What Are The Stereotypes Of Women In Action Films

“She fights, she shoots, she kills, she solves and she rescues” (Brown, 1996, p.56) and she, is the new heroine portrayed in films today. Films possess the potential to influence, engage and inspire and hence is vital in constructing one’s perceptions of gender (Hammer, 2009). Together with the rise of feminism, female portrayals in action films have also changed from male dominated action films to heroine action films. However, does the change in female portrayals in these action films reflect the progress of feminism? Previous portrayals of women in films adhere closely to women in reality and hence demonstrate the 4 cardinal virtues mainly, piety, purity, submissiveness and with greater emphasis on the last virtue, domesticity (England,
Receptivity is assessed based on the success of the films. According to Gilpatric (2010), heroine action films are still not as successful as male dominated action films as they produced much less revenue compared to the latter, indicating poor receptivity of heroine action films. Furthermore, subjugation, sexualization and the creation of the new stereotype of heroines indicate that the effectiveness of these heroine portrayals are minimal, and thus undermining their ability to effectively break away from patriarchal structures (Brown, 1996; Demiray,2012; Forte,1986; Gilpatric, 2010).

In conclusion, heroine action films may seemingly appear to portray female characters away from traditional portrayals. However, upon a more in depth analysis of these films, these heroines in fact still conform to stereotypes. Not only are they still conforming to conventional stereotypes such as being subjugated and sexualized, they now even conform to male stereotype. Therefore, female action characters in heroine action films may not seem to be liberated while remaining