Media Influence On Bond Girls

The genre of the spy film has been highly influential in culture and the media since the introduction of the James Bond Series. This influence has since extended into the music video genre, for example Madonna’s Die Another Day and Justin Timberlake/50 Cent’s Ayo Technology.

The bond franchise is a well-known franchise with expectations such as gender stereotypes with males being more dominant and women being not dominant and only being used as sexual objects in the films. James bond is shown to have misogynist ideologies towards the feminine characters. The ‘bond girls’ have dominant ideologies of female characters. This expectation is somewhat shown in ‘Die Another Day. Whereas Jinx is confident and professional and has short hair, which
is stereotypically a male attribute. Miranda frost has longer hair, which is a stereotypical female attribute.

Madonna at the start of the video is seen in what looks like a military base and is seen being dragged away in a very masculine environment as it appears as a very dark, grimy and threatening environment.
This resembles that she is taking on the role of bond in this military. When she was being dragged away she is seen kicking a high heel shoe away rejecting her femininity, as a high heel shoe is a sign of femininity. Contributing to that idea she is seen wearing combat trousers, wearing no make up and she has a tattoo, which are signs of masculine attributes as she is independent and muscular. However Madonna contrasts those ideas as she wears a low cut top and she starts dancing very provocatively emphasizing her sexuality. It is also a possibility of Madonna is a post feminist as she is seen in a fencing hall fighting herself. We can assume from the lyrics of the song that she is going to destroy her ‘ego’ destroying her feminist ideology and instead emphasizing the power, dominance and control she has as a women. So she must be fighting her ego in the fencing hall. However in the other video 50 Cent is shown as conforming to dominant ideology of the male characters. Such as him being dominant, aggressive and authoritative. He is seen wearing smart expensive suits and driving expensive sport cars. Justin Timberlake also is seen wearing similar smart clothing and seen being chauffeured around by a masked
woman.

In ‘Ayo Technology’ it is shown that 50 Cent conforms well to the exaggerated stereotypes of the male gender.
In the video he is shown off as an alpha male, this is firstly shown at the beginning of the video when you see him looking down the scope of a very large gun, this would be seen as phallic imagery used to emphasize his masculinity in the video. These aspects of the Die Another Day could be seen to subvert the dominant ideology of women and how they can effeminate and glamorous. In 50 Cent’s video it reinforces the hegemonic idea of men dominating as masculine characters and women sexual objects. There is also a scene where 50 Cent is blindfolded whilst a number of women dance seductively, representing them as sexual objects for 50 Cent. Justin Timberlake throughout the video is potentially shown as a metrosexual. One way that this is shown is that Justin Timberlake spends the majority. And the female characters in the video although they have not acquired an identity and are only seen masked, they have been objectified like any of the James bond films female characters. You do also see times where the camera pans up and down the women’s bodies and their underwear is shot in close up, as if we are looking at these women from the perspective of a heterosexual male "gazing" at the women via the camera and thus making us gaze at them too. This is reinforced by the use of the gun scope looking at women, the night vision goggles and the eye line of the men in shot looking
at the dancing models. All these elements are signifiers of voyeurism and reinforce the actual meaning of the song - "I'm tired using technology" ie looking at the women instead of possessing them. References to the "spying" aspect of the spy film and an intersexual reference to particular bond films where bond is looking at women through binoculars - find these and give the examples. You also see Timberland in the video too; he acts throughout the video as somewhat of a godly figure. You can gather this from him using a futuristic user interface where he is able to almost spy on various women, which adds a sense of voyeurism in the video. This representation of women in the video is shown to be conforming to the dominant ideology as they have been made easy targets by the men. By the end of the music video like all other James bond films you eventually see the characters get the girl that they have been after for the duration of the music video.

The male characters in ‘Die Another Day’ music video are shown to be animalistic as they are brutal and that they torture Madonna. They are being represented as if they are one of thugs from the film of ‘Die Another Day’ as Madonna is taking on the role of bond she is taking on those thugs who are in the music video. In the narrative Madonna eventually gains success as she escapes from the thugs inside the bunker. Subverting the dominant ideology of the femininity of women. The female characters in Ayo Technology are ‘Bond girl’ like women. This is shown in the video as they are heavily objectified as they are seen dancing seductively in front of 50 cent, Justin Timberlake and Timberland. A majority of them are only seen wearing very little clothing contributing to the seductive manor of which the video appears to be, and how the women are shown off as conforming to the female gender stereotypes.

In Die Another Day there are only two locations seen in the video. One of them was the army bunker, as the army is a predominately masculine environment, Madonna yet again subverts dominant ideology being in this sort of environment. The other location is the fencing hall where Madonna fights and then destroys her ego. The bunker would be considered to be a realism environment portraying that Madonna is fully capable of subverting dominant ideology in a realistic environment. Whereas the fencing hall would be considered as a surrealistic environment.

In conclusion while these videos do share some qualities and production values they do still have some key differences in the representation of gender between the two. The reinforcement of gender stereotypes in 50 Cents video and the subversion of hegemonic representations of women in Madonna’s video.