Good evening Sir Casocot!

This is our Feminist Criticism on the movie “Antonia’s Line”

Thank you Sir and God Bless!

Submitted by Group 5 Section A:

Roleda, Dominique

Manso, Rhaze

Mantilla, Caem

Suminguit, Anna Mae

Tanquiamco, Miciola Mitch

A Feminist Criticism on the movie

entitled “Antonia’s Line”

Antonia's Line (Original title: Antonia) is a 1995 Dutch feminist film written and directed
by Marleen Gorris. The film, described as a "feminist fairy tale", tells the story of the
independent Antonia who, after returning to the anonymous Dutch village of her birth,
establishes and nurtures a close-knit matriarchal community. The film covers a breadth of
topics, with themes ranging from death and religion to sex, intimacy, lesbianism, friendship and
love.

Antonia is an elderly woman who wakes up one morning and realizes that this is the last
day of her life. She begins to tell her story in flashback, beginning with her arrival home to the
family farm after World War II with her daughter, Antonia and her descendants come to
symbolize the freedom of independent females, with little need for men in their lives.

Antonia came back to her village when she knew her mother was dying. She is a widow
and single mother of a teenage daughter, Antonia is a formidable personality. She’s smart,
proud, outspoken and clearly the equal of any man - especially given the narrow-minded bigotry
that passes for masculinity thereabouts. She was accompanied by her daughter that also had a
great part in the story. In a quiet rural setting, where people are busy working to make a living,
you can still see a community full of judgment and hatred. Even after the war, Antonia
mentioned that it had never changed and yes it was indeed. The patriarchy was so evident in
the story, for almost the characters were men and still privilege and slavery exist. One example
of this was the sitting arrangement in the church where men are in the right side facing the altar
and women are in the left side.

At the beginning of the movie, it is really evident that women are inferior to men in such
a way that there are certain scenes where women were treated badly, abused verbally and
sexually harassed even in men in the family. It is evident to Antonia and her daughter upon
entering a room or a café where men whistled- this maybe a compliment but still improper on
addressing to a woman’s beauty and grandeur. Women are treated as objects that fathers can
sell their daughters to gentlemen and verbally spit words that are very degrading and inhumane
to the daughter’s part. Like one father after the burial of Antonia’s Mother, He announced to the
room, that his daughter is up to the offer too (marrying someone), wherein she may not be the
smartest but she’s strong as a sow and her trousers has been ready for years and laughed
mockingly with one of the brothers touching or gripping her breast in front of everybody. In this
scenario, we can observe that women are treated unfairly and unjustly. Were do not have
freedom, voice and rights to say no. Women are oppressed and mistreated with men where
men can easily spank the back of their heads or kick them whenever they please even without
reasons. There is also a time in the movie where Dedee, a woman, is forced to do sexual act
even without consent and very unwilling, even though it is spread in the neighborhood, nobody
cares and remained silent even the Church, nobody acted upon it and no authorities and laws to
capture those perverts. No laws protects women. The norm in the movie is PATRIARCHIAL and
men where at an advantage than women. They have freedom, liberty to do things, POWER and
ability to be heard and sided on the society for male point of view is considered universal.

But the world of Antonia is very different with the norm in the society instead in her
home, she unconsciously build a family where people are accepted and treated fairly either you
are men and women. Everybody is working and eating on the table happily. This is an example
of MATRIARCHIAL for Antonia is the head of the house and she is the one regulating/ decision
maker. Even herself a widow, she is strong, confident, and knowledgeable and empowered in
such a way that she knows her value and she’s not afraid to voice out her thoughts on certain
issues. She is kind and just wherein she let her daughter Danielle to have the freedom she
deserves. She even let her choose what she wanted to pursue such as Fine Arts and having a
baby without a father figure supporting her. She supported her daughter in everything.

The situation is far from idyllic; rape, murder and suicide are not unknown in this movie.
Encompassing five decades, the film traces Antonia's family line down through the generations
to her great-granddaughter. The farm is a matriarchy in which men do have a place but little, if
any, authority. All traditional institutions of authority are, in fact, distrusted here, including
organized religion. The generations of Antonia's line are defined by their females, with no formal
marriages necessary.

Danielle, for example, is a lesbian who, with her mother's support, contrives to have a
child through a one-night stand. This movie is full of sex which for them is very normal, even for
women, to be used, impregnated and treated like toys for the pleasure of men. Antonia is like a
super hero for women who bounces back from the tragedies of life with strength tenfold. She
manages inequality, empowers those around her, and will pull a shotgun on anyone who hurts
her loved ones. After watching Antonia’s Line, It was amazing to see the bold, fierceness of
Antonia’s spirit, as if watching her do life “right” made me want to do that to another thing was
Antonia doesn’t need a partner to feel fulfilled since she was already happy with her daughter
and granddaughter with her. Women possess safe choices for their bodies. When Danielle’s
daughter Therèse becomes pregnant a debate briefly sparks over whether she should keep it or
not, a decision she ultimately makes on her own. However, before she does so half of the
villagers in Antonia’s camp tell her to keep it while the other half suggests getting rid of it and
Antonia gets to live her life the way she wants to, fostering love in everything and everyone she
befriends, and on her own terms she gets to decide when to call it quits. There’s nothing more
empowering than that.

However, the pressure of the story does not hinder the confidence and womanhood of
Antonia. She displays a character who is strong, courageous and independent. She had no
fears to men even if it was a priest. Antonia opened the heart, mind and eyes of her daughter
Danielle to how the real society and men is, by telling her what she had been through and the
story of their village before. The feminism of the movie was clear when Antonia was asked by a
villager man to be his wife and the most amazing part was her response, "what for?" and the
man nodded after. It was so unusual on this time that a woman will reject a man's offer, however
Antonia did.