Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

I actually watched this film as part of a required women's studies course during my undergraduate education. The film itself can be frustrating because of the plot line, but I am giving it a good rating because of the way it was written and produced. I think the intent of this movie was to make a statement. Apparently, my professors agreed.

The film, “The 24-Hour Woman” represents the appropriation of women in many ways. When I watched this film, my professors drilled this term over and over as a key idea that was central to the movie. Appropriation can be defined as the oppression of women by men and society, through possession, material value, and property ownership. It is said to cause a separation of classes, dividing men and women into separate, unequal categories.

The film, “The 24 Hour Woman” is a good representation of the appropriation of women in society. The character played by Rosie Perez, Grace Santos, is a young, successful television producer, and when she becomes pregnant, the show utilizes her pregnancy to boost their ratings and to have topics to cover in each segment. From the beginning of the movie, it is easy to see how the women are oppressed. Grace is treated extremely impersonally, as if she is simply a means to achieving end- ratings for the show, etc. No one seems to actually care or notice that she is a person, a human being who has emotions. Grace is completely used as an object, with the television station’s main concern as the shows’ outcome, rather than Grace herself.

In “The 24 Hour Woman”, the other members of the show also experience oppression and appropriation. Grace hires a woman (Madeline) to fill in for her, during the pregnancy and birth. She warns Madeline that she is overqualified for the position, will be underpaid, and will have long hours. Madeline accepts the job without hesitation, and admits that she already works full time without pay. It is a struggle for her to have to leave her husband at home to take care of the domestic duties, and even so, she still comes home from a hard day of work to have to tend to more domestic duties. With three children, a husband, and a full time job, she struggles to keep things together.
When Grace finally has the baby, we see that she is the sole caretaker of the baby, working full time to take care of her daughter. Her husband works as an actor, and relieves himself of the domestic duties. He is rarely present, and when he is, he does not bother to help with any of the work. On the rare occasion that he does, he immediately absolves himself of this “burden”. Family and friends also criticize Grace for her parenting abilities, and are many times hypocritical in this sense.

Once Grace goes back to work at the television station, she is forced to hire a nanny for the baby, yet still she has an unimaginable amount of duties to take care of. Her boss expects that even though she has a new baby, that Grace will be able to provide herself in entirety to both her work and her domestic duties. She experiences the pressures of society in a double bind, in which people subject her to their personal opinions. These pressures force guilt on her, telling her that she is wrong for not staying home and taking care of her daughter, and also for not going to work. There is no possible way that Grace can satisfy the wants of all the people in her life at once. She is pressured by her relatives, her husband, the people she works with, her boss, and even by people who don’t know her.

The film shows the tremendous responsibilities of women who have families to take care of as well as jobs. Society places stereotypes on these women, forcing them to make difficult decisions. There was the expectation that the women should be perfect, in the sense that they should be able to take care of everything, making everyone happy.

This film is not only a fictitious story. It has much more to say than it might seem.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: VHS