Historical context

The main historical film that i will be concentrating on throughout this study is 'Alien' which was released in 1979 and directed by Ridly Scott. It relates with my main text Domino as it also has a female protagonist in fact, Alien is the first film in history to give the role of the main protagonist to a female and in this case it is Sigourney Weaver. As Ellen Ripley in Alien, Weaver has become the first female action hero. This shows that even though Ripley is tender with a cat or a child, she is still capable of being aggerresive and tough while destroying monsters and alien.

There are lots of similarities between Domino and Alien as both the characters of Domino Harvey and Elen Ripley share similar charactersitcs. Both protagonists share the same powerful, manly, violent characterstics as they fight their way through life however, we can still see a sensitive side in them. we can also see in the mese en scene of both films the fact that they are constantly being surrounded by men which implies the male dominant society that we live in. Furthermore, both Knightly and Weaver are very attractive which implies that even though they are breaking lots of female steorotypes, they are still part of a male gaze which Laura Mulvie talks about. However even though we are living in a male patriarchal society, we can see the improvments made in gender equalities as for the first time ever, we see a female protagonist in Alien which suggests that the second wave of feminism which took place in the 1970s made a great impact on peoples lives. Since Alien, there has been lots of films that feature female protagonists for instance Erin Brokavich where the lives of a small town were put on Julia Roberts shoulders. This emphasises the fact that women are becoming slowly, yet effeciently more equal to men in society and most importantly in the media.

However, even though Knightly n Weaver are both very similar at times, their charters are also quite different as in Domino, Domino Harvey is seen as a psychologically disturbed girl with 'daddy issues' where as on the otherhand, Riply is seen to be agrresive towards the aliens yet very tender and nurturing at times. we can also see that