The Female Avenger, Women’s Anger and Rape-Revenge Film and Television

The Female Avenger, Women’s Anger and Rape-Revenge Film and Television examines the contentious nature of the female rape survivor turned avenger in rape-revenge stories. The focus is on a trend of contemporary rape-revenge film made by women directors. Vaage asks what it might mean for women in particular to watch female avengers, and suggests that the reason some women filmmakers explore the rape-revenge convention is because it is all about an emotion that is difficult for women, and used to label women as difficult, namely anger.

The central premise in this book is that understanding the emotions stirred up by this type of story is crucial in order to understand its recurring, controversial presence in popular culture, and also its potential value. Vaage offers a cultural and political analysis of contemporary rape-revenge film made by women grounded in the psychological and philosophical study of the emotions.

Margrethe Bruun Vaage is a Senior Lecturer in Film and Media at the University of Kent. She works in cognitive film theory, at the intersection between film theory, philosophy and psychology, and specializes in exploring the spectator’s engagement with fictional films and television series, and more specifically emotions and morality. Her work includes The Antihero in American Television, and she has published widely in film and philosophy.