Discuss the way Gender is portrayed in the music video ‘Love the Way You Lie’ by Eminem Ft Rihanna.

In the extract which we watched and listened to in our Media lesson portrays Gender in many different ways. The initial view which the audience will emphasise is the fact that Eminem is the dominant male and controls the way Rihanna thinks. Rihanna is portrayed as a typical female and is upset over a little problem in love. I have a strong opinion towards the title of this song, as I believe that it is very ironic and possibly sarcastic; I think it is sarcastic; this is because lying cannot be loved no matter who does it. There is a short movie going on in the background, with Megan Fox as the actor, she acts along to the song and it creates a massive effect, this effect is the feeling of the audience being able to visualise the song as well as hear it. The attention is taken off Eminem and moved more to the actors, this idea makes the audience want to see Eminem more as you see little of him; it could be called a small type of reverse phycology. In the physical video which you see, Megan Fox is dominated by her boyfriend, which agrees with dominant ideology as the man over powers the woman. Eminem’s voice is very dominant and over powers Rihanna’s just like ideology suggests; Rihanna’s voice is very high and soft to make Eminem seem more in control.

Eminem’s dominance in this music video is teased out in many ways; through the sound, the actual video and also the lyrics. The idea of sound portraying the representation of Gender is a key theme in the video; The music tones down Rihanna comes in and gets stronger when Eminem raps, popular belief suggests that men should have a stronger voice than women and this is the case in the video ‘Love the Way You Lie’. The acting within the music video also agrees with dominant ideology, as the woman (Megan Fox) is trying to say no to the man but she ends up kissing him due to his over powering character (male). As well as this, the man is also seen stealing some alcohol from the shop, the male steals it and not the woman, this emphasises that it is a man’s job to do the dirty work, not the woman’s. The lyrics, “I laid hands on her; I guess I don’t know my own strength” shows that the man is stronger than the woman and can do what he wants to her if he wanted to, but he suggests that he doesn’t want to but did out of anger; men are portrayed to be angry and strong and this lyric shows this. Rihanna says, “Just gonna stand there and watch me cry, that’s alright…” this means that she will accept that her boyfriend doesn’t care about her feelings and is going to have to accept the fact he doesn’t care; this shows the male dominance that occurs in life even though women now have the same rights as men in the modern era.

‘Love the Way You Lie’, the title of the song. I feel that the title is very ironic as I cannot see how anyone can love the way somebody lies, even if you are in love, you will not like them lying. The title is a lyric that Rihanna says and not Eminem even though it his Eminem’s song; this shows that men have a lot of respect for women even though are over powering; it also shows that men do have emotions and can be sensitive just like women, which challenges dominant ideology.

Whilst the song is playing, a short movie is shown; Megan Fox stars in this and so does another famous male actor. In this video you can see that the man tells the woman what to do but she gets fed up and tries to leave, then she falls back into the trap of the male and kisses him again, this has a massive importance on the entire music video and suggests that the male is in control even though the female hits the man, the man does not retaliate as he has respect just as ideology says, you could call the man a Gentlemen.

Eminem’s voice is very deep and manly compared to Rihanna’s, her voice is very soft and high which makes you immediately know it is a woman singing; Eminem’s voice dominates Rihanna’s just as a man shouting would over power a female shouting.

The overall effect of this music video emphasises that the male is more dominant compared to females and shows this is a few different ways. The idea of this song is to show that men can be affectionate just as women are and to also show that women are not just ‘textbook’, they can be horrible (punching the man) just as males supposedly are, and how they are presented.