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Rosillo, Tatiana

Professor Nelson

Film and Other Media

Final Paper

2 May 2018

A Stiletto in the Hand Is Worth a Gun in the Purse

Mainstream American action films require the audience to empathize with a protagonist as he (and very seldom she) is put through a series of intense fight sequences and tension-filled personal exchanges to complete any manner of high stakes mission. The spy film is an exemplary subset of this genre, employing the formula in an interesting, if somewhat statist, romp through action genre conventions. Overwhelmingly, men have been the main creators, consumers, and centers of spy narratives. These narratives tend to leave women out on the margins, restricting female characters and excluding female creators and consumers.

Recently, there has been a shift towards women playing larger roles and even leading spy films. However, this progress remains hampered by the lack of opportunities afforded to female directors and female driven scripts. The film

Atomic Blonde (2017) exhibits this complex step in the move towards female- centric spy films with Charlize Theron as the titular blonde, Lorraine Broughton, with male director David Leitch at the helm. What warrants critical attention in

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Atomic Blonde are the modes of weaponized femininity constructed by Lorraine in her wardrobe and mannerisms; Lorraine cultivates an impenetrable, unflappable traditionally feminine aesthetic and uses this aesthetic as armor, weapon, and trap.

Using these modes of weaponized femininity, the film examines the constructed nature of femininity and weaponized femininity’s interventions in those expectations.

In order to understand the progress Atomic Blonde is attempting, one must examine the pre-established conventions of spy genres with regards to male and female roles. Within the typical action spy film lies a heavy reliance on a hyper- masculine fantasy. The male characters in such spy films are the actors in missions, and the female characters are either sexual objects to be won or sexual objects who momentarily confound the male hero or die for the sake of male angst. Miranda J.

Brady briefly examines this hyper-sexualized fantasy in regards to James Bond, explaining the sexual politics as “promiscuity” (Brady 112). James Bond, both the franchise and the character, engages male fantasies of danger, violence, and sexuality all in the service of the “greater good” and for queen and country.

Meanwhile, women in these films are relegated to the femme fatale role or that of homemaker. The focus of Brady’s essay is that of the American television show

Alias (2001-06) and the exploration of that same dynamic from a female character’s focalization. This example of the female spy does not move towards

Rosillo 3 more diverse representation for women, as it cements the “role of the contemporary female secret agent to conflate traditional family values … with nationalism, modernism, and sexuality” (112). This perspective contextualized the interventions in the formula Atomic Blonde attempts. Not only does the film shift the focal character from the male avatar of the masculine fantasy to that of a female protagonist, but it also allows her to weaponize femininity without succumbing to the patriarchy in any way. Lorraine sets herself apart from other female spy leads by operating under her own set of rules, “trust[ing] no one,” and taking a female lover (Atomic). These factors simply lay the groundwork for the film’s reconstruction of the female spy.

The first time the audience is introduced to Lorraine, she is stripped completely bare of the modes of weaponized femininity she will later construct.

This scene establishes the vulnerable human being beneath the complex amalgamation of weaponized femininity with which she arms herself with throughout the film. The scene opens with a shot of her face emerging from an ice bath, followed immediately by her bruised shoulders; this shot quickly subverts the expectation of a voyeuristic look at Lorraine’s body in the bath by exposing physical trauma on her body. This shot is emphasized by two shots of her severely bruised back: one spotlights her emergence from above, while the second focuses straight on her bruised back at bath level. These shots emphasize Lorraine’s basic

Rosillo 4 humanity and work to establish Lorraine as a person, not a sexual object. Though

Lorraine is introduced without her clothes, the framing of these shots does not seem sexual. Tight close-ups on Lorraine’s face and shoulders give the audience no room to idealize her form, but confronts them with the stark reality of dark bruises marring her skin. The emphasis is not on Lorraine’s body in an idealizing, objectifying manner, but drives home the damage done to her fragile body. The following shots of her openly traumatized face are followed by her curling into herself and crossing her arms around herself in a self-soothing embrace. She then buries her face in her arms and effectively shields herself from the audience by turning inward. This scene “engages” the audience to form an empathetic bond with her while knowing nothing about her character (Plantinga 10). This

“engagement” is reminiscent of the concept discussed in Carl Plantinga’s Moving

Viewers: American Film and the Spectators Experience, in which Carl discusses the affect theory and the importance of a protagonist in the viewing relationship.

The level of engagement demanded by these first few scenes with Lorraine establish Lorraine as a person to be empathized with, not merely an object to ogled. These shots communicate that this is a woman who has just been through a grueling experience and has taken solace in the admittedly frigid looking bath.

Lorraine emerges from the bath a cold, battered, enduring woman, and the subsequent close-ups on her bruised face and bedraggled hair from the perspective

Rosillo 5 of the mirror force the audience into Lorraine’s perspective. The audience is confronted with the bare bones of Lorraine’s personality in this shot and is therefore predisposed to not only believe Lorraine’s narration later in the film, but completely accept her as the protagonist.

Directly following her vulnerability after leaving the numbing bath, the next shot establishes the first mode of weaponized femininity: Lorraine’s application of camouflaged feminine armor. After a quick shot of her calmly taking a drag from a cigarette, the camera does a tight close-up of Lorraine’s hands as she places a gun inside a sleek black handbag (Atomic). Her wardrobe in this scene acts as the first hint at Lorraine’s weaponized femininity in the film. By concealing a handgun, one of the more typical symbols of spy and action films in American cinematic language, within a purse, the film establishes a unique difference from many other spy films. The previous scene established an empathetic bond with the audience on a human level, but this scene makes the distinction of Lorraine utilizing her feminine role to her advantage. Following the shot of the handbag and handgun,

Leitch uses a full body shot to capture Lorraine smoothly putting on her white vinyl trench coat to once again make this distinction. Lorraine’s coat functions as a type of armor, not only against the cold but also against detection and scrutiny.

While she puts the coat on in the background of the frame, the foreground is composed of empty space and the corner of the bed separates Lorraine from the

Rosillo 6 audience in the midground. Lorraine slowly constructs distance between herself and the outside world, but her armor and weapons are not those of the traditional secret agent. She does not hide her true self from the audience with a fedora and discrete suit or indiscrete tuxedo, but with vinyl trench coats and large rose-tinted sunglasses. This moment is the first step towards establishing Lorraine’s weaponized femininity in the film by establishing her feminine armor. Strutting around London in a shiny coat while carrying a firearm in a small purse on knee- high, stiletto heeled boots allows the audience to understand how Lorraine’s defenses work. This scene forms the audience’s understanding of the defensive mode of weaponized femininity and hints at how the second might be applicable.

Not long after this scene the audience is introduced to the offensive mode of weaponized femininity. The dichotomy between her projected femininity and her desire to blend in feature in the next two scenes. As the film cycles back to the assignment of the mission she is being debriefed on at the beginning of the film,

Lorraine features in more masculine and less stark clothing. When K and C brief her on her upcoming mission to Berlin, she wears a traditional film noir style trench coat with a grey pantsuit beneath it. This outfit projects an air of subtle deference to her male superiors and seems to fit in with the traditional costumes of spies attempting to blend in. Once she arrives in Berlin, that attitude changes. She walks off the plane in red high heels in an impractical-looking pinstripe trouser and

Rosillo 7 bustier over a white button-up shirt, an outfit which projects overtly feminized confidence. Additionally, the inclusion of the bustier, a garment typically worn underneath outerwear signals the emergence of the specifically feminine aspect of her character. Bustiers are specifically related to women’s undergarments and as such are typically sexualized. Here Lorraine wears it at the forefront of her clothing choices. Lorraine walks into Berlin with purpose and a carefully cultivated projection of powerful femininity. Once again hidden behind the rose- tinted sunglasses, she calmly assesses the situation with Bremovych’s henchmen and identifies the places they have hidden weapons. Once she has decided she’s been “made” by the Russians, she calmly packs her sunglasses away and casually removes one of her heels. Here Lorraine’s weaponized femininity transforms from defensive to offensive. Using only a red stiletto heel, Lorraine single-handedly disarms the two Soviet agents in the car with her, pushing one out of the vehicle and wresting control of the car from the other. Her outfits, clearly a method of camouflaging herself and conditioning others into underestimating her, literally becomes her weapon; in stabbing these two men with her incredibly feminine footwear, Lorraine establishes that her femininity can be used as a more effective weapon in her hands than a gun could ever hope to in less capable hands.

The third mode of weaponized femininity seems to be a reconstruction of a traditional trope of spy films: the seductive female spy. Lorraine uses sexually

Rosillo 8 suggestive clothes twice in the first half of the film to “make contact” with foreign intelligence, first with Bremovych and then with Delphine. These scenes lean on more typical visual language for the seductive spy and incorporates lingering shots typical of the male “gaze” (Mulvey 20). The first of these scenes begins with

Lorraine entering a restaurant with the intention of meeting and presumably getting information from Bremovych. The shot following her entrance into the restaurant features one of the classic cinema shots of a woman shrugging off her coat and exposing her bare back or shoulders. The outfit Lorraine dons for this interaction emphasizes her ability to use sexual situations to her advantage. The close, waist- up shots of Lorraine linger on the skin exposed by her slinky wrap dress. The red tone of the lighting, while concealing the precise color of her dress, intensifies the contrast between the dark, sequined fabric and Lorraine’s pale skin. Her outfit draws the eye’s attention, while her playfully abrupt tone seems designed to rebuff and invite. These tactics were specifically constructed to catch Bremovych’s attention, but the attempted rendezvous is interrupted by Delphine, the emerging

“love interest” of the protagonist. This moment exemplifies another shift from the typical spy narrative. The seductive “femme fatale” approach of the protagonist is foiled by female solidarity and sexual attraction, both of which do not tend to feature in traditional spy films. While this makes a welcome intervention in the female spy narrative, Lorraine’s decision to strike up a “relationship” with

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Delphine in order to gain information does still lend itself to the seductress trope

(Atomic). Still, it is an important attempt at a shift in this narrative, particularly in regards to weaponized femininity. Lorraine’s attempted “seduction” of a man being intercepted by another woman for her benefit places importance on relationships between women while acknowledging the roots of the seductive mode of weaponized femininity.

All three of these aspects of weaponized femininity culminate in the final act of the film in order to demonstrate the constructed nature of weaponized femininity and Lorraine’s control over that projection. At this point in the film, both the audience and her MI6 superiors have been lulled into a false state of understanding by Lorraine, but that begins to change when Lorraine reveals the fate of David

Percival. When Lorraine reveals her fabricated recording of David Percival dealing with Bremovych as the supposed “Satchel,” the rapid-cut montage of Lorraine recording and piecing together bits of audio on the tape recording exposes her plot to frame Percival for what the audience now knows is Lorraine’s crimes of being

“Satchel.” Throughout the film, Lorraine has quietly been using the camouflage and seductive modes of weaponized femininity to orchestrate the ultimate offensive maneuver against Percival: beneath her clothing and lingerie Lorraine has taped a recording device to herself. When this recording device was first introduced, Leitch’s camera gratuitously traced up Lorraine’s body in extreme

Rosillo 10 close-ups of her body in stockings, panties, bra, and eventual slip. These shots themselves implicate the audience in the very objectification they know Lorraine exploits. The audience is encouraged not to dwell on the function of the recording device when first introduced to it. Though there are repeated shots of Lorraine wearing and taping the recording device to her body clad only in underwear and shots of her listening to conversations a second time on cassette tape, the audience is kept largely unaware of the purpose of Lorraine’s recordings. During the conclusion of Lorraine’s debriefing, the film cuts to scenes where Lorraine prods out incriminating quotes from Percival, including their brief meeting inside a

Berlin night club. The final declaration the construct Lorraine has prepared for the debriefing include Lorraine piecing segments of tape together in order to frame

Percival as Satchel. This reveal of Lorraine’s constructs is further emphasized by the final scene of the film.

The final scene culminates with all three modes of weaponized femininity being utilized before it is stripped away and reaffirms Lorraine as ultimately a human. When Lorraine appears in a Parisian hotel room clad in a bright red coat and a brunette wig, it is a nod to the audience that her weaponized femininity is still being employed, foreshadowing her status as a triple agent. The reassertion of the construct also appears in her behavior towards Bremovych, whom she meets in this hotel. She continues to engage in the flirtatious banter from their first onscreen

Rosillo 11 encounter, playing into Bremovych’s expectations of what he presumes is his successful double agent, the actual Satchel. This method perfectly combines the first and third modes of weaponized femininity in order to deceive Bremovych, but still manages to instantly adapt into the offensive weaponry of the second method.

Though she does not use an article of clothing to fight Bremovych’s henchmen, she does utilize a traditionally female role in order to conceal and retrieve her weapon. At the start of this scene, Lorraine played the acquiescing woman by pouring drinks for their toast. During this exchange, Bremovych prompts Lorraine to drink her glass before he imbibes his own, indicating that he suspects her of poisoning the alcohol. This alludes to a trope older than film itself: the treacherous female poisoner. In yet another shift of the typical narrative surrounding female spies, Lorraine is not hiding poison within the ice bucket, but a modern form of weaponry with her gun buried safely within the ice. Lorraine uses this association with female subservience to conceal a weapon which she uses to smoothly and efficiently dispose of Bremovych’s henchmen and Bremovych himself. After the fight, Lorraine explicitly states that the maneuvers she has been preforming were all a part of an elaborate construction: “I never worked for you. You worked for me.” The final shots of the film depict Lorraine literally and physically removing her disguise and show her transition back into the woman beneath the spy persona.

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Lorraine pulling off the brunette wig and wiping the blood spatter off her face signify the return of the real, vulnerable woman from the beginning of the film and the removal of the modes of weaponized femininity. When Lorraine walks onto the CIA plane, she does so with her blonde hair pinned up in a messy bun.

She returns to the unvarnished woman and the beginning of the film, and with that hairstyle the audience is fully reminded that the weaponized femininity remained a tool for Lorraine to use throughout the film. According to the online publication

HelloGiggles’s interviews with the stunt coordinator Sam Hargrave and costume designer Cindy Evans, the stylized wardrobe and action sequences were intended to evoke a powerful but explicitly feminine heroine (Smith). The effort to produce this heroine was ultimately successful, but marginally less so than it likely would have been from a female director, but the film seems to gesture at the constructed nature of traditional femininity. In Atomic Blonde, a woman can harness femininity, which has been constructed in the American minds as being specifically connected to the consumption of beautiful clothing, and retool it to her advantage in a situation fraught with absolute peril. Lorraine takes ownership of a set of expectations meant to control her and uses those expectations to pit two national intelligence agencies against each other. In the Washington Post, Kristen

Page-Kirby argues that labeling Lorraine as a “lady James Bond” is a reductive perspective to take on the work Atomic Blonde undertakes (Page-Kirby). While

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Page-Kirby’s argument is not without merit, the film demands recognition of

Lorraine’s femininity. This move demands recognition of the ability to weaponize the dismissive expectations towards overtly feminine presentation is a skill which is uniquely applicable to women and can be highly effective in capable hands.

Atomic Blonde is not without flaws and problematic appeals to the sexually objectifying male gaze, but with Lorraine as its protagonist and femininity weaponized in her hands, it takes strides towards equality in the portrayal of women in action films.

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Works Cited

Atomic Blonde. Dir. David Leitch. 87Eleven, 2017. Film.

Brady, Miranda J. “The Well-Tempered Spy: Family, Nation, and the Female

Secret Agent in Alias.” Secret Agents: Popular Icons Beyond James Bond,

edited by Jeremy Packer, Peter Lang, 2009, pp. 111-132.

Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasures in Narrative Cinema.” Visual and Other

Pleasures. 2nd ed., Palgrave Macmillan, 2009, pp. 14-27.

Page-Kirby, Kristen. “The Power of 'Atomic Blonde' Isn't a Girl Thing.” The

Washington Post, WP Company, 28 July 2017,

www.washingtonpost.com/express/wp/2017/07/28/atomic-blondes-power-

isnt-a-girl-thing/?noredirect=on.

Plantinga, Carl R. Introduction. Moving Viewers: American Film and the

Spectators Experience, University of California Press, 2009, pp. 1-17.

Smith, C. Holly. “Charlize Theron's Heel Fight Scene in ‘Atomic Blonde’ Is a

Reminder That Women Can Be Feminine *and* Badass.” HelloGiggles,

Meredith Corporation, 28 July 2017, hellogiggles.com/reviews-

coverage/movies/atomic-blonde-charlize-theron-heel-fight-scene-sam-

hargrave-cindy-evans/.