Thursday, April 10, 2008

Blog#4




Willie Gibson
The film is about a group of four young African American women living in south central Los Angeles. Each comes from a modest somewhat poor family life living in a poor neighborhood, where drugs and gang violence are prevalent. The frustration of trying to live according to the social rules seems to get them nowhere, so the women decide to rob banks as a way to attain financial success, get back at society and take charge of their lives. Each character goes through some type of adverse situation that requires the need for money or revenge.

The film addresses gender by presenting these women as attractive and strong charactered women that struggle with the conflicting duality of acceptable social patriarchal female behavior and a more rebellious feminist behavior. This is shown through the way they interact with men in a more submissive manner, using there femininity to attain money, favors and power. Their behavior is then portrayed as being more masculine amongst themselves with the use of vulgar language and physical violence. I think it gives females a positive and empowering image by showing the ability to manipulate and control in order to attain the things that the women desire.

I feel that the film could be viewed as a feminist film because of the clear presentation of the struggles that women are forced to deal with in a patriarchal society. It then shows how these women overcame their adversity and persevered the dominance of the patriarchy.

I enjoyed the film for the perspective that it brought to me about some of the many scenarios of sexism that women are faced with. I liked how the women were able to be strong and aggressive, while maintaining their femininity. In my own family I have women that reminded me of some of the characters. The strength and ability to fight to overcome adverse situations is something that I could identify with and something that I am accustomed to seeing.

To learn more about this film go to the following:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8zPZdxojbpc
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Set_It_Off
http://www.movieweb.com/movies/film/18/1618/summary.php

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