Rachel

• Please provide a brief summary of your research.   

I read through 250 IMDb user reviews for female-led superhero films Wonder Woman and Captain Marvel to uncover another aspect of their public reception. Both of these films were successful in two of the film industry’s standard metrics for success, professional critics reviews and box office totals, and these two factors can have a large impact on future releases. However neither of these metrics take into account what audiences say after they leave the theater and these sentiments can impact the performance of future sequels.

• What made you interested in pursuing interdisciplinary research more broadly?

If we’re being totally honest, most of what brought me into the OUR was a fear of summer plans. I first went to the OUR when Peter came into one of my classes freshman year and it seemed like a solution to my anxieties about finding an internship because the need for one hadn’t even crossed my mind. However, when I met with him I wasn’t ready to apply for a grant because I was young and had absolutely no ideas for a project. Later in my Northwestern career (as I was going through a college major identity crisis) I found my way back into the OUR because I needed something to do for my shortened summer before going abroad. This is the summer when everything “clicked” for me and I realized how interested I was in discovering more about the world through researching it and why I was always drawn more to film theory classes rather than physical production. Fear brought me into the OUR each time but what kept me coming back was a passion for what I had found and a desire to uncover more.

• What made you initially interested in researching your project in particular?

I am a woman in an industry that, as shown most recently by the #TimesUp movement, does not always treat woman fairly both in front of and behind the camera. The most recent set of female-led projects and reckoning to remove sexism from the industry gives me hope that things will improve however these things are often a slow moving process. I was drawn to studying female-led projects because I see it as my contribution to the movement.

• Describe your experiences with research thus far in your career.

I’ve know for awhile that I wanted to work in film in whatever way I could. However, what my research cemented for me is that whatever position I choose, I want to help make things better. I want to be part of the systems that are opening up the film industry for women to have successful careers without harassment or sexism. I read a lot of overwhelming negativity toward women in film during my project and that is, in some ways, disheartening. However I am choosing to be fueled by it. I do not just want to work in film, I want to change film.

• Any tips or advice you have for students interested in pursuing undergraduate research?

As much as it may be a royal pain while you are completing your project because you have to look for books that span the far reaches of the library, the best research is interdisciplinary. Nothing in the world exists independently and there is no invisible force in nature that separates the humanities from being affected by the social sciences and, as a researcher, you need to take that into account. Stay true to your vision for the project but be open to the influence who have a different set of expertise and get as many books as you can that even tangentially relate to what you are studying. University Library is free and I implore you to use and abuse that to the best of your ability- I had a gigantic tote bag that held all of my books. Cold emailing professors in as many departments as you can justifiably relate to your work is also is a must. Some may ignore you, but for the majority, their work is what they devote their life to. They *want* to talk about it and they *want* other researchers to be inspired by it. You have so much more to gain than you do to lose.

• If you had unlimited time, money, resources, support, etc. what is something you would research?

I would either continue my current research project but with different female-led films as compared to male-led predecessors- two I’ve considered are Suicide Squad vs Birds of Prey or Wolf of Wall Street vs Hustlers- or I would do research into film subtitling/dubbing into other languages.

• What is your most useless talent?

I can make myself burp on command.

• What’s the most interesting thing you’ve learned/read about/listened to this week?

Aspects from daily Pakistani-American life and culture that I find in the Ms. Marvel comic book run I’m reading.

• Favorite breakfast food?

Asiago Cheese Bagel