Amy Dunne, the protagonist of "Gone Girl," proclaimed, “I waited years for the pendulum to swing the other way, for men to read Jane Austen and make out with each other while we leer. And then we’d say, yeah, he’s a cool guy”.
“Cool Girl” is a phrase that essentially encompasses all of the sexists expectations our society has attributed to women. I chose to analyze sequences from "Transformers," "Gone Girl" and "Mad Max: Fury Road" because each female leads exemplifies qualities that ample women in the 21st century struggle with: staying true to oneself or yielding to the “Cool Girl” position. Additionally, each film utilizes the male ontology of the eye, a male's "look” or their "gaze” in order to define or establish female characters. "Mad Max," "Gone Girl" and "Transformers" female characters are all pressured to adopt the “Cool Girl's” dangerous persona inside of a male-centered narrative. The characters, Mikaela, Amy and Furiosa and Immortan Wives, are representations of the drastic effects and consequences women encounter when they submit, acknowledge or reject the “Cool Girl” image within a world focused on the male perspective and narrative.
Michael Bay’s "Transformers" not only objectifies the female protagonist, Mikaela Banes, through cinematography and focusing only the male character's narrative, but reinforces the disturbing “Cool Girl” image. Mikaela is the epitome of “Cool Girl;” she has Jennifer Lawrence’s charm, the intellect of a greasy, overweight mechanic, combined with the face and body of Megan Fox. Though there is nothing unrealistic or wrong with a beautiful woman understanding the mechanics of cars, the dilemma lies in the movement of the camera and Sam Witwicky’s, the main character’s, reaction to Mikaela. The sequence is just under 45 seconds but begins with a match on Sam’s action: in shot two, he turns his head and stares at Mikaela’s body. The camera follows suit and pans right and enters a close up of Mikaela’s stomach while she talks about cars. They enter a dialogue about Sam’s car engine and the camera enters a close up on Mikaela’s face she while she says, “It squirts the fuel in, so you can go faster.” Not only is she being sexualized through the male gaze, but so is her intellect. Everything about Mikaela must be sexy; otherwise, she has no purpose. In shot four, Sam, bent out of shape over Mikaela’s body, responds with, “I’d like to go faster.” Shot five then enters Sam’s POV an upward tilt of Mikaela’s exposed torso to her breasts. In shot nine, Sam’s character states, “I wouldn’t peg you for mechanical,” to which Mikaela responds with, “guys don’t like it when you know more about cars than they do.” In classical Hollywood, cinema typically assumes that the spectators are male. Sam and Mikaela’s entire conversation is performed with a male audience in mind. Bay knows boys like to feel superior to women, and he’s using Mikaela, a beautiful woman, to reinforce his notions on women and cars. Mikaela is a “Cool Girl” because she accepts the male perspective as her own. Additionally, Mikaela never tells Sam to stop looking at her, meaning that she is OK with being fetishized, which relieves male spectators from the guilt of witnessing her objectification. In just 45 seconds, Michael Bay creates an atmosphere centered on cheap laughs at a woman's expense.
Amy Dunne’s character in "Gone Girl" visually represents what happens when a woman acknowledges the “Cool Girl” image and challenges the male gaze and male spectators by pointing out and demonstrating the consequences of the persona. The “Cool Girl” sequence in "Gone Girl" starts off with a series of intercuts of Amy in a bathroom, in a car and buying products from Big Lots. There are a few things to be noted throughout the sequence: Amy is wearing an unflattering T-shirt, Amy is cutting her hair and dying it, she is eating burgers, fries and whole liter sodas. Amy eats her burger and fries not in a Super Bowl ad kind of way, but in a starving and emotional wreck kind of way. This film is not assuming that the spectators are just male, but it does not eliminate them and reinforce the melodrama chick flick cliche. Amy’s presence, while speaking in voiceover, is a sharp contrast to how Mikaela is presented in "Transformers." Amy is not neat or made up for male spectators like Mikaela, and our focus is not on what she’s wearing or how sexy she is, but what she’s saying and doing. She’s in a dirty bathroom, which is a representation of her crumbling life. While shedding her stereotypical feminine qualities (hair cutting), the spectators hear a monotoned, yet heated, Amy in voice over articulate, “Cool Girl. Men always use that as the defining compliment, don’t they? She’s a cool girl. 'Cool Girl' is fun. 'Cool Girl' is game. 'Cool Girl' is hot. 'Cool Girl' never gets angry at her man. She only smiles... and then presents her mouth for fucking.” She scarfs down burgers and fries because she’s denied herself those luxuries in order to be the “Cool Girl.” Amy acknowledges “Cool Girl,” and her response is to frame her husband for her death. "Gone Girl" depicts a woman's response to facing the harsh realities of “Cool Girl.” Furthermore, spectators have a front row seat in witnessing the effects the “Cool Girl” facade has on Amy and how she turns the distorted image on a man. Women face major consequences when they refuse to be fetishized or have a problem with the small box they’re placed in. Amy refuses to just divorce Nick because that ultimately would be a repercussion for her; she wants revenge. Her life’s over, and so, Nick’s life must be over, too.
Amy’s voiceover monologue invades a male-dominated position that pressures both genders to stop submitting to the “cool girl” image. Nick Dunne, like so many male characters, are not only often given the opportunity of having the camera frame follow their gaze, but also afforded the opportunity of voiceover, which allows the audience to have a more intimate understanding of their perspective. Up until the “Cool Girl” sequence, Nick is the only character speaking in voiceover; however, Amy starts to speak out in the second act of the film, too, and exposes her distaste for the way men treat women in our society. She then proclaims, “I wax stripped my pussy raw. I drank canned beer while watching Adam Sandler movies. I ate cold pizza and remained a size two. I blew him semi regularly…” Moreover, because "Gone Girl" does not assume that its spectators are just males but both men and women, the “Cool Girl” image is a message both genders need to see and hear. Women do not want to drive themselves crazy like Amy, and men should know the pressures women face in our society as well as not reinforce them. Furthermore, Amy’s dive into madness forces the spectators to face the ugly truth: When one steps away from their identity to become what others want them to be, trouble and emotional breakdowns are probable consequences.
"Mad Max," for all intents and purposes, was suppose to be a male-oriented film that was hijacked by Furiosa and Immortan Joe’s wives. The action-drama was advertised as a male flick. The first act had all the common tropes: lots of male characters, male voiceover, beautiful women, etc. And then, about 20 minutes into it, while going on an expedition, Furiosa turns her truck around. This moment in the film symbolizes the beginning of Furiosa, as well as the other female leads’, journey to finding their identity outside of the male-oriented world we were introduced to. As Amy stated, “'Cool Girl' is game...'Cool Girl' never gets angry at her man.” Furiosa, turning her truck in a different direction, and the Immortan Joe’s wives, hiding in the back of her truck, indicates their rejection and attack on the societal expectation of being the “Cool Girl.”
Furiosa as well as the sex slaves in "Mad Max" prove that women have to fight against the male gaze in order to escape it and establish their own. From the inception of the film, Furiosa’s clothing indicates that she is not only ready for battle, but was not created for the male gaze. She’s wearing pants, her hair is shaven and she has a missing arm. The final moments of the film involve Furiosa, along with the Immortan Joe’s wives, being lifted up by a platform as people stare up at them. Because the camera is framed from a high angle shot, the perspective the spectators are viewing the film from are the women. Furiosa stares down at Max as he stares up at her, and after all the fighting and blood, he doesn’t wave goodbye, but nods. The nod symbolizes the little validation Furiosa needs from any male because she stood in her own truth and knows she is worthy of the position she’s acquired. In the final scene, Furiosa, Toast the Knowing, Cheedo the Fragile, The Dag, Capable and Angharad all have battle wounds. All six women never submitted to the “Cool Girl” facade of caring about what the men in their lives wanted.
The male gaze had become an imperative presence in my life. I used to leave the theatre, searching for its presence in the faces of people, more specifically white males, which, coincidentally, is the perspective mainly focused on in classical Hollywood cinema. I have also been a part of this terrible trend, my childhood was filled with images of white men. My identity was distorted. I remember Romeo’s first scene in Baz Luhrman's "Romeo + Juliet" when I was 12. Romeo, played by Leonardo Dicaprio, walked along a graffitied beach and stared almost into the camera with a brooding, knowing look. I thought his piercing blue eyes and blond disheveled hair were beautiful. Like several women, I attempted to be “Cool Girl” in order to get the look like the one Romeo makes at the camera. I watched football, even though I don’t like it, I wore clothes, not because I liked them, but because I knew boys would and I eliminated carbs from my diet, so I could maintain a smaller figure to look more desirable. All of this was for the male gaze. If I didn’t get looked by a lot of guys on a certain day, I’d spend that night beating myself up. My identity rested on the male gaze because it was the only perspective fed to me as a child. Though I didn’t wax strip my pussy raw or drink beer and watch gross Adam Sandler movies, I dated a guy who thought the Native American genocide was “probably a bad idea.” I kissed a guy whose first words were, “You know I’ve always liked chocolate” and dated a guy who said the words “nigger” and “cunt” did not bother him because I wanted to be a “Cool Girl.” I was like Mikaela, and like Amy, I realized it was all crap. My worth is not tied to how eurocentric I could make myself look or how sexy I dressed. In the end, I wasted my time and had to go through a lot of self-reflection just to like myself. Films, such as "Mad Max," demonstrate that it is possible for female characters to stand outside of “Cool Girl.” This is an option I no longer ignore.
The fight begins with dismantling the “Cool Girl” image. Women should not feel pressured to express themselves in a way that makes men or other people happy. Humans are complex creatures, and that complexity should not just be extended to the gender group that identifies as male. Films, such as "Gone Girl," demonstrate that both males and females suffer at the expense of maintaining “Cool Girl,” or "Mad Girl," which I created. It dismisses society’s expectations of not just genders but all humans. "Mad Girl" is a woman who fights against patriarchal ideologies.“Mad Girl” and “Cool Girl” cannot exist within the same society. Therefore, “Cool Girl” needs to go in order to have a more levelheaded society.
Cinema is one of the most influential forms of media today. Film has the ability to delve into all of the senses – conscious and subconscious. One of the recurring themes in cinema is the eye ontology (look and gaze). The male gaze and male perspective heavily saturated in classical Hollywood cinema and today's Hollywood has created a “Cool Girl” image that objectifies women. The female gaze and narrative are just as imperative as any man's. In order to obtain the perspective that has historically been handed down to male characters, women have to fight. "Cool Girl" is dead. "Mad Girl" took her place.
