Examining the evolving representation of female characters in Zimbabwean films: a case study of Neria (1993) and Sinners (2013)

Abstract

The broad research question for this study was to investigate if the advocation for females’ equality globally has produced any positive results towards the upliftment of females from the restrictive political and social inferioties impacted on them by patriarchal societies in Zimbabwe. The thesis investigates the positive transition in the way females are portrayed in Zimbabwe between the 1993s and the 2013 period using a case study of two films Neria (1993) and Sinners (2013). The films where shot in different socio-economic contexts of Zimbabwe, but both films were based on true life events. In an attempt to map out the evolving representation of females in Zimbabwe, the thesis pays specific attention to how female lead actresses are represented in the two case studies selected. Drawing a comparative analysis of the manner in which female lead actresses are portrayed on screen between the different decades in which the films where produced. In order to achieve the goals of the study a qualitative method was applied. The research is centred within the Feminist Film Theory which proposes, critiques and acknowledges that females are represented as objects for male gratification. Who are naturally immoral, intellectually inferior to men, malicious and weak. The Feminist Film Theory is rooted within the ahistoricism thinking which is built upon semiotics, psychoanalysis and monolithic concepts of ideology defined as patriarchal and predicated upon rigid binary oppositions. Which evidently shows that females’ recognition and character is outlined in relation to that of males. The project’s data was collected mainly from watching the purposively selected scenes from the two case studies selected. A semiotic analysis was used to analyse the data as it explores and discovers the arrangement and use of content bringing out what it communicates (Ballaster, 1991:29). Together with the semiotic analysis, textual analysis was also applied to analyse the data. This is so because films make use of a sophisticated and knowledgeable style that is dominated by many ways like the mis-en-scene, narrative structure, lightning and sound.