The Wizard of Oz was directed by Victor Fleming, produced by Mervyn LeRoy and the director of photography was Harold Rossen. The book was originally a book written by Lyman Frank Baum and the movie was first released in 1939. The movie portrays Dorothy, a female protagonist on a journey home. Within Casey Cipriani’s article, “Sorry, Ladies: Study on Women in Film and Television Confrims the Worst,” Cipriani explains the implication of statistics on women in film. According to Cipriani, “Only 12% of all clearly identifiable protagonists were female in 2014. This represents a decrease of 3 percentage points from 2013 and a decrease of 4 percentage points from 2002.” Within the Wizard of Oz, the protagonist Dorothy and the witches are female but the majority of other characters (the tin man, the lion, the scarecrow and the Wizard are all males).
Dorothy, the witches and Dorothy’s family does fall into the statistic that 74% of all female characters are white. For the 12% of female protagonists, only 11% of those were Black, 4% of those were Latina, 4% of those were Asian while 3% of those were other worldly. For those of minority races, the probability of seeing their representation on television is minimal. Although women make up half of the population and play an essential role in the world, movies downplay this as a result of being an industry which is predominantly white male and exclusive (as is seen in those who directed the Wizard of Oz).
Binary oppositions are perpetuated in most films although in reality gender is a complexity factor in society. This idea that gender is strictly male and female and must be treated as such appear in the movie in both dress and action (Ott and Mack 2014). Dorothy and the good witch of the West Glinda wear stereotypically female clothing and the solution to the predicament are red, sparkly high heel shoes. In order to get home to Dorothy’s family in order to help take care of them (as is the stereotypical female role), Dorothy must find the Wizard (a white male) to help her. The plot also contains in fighting amongst women as the Wicked Witch of the West attempts to stop Dorothy every step of the way.
Within the Wizard of Oz the idea of psychoanalysis (Mulvey 1999) becomes evident because Dorothy hits her head and ends up in Oz where she must find a Wizard to remind her that she has the skills which she has searched for throughout the entirety of the movie. The characters are not particularly attractive and although the scarecrow, tin man, and lion are all male, there is no romance throughout the entirety of the film, rather it is a woman’s struggle to succeed and achieve her own greatness and independence. Unlike Laura Mulvey’s essay which claims that women can only look at films sadly because of the way in which females are presented, the Wizard of Oz provides a strong female protagonist who goes on a journey and is more than solely a pawn to be adored by men.
As a result of the lack of predominant men in the movie, the Wizard of Oz passes the Bechdel Test with flying colors. Glinda and Dorothy converse about Dorothy’s killing of the Wicked Witch of the East and Dorothy finding her way home. Dorothy and the Wicked Witch also converse when Dorothy is captured – although this is not a positive interaction with another woman. Dorothy and Aunt Em also speak when reunited and Miss Gulch and Dorothy set off the adventure in the first place.
Sources
“Bechdel Test Movie List.” Bechdel Test Movie List. Accessed February 02, 2015. http://bechdeltest.com/.
Cipriani, Casey. “Sorry, Ladies: Study on Women in Film and Television Confirms The Worst.” Indiewire. February 10, 2015. Accessed February 13, 2015. http://www.indiewire.com/article/sorry-ladies-study-on-women-in-film-and-television-confirms-the-worst-20150210.
Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Film Theory and Criticism :Introductory Readings. Eds. Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen. New York: Oxford UP, 1999: 833-44.
Ott, Brian L., and Robert L. Mack. Critical Media Studies: An Introduction. 2nd ed. West Sussex: Wiley Blackwell, 2014.
and the subsequent commercials which influence their perceptions of American Culture. Children between the ages of four and 12 influence more than $165 billion in spending in the United States (Alberman and Atkin 2000: 143). These purchases are based upon what kids consider “popular” or the “in” fashion at the time, perpetuating cultural norms in regards to fashion, food, toys and any other accessory one could imagine. The commercials which target these children are not random, they involve a complex interpretation of viewing patterns, the goal of the viewer’s behavior, the amount which this group uses media and the needs of these viewers (Alberman and Atkin 2000: 144). When watching a children’s show, it is rare to see a commercial for medical diseases because the commercials are analyzed in order to best fit the audience. Rather than a Viagra commercial, there are commercials for 
under 250 media executives to control all American’s television watching. The six companies consist of General Electric, News-Corp, Disney, Viacom, and Time Warner. Each of these companies own various television channels and as a result air different programs on each of their channels. The programs displayed on all of these channels oftentimes exhibit the biases of the executives which produced them, allowing for a perpetuation of the American culture without reason or a voice for change. This means that those that watch media are biased by the opinions, beliefs and cultural norms of solely 6 companies which prevents diversification of available media options.
Social Impact of Mass Media 