'Sitting in Cages': Imagining Victorian Women in Neo-Victorian Film Musicals

Edited book (chapter)

Stevenson, Ana. 2015. "'Sitting in Cages': Imagining Victorian Women in Neo-Victorian Film Musicals." Falchi, Simonetta, Perletti, Greta and Ruiz, Maria Isabel Romero (ed.) Victorianomania: Reimagining, Refashioning, and Rewriting Victorian Literature and Culture. Milan, Italy. Franco Angeli. pp. 73-86
Chapter Title

'Sitting in Cages': Imagining Victorian Women in Neo-Victorian Film Musicals

Book Chapter CategoryEdited book (chapter)
ERA Publisher ID1954
Book TitleVictorianomania: Reimagining, Refashioning, and Rewriting Victorian Literature and Culture
Authors
AuthorStevenson, Ana
EditorsFalchi, Simonetta, Perletti, Greta and Ruiz, Maria Isabel Romero
Page Range73-86
Number of Pages14
Year2015
PublisherFranco Angeli
Place of PublicationMilan, Italy
ISBN9788891725905
Web Address (URL)https://www.academia.edu/20840263/_Sitting_in_Cages_Imagining_Victorian_Women_in_Neo-Victorian_Film_Musicals
Abstract

The process of imagining the culturally constrained Victorian woman is familiar in contemporary cinema, especially in film musicals. From Baz Lurhmann’s Moulin Rouge! (2001) to Tim Burton’s Sweeny Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (2007) and Tom Hooper’s Les Misérables (2012), contemporary film musicals seek to deconstruct the gender politics of Victorian society. These films present the nineteenth-century past as cultural memory, wherein women’s lives were shaped by inherently restrictive Victorian gender norms. A specific metaphor – the caged bird – is used to aesthetically and thematically present the restrictions placed on women in Victorian society.

Keywordsfilm musical, bird in the cage, nineteenth century, Neovictorian, twenty-first century, film history
ANZSRC Field of Research 2020470214. Screen and media culture
470107. Media studies
Byline AffiliationsUniversity of Pittsburgh, United States
Journal TitleVictorianomania: Reimagining, Refashioning, and Rewriting Victorian Literature and Culture
Institution of OriginUniversity of Southern Queensland
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