Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, Hero, and House of the Flying Daggers: Interpreting Gender Thematics...

<jats:p>Some 20 years ago, I was doing research for a film on women fighters in liberation struggles. My results were unexpected back home. In North America at the time, the dominant mythology in the women’s movement was that females were non-violent by nature. It was taken for granted that women favored pacifism and avoided conflict. My interview with a young woman fighter from Zimbabwe was thus shocking. I still recall her phrasing: “If too much time goes by without combat, my little trigger finger is itching to shoot.” She told me she had lost her cousin in an air attack by the Rhodesian military on their guerrilla army camp in Mozambique. It was a quiet day and her cousin had been braiding her hair. As the planes retreated and the noise subsided, she suddenly realized that her cousin was dead by her side. This young woman fighter was angry. She wanted revenge.</jats:p>