Although running her own successful real estate firm, Carolyn Burnham was always second best to Buddy Kane. He had many employees working for him, selling his houses, building his reputation. Carolyn was all on her own trying to give herself a reputation. Every house she showed, she did by herself. In one scene her preparations for an open house were shown. The viewer was able to see everything she went through to get a house ready to show while Buddy Kane was able to get somebody else to do that for him. Carolyn was shown walking up at 5 a.m. to go set-up the house. She was shown cleaning every inch of the house. She washed all the windows and vacuumed the carpets and scrubbed every inch of the house. And despite all of her hard work, six or seven possible purchasers walked through the house and decided not to purchase. Not only did they not buy the house, but in the film each of these characters made a point of pointing out something to Carolyn which was wrong with the house. One couple commented on the fact that the pool was advertised as exotic and yet it was not exotic enough. Frustrated, Carolyn replied, “ There are leaves in the pool, that’s exotic”. This display is a great example of how women are portrayed in relation to their male counterparts. Buddy, the calm successful and established real estate agent in comparison with Carolyn who works 16 hour days just to succeed.

This portrayal of women offering sexual favours with career advancement opportunities as the return favours was also displayed in “The Associate”. No, Whoopi did not offer sex in return for promotion but Bebe Neuwirth, the shamelessly aggressive Camille who uses her feminine wiles to get ahead on Wall Street. Working for Fallon, a major Street Player, and a future partner of the mysterious Mr. Robert S. Cutty, Camille wants to do everything in her power to get the inside edge. Camille is the ideal stereotype of the women Hollywood portrays as those willing to sleep their way to the top. While talking to Laurel Ayres, (Whoopi’s female character in the film), trying on lingerie in a lingerie store, Laurel asks Camille she can expect to be respected in the business world when her attitude is that she can always have sex for success, and her response is that as a woman in business your brain can only take you so far and your body has to do the rest. This demoralization of an educated successful businesswoman continues in the film when Camille finally meets Mr. Cutty. Instead of trying to talk to him about business, her first instinct is to sneak into his room and tries to seduce him when he arrives. Instead of wowing him with her mind - staying true to her word – Camille tries to win Mr. Cutty over with her body. And while she is doing this, she has no look of shame. Even after being lectured that what she is doing is demoralizing and wrong – from who she believes is a man – she is only upset that she was unable to have sex with him and not that she looked like a fool.

The idea of sex was also used not to enhance a career but rather an image. Another image of women blown out of proportion by Hollywood is that of the teenaged girl and her willingness to use sex as a tool to increase popularity. This was shown very throughout the entire film of “American Beauty” with Mena Suvari’s character Angela Hayes. A teenage girl in the film, Angela does not use the actual act of sex itself as way to improve her image but rather just the discussion of sexual thoughts. Angela believes that if she gives off the impression that she has had sex people will like her and respect her more. She feels as though sex makes a person more mature. It makes her feel in control when she discusses sex. Letting people belive that she is no longer a virgin makes her feel more grown u

Some topics in this essay:
Associate” Sally, Cutty Instead, Wall Street, Angela Hayes, Buddy Kane, Hollywood Society, Carolyn Buddy, Laurel Laurels, Angela Angela, , “american beauty”, real estate, male counterparts, “the associate”, real estate agent, business world, women portrayed, buddy kane, estate agent, real estate firm, estate firm, estate firm carolyn, sleep top, females viewed movies, actual act sex,