Again-this comment might contain a handful of grammatical mistakes but it's too late (aka 3am) for me to care so please bear with me if you decide to read it through.
There are so many feminist film studies analysis that this movie can do. I even think I can write five thousand words based on this movie. Unfortunately, I am no longer a (half-hanging) film major...
It is better to watch with That feminist manifesto .
First of all: women do not need to be "men" in order to justify their greatness; brilliance itself should be genderless, and so is power in its essence.
Second of all: both men and women need someone who truly appreciates and is compatible with them-as a partner and as a friend.
And third of all: family/love life and work life can be balanced. It's not the issue of being "men" or "women" (though the binary upbringing for men and women is indeed part of the problem). Navigating a married life is an issue of initial compatibility of the two parties, the extent of love/appreciation that you have for each other, the willingness to work out a solution base on what you have that suits you both, and, for the last resort, the courage to leave for someone more suitable. It's hard, but it's possible, and it takes two to navigate unless you're willing to settle down with a robot.
True, some men's imagination of "someone who truly appreciate them" is very limited as portrayed in the film: a woman who'd attend to them wholeheartedly and some other men who'd engage in silly aggressive activities with them. Plus the echo chamber effect in the Stepford area, the Stepford men have evolved into this patriarchal alpha male stereotype: self-centred, narcissistic beings that objectify women, thinking they're taking men's place by becoming independent/great. A lot of patriarchal values they've managed to absorb from their upbringing plus some brainwashing could achieve that pretty easily.
Now onto the women: they really need to find better men to be in a relationship with. It's even harder because decent men are SO rare due to them being raised in patriarchal values. But seriously though, the creation of "the Stepford society" derives from the dissatisfaction of Claire's marriage, and she somehow fails to imagine an alternative to this most conservative romantic ideal in which socially-constructed gender roles are reinforced in the most disgusting way. Free-will, individuality and intellectual capacity of women are no longer in the equation (literally-erased). Claire imposed her will on all of them.
"Human stupidity plus advanced technology. Trust me, it's unbeatable." ~ Doctor Who (lol)
Family is the smallest "unit" of a society, and the Stepford phenomenon is typical of the families where women are empowered (aka "becoming men" in men's terms, lol), challenging men's position to the point where men performed another level of systematic oppression upon women-biohack. Though a woman started it, the already-existing misogyny in our society is so handy to be put into use by her to create this seemingly-ideal, homogenised hell.
The film itself is a micocosm of the patriarchy. It includes elements of total objectification and systematic oppression of women through the vessel of science fiction. By presenting Bobbie, the woman who'd totally rejected the dichotomy of gender roles and Joanna, the woman who "used-to-feed-off-of-gender-division-but-is-now-really-ambivalent", the film presents two different viewpoints on the patriarchy. By presenting Claire, the film made it clear that a patriarch doesn' t have to be a man. It's a solely value-based, gender-blind casting and everyone can easily veer into it if you have enough power.
The ending of this film is very telling as well. Clearly the men are not ALL stupid-some of them worked in Disney, Microsoft, etc., but in the end, the gender roles are as clean cut as before but simply in reverse: women in charge doing what they like, men are being oppressed and taking on all the houseworks. (aka homomorphic revenge, aka one size fits all family cooking husband, aka it's still a binary, aka NO) Yes, I admit the female part of me really enjoyed seeing men getting tortured like how they've tortured the women and they deserve it, but the film fails to envision a better future where gender roles/barriers are completely shattered and people can get together for the sake of compatibility. The nuance of human/couple relationships fail to be addressed. (I don't blame it tbh-the film itself is 15 years old and it's hard for people to imagine a world like that even now, let alone then.) Would the men learn anything through oppression? Is it productive? I doubt it. Though those fat, bald, sexist and misogynistic men are so damn helpless, women should just...idk, compell them to housework for a period of time simply for torturing them , then get a proper divorce with good financial deal and find someone better.
In terms of audiovisual arrangements: I really liked how the film employ the stereotypical, light vanilla colours and their semantics to create this deeply artificial environment. The rain, thunder and the light/dark contrast are handled well too.
The colour of Joanna's clothes (black---pink) has obvious implications such as gender-conformingness/being sucked in by Stepford, etc., but Joanna's hairstyle at the end of the film really grabbed my attention. It's short, but it's blonde -it signifies her growth. She'd evolved from being a callous tv personality to a point where any shreds of feminity was rejected by her (signified by short, black hair) as well as trying to be perfectly obedient and totally submissive (signified by long, blonde hair). This version of herself is a combination of both: being totally free to express herself however she wants. It's very nicely handled.
Moving on to personal babblings: Long live the old science fiction, twists and turns are arranged properly and have a full sense of age. There is also the American vulgar cream vanilla pastel color and their semantics, which is really a very interesting movie.
Given that it is a film made in 2004 based on a novel written in 1975: this franchise is truly streets ahead.
(Using the Community reference because, yeah, I found this film through Britta saying Steppwolf Wives in the marriage episode; and when I was rewatching that particular clip on Youtube I found the explanation/film in the comments section xD)
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