“Kill Bill” as a Feminist Statement
“KILL BILL” AS A FEMINIST STATEMENT Feminism , in general terms, is a movement for women’s empowerment. It comprises a wide range of social, cultural and political movements and is concerned with gender inequalities and equal rights for women. Feminist movement has generated feminist theory which puts feminist ideas into theoretical background. It aims at understanding the nature of inequality and focuses on gender politics , power relations and sexuality. It explores a broad scope of themes such as discrimination, stereotyping, objectification, especially sexual one, oppression and patriarchy. Feminist literary criticism derived from feminist theory and it deals with traditions and conventions of patriarchy, a social system in which , from the feminist point of view , men hold all the power. The dominance and superiority of men over women which result from this social construct exist in literary, historical and cultural contexts. Feminist criticism studies texts and considers the approaches to women’s portrayal and position in the text. From this particular point of view , a feminist text, a work of literature or a film , needs to posses certain features and stress particular issues such as encouragement of female empowerment and abandonment of the stereotypical way of portraying a woman, it should challenge gender role model and a patriarchal system of society. In 2003, an American film director Quentin Tarantino(“Pulp Fiction”, “Reservoir Dogs”)directed his fourth film ”Kill Bill”, which was released in two installments, “Kill Bill vol.1”in 2003, “Kill Bill vol.2” in 2004. During the press conference before the premiere of “Kill Bill vol.1”in August 2003, Quentin Tarantino was asked if he considered his film “a feminist statetement” since it was dominated by strong women. He answered ”Erm, I would probably use the word ‘girl power’(www.kamera.co.uk) which has generated a great deal of heated debate among feminists. The
Bibliography: Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Literary Theory : An Anthology. Julie Rivkin and Michael Ryan. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1998. 585-595. “Kill Bill vol.1 . Writ. and dir. Quentin Tarantino, prod. Lawrence Bender. DVD-5.Miramax, 2003 “Kill Bill vol.2 . Writ. and dir. Quentin Tarantino, prod. Lawrence Bender. DVD-5.Miramax, 2003 Anne Babeau Gardiner. ”Feminist Literary Criticism: From Anti-Patriarchy to the Celebration of Decadence “. First PrinciplesWeb journal , April 2008 <http://www.firstprinciplesjournal.com/articles.aspx?article=454&theme=home&page=2&loc=b&type=ctbf> http://www.neiu.edu/~edepartm/dep/profs/scherm/html/feminism.htm. A Basic Glossary of Film Terms. Adapted from:Hayward, S. Key Concepts in Cinema Studies (London: Routledge, 1996), Monaco, J. How to Read a Film (Oxford University Press, 1981) Ben Walters. ”Kill Bill Press Conference.” kamera.co.uk <www.kamera.co.uk/features/kill_bill_press_conference.php> http://www.festival-cannes.fr/en/festival/2004-05-16/theDaily.html