth is gentle and soft, Meg is moderate and calm. The differences in their characters do not serve as the reasons for fighting but instead allow them to form an unusual group female bond that goes beyond their blood ties as it encompasses their stepmother Marmee. “Fried Green Tomatoes” also has a combination of a moderate and an impulsive presence in its characters, where Ruth and Idgie balance each other. It is of general knowledge that, throughout history, women had less possibilities of expressing themselves in public relationship. (Johnston, 2010) This resulted in the necessity of put extra efforts in order to reach the same position of men, yet the outcome was rarely as satisfying. This does not specifically refer to the professional world but to the world of society, as well, as it can be seen on the example of “Sense and Sensibility,” where women are perceived from the point of view of whether they married successfully or not. This also interferes with female bonding, when romantic relationship disrupt the deep friendly connection between women. Still, it is curious that, both on the films “Fried Green Tomatoes” and “Little Women,” there is no rivalry depicted between the leading female characters. In “Fried Green Tomatoes,” friendship between Idgie and Ruth is formed on the basis of their friendship and grieving Buddy’s death while one of them was his sister and the other was his girlfriend. This serves as the beginning of their friendship that will last forever. In “Little Women,” the romantic interest is handled in a different manner since Laurie who at first courts Jo and later her little sister Amy does not serve to disrupt their relationship. Yet, it is also notable that lack of bonding in the first place can easily crush the starting relationship between women. In “Sense and Sensibility,” when Lucy Steele tells Elinor that she is engaged to Edward, it makes their starting friendship break before it even had the chance to start. On the other hand, the hardships of different kind instead serve the purpose of strengthening the bonding practices depicted in the films. The studies indicate that “‘pathetic’ histories of [women in films creates] a very unusual spectatorial effect” that draws the spectator greatly. (Russell, 1994, p. 26) In “Sense and Sensibility,” destitution of the Dashwood family helps Elinor and Marianne to establish strong and tender friendship that goes beyond family ties, and even further develop it when they both experience romantic pain. This is translated through the sets where the sisters are together, through their walks and them being in the same frame very often, which creates the feeling of unity between them. In “Fried Green Tomatoes,” the physical abuse that Ruth experiences allows Idgie to take her away from her husband and start business together. Starting from the complicated period when they both lost a precious person, they are depicted in different roles of willing to help, refusing help, accepting help through variety of scenes and especially the abandoned feeling given to the town where the film was shot, which allowed to concentrate on their bonding exclusively. In “Little Women,” the sisters start a home theater to make it through in the times of war. The four sisters and Marmee are often shot in a united group while reading a letter or singing at the piano, where each of such shots allows to define them not only as being close to each other separately but as a well-established group. Finally, there is an important note that the female bonding practices depicted in the films under analysis allowed to “create an atmosphere of female exclusivity.” (Greven, 2011, p. 52) This centers the plot of the films around its female protagonists even though they have male counterparts necessary for the plot. However, despite the strong line of romantic relationship in both “Sense and Sensibility” and “Little Women,” both of these movies tell the story of female bonding in the first place, and how it changes over time and with the different experiences of the sisters. In “Fried Green Tomatoes,” the focus is already made on female friendship and has to vivid romantic lines in it but instead allows to see how relationship between women develop in the complicated life situations of business, family and marriage nature. To summarize, the three films that were analyzed in this paper, each demonstrate female bonding from the perspective of the creators of these stories. In each of them, the development of the relationship between leading actresses is tied to the internal characteristics of their roles, whether they are family or friends. While having little public and professional growth possibilities, the characters overtake in friendship that often overcomes the blood ties. In “Sense and Sensibility” and “Little Women,” sisterhood is translated not only as blood connection but also spiritual ties that benefit from hardships and romantic failures of the characters. In “Fried Green Tomatoes,” the complicated beginning between the two friends develops into friendship that brings them closest to forming something like a family, living and starting business together. Overall, the exceptionality of women in these films is obvious specifically due to the bonding practices that allow the audience to concentrate on their relationship exclusively and trace the growth of the characters within their close bonds. References Greven, D. (2011). Representations of Femininity in American Genre Cinema: The Womans Film, Film Noir, and Modern Horror. Palgrave Macmillan. Hoberg, T. (1999). “Her First and Her Last: Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility”, “Persuasion” and Their Screen Adaptations.” In: Nineteenth-Century Women at the Movies: Adapting Classic Women’s Fiction to Film, Tepa Lupack, B., 140-166. Popular Press. Johnston, J. (2010). Girls on screen: How film and television depict women in public relations. Prism, 7(4), 1-16. Marchalonis, S. (1999). Filming the Nineteenth Century: “The Secret Garden” and “Little Women”. The American Transcendental Quarterly, 10(4), 273-292. Niewiadomska-Flis, U. (2011). Bonding and Moving On: Southern Female Companions in Motion (Pictures). Moravian Journal of Literature and Film, 2(2), 25-42. Russell, C. (1994). Mourning the Woman’s Film: The Dislocated Spectator of “The Company of Strangers.” Canadian Journal of Film Studies, 3(2), 25-39. Read More