Sunday, April 25, 2010

Final Paper Sneak Peak

In “The Philosophy of Composition”, Edgar Allan Poe states that the death of a woman is “the most poetical topic in the world.” Woven into the American slasher film, this Poe-like quality is adapted and transcended beyond the screen to audiences across the nation. Notably, a good slasher flick is not at all terrorizing and gruesome without the female tragedy. The majority of these horrific writers, however, are men, which calls into question the dependability on this notion of “beauty.” Feminist theorists, Gilbert and Gubar, argue that a woman should not be forced to be killed into the art that the patriarchy paints. That is, the cinematic beauty of a woman dying from multiple stab wounds should not be the only type of woman seen in Hollywood films. Similarly, female homicidal maniacs should be able to defend more than just her domesticity. By examining the 2009 horror film, The Orphan, through a feminist and gender studies lens, we will learn that the movie’s female characters are neither angelic nor demonic, but oppressed from the patriarchal society surrounding them.

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