Patricia Cordero Revolutionizes Female Representation in Film with "Real Women Have Curves"

The mainstream film industry has long dictated what audiences believe is culture. In the setting of a dark theater, any preconceived notions of what is real and what isn't literally go out the window and are replaced by directors' own ideas of such. As Bell Hooks states in her book "Reel to Real", "The fact that some folks may attend films as 'resisting spectators' does not really change the reality that most of us... are usually seduced, at least for a time, by the images we see on the screen. They have power over us and we have no power over them," (3). These constructed realities become ingrained in viewers' brains so that notions of gender identification and roles are suddenly dictated by cinema.

Unfortunately, a mainly male-dominated cinema industry means that the messages fed to the public regarding females are constructed through a male point of view and influenced by the male gaze. Sexualized images of women are what become "reality" to audiences rather than the actual cultural and societal female experience. Difficulty in selling films that offer a real world look at feminine life and culture are too often rejected by an industry looking to marginalize profits. As Debra Zimmerman states in her book, "Women Make Movies", "A major problem, even today, is convincing men that films by and about women are important," (265). Female directors aiming to show the public an actual realistic depiction of the struggles, triumphs, and overall condition of women in society through their films are stomped out by popular cultural trends of sexuality in mainstream films.

It is the female population's duty therefore, as Maggie Humm mentions in her book "Feminism and Film", to create a "collective social construction of reality" (95) and create "groups where peer support and a shared political perspective enable women to construct a women's epistemology," (95). One such director who has attempted to do such through her films is Patricia Cardoso. In many of her works, particularly her film Real Women Have Curves, Cardoso attempts to deconstruct the popular and false image of the Latina woman created from the minds of male directors and repeatedly presented in films. In this particular film, she presents the real condition of Mexican women both in their own Latino culture as well as American culture. Told through the story of character Ana and her struggles with conflicting messages from her own family and community, the film depicts what many Latinas experience in growing up and entering adulthood.

As Kristen Holm and Katherine Daniels state in their review "Eat the Flan: Real Women Have Curves", the movie "confronts ideas about what women are valued for, including societal messages about education, serving men, and sexuality, "(95-96). Ana is made to believe by her mother that learning to cook and serve men is far more valuable then getting a higher education. She is also consistently called fat by her mother and pushed to lose weight, as many Latina girls are in their own families. As Holm and Daniels state, in Real Women Have Curves "women are keenly aware of cultural and gender norms and women hold other women accountable to these norms...to instill gender socialization in the next generation," (96). Furthermore, as Jillian M. Baez states in "Towards a Latinidad Feminista: The Multiplicities of Latinidad and Feminism in Contemporary Cinema", the scenes in the film show how females are "exploited in the global economy by performing low-paying, gendered work," (120). In the end, Ana breaks free from the restraints that many of the societal and cultural norms of her culture had on her and chooses her own path by opting to further her education away from home.

Cardoso is considered a pioneer in feminist film directing. She creates works of "gynocriticism" that Humm mentions and, as Bell Hooks mentions, creates films that are "free from all limitations of which teh most dangerous is the imitation of life," (1). Cardoso's films generally reflect the social reality of females in the Latino culture and is, in her own rights, an auteur in that she is creating works about restrictive and often harmful cultural values directed towards females. Her films generally receive positive critiques and are supported by a handful of feminist theorists and, not surprisingly, the Latino population. Directors like Cardoso may be able to bring the feminine reality into mainstream films and break the preset ideologies of gender in popular cinema.

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Bibliography

1) Baez, J.M. "Towards a Latinidad Feminista: The Multiplicities of Latinidad and Feminism in

Contemporary Cinema." Popular Communication 5.2 (2007): 109-128. Web.

2) Holm, K. and Katherine Daniels. "Eat the Flan: Real Women Have Curves." Journal of

Feminist Family Therapy 15.4 (2003): 95-98. Web.