The Male Gaze

Going back to Laura Mulvey and what she calls the "Male Gaze" the first example that popped into my head was The Wolf of Wall Street.  You have this handsome man played by Leonardo DiCaprio, and of course, he has this beautiful woman as his wife, played by Margot Robbie.  However, this encounter of meeting his wife did not come without plenty of sex and sex appeal, or the "male gaze".  We see all throughout the beginning of movie, especially in the scenes where he takes the woman that he is sleeping with at the moment, the camera is focused on the woman and their curves,and depending how interested Leonardo has in the woman, the shot of the woman is either longer if he's really interested, or shorter if he isn't.  But when he takes his wife (before they got married) she is shown in full, naked body and all. You see the camera show Leonardo gaze at her, though they don't show her right away but you assume by his reaction that the woman must be something worth gazing at. Then you are shown the woman, who again is shown in full long shot to show that that is what Leonardo was gazing at.

Although Leonardo does have some naked scenes where one could argue that a woman could gaze at, the shots are nearly half as long as the they are when they focus on the women.  This movie is strictly focused on sex, money and drugs and although one may argue that it's simply a movie, I also think that this movie gives men an opportunity to fantasize about having a woman like Leonardo did in this movie.

I also want to relate this movie to Angela McRobbie, because throughout this movie you see how much of lack of empowerment that the woman play, Leonardo is portrayed at this powerful, wealthy man who only makes valid decisions, but when it comes to the wife deciding what should be done, it's shut down because she is just meant to follow along with the what the husband says, showing the figure of "I am the man and I know what's best" which of course for those who have seen the movie, know how that turns out.  And of course this is a form of scopophilia, because the men are active and the women is passive.

I was going to put a link up of the scenes that is named Wolf of Wall Street-Best Scenes, but considering it may be a little inappropriate, I figured people could look it up on their own time.