The movie She’s The Man, directed by Andy Fickman it is shown that men always get the upper hand in almost everything and girls have to work twice as hard to get to an equal level as them. This movie gives out a feminism message saying women should be able to work alongside with men with the same equal treatment. Its obvious men have an easier life and they get what they want easily. Many scenes challenged traditional views of gender roles in society. Traditional views are appointed based entirely on gender and not ability.
Viola soon learns how to act like both a boy and a girl in order to get where she wants to be. This movie really shows how women are treated as inferior to men, the sports world is just one example. Throughout the movie of She’s The Man, there is a clear representation of gender inequalities in which Viola has to go through in order to be on the men’s soccer team. Gender roles is an expected behavior and traits of a certain gender (Massey). It has been around for ages and society has constructed it. At a young age, kids know their gender roles by the toys the play with and how they are treated.
Young boys are given fire trucks and dinosaurs while girls play with Barbie and dress up as princesses. What people also watch on tv is based on gender roles. Men watch fighting and thriller genres while women watch drama and love stories. Femininity relate to caring, motherly, emotionality and masculinity relate to independence, assertiveness, and power. When people don’t act how their gender is supposed to act like, they are looked downed open. But in today sports, there are male coaches coaching women sports which teach them how to be masculine. Gender roles isn’t something a person is born with, it’s taught.
In the movie when all the girls are together at the debutante lunch, it’s clear that the older women are teaching the younger girls ladylike manners and the older women were once taught too, almost like a tradition passed down to each generations. When talking about gender roles, there are also colors that match the roles. Girls are often seen as loving the color pink since they were little girls. In the movie She’s The Man, the women are always wearing a shade a pink. Whenever people see the color pink they think of sweetness, kindness, and politeness, traits that women are supposed to have.
Viola is the main character and her academy, Cornwall, women’s soccer team has been cut due to low funding and interest. She then talks to the men’s soccer coach to ask him if she can join the team and gets mocked by the coach, all the teammates, and her own boyfriend. Her twin brother goes to a different school so she pretends to be him, Sebastian, while he’s away in London. She is then helped by one of her male classmates, Duke Orsino, to help her get on the team to play against her own school while hiding her true gender at the same time.
While she has to pretend to be a boy, she has to try to be a debutante to make her mom happy. On certain days she has to change back and forth between Viola and Sebastian. Throughout the movie a romantic relationship starts to occur causing problems with her identity. In the end of the movie she reveals her true gender at the soccer game. Amanda Bynes was the actress for Viola Hastings and the way her character was developed really made the story more interesting. She’s very outgoing and optimistic which makes it easy for people to like her but she can also be rough if someone disrespects her.
Viola’s motivation to make it onto the male’s soccer team really shows that female soccer players can have the same abilities as male players. She uses the anger the anger of her breakup to motivate her even more into beating her own school soccer team instead of being at home being sad and crying. She also struggles to show her mom how important soccer is to her mom but her mom just wants her to more feminine. Her character also shows how modern idea of masculinity looks like by the way she has to act at Cornwall (Irarnoldd). The character Viola eaches people that everyone can have a little bit of feminism and masculinity within them. Viola also shows the female audience that there are always going to be people putting them down but they can’t get discouraged, prove to those people that they are better than them. Viola mixed up gender norms many times throughout the movie proving that your genitalia doesn’t define how you need to act. Viola’s boyfriend tried to be the man of the relationship by telling her to stop talking in front of his whole team and she responded by saying the relationship is now over.
She stands up for herself regardless of what people think because when women assert power they are seen as bossy and portrayed negatively unlike men who are praised for being a good leader. Viola’s mother despises her love for soccer because it’s a “man’s sport” and wants her to be debutante. Violas expresses how she isn’t interested in making an appearance in the fashion society and her mother says she’s just like her brother implying she’s a tomboy. Girls are supposed to wear flowy dresses and flats in society’s eyes.
When all the debutantes meet together and Viola is chewing with her mouth open and is told to chew like she has a secret, Viola mocks the nonsense of having to act and do things a certain way to be lady like. While pretending to a boy, “Sebastian” points out that having inner beauty is just as important as outer beauty. Sebastian also points out when Duke is blushing revealing that boys have emotion. In today’s world men are supposed to be emotionless and be assertive in every situation.
In just a couple of these scenes, Viola has broken the gender norms. In every sport, men always get noticed and praised more. Men are also praised more in the work field even when women are at the same level as them. When Viola asked the coach of the men’s soccer team if she could try out, he said girls aren’t as fast as boys or as strong or as athletic. Women are always seen as weak human beings when they can have the same strength as men. The coach also said “Girls can’t beat boys” in today’s world women are getting more degrees than en, even in some countries where education is restricted for young girls they still outperform men (Turner).
During WW2 and The Civil War when men went off to the battle field, women stayed behind to run the factories producing bullets and ships. Once Voila revealed her true gender, Cornwalls coach said they had to forfeit the game because there are no girls allowed in the league. Illyria’s coach stood up for Viola and said that they don’t discriminate based on gender and Cornwall’s mocked them by doubting them they could beat them with a girl on their team.
There’s such a lack of appreciation toward Viola’s soccer ability because she’s a female. In the work field women who perform the same jobs as men earn less money (FindLaw). In this movie when a guy gets many girls, they are seen as cool and everyone wants to be like them. When Viola first had to act like Sebastian, no one really noticed or liked him. One example was when Duke spotted Sebastian at the pizza parlor he made all his friends take up all the space at the booth so Sebastian wouldn’t sit with them because they didn’t want people to see.
After what it looked like Sebastian had many relationships with different attractive girls and also calls a girl ugly, everyone at the pizza parlor cheered for him and he suddenly became popular at school, everyone would ask him relationship advice or how to get a girl. In society when a girl is with many different guys she then gives herself a bad reputation. People see girls as waiting for the right man to come and only be committed to the one person for their rest of their life. Men on the other hand, if they are with different girls they are seen as an Alpha male and are praised.
Although this movie is a comedy for young teenage girls, the deeper meaning of the movie shows the issues that women go through a lot to be equal as men. Sports is just one of the many examples where men get the upper hand and are praised more for their ability. Gender inequality has to with almost everything in this world. Viola shows the ability a women has today in the 21st century and women aren’t as weak and passive as before. Women need to be recognized and praised more, and it’s time we have a woman run this nation because they can be just as assertive and have leadership skills like men.
