>
>         Amanda, you say it is "lamentable that the only female characters
>         in this movie ["Unforgiven"] were prostitutes." Well, yeah, but
>         don't overlook the fact that a woman NOT shown on screen, i.e.
>         William Munny's deceased wife, has great and positive impact on
>         the film. She is responsible for the "humanization"
>         of the Munny character, who had been a vicious killer in his
>         youth. Sometimes a character can throw a shadow over a movie without
>         actually appearing on screen. Another example of this is "Rebecca,"
>         in which the title character is dead at the opening of the film
>         but her shadow falls over everybody and everything. Ernie.
>
Ernie..The traditional role of women in the western has always been one
of bringing civilization to the frontier...My Darling Clementine
is a good example...i.e. the school marm image..but
the civilizing is only on the surface, and given the chance, men all revert
to the brutes they always were, just as Munny does "for a few dollars more"
and he has to relearn all his old skills...it doesn't take him long
 
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