Feminist Review

Feminist Film Review: Female Bosses

“Lady Boss” or “Female Exec”

“…the Female Exec as an imposing, scary women who works long hours and is a horrible Bitch when she has her period. If she was single, the Lady Boss was even more scary because her whole life was her job,” – Bitches, Bimbos, and Ballbreakers

Rating Scale: “Rosie the Riveters”

3 Rosie – Although the film depicted some “Female Exec” stereotypes, it was able to challenge these characteristics by the end of the movie, suggesting that such stereotypes are not true

2 Rosie’s – The film was filled with “Female Exec” stereotypes but not so much that it completely reinforced them as true

1 Rosie’s – The film was centered around “Female Exec” stereotypes and as a feminist critique, hurts the progress toward an egalitarian society because of this movie’s depiction of female bosses as Bitches with no personal lives

Group Film Review: The Devil Wears Prada

Summary: A smart, ambitious young woman comes to NYC to pursue a journalism career. She lands a spot at Runway magazine as an assistant to the editor-in-chief Miranda Priestly (played by Meryl Streep). Miranda sends her assistant on insane tasks like finding the unpublished manuscript of the seventh Harry Potter book for her daughters as a punishment for not getting her out of Miami during a hurricane in time to see her twins’ piano recital. Her nickname is the “Dragon Lady” and although she realizes huge professional success, she has a deteriorating personal life (by the end of the movie, she’ll have been divorced twice).

Rating: Because the female boss in this movie meets and even exceeds the stereotypes as depicted in Bitches, Bimbos, and Ballbreakers, she receives 1 Rosie the Riveter. She has no personal life, huge, beyond huge Bitchy tendencies, but very successful. Although at the end she does help her assistant pursue her journalism career, this is not enough to overcome the characteristics of a “Female Exec” stereotype....