The American Film Institute has long been a
staple of film culture in the United States since the time Charlie Chaplin
begin to expose the world to his “City Light;” but what was created during the
antiquation of the silent film era seems to be not only bygone technology but
masculine dominance in today’s film industry.
This dominance and inequality
has ranged and lingered true in all aspects of mainstream film; the Oscars
namely but also in a greater list of prestigious noting; The 100 Greatest films
of all time.
Few
have ever experienced the entire list, in fact, unless film was your entire
life or livelihood, about 75% of these films will have been beyond your
knowledge. From filmmakers as Orson Welles to Milos Forman, these 100
emphasized works of motion cinema has given so much appreciation to perceptive
viewers that it left them nearly blind.
Of all the 100 greatest
films of all times, none of them have been directed by women, which prompts the
question; “Is Male dominance a factor in the critique of chosen films?”
To examine that question
and notion, one only has to turn to the British Film Institute’s list of 100
greatest films of all time and again, of the 100 films, none were directed by
women, although women entered the filmmaker world just as early as men and since
the silent film era, have also given the world marvelous perspective through
the lens, helped to evolve film to an apex that the auteurs of the French New
Wave begun to live inside of it.
Many,
if not most, of these 200 films were given such exceptional regard inasmuch a
woman, usually a central figure, controversial or just “eye candy” became the
focal where a script was written and a director exploited. Many caricatures
came from these films and many failed to see the woman of the time, and the
woman of today, eye to eye. Her place is in frontal view of the camera, not
behind it.
This
notion, which surely exposes man in full pursuit of his own potency, in some
mythical virility he believes will take life form as Galatea from the breath of
Aphrodite, has led to successful female filmmakers and actresses to evoke
chances within the mainstream of film. Ostracized by the Oscars and denied
slots on the list of legendary films, female filmmakers have continued to do
what they have always done, contribute to film but now, with full perception of
what is to await their film upon release to the box office; masculine denial of
its due & proper.
In 1998, screenwriters, critics, film historians, the who’s who of the film
community was invited to the American Film Institute to choose from 400
compiled films chosen by the AFI. It is fair to say that of the 400 films,
most, if not all of them films were male
directed. http://www.afi.com/Docs/100Years/movies400.pdf
What
is it about the woman that man seems to be terrified of? Is it that she is
omnipotent and her omnipotence may someday surpass, or has surpassed man’s
biological impasse? Or is it that he feels that women have no place behind the
camera and as long as she remains a source of sexual interest en scene, her
fret or flight, her “hysterics” can be avoided if she is given no zenith
recognition for her creativity.
Inequality
in art tarnishes the one thing of this world that is immortal, that lives on
after our cells begin to proliferate. Whether a man aims a camera or a woman
aims a camera, who is holding it is of no importance as longs the aim is true,
the prose is true, its intent is to tell a story, or retell one that must be
told if only to give the world a minuscule break from the coming of guaranteed
obstacle. The one thing that is apparent throughout history, for every great
man who has accomplished a great feat, there was a great woman whose character
and identity was left to drown in oblivion, far from the cheers, the awes and
the recognition that was hers from the very beginning.
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