CF and Representation

• Captain Fantastic and Representation 


  Representation of women - Very Stereotypical - e.g. Opening scene - through the performance of women doing stereotypical tasks such as cooking, presented as moaning through the dialogue "Dad Zaja has the boning knife again"
• Captain Fantastic and Representation

  Representation of women - The film is centred around men - Ben is the main character and the storyline is based on Bo coming of age
• Captain Fantastic and Representation

  Representations of women - Abigail is presented as weaker than her husband Jack in the funeral scene through performance and dialogue when she wants to spend time with the children "Honey would you just give me a minute" "No, Leslie's waiting"
• Captain Fantastic and Representation

  Captain Fantastic does not feature any/little representation in terms of race. Everyone seems to be white
• Captain Fantastic and stereotypes

  Stereotype of fat Americans - "What's wrong with them" "Are they sick?" "Everyone's so fat[...] Fat like hippos"
• Captain Fantastic and stereotypes

  Stereotype of Christians - film mocks Christianity - "We aren't mean to anyone" "Except Christians", binary opposition of Christianity vs Buddhism, Ben vs Jack. Christmas described as a "Fat, ficticious Elf", pretending to be religious in order to scare the policeman away, Noam Chomsky day and ending sequence when they dig Leslie's body up and burn it (Burial a Christian practise)
• Captain Fantastic and stereotypes

  Left wing stereotype that Ben is a dictator - Mise-en-scene suggests they are a tribe
• Captain Fantastic and stereotypes

  Anti-stereotype of home-schooling - Ben's children are more clever than the average kids, seen in the Bill of Rights scene