Gender Stereotype in the Wrong Turn Film - Essay Example

Gender Stereotype in the Wrong Turn Film The media acts as the primary source of information to the citizens of the country because it provides variety of information. The information that the media provides may be real or unreal, but this depends on the achievements that the media wants to achieve when the audience reacts to the data. This means that the media may mislead as well as advice its audience. The media may at times provide the audience with false information in the gender field. This field is prone to misrepresentation in the media because of the stereotypes in the society (Kosut 15). Stereotypes are beliefs that men and women believe about the roles of each gender in the society. An example is the stereotype that men are more muscular than women. This belief causes women to underestimate their abilities and fail to take part in activities that require a lot of force (Ross and Lester 36). This gives men the chance to dominate the society in careers, courses, and activities that require extra energy. This paper will determine how the media mediates through the stereotype that men are more muscular than women in the movie The Wrong Turn, and the effects of these interventions to the society. The Wrong Turn is a horror movie that is acted in the Western Virginia Mountains. The movie begins when Chris Finn who has gotten a job in another town drives along the highway. However, Chris is prevented from using the highway by an accident that involves a trunk that has fallen across the road while transporting chemicals (Benshoff and Griffin 60). The man decides to use the route that passes through West Virginia Mountains so that he can arrive early for the interview. Chris meets five youths who were on vacation on the mountains, and they decide to find whether they can get help from anyone. The group meets cannibalistic men with disfigured faces who scare them, chase them, and feed on their flesh (Benshoff and Griffin 61). The movie continues with the cannibals eating the flesh of anyone they come across in the mountains. The film indicates that men are more muscular than women from the beginning to the end. The first way in which the movie portrays this stereotype is the fact that the main actors who are the cannibals are men. These men perform heavy functions in the film from the first episode to the last; for example, they pull the truck that they use to carry the human beings that they kill along their way. The truck is so heavy and huge meaning that the men possess supernatural energy that enables them to pull the heavy vehicle. In real life, the normal people cannot pull such a heavy vehicle for long distances like the cannibals (Harris-Perry 45). The woman who acted as one of the cannibals was left in their creepy house where they stored their food. The woman was in charge of cooking for the men and taking care of the compound. The fact that the men left her at home indicates that the producer of the film predestined that women would not be strong enough to find food for the family. At the beginning of the movie a man and woman climb on a cliff so that they can access the upper region of the mountain. The man reaches up before the woman meaning that he is more energetic and powerful to carry out such hard tasks than the woman. As the film continues, one of the cannibals uses an axe to slice a woman into two pieces while she was driving on the road. This indicates that the muscular nature of men can enable them to kill their enemies. Apart from the physical masculinity of the men this act also signifies that men also possess the energy to withstand harsh conditions more than women (Hegarty, Watson, Fletcher and McQueen 87). Men can kill without mercy and feel nothing much about the act. The cannibals in the film always become cheerful when they kill and capture the youths in the mountains. They shout and scream with joy as they pull their meat towards their house and as they feed on the meals. The happiness that they show indicates that men are proud of the achievements that they gain from their masculinity even when they are not acceptable in the society. The women who take part in the film from the first episode to the sixth are all skinny. The women also wear clothing that exposes their inner parts of the body while the men who accompany them put on their full attires throughout apart from when they are swimming. However, even as the youths swim, women put on swimming attire that still exposes their bodies more than the men (Benshoff and Griffin 97). The act of showing women with skinny bodies is similar to the other sources of the media such as television advertisements, magazines, and shows. Magazines such as glamour, vogue, and cosmopolitan advertise women’s products using images of their skinny counterparts (Kosut 56). These magazines also advise women to observe their diet to ensure that they do not gain weight, which will make them less appealing to men. This means that the wrong turn film follows the traditions of the ordinary media of showing that women should be less muscular and have less weight than their male counterparts. In the fifth episode of the movie, Maynard, one of the cannibals who resemble a human being is imprisoned by a police woman. Maynard keeps threatening the police woman telling her that his boys are coming for him and that they will kill everybody and leave no survivors (Benshoff and Griffin 100). When the other cannibals arrive in the town, they destroy and kill everyone mercilessly just as Maynard described to the police. The cannibals torture the woman on electric hangers where she dies from the shock. The harassment of the police woman and her killing indicates that men are free to abuse women. This is because men are more muscular than women meaning that they can use their energy to spoil, beat, and kill their women (Ross and Lester 89). The film also depicts that despite the energy that men have cooperation that also helps them to be more superior to their female equivalents. Other movies that indicate the superiority of men over women based on their masculinity include Jackie Chan and Rambo. Jackie Chan and Rambo the main actors of these movies possess supernatural energy that enables them to climb on trees, jump long distances, and kill supernatural beings such as the predator (Benshoff and Griffin 1220. There are no female actors who possess similar characteristics in these movies meaning that it is men only who can perform such extra ordinary acts. Apart from movies, children’s games also portray this stereotype because the virtual players in these games have different body shapes and sizes. Women characters are skinny while the males are muscular. The stereotype depicted in The Wrong Turn, Rambo, Jackie Chan, and children’s games that men are more muscular than women has numerous effects on both genders. Women are the most affected because this belief portrays them to be weak human beings who do not have the ability to achieve anything greater than men. The effects of this belief on women include eating disorders such as starving, plastic surgery, and beauty therapies (Hegarty, Watson, Flecther and McQueen 104). Women also turn to the media as their main source of advice so that they can achieve light weight; for example, ABC Television broadcasts a show known as Victoria Show that teaches women how to maintain the figure of a model (Kosut 97). This misleads women and it also has health effects such as accelerating the process of aging. Women age faster than they would do because of following the fantasies of the media. The effects of the masculinity stereotype on men include increasing their self esteem at higher than average levels making them to feel that they can control women. Men gain their esteem when they observe how the cannibals and Rambo perform extra ordinarily heavier tasks than women. The high esteem of the men causes them to control their children and wives excessively. This causes conflicts in numerous families leading to stress and depression. The conflicts arise between men and their wives as well as between siblings from both genders (Harris-Perry 76). Families also waste time on conflicts instead of utilizing it on development issues such as developing new problem solving techniques in the economy. This affects the economic growth of the country negatively and it also slows down development. Stereotypes refer to the beliefs that the society holds about issues such as the role of women and men in their families. The stereotype that men are more muscular than women is depicted in the Wrong Turn, a horror, film that has been acted in the Mountains of Western Virginia. The main actors of the film are mainly men who possess extra ordinarily muscular bodies that enable them to kill other human beings. The cannibalistic men command the women in the film using threatening words. The women in the film are skinny and incapable of carrying out activities such as climbing cliffs. These portrayals have effects on the audience such as lowering the self esteem of women while that of men increases. These effects indicate that the media should avoid releasing to the public any information that may accelerate the effects of stereotypes in the society. Works Cited Benshoff, Harry M, and Sean Griffin. America on Film: Representing Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality at the Movies. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Print. Harris-Perry, Melissa V. Sister Citizen: Shame, Stereotypes, and Black Women in America. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011. Print. Hegarty, Peter, Nila Watson, Laura Fletcher, and Grant McQueen. "When Gentlemen Are First and Ladies Are Last: Effects of Gender Stereotypes on the Order of Romantic Partners' Names." British Journal of Social Psychology. 50.1 (2011): 21-35. Print. Kosut, Mary. Encyclopedia of Gender in Media. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage Publications, 2012. Print. Ross, Susan D, and Paul M. Lester. Images That Injure: Pictorial Stereotypes in the Media. Santa Barbara, Calif: Praeger, 2011. Print. Read More