Searching for Angela Shelton
The portrayal of rape, abuse, and molestation committed against women in Searching for Angela Shelton differs greatly from the current portrayal of such acts in modern culture. Typically, it is seen that most rapists have absolutely no connections to their victims, although this portrayal is starting to change with the knowledge that most rapists actually are family or friends of their victims. This is the case with most, if not all, of the women that are interviewed or featured in the film. The majority of the time on shows like CSI the rapist is a random man off the street, while the abusers are usually closely connected to the victim. In this respect, the representations on TV fit well with the testimonies of the film's Angela Sheltons.
Another aspect of difference is the fact that the filmmaker Angela Shelton was also abused by a woman, her step-mother. This is very rarely seen on TV crime shows; usually the woman is the victim and never the culprit. I feel that by never depicting the woman as the assailant, screenwriters and TV producers are in a way feeding into the stereotype that women are always weak and susceptible to men. Men being victimized by women is not unheard of at all, but it is never seen on television. In this regard, I think that it is admirable that a woman was also portrayed as a "bad guy" in the filmmaker's narrative, even though Angela never actually confronted her as she did with her father and brother.