Gender performance in” Fast Five”

Today I went to the movies and watched “Fast Five“. It is the fifth part of the “Fast and Furious” and ofcourse this type of action movies is dominated by male characters as we all know. But my main concentrarion here will be on the secondary roles assigned to female characters in this type of  action movies.

In Fast Five, there are three female characters: Mia, Gisele and Elena. Mia is supposed to be one of the main characters in the movie. But on the contrary, while all men have power, are able to fight, make plans….etc. Mia’s role was doubly sterile obviously because of her gender and what worsens this character’s situation is that she is pregrant which totally eliminates her existence and reflects her subordination to the main characters not only physically(because men are known to be more powerful than women) but also mentally, because men plan everything. She is always inside a private closed sphere and rarley comes out to public spaces but not as often as men. Men are driven by their minds, while women by their emotions as if the the two words women and mind can’t come together.

Another woman in the team is Gisele, which uses her body as part of the team’s plan. Here, gender performance relies in woman’s body which affirms the stereotype that woman is nothing but a body, they are “imperfect men” in Aristotelian terms. The third female character is Elena, a police officer who was at first mocked at. But even as a police emotions are what control women. Even Brasilian ladies appear as mere bodies to be exploited by men.

As a whole, women performativity was merely and solety through body and emotions. On the other hand, even women who appear in cinema industry are of a specific category: white or bronze, sexy, thin…etc. Rarely did black women have major roles in movies. In this point bell hooks confirms that many don’t really inderstand what feminism really is, when the word feminism is mentioned a specific race(white) and specific class( bourgeois) comes to minds. But feminism should include all races and classes because it’s not just about a socio-political movement and it actually goes beyond this perspective:

Feminism is the struggle to end sexist oppression. Its aimis not to benefit solely any specific group of women, any particular race or class of women. It does not privilege women over men. It has the power to tranform in a meaningful way our lives… Feminism as a movement to end sexist oppression directs our attention to systems of domination and the inter-relatedness of sex, race and class oppression. (hooks, 240)