Sounding Out the Femme Fatale-ness of Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction (1994)

Abstract

This article develops a theoretical framework for analyzing the roles of sound in character development in relation to issues of gender called the gendered character soundscape critique. This theoretical framework is applied to the character Mia Wallace from the film Pulp Fiction (1994) and illuminates the contrasting ways sound contributes to her characterization as a femme fatale. Mia Wallace is a significant character to examine because she is an iconic character, a pop culture sensation, the only female character that is predominately featured in the film, and has a dynamic character arc. The article argues that the music track, sound effects, and the absence of sound sexualize and objectify Mia Wallace within standards of hegemonic cinematic femininity, while the voice tracks work in two different ways. Mia Wallace’s voice opens a space for her to express her subjectivity and her point of view. Dialogue tracks shaped her as erotic, powerful and dangerous. However, in the final scene, the dialogue and absence of sound sexualize her and relegates her into an inferior subject position. This final scene concludes the femme fatale character arc of punishment for transgressing the hegemony and reestablishes the dominance of the patriarchal gender order over her.

1. Introduction

Pulp Fiction (1994) is an Academy Award-winning American neo-noirish gangster film directed by Quentin Tarantino, which presents several semi-intersecting stories through a nonlinear storyline. Pulp Fiction is an iconic film, and the character Mia Wallace is a lasting pop-culture and fashion icon. Mia is married to the mob boss Marsellus Wallace, who conscripts Vincent Vega, one of his gangsters, to entertain his wife Mia and presumably keep her out of trouble while he is out of town. In this neo-noirish film, Mia Wallace is presented as a femme fatale, as she is a complex, powerful woman and a danger to men, who is eventually punished for breaking away from hegemonic femininity. Mia Wallace’s dynamic character is in contrast to the other female characters in the film, such as Esmeralda Villalobos, Jody, Fabienne, and Honey Bunny, as they have stable characterizations.

Mia Wallace is also important to study because of her extratextual significances. Images of Mia Wallace were featured heavily in the marketing of the film. Her image was featured on several movie posters and on the cover of the soundtrack album to Pulp Fiction, which spent over 70 weeks on the Billboard charts, peaking at 21. Over thirty years after the film’s premiere, Mia Wallace’s blunt bob haircut and her wardrobe style are still written about in popular media, such as in Vogue Magazine, and have been a staple Halloween costume for the last three decades (Yarborough 2025; Jackson 2024; Gentile 2025). The film projected its auteur director, Quentin Tarantino, into fame for his use of existing music that is sourced diegetically from within the film world rather than the traditional originally composed music score, leading him to be recognized for this practice at the 16th Critics’ Choice Awards for their inaugural Music+Film Award (Levine 2011).

This article examines the engagement of sound in the characterization of Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction. As a gangster film, Pulp Fiction tends to be overwhelmingly masculine with a dominance of male characters, which makes it a unique film for the study of the representation of women. This article focuses on the character Mia Wallace as she is presented with complex structures of femininities and is the most prominently featured female character in the film. Mia Wallace is also the only main character shown to select a song that is played in the film, which develops a strong connection between her and the songs.

The article examines sound in this film in response to Coulthard’s (2012, p. 165) claim that the director Quentin Tarantino can be classified as what Gorbman (2007, p. 149) states is a mélomane, a term used ‘to describe those directors for whom sound and music are crucial, exciting, and innovative aspects of the medium.’ Coulthard (2012, p. 165) further stated that Tarantino could also be called what Beck and Grajeda (2008) identify as an acoustic auteur, a director ‘who can be analyzed in terms of their commitment to film sound and music’. Coulthard (2012, p. 166) discusses Tarantino’s sonic style at a macro level, engaging with his catalog of films and asserts that ‘his films require that music be taken seriously as a structuring element, thematic subject, affective experience, and sincere homage.’ This article takes the next step from Coulthard’s (ibid) overview of Tarantino’s sonic style and presents a micro-level case study that examines the acoustic impact of music, dialogue, voice, sound effects, and silence on the characterization of Mia Wallace in Pulp Fiction.

The article presents the gendered character soundscape critique as a theoretical framework for analyzing the ways in which sound contributes to the construction of Mia Wallace within the gender-based character trope of the femme fatale. The analysis begins with an examination of the dialogue between Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega when Mia Wallace is first introduced in the film. The analysis then examines the scenes from the ‘Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife’ episode through the voice, dialogue, sound effects, diegetic music, silence, and the absence of sound. Through confirming Mia’s aural construction is consistent with the notion of the femme fatale and her character arc shifts from powerful to punished, this paper argues that the film’s sound has a dual role that subverts and reinforces hegemonic female stereotypes.

2. Literature Review

The theoretical background for this research is based upon relevant scholarship on functions of film sound, gender and film sound, the femme fatale, and studies on the film Pulp Fiction and the character Mia Wallace. This section will point to two strands of film sound and gender scholarship that discuss how music and sound effects have been used to subjugate women to patriarchal ideals and sexualized stereotypes, and in some cases how the female voice has been used to liberate them. The final sections will present conceptions of the femme fatale as an approach to understanding the portrayal of the Mia Wallace character and previous studies on Mia Wallace and Pulp Fiction.

Buhler et al. (2010) provides a detailed discussion on the narrative functions of different sound types in films. According to their analysis, the most commonly important function of speech is to supply ‘a great deal of information that we either cannot get from the image track or could get only with considerable difficulty’ (Buhler et al. 2010, p. 11). In addition to that, the sound of speech can also cue the emotional state of the speaker and direct narrative development (ibid). Silence or the absence of sound can be a significant aspect of a soundscape. If ‘a certain sound was present in a given scene, or associated with a certain character, the lack of this same sound in a similar scene later in the film will create an expectation and make the audience aware of the previous sound’s absence’ (Sonnenschein 2001, p. 125). Music can reinforce the narrative with a set of familiar codes, largely achieved by lyrics (Neumeyer and Buhler 2009, p. 43). As Reay (2004, p. 40) points out, the lyrics ‘bring an enhanced level of intertextuality to the soundtrack and supply a self-sufficient narrative allowing for a more abstract visual treatment.’

Several scholars have extended film sound scholarship to issues of gender (Binns 2009; Buhler 2014; Kalinak 1982, 1992; McClary 1991; Prock 2014; Silverman 1988; Sjogren 2006). Kalinak (1982) is a pioneering scholar who associated the musical score with the hegemonic female stereotype in cinematic representation. She finds that the musical conventions characterize two sexualities of female characters, which, in her words, are ‘fallen woman’ and ‘virtuous wife’ (Kalinak 1982, p. 76). Kalinak (1992, p. 120) also discusses music’s function in relation to gender archetypes by stating:

Like the Hollywood film itself which created an image of woman as the projection of its own (male) fear and desire, the classical Hollywood film score collaborated in the dominant ideology which punished women for their sexuality. Visual displays of female sexuality were accompanied by a nucleus of musical practices which carried implications of indecency and promiscuity through their association with so-called decadent forms such as jazz, the blues, and ragtime.

Kalinak’s analyses inform this article’s examination of the characterization of Mia Wallace as emanating from the score and music’s connection to gender and ideology.

Other scholars who study the construction of women through film music echo Kalinak’s (1982) opinion that music in film is likely to reinforce the dominant stereotypes of women. McClary (1991) sees music as a fluid commentary that can reflect or construct gender and sexuality, and Kassabian (2001) claims that film music is a gendered discourse. Similarly, Binns’s (2009, p. 376) central argument is that music predominately perpetuates the dominant ideological position of female sexuality not only in terms of the encoded cultural codes, but also by being attached to the visual discourse, as music can play out as a set of attitudes towards women with affective, social, and psychological implications.

In contrast to these scholars, Sjogren (2006) holds an optimistic attitude towards the use of sound in female representation. Sjogren’s (ibid) book Into the Vortex: Female Voice and Paradox in Film looks at how film sound, particularly the female voice, opens a space for female subjectivity within the patriarchy. Sjogren (ibid) argues that cinematic representation of women is not monolithically repressed and stereotyped since sound, especially female voice-off (a term used by Sjogren referring to any voice that speaks of the feminine), provides opportunity for female subjectivity and point of view to be expressed in film. In this way, Sjogren contributes to an alternative discourse to the mainstream critique of male-centered cinema, in which sound is privileged over image.

A femme fatale often occupies a central role in film noir, which is a privileged position for a female where she is powerful, intelligent, dominant, and sexually desired, though towards the end of her character arc she is punished and made to submit to the patriarchal system (Hayward 2000, p. 130). This type of representation of women breaks with the traditional female stereotype as monolithically passive, incapable, and male-dependent. Meanwhile, this kind of figure reworks the notion of character stability. According to Doane (1991, p. 1), the femme fatale is ‘the figure of a certain discursive unease, a potential epistemological trauma. For her most striking characteristic, perhaps, is the fact that she never really is what she seems to be,’ from which it can be seen that a femme fatale figure is highly complex. As Place (1980, p. 63) states, the femme fatale possesses a set of dynamic identities lying in between the polarity of ‘the deadly seductress and the rejuvenating redeemer,’ with the emphasis very much on female sexual agency.

Though the concept of the femme fatale has been revisited in more recent literature (Farrimond 2018; Grossman 2009; Hanson and O’Rawe 2010), as Pulp Fiction is designed through pastiche tropes of characterization and, according to Howley (2004), was produced under a classical Hollywood cinematic style, it is reasonable to work with the more traditional conceptions and characteristics of the femme fatale, such as those proposed by Lindop (2015). Lindop (2015, pp. 19, 23) argues that a characteristic feature of a femme fatale is her power to seduce and destroy men and her ‘ability to bring ruin and misery (in some form or another) to the men who cross her path.’ The femme fatale is ‘an exciting mix of brooding, sultry sexuality, and danger; she is also fuel for anxiety because of this’ (Lindop 2015, p. 42).

A seminal scholarship on sound, female protagonists, and the femme fatale is George Toles’s (2024) “The Sounds and Silences of Mildred Pierce (1945).” Toles (2024) offers unique insights into narrative functions and meanings of sound associated with the female protagonist, Mildred Pierce, in this Academy Award-winning film noir classic. The film is significant because it has a female-centered plot, focusing on the mysterious Mildred Pierce, who is initially depicted as the film’s femme fatale, and her cunning daughter, Veda Pierce, who is revealed to be the actual femme fatale. Toles (2024) maps out what he calls the ‘fatalistic sound patterns’ of score, aural effects, voice, and silence, as their stylized applications help to reveal the fatalistic nature of the character’s lives and the mystery of Mildred Pierce’s identity. Strategic moments of silence convey character anxiety and loss of oneself, highlight conflict, dramatize emotions, create ambiguity, and signal fate. Voice defines character, and aural effects are expressionistic, punctuating themes, emotions, action, and tensions. Score is argued to both develop and counterpoint themes, invoke character spirit, such as indomitability, and express character subjectivity and inner sensations. Toles’s (2024) research adds further credence to this examination of Mia Wallace through sound, the femme fatale, and gender.

Though an iconic character, Mia Wallace is only occasionally mentioned in Pulp Fiction scholarship and is rarely featured as a major point of analysis. This review of Pulp Fiction scholarship will provide some key understandings for the study at hand. Kimball’s (1997) research applies discursive and textual analysis to Pulp Fiction and discusses the film’s homophobic traits and the heterosexual regularity norms. Kimball (1997, p. 172) stated that the film ‘idealizes the women as the heterosexual male’s love object’. Likewise, Schippers and Sapp (2012, p. 34) state that the characterization of Fabienne shows her as ‘passive, weak, stupid, infantile, and obsessed with her appearance—that is, feminine—Butch finds her both controllable and desirable,’ which ‘endorses the patriarchal requirements of femininity that reflect men’s interests and sustain men’s dominance over women.’ These studies show that the role of the women in the film predominately works under hegemonic femininity and patriarchal structures.

The following scholarship identifies Mia Wallace as Pulp Fiction’s femme fatale but offers little in the way of support for their claims. Bertelsen (1999, pp. 13, 25) discusses Mia Wallace in quick passing, identifying her as ‘a would-be noirish seductress’ and describes Mia Wallace ‘as the film’s femme fatale, Mia is satisfyingly menacing, tightly coiled and ready to strike, but […] will unfold as a vulnerable ingenue.’ Carly Shapiro (2016, p. 4) stated that the costume designer Betsy Heimann brought the ‘dualities of the femme fatale and a more masculine style together.’ While Mia Wallace’s white button-down shirt was created specifically to ‘feminize and add sex appeal’ to the traditional male white dress shirt, ‘Chanel’s “Vamp” nail polish helps convey her as a dangerous femme fatale’ (Shapiro 2016, p. 5).

Rodman (2006, p. 126) states that for Mia Wallace, ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ (Springfield 1994) and ‘Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon’ (Urge Overkill 1994) ‘foreground “female” characteristics’ through a leitmotif style, though Rodman does not go on to identify any specific ‘female characteristics.’ Howell (2015) briefly discusses the scene where Mia Wallace views Vincent Vega via surveillance cameras and directs him through the intercom when they first meet. Howell (2015, p. 155) states that ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ ‘might be read both as a comment on Mia’s identity as Marsellus’s wife and also, perhaps, as a teasing hint of seductive intent.’ Howell (2015) and Rodman (2006) both only allude to the significance of the songs in the characterization of Mia Wallace, warranting the deeper examination that follows.

3. Gendered Character Soundscape Critique Framework

This article presents the gendered character soundscape critique as the theoretical framework for investigating the relationship between sound and characterization, centering on the dual capability of film sound to subvert and reinforce hegemonic gender stereotypes. This framework examines the functions of sounds at a micro-level, detailing how individual acoustic elements contribute to constructions of gender, character identity, and character development. The gendered character soundscape critique is a gender-open approach that can be applied with frameworks of feminist film studies, masculinity studies, and LGBTQAI+ studies. In the case of this article, the application of the theoretical framework focuses on sound’s contributions to the construction of a complex female character as she progresses through a defined character arc of the femme fatale archetype.

Characterization is the development of a character’s identity by both direct (explicit) and indirect (implicit) means, through what the preeminent character scholar Jens Eder (2014, p. 84) calls characterization devices. Characterization devices are textual signs that transmit character-related information (ibid). They are media-specific, such as sound effects, music, mise-en-scène, or cinematography for film, TV, and other audio-visual media (ibid). This framework’s emphasis on gender is based on Eder’s (2014, p. 71) concept of socio-cultural character analysis, which is concerned with the representation of particular social groups, including gender, to uncover representations of ideologies and their structures.

This framework attends to two of Eder’s (2014, p. 76) essential questions for analyzing characters: “How is the character represented and constructed by textual devices?” and “What do the characters stand for, what indirect meanings do they convey?”. Characters are analyzed as artifacts with cultural contexts, such as sociocultural schemata and stereotypes and topics of references, with thematic messages, ideologies, latent meanings, or mythologies (Eder 2014, p. 79). Characters are also analyzed as constructs built by media-specific means of representation, such as sound, camera work, editing, acting and narrative forms, and as placements within social systems imbedded with values, conflicts, power, recognition, and sympathy (ibid). Characters are considered to be “intersubjective constructs,” as they are open to interpretation by both creators and audiences (Eder 2014, p. 74).

The framework views sound as an integral part of the filmic representation of gender and characterization. The gendered character soundscape critique examines the sound elements of dialogue and voice, music, sound effects, silence, and absence of sound. Through textual analysis, the sound elements are examined in relation to the narrative, actions, visuals, and other film forms to understand the significances of the sound elements in the representations of gender. For example, dialogue and voice are examined for their function in supplying information, cueing emotional states, directing narrative development, and establishing power relations. Music is scrutinized for its role in supplying referential markers for characterization or setting a mood. Sound effects, silence, and absences of sounds are analyzed for drawing attention to narrative information or symbolically punctuating themes, emotions, action, or tension. It is important to apply the gendered character soundscape with consideration for information distribution because “how much information we get in what sequence of a film” is integral to understanding character development and arcs (Eder 2014, p. 85). Thus, the gendered character soundscape critique acknowledges character development in the framework, avoiding absolutes in roles of sound. In essence, the framework guides researchers in charting the subtle shifts in power and gender dynamics in character development by isolating how different aural elements either challenge or uphold hegemonic representations of gender.

4. Sound’s Contribution to the Characterization of Mia Wallace

This study’s application of the gendered character soundscape critique draws from the above-reviewed scholarship that identifies sound’s role in hegemonic reinforcement, subjugating women to patriarchal ideals and sexualized stereotypes, contrasting this with the perspective that sound can liberate women by opening a space for female subjectivity and point of view as hegemonic subversion. This study applies the gendered character soundscape critique to examine the impact of sound in Pulp Fiction on Mia Wallace’s characterization across her storyline, paying close attention to narrative meanings produced by the sounds themselves and in their relationship with the narrative and the visual components of the film. The analysis of sound’s contribution to the characterization of Mia Wallace will cover six scenes from the film in chronological order. The first scene that will be discussed takes place directly after the opening credits when Vincent Vega and Jules Winnfield talk about Mia Wallace as they go to Brett’s apartment. The analysis will then focus on five scenes in the ‘Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife’ episode. The analysis of each scene will start from a detailed description of what happens in terms of who Mia is as a character, with close attention to the working of the soundtrack, analyzing how different sounds contribute to the construction of Mia Wallace as a complex character.

4.1. Vincent and Jules Talk About Mia Wallace

The first scene to be examined takes place directly after the opening credits when Mia Wallace is first introduced through the dialogue of men when Vincent Vega and Jules Winnfield are going to retrieve the belongings of Mr. Wallace from Brett and company. As Jules and Vincent enter the apartment building and as they wait for the right time to visit Brett, Jules tells Vincent the story that Mr. Wallace had Antwan Rockamora thrown off his balcony for giving Mrs. Wallace a foot massage. Their discussion then focused on the level of intimacy of a foot massage as (in)appropriate for a man to do to another man’s wife.

While Sjogren (2006) claims that women’s voices provide opportunities for them to have power, the male voice, in this case, subjectifies the female into the stereotypical position of male ownership and sets up the femme fatale trope with her as a sex object who is a danger to men. Male ownership is subjected through the continual designation of Mia Wallace as Marsellus Wallace’s wife, his property that he protects with violence. Mia Wallace is designated as a sex object from the dialogue depicting the foot massage as an overtly intimate act, a discussion that turns to talk of other sexual acts involving her. Her identity is tied to her marriage to the crime boss, as she is identified as a former actress whose career never took off. She is portrayed as a dangerous woman for allowing Antwon Rockamora to give her a foot massage, resulting in Mr. Wallace having him almost killed. In Vincent’s convincing argument that a foot massage is a sensual and intimate act, he stated that Marsellus Wallace knows it is not appropriate for anyone besides himself to do that with Mrs. Wallace, and that Antwon should have known better. By the end of this sequence, Vincent reveals that he is going to take Mia Wallace out for dinner on the order of his boss, Mr. Wallace, to keep Mia entertained while he is away. This news has Jules concerned about Vincent, as Mia is constructed as a femme fatale who is dangerous to men, and Vincent needs to be careful of her so that he does not end up like Antwon Rockamora.

As Doane (1991, p. 1) and Neale (2010, p. 188) have suggested, the femme fatale is constructed, complicated, or undermined through the narrative and through viewer and protagonist knowledge of the character and motives. Grossman (2009) has argued that the characterization of a woman as a femme fatale is based on an audience’s viewing alliance with the male protagonists and the male-female relationship in the narrative points. In this sequence, the audience and Vincent simultaneously learn about Mia Wallace from the discourse and perspective of men who work for her husband/their boss, as told by Jules. In this dialogue-based scene, the dialogue plays a heavy part in the construction of the viewing alliance and in constructing Mia Wallace as a femme fatale. Vincent, and the audience, are aligned with Jules’s male-centric aural depiction of Mia as a woman with attributes of a femme fatale. Mia Wallace is characterized as being a danger to men and causing anxiety through her sexuality. As Grossman (2009, p. 201) states, a reading based on the male viewing alliance is a misreading of the character, as it limits the depth and knowledge of who the woman is as a character, her female agency, and her empowerment. These characteristics of Mia will come out in the next set of scenes, with sound providing significant contributions to the construction of these attributes.

However, before that examination, a sequence from when Jules and Vincent are discussing the intimacy level of a foot massage provides a counterpoint to the male viewing alliance as the predominant perspective in this scene. While Vincent and Jules are walking to Brett’s apartment, they pass by an apartment that has its front door open, and a female adult voice is heard. A harsh and firm voice, from whom can be presumed to be a mother or grandmother, yells “what do you have on young lady” (Tarantino 1994, 00:11:37). A female voice-off of female subjectivity chastises a girl for wearing what is insinuated as age-inappropriate clothing that is presumably sexualizing her body and says that she should dress/act age-appropriately (Sjogren 2006). The phrase provides a commentary on Mia as she is paralleled with the inappropriately acting young lady.

The dialogue can be read as subjugating females to a reinforcement of hegemonic female appropriateness within patriarchal ideals by authority figures. The young lady can be conceived as a stand-in for, or a parallel to, Mia Wallace, as both the young lady and the description of Mia Wallace are presented as breaking hegemonic notions of femininity. The young lady is not dressed appropriately in the eyes of the adult, and Mia Wallace is presented as not acting appropriately as a newlywed to allow another man to massage her feet. This dialogue reinforces the notion of Mia as an inappropriate seductive danger to men, a similar description to the inappropriately dressed young lady. Furthermore, as Mia’s stand-in is a young lady, the association infantizes Mia with a hegemonic notion of femininity associated with inappropriate choices that only an authority figure can try to correct. The audible phrase acts as both a comment on and a warning about the nature of Mia Wallace as being hegemonically subversive. This reading of the female voice and dialogue counterpoints Grossman’s (2009, p. 201) assertion of the effects of a male view alliance. This viewing alliance with female subjectivity is aligned with the male viewing alliance in terms of the patriarchal society. The double viewing alliance with both male and female characters via the voice and dialogue further supports the characterization of Mia Wallace as a femme fatale.

4.2. Vincent Picks up Mia Wallace for Dinner

The next scene that is examined is when Vincent arrives at the Wallace residence to entertain Mia for the evening. Vincent approaches the Wallace residence to pick up Mia and take her out at the request of Mr. Wallace. He pulls down a note from the door, and the film cuts to a close-up of the handwriting on it with a voice-over of Mia Wallace reading the message: ‘Hi Vincent, I’m getting dressed. The doors open. Come inside and make yourself a drink. Mia’ (Tarantino 1994, 00:31:54). Vincent enters the house and looks around, and we hear Dusty Springfield’s (1994) hit song ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ (from 00:32:02) playing on the sound system in the house. The following shot is of Mia’s back, showing that she is sitting in a room closely watching Vincent through the video security system. The camera focuses on Mia’s lips wearing bright red lipstick as she calls Vincent’s name, directing him to the intercom, setting him to make a drink, and letting him wait for her. After that, shots of Vincent are cut back and forth from between the two rooms, where the footage of Vincent is at eye level in the living room and the black and white video surveillance is from a downward angle. Mia is then shown snorting a white powder, presumably cocaine, in the surveillance console. Mia then walks downstairs, and once she reaches the ground floor, she bends her right foot behind her left foot and says ‘Let’s go’ while simultaneously the song ends, marking the end of this scene (Tarantino 1994, 00:35:06). Mia’s speech and the diegetic song ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ are examined as the two sounds most pertinent to Mia’s characterization in this scene. The following is a discussion of these two acoustic elements, looking at how they function in the film’s narrative structure as well as how they produce aural meanings of Mia’s identity, personality, and psychological state.

The character design of Mia Wallace with only an aural presence for Vincent constructs her as a mysterious and powerful woman. Mia controls the entire storytelling space: the soundtrack, the surveillance camera, and the male character Vincent. She dictates to Vincent to do a series of acts in a sexually seductive voice, while Vincent is kept under Mia’s surveillance. In this scene, Mia is aurally characterized as a non-stereotypical woman who is exerting power over her male guest. Mia’s dialogue places her in an active and dominant position, while relegating the male character as the object of her gaze, doing whatever she requests without much autonomy. Mia’s verbal dominance serves as an act of her identity as a strong and powerful woman, who assumes a high status in the male-dominated story world. Mia is sexualized by the deep, domineering, and seductive cadence and tone of her voice as well as by the close-up shots of her red lipstick-covered lips as she speaks into the microphone when Vincent first enters the house. Ultimately, these characteristics, her aural presence, and actions resonate with the role of a femme fatale, with the shot of her ankles at the end of the scene reminiscent of the ankle of Phyllis Dietrichson, the quintessential femme fatale in Double Indemnity (Wilder 1944).

Through the dialogue track, Mia is structuring the entire scene in the domestic environment, with the editing, camera, and image working together to align viewers with Mia’s position. The scene is constructed to be seen primarily through Mia’s point of view and to be heard through Vincent’s perspective. Mia’s voice and the way the scene is constructed through camera shots and editing sutures the viewers into the point of view of Mia Wallace to take her subjective position. The dialogue design in this scene echoes Sjogren’s (2006) idea that the female voice opens a space to represent female subjectivity and point of view within the patriarchal filmic world. The dialogue track allows Mia to have strong discursive power and maximum control in this scene and enables her to take an active stance in a gender relationship through her aural agency. This contributes to an alternative female characterization to that of other female characters who are depicted as male-dependent, as argued by Schippers and Sapp’s (2012) second-wave feminist reading of Butch’s girlfriend Fabienne in the ‘Gold Watch’ episode of Pulp Fiction.

The song ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ is the other remarkable sound element in this scene. The song is played in the diegetic world on a phonograph as the background music to Vincent picking up Mia. The music is what Neumeyer (2005, p. 11) calls referential, in that it is supplying identifying markers for the characterization of Mia Wallace. This reading is reinforced by a statement by Mary Ramos, Quentin Tarantino’s music supervisor. Ramos (cited in Barraclough 2016) stated that “what makes Quentin standout is his bold use of music. Often times it is a main character in his movies. The reason is the referential element to his storytelling.”

‘Son of a Preacher Man’ is continuously present throughout the entire sequence, with the song beginning when Vincent entered the house and ending when Mia says, ‘let’s go.’ Music that underscores speech normally ‘establishes a mood or tempo for a scene but does not try to follow action closely’ (Buhler et al. 2010, pp. 216–17). The song does just that as the scene is edited to fit with the beat of the music and to match the temporal synchronization of starting and ending. The song also instills a mood of eroticism, as the song is about a woman’s sexual awakening.

In addition, there is an observable change in the volume level of the song: while Mia and Vincent are in conversation, the volume is reduced, and when the dialogue suspends, the volume is increased. This design of the music track retains the dialogue and places emphasis on specific pieces of the song and its lyrics. In this way, the volume changes allow the music to smoothly move between foreground and background and strategically allow the piece of music to take an active stance in the film’s narrative register, directing viewers’ attention to its narrative importance in the storytelling.

The song’s importance in the narrative structure enables it to contribute significantly and notably to the characterization of Mia Wallace. In this sequence, the lyrics take over the role of voice-over narration or dialogue to implicate the underlying meaning for Mia’s characterization. The words most frequently heard in the foreground are the chorus, which is as follows:

The only one who could ever reach me

Was the son of a preacher man

The only boy who could ever teach me

Was the son of a preacher man

(Springfield 1994)

These words fit well with Mia’s identity as the untouchable wife of Marsellus Wallace, Vincent’s boss. Taking a clear stance on the stereotyped gender roles, the lyrics disempower Mia to be subordinated to her powerful husband and not sexually liberated to others, as only one person can ever reach her. The diegetic music provides a poetic and authoritative form to express this piece of important information about Mia’s identity. It symbolizes Mia as a do-not-touch item and at the same time adds an erotic tension to the domestic space. The piece of music not only serves as a background filler to accompany the visual actions and the dialogue and set the mood, but more importantly, cues an implicit meaning that supports the interpretation of Mia’s characterization presented in the earlier Jules and Vincent discussion of her.

The entire aural track produces a deliberate ambiguity: while the dialogue masculinizes Mia with power, the music track serves as an aural twist to the ensemble to suggest Mia’s hegemonically framed femininity. While both image track and dialogue track try to establish Mia’s powerful and intelligent persona, the music track sexualizes her to be secondary and male-dependent. The use of ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ in this scene consolidates the dominant ideology of women’s femininity, echoing the opinion that Hollywood film music is likely to construct and reinforce dominant female stereotypes (Kalinak 1992; Binns 2009). The song was sampled by the rap group Cypress Hill (1993) in their hit song ‘Hits from the Bong’, which was released just a year before this film’s release. As Cypress Hill’s song is about illicit drug use, this extratextual reference emphasizes Mia as a drug user.

4.3. Mia and Vincent at Jack Rabbit Slim’s Restaurant

The analysis moves onto the dialogue in the scene where Mia and Vincent sit across from each other at the retro 1950s diner Jack Rabbit Slim’s. The diegetic music of Chuck Berry’s (1994) song ‘You Never Can Tell’ (from 00:48:04) that Mia and Vincent dance to functions in much of the same way as the music in the first scene. Its dialogue reinforces dominant stereotypes about women and projects them onto Mia; thus, the following analysis will focus on Mia and Vincent’s dialogue exchange. The long, rich dialogue in this scene is significantly important to help the audience read into Mia’s personality more deeply as she reveals her attitudes and values. The dialogue also develops a closeness to Mia and Vincent’s relationship. Though Mia and Vincent cover a wide range of topics in their conversation, the following analysis will exclusively focus on the milkshake and foot massage topics, as they are where Mia’s active sexuality and her male-dependent identity are negotiated.

Mia holds control of the conversation, and thus over Vincent, as she primarily leads the discussions as Vincent nervously answers her many questions and follows her rules and orders. When Vincent asks for a sip of Mia’s five-dollar milkshake out of curiosity for what it tastes like, Mia invites him to use her straw:

Mia: You can use my straw; I don’t have cooties.

Vincent: Yeah, but maybe I do.

Mia: Cooties, I can handle.

Vincent: All right.

(Tarantino 1994, 00:40:45)

Vincent is subservient to Mia and takes a sip with her straw at her invitation. The milkshake conversation and sharing of the straw are depicted as sexually provocative, through which Mia overtly exerts sexual tension on Vincent. This can be read as characterizing Mia as an evil seductress who has a deadly temptation, as in the Antwon Rockamora incident.

When their conversation moves to the Rockamora foot massage incident, the dialogue becomes more centered on sexual stereotypes and power relations. When asked by Vincent about the truth of the foot massage gossip, Mia becomes emotionally excited and somewhat annoyed in tone. She complains about men’s obsession with sexual gossiping by giving a brief answer:

Truth is, nobody knows why Marsellus threw Tony out of that four-story window except Marsellus and Tony. When you little scamps get together, you’re worse than a sewing circle.

(Tarantino 1994, 00:46:28)

Mia speaks bluntly to provide her own ironic comment on men’s toying with sex. In an aggressive and disdainful tone, she shows dissatisfaction with men’s exclusive treatment of women as sexual objects. The dialogue provides Mia with aural agency in talking about sexual relationships. She is a woman who is not willing to openly compromise the sanctity of marriage and is strong enough to be able to negotiate male-dominated power relations.

In the next minute, the twist contest is announced. At this time, Mia expresses her power over Vincent as she states:

I do believe Marsellus, my husband, your boss, told you to take me out and do whatever I wanted. Now I want to dance, I want to win, I want that trophy. So, dance good.

(Tarantino 1994, 00:47:10)

This verbal speech shows that Mia is aware that her power in the relationship with Vincent is given to her by her husband. Her superiority over Vincent is an extension of the power of another male character. At the same time as being cynical about the male-dominated sexual relations, she herself is passively involved in that discourse as one of the subordinated women, who makes use of her physical appeal to get what she wants. For example, in this case, it is to hold Vincent for her use and to command him to dance with her. This is consistent with the characterization of a femme fatale, who can be strong and powerful, relying on her sexuality (Hayward 2000, p. 130). On the dance floor, she introduced herself as ‘Mrs. Mia Wallace’ (Tarantino 1994, 00:47:36). This act shows her compliance with male authority and patriarchy by identifying herself as married, belonging to a man who is not her dance partner.

The dialogue track in this scene firstly gives voice to Mia’s subjectivity to challenge patriarchal sexual discourse and secondly represses her active power under that discourse, which provides her with an alternative way to use it to her advantage. It can be seen that the dialogue track is able to construct a complex female characterization, in which the language plays a crucial role ‘in the reproduction and transmission of ideology’ (Graddol and Swann 1989, p. 192). In this scene, the aural and verbal portrayal of Mia is reduced to a stereotyped female archetype, whose primary value is physical attraction, being unable to demonstrate power without it derived from a man.

4.4. Mia and Vincent Return to the Wallace Residence After Dinner

In this next scene, Vincent and Mia return to her house after their night out, dancing trophy in hand. The scene opens with the muted sound of keys tossed from Mia flying through the air into Vincent’s hands as he approaches the front door. As Vincent opens the door, the alarm bell rings. Mia dances tango-style with Vincent into the house and turns off the ringing alarm during the short dance. Afterwards, they stand face to face at an intimate distance, silently and seductively looking at each other. Vincent breaks the sexual tension with dialogue referring to the uncomfortable silence discussion from the previous scene. This statement also foreshadows more uncomfortable silences to come and the silencing of Mia as her femme fatale character arc is nearing completion.

In the break of sexual tension, Mia plays Urge Overkill’s (1994) version of Neil Diamond’s hit song ‘Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon’ (from 00:50:48) and soliloquizes to the music, dancing her way around the room. Meanwhile, Vincent is in front of the bathroom mirror delivering a monologue to himself about morality and loyalty to convince himself to not be sexually involved with Mia. During his overtly long bathroom break, Mia finds heroin in his jacket that she is wearing and overdoses on it. The scene ends with a close-up of Mia’s deathly white face, with blood flowing from her nose and $5 white milkshake vomit coming from her mouth.

The jingling keys are the first significant sound in this scene. This sound of jingling keys directs the viewer’s attention to the specific action that Mia flung the door keys to Vincent, which is a piece of information not explicitly shown in the visual frame as Mia remains offscreen at that moment. However, this subtle action is rather pertinent, as it suggests the increasing intimacy between Mia and Vincent after spending some time together and symbolizes the developing romance in their relationship. She has literally given Vincent the keys to the Wallace castle. Therefore, the sound effect of jingles supports further information on the Mia character by extending the physical environment represented in the visual frame and drawing the audiences’ attention to significant narrative information.

The second important sound effect in this sequence is the alarm bell. It happens at the moment when Vincent opens the door after they return from the restaurant. The alarm bell can be conceived as a symbol of Marsellus Wallace and acts as a warning of the impending danger. However, simply turning the alarm bell off and inviting Vincent to stay longer, Mia’s reaction does not follow the narrative development direction associated with the sound of the alarm bell. Therefore, in this sequence, by authorizing a subjective expectation on Mia and anticipating narrative development, the use of the alarm bell is relaying information about the characterization of Mia. The alarm bell, together with the aforementioned jingles of keys, enhances the depiction of Mia at a more meticulous level, revealing her dangerous sexuality and anticipating a punishment for her potential intimacy with another male.

As Vincent goes to the bathroom, Mia plays the song ‘Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon’ (Urge Overkill 1994) on her reel-to-reel player and begins singing and dancing. As opposed to non-diegetic music, which film characters do not hear, diegetic music is heard by the characters so it can directly affect their actions and states of mind (Gorbman 1987, pp. 23–24). The scene functions according to Wojcik’s (2001) claim that females playing music in a film often marks that woman as sexually transgressive and betokens female desires. The song’s passionate and sentimental singing charges the environment with eroticism and helps disclose Mia’s desire to be self-indulgent and sexual and echoes her as emotionally repressed and alienated. Mia is again aurally infantilized as the lyrics refer to an underage female being pursued by an older male that her family forbids. The lyrics reflect Mia’s unavailability to Vincent and his sexual desire for her. The song plays a part in forming Mia’s characterization, speaking for her emotional subjectivity and foreshadowing danger and forbiddances linked to the concept of the femme fatale as the girl in the song is a forbidden sexual danger like Mia is.

In this scene, Vincent reacts to the sexual danger Mia is to him due to their sexual attraction to each other. While Mia is singing and dancing, Vincent is in the bathroom resisting her femme fatale-ness that could lead to his demise by convincing himself to just leave and satisfy his sexual desires elsewhere. Vincent delivers a monologue to himself, which left Mia alone with enough time to find his drugs and overdose on it. While the song focuses on the transition from girlhood to womanhood, Mia transforms from the sexual danger to a new form of danger to herself.

The aurally erotic tension in this scene embodies a sharp contrast between male and female characterization. The dialogue track depicts the male character Vincent as mature and responsible as he is in the bathroom reassuring himself that he will be loyal to his boss and will not try anything inappropriate with Mia Wallace. The music track cues an ironic comment on Mia’s state of mind as childish and innocent and places her as a male’s sex object, which is reinforced by Vincent being sexually attracted to her. A shift in power relation between Mia and Vincent starts to appear in these two aural tracks. Mia is no longer as powerful as she was previously depicted and she becomes a potential troublemaker who needs to be saved by her male caretaker, as by the end of the scene she has overdosed on Vincent’s heroin while he was in the bathroom. While Mia is sexualized by both the music and dialogue tracks, she is eventually reduced to a character that is passive, emotional, under-capable, and male-dependent, which is further realized in the next scene.

4.5. Mia’s Overdose and Revival

Another uncomfortable silence permeated Mia during her heroin overdose and revival, primarily because most of the time she was unconscious. In six minutes of screen time, Mia says only one word when she is revived after screaming and gasping for air. As Mia fell into unconsciousness from the overdose of Vincent’s heroin, the song faded out with the final words, ‘Soon, you’ll be a woman,’ and the screen faded to black (Urge Overkill 1994, 00:54:12). After the fade-in from black, Vincent returned from the bathroom, telling Mia that he has to go home. However, he finds Mia overdosed and unconscious on the floor. With no music playing in his car, Vincent drives the dying Mia to his drug dealer Lance’s house, calling him on the phone as he drives erratically, eventually crashing his car into Lance’s house.

The song lyrics indicate the change in the characterization of Mia Wallace from the strong, seductive femme fatale to the end of the femme fatale character arc as a new woman. Mia is punished for living outside the hegemonic femininity with a near-death experience. The woman she becomes is based under the patriarchal hegemony of femininity. She literally has no voice, is dying, and is a drastically different woman after her resurrection, as the following analysis will argue. Mia was a potential danger to Vincent in terms of her sexuality, which he avoided. But then she became a danger to him, as she almost dies while under his watch from his drugs. Her overdose brings an end to her charm, wit, fun, and sexuality as they are essentially killed off, leaving behind a disempowered female whose life is male-dependent. Mia Wallace’s new form of femininity falls under the patriarchal structure where men hold power over women.

In the scene in the car and at Lance’s house, Mia’s subjectivity and characterization are, once again, controlled by the male voice, as they were when she was first introduced in the film. Both on the phone and in person, the two men discuss and decide the fate of Mia’s life as she is quickly dying from the heroin overdose. The result of the negotiation of whether Lance helps save Mia or not, and the efficacy of his help, determines whether Mia and Vincent live. If Mia dies, Vincent is sure that Marsellus Wallace will kill him.

The vocal tonal characteristics of Vincent when talking to Mia in the car and to Lance, both while driving up to Lance’s house and until Mia’s revival, signify the danger Vincent is in due to Mia’s overdose. His vocals express his new danger. Vincent’s vocal register is in distress and panic. The frequency of his voice is raised, as are the intensity, volume, and speed of his speech. When Lance meets Vincent and Mia outside his house, his voice mirrors Vincent’s. According to Johnstone and Scherer (2000, pp. 226–27), these vocal characteristics are indicators of high stress, anger, and fear. Mia has transitioned from being a danger to men because of her sexuality and power to the final stage of the femme fatale character arc as punishment for such deviations from the hegemony. However, unlike the traditional femme fatale, she is still a danger to men, albeit in a new form, which the characteristics of the male voice reinforce.

4.6. Mia and Vincent’s Goodbye

The final scene that will be discussed is the scene where Vincent and Mia return to her house once again, this time after she is revived from her heroin overdose at Lance’s house. As Vincent drives her home for the final time, they both sit in silence in the car, and there are only background sounds of the car and street noises. Without saying a word, Mia walks along the walkway towards the front door. Vincent calls out to her from behind her, and they have their farewell conversation at a distance from one another. They make an agreement to keep the overdosing incident a secret, and Mia finally reveals her corny joke to Vincent.

In this final scene, Mia has changed completely from one type of person to a completely different, post-drug overdose, Mia Wallace. Compared with previous scenes, this scene is much more subtle in its usage of sound, with only dialogue and subdued sound effects. The absence of music and the subdued sound effects convey a message that the dialogue is the particular focus to guide viewers’ understanding of the changed characteristics of the post-drug overdose Mia Wallace. This section will discuss dialogue as well as the absence of sound as an important sound design in dealing with Mia’s transition.

According to Sonnenschein’s (2001, p. 125) statement on the significance of missing sounds, the fact that there is always a rich aural construction of Mia in the previous scenes makes the subdued sound in this farewell scene notable. Throughout the entire sequence, there is no music, which has previously been integral to her characterization. Mia is also lacking in her verbal presence during their ride back home in the car and for most of the time when Mia is walking to her front door until Vincent works out how to deal with the situation and her husband. During their walk up to the house, the sonic perspective of the background night sounds and their footsteps are aligned with Vincent rather than with Mia, as the camera is predominately positioned behind Vincent. Mia walks almost silently as she is barefoot. Up until this point Mia has little aural presence.

Unlike previous scenes where Mia is controlling the dialogue, the soundtrack, and the relationship with Vincent, in this sequence Mia’s voice is largely underrepresented. As Sonnenschein (2001, p. 125) observes, silence is able to represent the negative aspects of characters or narratives like oppression or solemnity. The design of sound absence and silence in this scene indicates Mia’s transition to the post-drug overdose Mia, who is no longer strong and powerful. It reduces Mia from the powerful and seductive femme fatale to a more traditional stereotypical woman that is helpless, vulnerable, and whose voice is underrepresented.

In their farewell conversation, Mia is aurally deprived of dominance and power. Instead of actively controlling the dialogue, Mia’s verbal presence is minimized in the keep-a-secret conversation, as she was only speaking when responding to Vincent. They agree to keep the overdosing incident a secret from Marsellus. Mia’s reply informs of her inner state at that moment as she states, ‘If Marsellus knew about this incident, I’d be in as much trouble as you’ (Tarantino 1994, 01:01:53). Mia has been totally defeated, being in fear of how her husband would treat her if he found out what happened. She pays for her sexuality through a near-death experience and the loss of her power over men and of her sexuality, which is consistent with the portrayal of a femme fatale, who is ultimately disempowered and submits to the patriarchal system (Hayward 2000, p. 130).

Finally, Mia reveals to Vincent the TV pilot joke that she is not willing to tell in the restaurant. Ending with ‘ketchup,’ as a pun with close pronunciation with ‘catch up’ as the dad tomato smashed the baby tomato that was falling behind in their family walk, Mia cues Vincent to her embarrassment and squashed emotional state. The exchange elicits a giggle from Vincent, restoring some of her dignity. However, without the aid of Marsellus’s power and her own sexuality, Mia is no longer able to control Vincent, as she is no longer in a dominant position in their relationship. Instead, Vincent controls her sexuality by blowing her a kiss as she walks away from him. Mia’s speech in this final scene associates her as a weak, vulnerable, and male-dependent female, a stark contrast to her characterization at the start of the film and the start of the ‘Vincent Vega and Marsellus Wallace’s Wife’ episode.

In summary of the above analyses, the dialogue of men subjectifies Mia Wallace into the stereotypical position of a woman through notions of male ownership and as a sex object. Furthermore, her danger to men through intimate contact and her inherent power of being the mob boss’s wife set her up as a femme fatale. Then when Vincent meets Mia at her house, the dialogue track empowers Mia to control the storytelling space; the diegetic music works in contrast to associate her with a male’s sex object. In the next scene at Jack Rabbit Slim’s, the dialogue produces a Mia Wallace that is sexually expressive, is able to make jokes on sexual stereotypes, and possesses power over men. Then when they return to Mia’s house, the sound effects and the diegetic song speak for her deadly temptation, while the working of Vincent’s speech ironically strengthens her innocent girlhood as if he has control over their potential sexual encounter. The vocal tone of the men is in terror as men regain control over the now hegemonically submissive woman. In the final scene, dialogue and the absence of sound reduce Mia to being characterized under Hollywood’s stereotypical womanhood that is subjugated to males and whose subjectivity is underrepresented. Based on the above analysis, the music and other sounds in these scenes complicate Mia’s characterization as a woman who is ever transforming. Her character arc and characteristics are consistent with a femme fatale, as she is initially a sexy, powerful, and devilish woman with a mixture of danger and allurement (Place 1980, p. 62; Lindop 2015, pp. 19, 23). However, she ultimately returns to the status quo as she is saved from certain death by her would-be suitor, whose life is at stake from their adventures. The femme fatale is narratively, visually, and aurally constructed.

5. Conclusions

Through the application of the gendered character soundscape critique, this article has argued that dialogue, voice, sound effects, and silence contribute significantly to the characterization of Mia Wallace as a femme fatale through their dual capability to reinforce and subvert female stereotypes. The femme fatale is a dynamic character that goes through a rise and fall of power based on opposition to and eventual subjugation to patriarchal hegemonic notions of gender. The dynamic nature of the femme fatale trope provides for opportunities for sound to be used in a multitude of ways of expressing dynamic femininities, making Mia Wallace a compelling character to examine with the gendered character soundscape critique. The analysis argued that while some sonic elements contribute to Mia’s subjectivity and power, others ultimately work to support the sexual objectification and punishment of her within the confines of a patriarchal structure. The article concludes that sound supports Mia’s character arc along the classic femme fatale trope, moving from a powerful and dangerous seductress to a disempowered, male-dependent woman. Her male dependency is further confirmed by the final time she appears in the film, as she accompanied her husband to Butch’s boxing match.

The gendered character soundscape critique unifies several theories of the roles of film sound and gender characterization. The framework recognizes that film sound, including silence and absences of sound, has narrative functions and acts as characterization devices that transmit character-related information (Buhler et al. 2010; Sonnenschein 2001; Toles 2024; Eder 2014, p. 84). Music and song lyrics can contribute to narrative and character development, including constructions of gender (Neumeyer and Buhler 2009; Reay 2004; Kalinak 1982, 1992; McClary 1991; Binns 2009). Voice and dialogue can both stifle and mobilize gendered subjectivity (Sjogren 2006). The gendered character soundscape critique is a systematic method for examining the roles of film sound for gender characterization, emphasizing the examination of all forms of film sound. The dynamics and speech tone of the voice, dialogue, sound effects, which include the ambient soundtrack, music, silence, and sound absences, are all sound types that should be examined for their contributions to the development of a character’s gendered identity. Sound is recognized as having a dual capability of reinforcing and subverting notions of gender and can both develop or contradict characterizations or other meanings developed by other film forms.

The application of the gendered character soundscape critique to the character Mia Wallace found that music tracks, sound effects, dialogue, voice, and the absence of sound are used in complex ways to sexualize and objectify Mia. However, the music, the initial dialogue of men in the beginning of the film, and her dialogue and voice when she meets Vincent also reinforce the characterization of her as a powerful and sexually dangerous woman, helping to construct her as a femme fatale. In the first two scenes of the Vincent Vega and Mrs. Marsellus Wallace episode, her dialogue dominance opens a space for her to fully express her subjectivity and shows her point of view. Mia is essentially the voice of God as she speaks over the loudspeakers, sight unseen by Vincent, being all-powerful to determine everything in the storytelling. This way is consistent with Sjogren’s (2006, pp. 2–3) optimistic opinion that sound-privileged scenarios offer a space for feminine subjectivity to be actively expressed through female voice-off or other aural components as a structuring force within patriarchal cinematic representations.

However, the dialogue is not always used in that way. Although it subverts the dominant ideology of female subordination in the first two scenes of the episode, it manifests a contrasting characterization of Mia in the last two scenes as well as in the first scene, where she is verbally introduced by Jules. Mia is not given a strong voice in the dialogue track after Vincent and she return from Jack Rabbit Slim’s; the discursive power is transferred to Vincent, whose speech provides an ironic commentary to Mia’s musicalized voice, highlighting a woman’s childishness and male power over women.

While Mia is dying from the drug overdose, her femme fatale danger to men based on her sexuality transitions to her danger to men because of the ineptness of Vincent. In one of his many mistakes in the film, he leaves Mia alone wearing his jacket that is holding his drug stash that she overdoses on. Her newly rooted danger to men is sounded out in the altered voices of Vincent and Lance. In the final scene, although she retrieves her verbal presence in dialogue, her voice is no longer used to speak out her subjectivity as it did in the first and second scenes. Her voice is used only to answer Vincent and reach out for some dignity at the end of the night. Therefore, the dialogue track initially shaped Mia as erotic, powerful, dangerous, and unrepressed, but then relegated her to a position of gendered inferiority. This follows the character arc of the femme fatale, who is ultimately punished for breaking out of the gender hegemony by being dominated by the patriarchal gender order.

On the other hand, the music, sound effects, and the absence of sound are repressing and stereotyping Mia Wallace into a hegemonic femininity. Taking ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ in the first scene as an example, while Mia’s speech gives voice to her subjectivity and point of view, the music lyrics sexualize and objectify her to be a stereotypical feminine figure who is sexually subordinate to men. In other words, the music works at odds with the image and other sounds in that scene to express inconsistent and even opposing character traits. In the overdose scene, the sound effects and diegetic music sexualize Mia in a similar way as ‘Son of a Preacher Man’ does in the first scene. They both occur naturally in the diegetic world and are being used as a commentary on Mia’s actions. Their contradictions helped develop her complex femme fatale characterization.

The lyrics of ‘Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon’ function in terms of Reay’s (2004, p. 40) claim that they can be a substitute for dialogue or comment on a character, which underscores Mia’s subjectivity and state of mind and centers the sequence on Mia’s interior feelings and emotions. The scene is structured around the song, in which Mia’s bodily performance of solo dance adds value to the musical meaning and power in characterizing the role of Mia as she is embodying the music and the lyrics. What is different from the subjectivity expressed by the dialogue in two music scenes is that the subjectivity expressed by the song ‘Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon’ is that the lyrics also foreshadow her transition into a new woman in the latter phase of the femme fatale who has lost her sexual power over men. The absence of her aural presence in the final scene is just as important as the dialogue of men in making her voice underrepresented, conveying that she is no longer strong and powerful and has been subjugated to male control.

The functions of these two songs offer support to scholars’ opinion that music, and in this case sound effects and silence, perpetuate the dominant ideology of female sexuality (Kalinak 1982, 1992; McClary 1991; Binns 2009). The two songs reinforce hegemonic notions of gender in terms of female sexualization, male sexual dominance, and infantilization. The working of the music reflects Kassabian’s (2001) claim that film music is a gendered discourse. Though Kassabian (ibid) and Kalinak (1992, p. 120) both were discussing traditional film scores, the functions are the same for these two diegetic popular songs, as the songs ‘carried implications of indecency and promiscuity.’ Based on this discussion, different aural elements can construct Mia Wallace in different ways; therefore, in this case, film sound holds a dual capability to reinforce and subvert female stereotypes.

This analysis has shown the ways in which Tarantino’s mélomania and attention to the function of sound manifest in the characterization of Mia Wallace. The use of sound contributes to the complex characterization of Mia Wallace as a femme fatale. Throughout the film’s engagement with the Mia Wallace character, she is going through the character arc of the femme fatale. Firstly, as a mythical sexual danger to men, then as a powerful woman controlling men who is finally punished for her sexuality and potential abuse of both her sexual power and her hierarchal power within the crime organization. Sound is used to develop and flesh out the femme fatale-ness of Mia Wallace both in accordance with narrative and image structures as well as in alternative. Through the application of the gendered character soundscape critique, the article has shown how Tarantino used film sound to both reinforce and to subvert the stereotypical cinematic representation of women in the case of Mia Wallace.