The Persecution of Women in Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail and Frenzy

In their work, author Vladimir Nabokov and director Jonathon Demme convey the assertion of male dominance in their respective texts, emphasising the idea of feminine inferiority. Vladimir Nabokov’s controversial novel Lolita looks at the story of paedophile Humbert Humbert who’s forbidden love for his step daughter causes him to take extreme measure into pursuing his love. Jonathan Demme’s thriller The Silence of the Lambs looks into Clarisse, a female FBI trainee pursuing her career in a male dominated field. Both texts analyse and identify the assertion of male dominance under the ideas of manipulation and objectification.

There is no doubt that in the majority of films directed by the renowned Alfred Hitchcock, women play a significant role. Many of Hitchcock’s films feature a blonde, rather than brunette, as the female lead because Hitchcock considered blondes “a symbol of the heroine” and “less suspicious than a brunette”. Hitchcock’s heroines are externally immaculate, but full of deceit and weakness. They have mother-like tendencies and are often portrayed as proper and obedient towards their male counterparts, as most women were expected to be in Hitchcock’s era. It is safe to presume that Hitchcock had severe mummy issues, which many of his films make apparent by severely punishing even the slightest of deceptions. The central dynamic in the majority of

“She thinks of when she fought a flood…There are some things a bushwoman just cannot do… she cried then.” The woman crying shapes our understanding of her mental strength, after everything living in the bush has thrown at her, being reduced to tears and physically beaten she stays strong. Willing to endure even more the environment can throw at her. Burton also uses flashbacks to add depth to Alice’s character; the flashbacks are symbolic of the decline in her imagination, her willingness to try the ‘impossible’ and a symbol of her conformity. These flashbacks are also a sad reminder of the passing of her father; he was one to encourage the use of her imagination and believing in impossible things. Her current adventure in Underland is very different to the first because she has forgotten to believe in the impossible; once she crosses this barrier Absolum confesses she is again the ‘real Alice’.

The 2003 film “Monster”, staring Charlize Theron and Christina Ricci, follows prostitute and serial killer Aileen Wuornos as she commits the crime of murdering six men. From the against the norm gender roles to brutal issues of domestic violence and rape, this film is ridden with numerous topics in relation to deviance. While murder and prostitution is universally regarded as deviant, the film embodies both labeling and feminist theory considering society provides a master status to those who commit deviant acts, deviance depends on nature of act and what others do about it, and society is built on a structure of male domination.

The anxiety that infused film noir, born out of post-war fears about the place women had found outside of the family structure, challenged hesitant conceptions towards the role of women in family and oppressive social relationships. Film noir’s included gender politics were to alleviate male confusion over women’s roles and their sexual identity through a restoration of the patriarchy. The femme fatale represented an independent and powerful femininity, rejecting the conventional role of the devoted wife and loving mother that mainstream society had prescribed for women, but in the end her transgression of social norms led to her own destruction and the destruction of the men who were attracted to her.

In the excerpt “Forties” from the novel Reverence to Rape, Haskell examines the portrayal of women in the films from the forties. American screenwriters during this time portrayed female protagonists in a negative way. Women were displayed as severely evil and immoral beings. This was a great contrast to the sexually and morally free women in the films created in the thirties.

The classic bespectacled female characters in Hitchcock who illustrate this semiotic phenomenon are illustrations of how a woman’s difference will result in her eventual punishment or elimination-whether symbolically as with Midge being cast aside by Scottie or literally as with Miriam being murdered by Bruno. The semiotic power of “woman-in-glasses” have cut across film, literature, psychology, sociology, rhetoric and popular culture, commercialism and day-today lives. Tzvetan Todorov notices a conincidence between “themes of vision” and “images of sight”, usually involving the symbolism of the eyeglasses, which “permit penetration into our marvellous universe” (121). For this reason the eyeglasses-coupled with the mysterious Otherness

Just after Alice opened the Duchess’ house door, a large plate came skimming out. Also, when she went to the Queen’s court, any mistake will result to the Queen ordering a beheading (Carroll, 1865). In comparison, the Victorian era is characterized by extreme violence due to the many cases of murder (Millikan, 2011). Second, Wonderland’s justice system is in disarray, “’No, no!’ said the Queen. ‘Sentence first—verdict afterwards’” (Carroll, 1865, p. 102). In addition, the Queen planned to sentence the one who stole the tarts to death. In a similar way, the Victorian society had the same punishment for any form of theft, may that be a small item like a pen or something expensive like jewelry (Millikan, 2011). Third, Wonderland is filled with people with mental illnesses, “’Oh you can’t help that,’ said the Cat: ‘we’re all mad here’” (Carroll, 1865, p. 50).

The arc of the story follows Alice’s growing certainty of her identity. When she first meets the Queen of Hearts she is only tentatively sure of herself: ‘My name is Alice, so please your Majesty’. In the final courtroom scene Alice scoffs at the jurors who write down their names in case they forget them (‘Stupid things!’), identifies herself clearly (‘”Here!” cried Alice,’) and then leaves Wonderland with the realisation, ‘You’re nothing but a pack of

The novel paints the judicial system of England as somewhat flawed and passive as frequent prisoners escape and those who are captured are not punished heavily. This leads to several individuals in the novel seeking revenge or justice on their terms and those end badly. The idea of true justice is uncertain and is a key recurring element in the novel.

During the trial of the Knave, Alice takes the stand in a very confident manner and stands up for herself before the King and Queen. “At this moment the King...read out from his book, ‘Rule Forty-two. All persons more than a mile high to leave the court.’...’I’m not a mile high,’ said Alice. ‘You are.’ said the King. ‘Nearly two miles high,’ added the Queen. ‘Well, I shan’t go at any rate,’ said Alice: ‘besides that’s not a regular rule: you invented it just now.’”(112). At this point in the book, the reader sees that Alice is no longer the little girl who cried when she did not fit through the door. She is now a confident girl who stands up for herself. This moment in the book shows the pinnacle of Alice’s growth as a person and the growth of her mind frame. Throughout Through the Looking Glass, Alice becomes more comfortable in standing up for herself and knowing how to figure out the situations thrown her way. “But the Red Queen looked sulky, and growled ‘Pudding-----Alice: Alice-----Pudding. Remove the pudding!’ and the waiter took it away so quickly that Alice couldn’t return its bow. However, she didn’t see why the Red Queen should be the only one to give order; so, as an experiment, she called out ‘Waiter! Bring back the pudding!’”(230). Alice wanted to see how the Red Queen would react to others ordering people around.

This essay optically canvasses the cases of three irreprehensible people convicted for gruesome malefactions, costing them approximately a moiety of their lives. By Studying these cases, it shows a miscarriage of the equity system. The cases provide paramountcy to the contention of this essay, which is to prove that the equity system does not invest their time in finding the offender but instead in closing the case as soon as possible. Even if that is to convict or frame an inculpable person. One one hand, Steven Avery was framed for the murder of Teresa Halbach by coercing out a confession from his nephew, Brendan Dassey. On the other hand Ronald Cotton and James Bain experienced lack of obligation from the equity system. As a result not just

Good morning ladies and gentlemen. Today, I would like to talk about “The effect of Hitchcock’s films”

Alice arrived in the courtroom and saw the King and Queen of Hearts on their thrones with the knave chained up in front of them. The White Rabbit, who was serving the court as a herald, read the accusation that the Knave had stolen the Queen’s tarts. The king called the Mad Hatter and the Cook as witnesses. The king asked the cook what the tarts are made of. ‘Pepper, mostly,’ said the cook. (Page 50) When they were done interrogating the cook, they called Alice to the stand as she was the next

“While the City Sleeps” is a dramatic film from 1956 based on a real-life serial killer nicknamed The Lipstick Killer. The screenplay was written by Casey Robinson and loosely follows the book The Bloody Spur, written by Charles Einstein. By using gender criticism as a critical approach to analyzing, I hope to show, as authors Kennedy and Gioia state in Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama, “how the images of men and women in imaginative literature”, in this case, film, “reflect the social forces that have historically kept the sexes from achieving total equality”.