The Final Girl

Conventions of a final girlThe final girl is a term coined by Carol J Clover who analysed slasher films and came up with the summation that there will almost always be a sole survivor who is a well behaved, conservative, young female. Her role is essentially to tell the tale of the nightmare and to subliminally deliver the message that good, innocent girls are safe whereas promiscuous bad girls will die. Considering that a large percentage of the film industry is directed by middle aged men who most likely have children of their own, its no wonder why these messages are weaved into the scripture of the films in a bid to discourage explicit behaviour in teenage girls. However as a whole in society, these same messages are reflected within the patriarchy we reside in. The final girl is a representation of societies ‘ideal daughter’. She is obedient and follows the rules always.

Laurie wears bland, earthy colours in the film and dresses very modestly. Her clothes represent her character as they are of a more mature style that would usually be the choice of attire for an older woman. Her friends wear trendier clothes which would have been considered the style of the time that the film was set in.

Characteristics of the final girl

The final girl is usually a fairly plain faced brunette, who is dressed modesty; she will be a binary opposite (Strauss) of the promiscuous blonde character who will wear revealing clothes with the characters attire reflecting their personalities.The final girl is well behaved, sensible and studious in contrary to her friends or classmates who are loud and mischievous, often dismissing school work and revision to go to parties and social outings. She will display maternal behaviour and represents conformity to the patriarchal ideas of femininity.

1940’s womenIn the 1940’s with the fall of World War 2, countries saw their men leaving to fight for their people and women stayed at home. The men having previously being the ones to go to work as breadwinners working in factories and other blue collar careers; women had to fill in their places in their absence. The women felt free and liberated as they were never given such an opportunity prior to this. Making money was a step to freedom for them and gave them a sense of power. After the war, women fought for jobs and thus the rise of second wave feminism led to working women being the norm. However the process of the fight for equality moved into the 1960’s and a lot of social issues for women of all minorities demanding more rights were becoming more apparent as people were becoming more vocal with their opinions and beliefs. In a patriarchal society, men were fearful of the loss of their power and masculinity as they no longer had as much power as they once possessed. Men believed that women needed them and would not survive otherwise as women were seen as weak and defenceless. Men were masculine and the protectors, yet women proved that they could do all the jobs that men could in their absence. Although today, women have come a long way from the 40’s, inequality is still present and is argued that the genders will never be balanced and men will always be above men.This essentially illustrates the evolution of the final girl throughout the film as initially she is seen as weak. The male characters such as the inefficient authoritative figure and the jocks/boyfriends try to defeat the killer but all fail, sometimes dying as a result. When she is left with no other choice she picks up the weapon and has a go for herself, being the closest of the previous attempters to kill the villain. However, in many films she will still be unable to kill him and therefore showing that no matter what, females will never be in a higher position of power to males.

Sigmund FreudSigmund Freud believes that negative events in childhood cause psychological trauma later in life. His theory states that young children – particularly young boys, cannot differentiate between themselves and their mother in terms of gender. He sees himself as one and the same without any perception of their physiological differences. This stage in the theory is known as the ‘pre-oedipal space’. Normal psychological development requires a separation or emergence from the pre-oedipal space into the ‘symbolic order’. This is the stage in which the infant begins to become aware of separation of male and female, and the ‘lack’ of features a woman holds (male reproductive organs). The child then begins to fear for his own ‘completeness’ and therefore the mother represents the fear of castration.

Oedipus and Electra ComplexFreud came up with the theory that young boys feel that they must compete with their fathers for the mothers attention as they have a fixation for them (Oedipus). As for the girls (Electra) proposed by Carl Gustav Jung, it is the same concept except with the genders reversed; the girl rivals the mother as she competes for her fathers affection. She also blames her mother for her “castration” once she realises she does not share the same reproductive organ as her father and develops envy for the male body.In slasher films, it could be said that the final girl identifies with the Electra complex and she feels as if she has been “castrated” and therefore the penultimate battle between herself and the killer is where she finally gets a hold of the weapon/phallic symbol and thus “reclaiming” what she believes was once hers. This can be linked to 1940’s women where women wanted the jobs that men had (phallic symbol = power) and women finally had the opportunity to have this when the men went to war. Eventually the men returned to claim back their jobs but women did not want to give them up hence the movement of civil rights for women came in action.

Man’s fear of womenWomen’s periods stand and in hand with pregnancy which is why both subjects are considered as taboo to openly discuss. It can be said that men’s fear of childbirth is an oppressing factor as society seems to hide from displaying any biological processes such as excretion, urination, flatulence, practicing body hygiene and procreation. Although eating and drinking is another process, society has created unspoken rules about the way to go about it (table etiquette) and has been given specific times where it is socially accepted as the time to collectively eat. As pregnancy cannot be easily hidden (baby bump), it is still somewhat taboo as it indicates that there was intimate activity and mans fear of childbirth is due.

Monstrous feminine in film (Barbara Creed)Barbara Creed’s theory was founded on the basis of the Freudian psychoanalytic theory of the monstrous feminine. She believes that women in horror films are represented as ‘abject’.The final girl is said to be the monstrous feminine in slasher films as in the end of the film during the final confrontation between the villain and herself, there is the notion of possible metaphorical castration for him. At first the girl is seen as good – like the mother during the child's infancy. However as time progresses the final girl becomes the monstrous feminine such as in John Carpenters 1978 film ‘Halloween’. Laurie Strode, who is the films final girl, takes the killers knife which is a phallic symbol thus demonstrating the act of castration.The villain and the final girl can be argued to be just as bad as each other and as the monstrous feminine and is displayed in various shots in different films where both parties share an equal amount of space in the frame to show that their behaviour is equal.

What the final girl representsThe final girl can be seen as a positive for the female gender as slasher is the only genre where the central narrative agency of the film is female, which is unusual in cinema. This came about shortly after the period in which women were protesting for their rights during the 1960’s onwards and classic slasher film Halloween was released in 1978.

On the other hand, Barbara Creed talks about the monstrous feminine which represents the woman as ‘abject’ and by the end of the film, has come level to the killer when she takes the weapon (phallic symbol) and attempts to kill (castrate) the villain.