In Greta Gerwig’s Little Women (2019), a coming-of-age film that revolves around the lives of the March girls as they transition into adulthood and are forced to maneuver through a highly misogynistic period of time, the Young Girl at School appears very briefly in one scene to contrast Amy’s personality and challenge her worldview in a way that foreshadows Amy’s transition into a self-aware young lady. In the particular scene we are exploring, we see a young Amy at school surrounded by girls who are seemingly trying to convince her to draw Abraham Lincoln (0:37:02). The girls are not only physically framing Amy and placing her in the focus point of our gaze, but also their “sharp-edged” personalities, contrasted by Amy’s timid demeanor, force us to pay attention to what they are saying (Straw 80). Amy’s presence in this scene is very clear as the girls all serve a similar purpose and are all directing their focus, and ours, towards Amy; however, one of the girls stands out by challenging Amy’s beliefs straight on by saying that she and her family benefited from the system that prompted the war, i.e., slavery. This conversation subverts the power Amy, a leading character, has over the scene and shines a spot light on this girl as she introduces to Amy the notion of the unfair/unbalanced system from which she and her family have benefitted. The importance of this small interaction comes from the fact that it foreshadows Amy’s growth on the latter part of the film as she recognizes the unjust, misogynistic system while at the same time acknowledging that she has little power to change it and is ready to take her place as a woman in a man’s world (Williams 102). The Young Girl at School’s role in this film becomes of paramount importance because this scene is an important piece in Amy’s character arc and her change into the self-aware and strong young lady.
Gerwig, Greta, director. Little Women. Columbia Pictures, 2019.
Straw, Will. “Introduction.” Screen, vol. 52, no. 1, 2011, pp. 78–81, https://doi.org/10.1093/screen/hjq057
Williams, Melanie. “Entering the paradise of anomalies: studying female character acting in British cinema.” Screen, vol. 52, no. 1, 2011, pp. 97–104, https://doi.org/10.1093/screen/hjq064
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