The background of this study starts with interest in diversity films produced for social minorities such as female workers inside the industrial structure where commercial movies with large capital dominate. Also, taking notice on how narratives in the form of drama film and documentaries selectively provide various stories of real life and give significance to the reality as a strong culture field which assumes the role of public sphere, this study observed how drama films and documentaries select which realities and how it provides them as stories.
This study selected the drama film <Alice in Eamesland> and the documentary <Factory Complex>, both of which handle the common theme of female workers of Korea, for analysis , first, to see how the reality of female workers of Korea is composed using the narrative analysis method, second, to analyze how the otherness of female workers of Korea is represented using visual representation analysis, and finally, to observe how undertone in the otherness of female workers of Korea is composed in each piece of work. For this, narrative structure and video representation analyses are set as research methods and used to analyze the film and the documentary. Narrative structure analysis first analyzes the entire story of the two pieces in units of sequence, observing the flow and changes of story, and based on this analysis, navigates the characteristics of the narrative structure’s main composition factors of character, plot, and setting. Visual representation analysis is conducted with focus around scene analysis, and description of camera techniques, audio and video.
The result of this study is observed as the following:
First, in the result of analysis of narrative structure and aspects of female workers in <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex>, <Alice in Eamesland> takes the structure of repeated misfortune and happiness taking place in the normal status of the character within a story of diligent female worker dreaming of happiness. Within this structure, the film takes plot composition in which conflict is amplified and eventually concluded in revenge. Based on such a narrative structure, the female worker in <Alice in Eamesland> is reflected in the aspect of a character dreaming unrealistic desire and transformed into an inhumane character to achieve it.
<Factory Complex> describes transformation of female labor and history of female labor movement through interviews with female workers of different generations. Such stories proceed with structure where female workers in abnormal status from unfortunate labor face continued misfortune, and through this misfortune, the conflict is amplified. The movie takes plot in which the events amplifying conflict progress through misfortune, sympathy, and concludes with comforting. Based on this narrative structure, female workers of <Factory Complex> transformed from manual laborer in the industrial era to temporary worker in the sophisticated contemporary era, and even the change of the era shows that low wages and poor labor conditions are widespread.
Second, through the visual reflection method of the two pieces, this study observed how image of female workers'' labor is reflected, and how image of men and result of female labor are reflected in the pieces. Labor carried out by female workers of <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex> is reflected in each piece as a life-threatening labor and a life-threatened labor. <Alice in Eamesland> reflected female workers'' labor as an unrealistically sophisticated and skilled technique, to reflect the paradox in which the worker has to kill others (generally men) to survive in the male-centered social structure. On the other hand, labor carried out by female workers of <Factory Complex> is reflected using abstract factors such as poverty, hope, hell, and pain, which threaten their life. Through this reflection, the reality is emphasized in that female workers’ life can be sufficiently threatened only with work.
The male perspective in <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex> is reflected in images of lost helper, onlooker, observer, and antagonist, in which men in <Alice in Eamesland> are portrayed as incompetent objects otherizing women who are competent subjects, showing strong disdain and contempt not only against the female workers, but against the female gender itself, reflecting female workers as the object of otherization.
The result of female workers’ labor in <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex> is reflected in each piece as ‘cruel revenge’ in <Alice in Eamesland>, and ‘comforting through solidarity’ in <Factory Complex>.
Third, observing the undertone from analysis results of narrative structure and visual reflection method of <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex>, both pieces present the gap between personal misfortune of the female workers and the social structure as the core of the theatrical motif. The female workers in both pieces are poor and from lower class, portrayed to be deprived of freedom of occupation although it is a vital condition to escape the poverty they are suffering, and through the social structure which makes the escape impossible, the pieces tell the story that her (their) misfortune is caused more by the society than the individual(s) themselves. Also, as antagonists presented in <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex>, the powerlessness in perspective of the male towards the female workers supports further otherization of the female. In the two pieces, the male workers are one-dimensional antagonists who live in the same era as the female workers, but the Korean social structure itself, including the male workers themselves, is implied as the strong antagonist of the female workers.
Also, <Alice in Eamesland> and <Factory Complex> only sympathize with their situation, but do not present a solution. The narrative structure and reflection method that do not present a solution signify the otherization of the female and the workers.
The female workers in both pieces are others that exist externally to the male. Once they realize the gap between their desire and the male-dominated social structure, they are frustrated and hurt. The two pieces describe and reflect the despair of female workers who cannot be included into the governing structure, each based on fiction and reality. Through this process of description and reflection, the two pieces can be said to emphasize the importance of discussion about others and otherness, which presents sense of existence of oneself actively within the society and records oneself.
The limits of this study is that, first, this study utilized the methodology of narrative structure and the visual reflection method of drama film and documentary, and it is assumed there is a certain level of difference in the methods of meaning construction of drama film based on fiction and documentary based on reality, but in the two pieces which were the objects of analysis, no meaningful differences could be found, other than the differences in formalities.
Second, in the same context as the first limitation above, this paper selected one drama film and one documentary to be studied, and there is a clear limitation in generalizing the results of this research. It can be said as a limitation.
Third, the discussion regarding otherness of female workers needs further expansion into discourse studies about the keywords ‘others, workers, female’, audience studies, and feminism studies, together with the analysis of a specific visual artwork, to achieve deeper discussion.