To what extent have gender roles progressed in mainstream Hollywood movies with reference to Angelina Jolie being cast for a role that was originally written for Tom Cruise?
In the 2010 movie SALT, Angelina Jolie plays the role of a CIA agent accused of being a Russian spy. Her name is Evelyn Salt and she goes on the run, however she is concerned about her husband’s safety and does everything possible to save him. What interested me in this film is the idea that the role of the woman has reversed and Angelina’s character has been created including many masculine traits. However, this argument can be looked from a different prospective as the character of Jolie does not manage to save her husband as he is made ‘tough enough’ to save himself. Furthermore, her appearance is attractive which can build up on Laura Mulvey’s theory of the ‘Male Gaze’ and the different aspects that are featured within the theory. T want to explore the question of has Hollywood progressed in portraying woman in a more independent and masculine way or actually there is no progress as they are still seen as sexual objects of the man’s desire.
‘The filmmakers believe that it was perfectly OK for the spouse to be rescued from mortal danger if said love interest was a girl, but not if the romantic partner was a man.’- Alison Thurston
Some can argue that the ‘damsel in distress’ is a male figure and by creating this image there is so called ‘progress’ in Hollywood production movies such as SALT. Never before has a female figure taken the role of such a masculine character. Angelina Jolie is known for her passion for masculine and ‘tough’ roles as she claimed in a magazine that she would rather ‘Play James Bond instead of the typically pretty and vulnerable Bond girl’. If Hollywood as made such a progression, than the audience and critics should ask themselves ‘Why is it so outrageous to put a man in a female role?’ If a movie is made with such a role, the audience would challenge the character’s sexuality immediately as a stereotype and an expectation is created within Hollywood movies and society about the image of the man. As the man needs to be seen as ‘powerful’, ‘dominant’ , ‘aggressive’ and ‘attractive to females’. I would count a progression with the idea of breaking those stereotypes and expectations from the male image. Women have been portrayed as ‘tough’ before in movies such as ‘The Tomb Rider’, however, their image has been highly sexualised to please the voyeurism of the man’s eye. This links to Laura Mulvey’s theory.
Laura Mulvey is a feminist which argued for the idea of the ‘Male Gaze’. Women in the media are portrayed in a way that can satisfy a man’s fantasy and expectation of a perfect woman. Angelina Jolie believed to be one of the most attractive women in Hollywood. To put her in the role of a man doesn’t convince all people that progress is made.
‘female characters, according to Mulvey, coded with “to-be-looked-at-ness.” Mulvey suggests that there were two distinct modes of the male gaze of this era: “voyeuristic” (i.e. seeing women as ‘whores’) and “fetishistic” (i.e. seeing women as ‘madonnas’).’
Fetishism in the movie SALT could be implied with the ultimate man’s fantasy of the ‘sexy girl with guns’. Even though Angelina plays a man’s role, she is sexualised by her appearance and there is still a creation of the fetishist view of her. However, some women, audience and critics might argue against this point by actually identifying with Jolie’s character of the independent, tough woman that is able to save herself from such danger and be so successful. Another point of view is that ‘do women really want to be represented in more masculine roles?’ or they want to ‘wait for the prince on the white horse’?
Furthermore, Angelina’s character is fairly unrealistic. She is a skinny woman, playing a CIA agent, suspected of being a Russian spy and fights equally with all the men in the movie who are triple her size. Is this progress? Not in my opinion. For a progression to happen in Hollywood production movies characters need to be portrayed in a more realistic way. Even if it said that this movie has a high feminist perspective it is not a realistic one. This is very unlikely to happen in the real world, so the audience might not even take ‘in’ the feminist hint that SALT is trying to push forward.
Evelyn Salt was trying to save her husband throughout the whole movie but at the end he was made strong and smart enough to save himself. SO the roles have not reversed completely. There is still the formula the formula of typical characters in movies: ‘the hero, the princess, victim, and villain. Even if some of them might be challenged as having the hero being a woman. But it will never be extreme enough to break this stereotype of the woman being less than the man. Many years need to go by for this image to be challenged even further, one unrealistic movie does not apply to all other Hollywood media productions.
Another theory that can be applied to this movie is the theory of the ‘dumb blonde’. The image of the attractive woman being vulnerable and highly unintelligent was created because of the ultimate man’s ego. It cannot be accepted that a woman can be beautiful, strong, independent, tough, could look after herself and intelligent because this would challenge the male dominance and authority. Yes Angelina’s character is beautiful. Yes it is independent, strong, and intelligent, however it is not complete. She is not able to save her husband and completely challenge this idea as he is still the dominant one by saving himself.
In conclusion, I disagree with the idea that Hollywood has made progress by portraying Angelina Jolie in such a way. This is because her character is unrealistic, fictional and not complete. She might have been cast for a male role however; the script was slightly changed to make it less shocking and obvious. A progress would have been if she managed to save her husband at the end and fully take on the masculine role of Tom Cruise’s original character. Furthermore, Hollywood should have picked a less attractive woman to play this role so the character of Evelyn Salt is not sexualised as Angelina Jolie is a sex icon. On the other hand, it is true that there are some successful aspects of feminist touch to this movie and there is slight progress by actually casting a female for a man’s action hero role.
