THE REPRESENTATION OF MOTHERHOOD IN THE FILM “IF I HAD LEGS I’D KICK YOU”

Abstract

Mainstream media have long portrayed mothers as patient, selfless, and able to balance caregiving with other responsibilities, while contemporary cinema increasingly shows the ex haustion and vulnerability behind this ideal. This study examines how motherhood is repre sented in If I Had Legs I’d Kick You (2025), directed by Mary Bronstein, and whether the film challenges, negotiates, or reproduces the ideology of idealized motherhood. Using a critical paradigm and a qualitative approach, the study analyzes eight selected scenes through John Fiske’s levels of reality, representation, and ideology, supported by Sharon Hays’ concept of intensive mothering and the concepts of maternal vulnerability and double burden. The find ings reveal four connected themes: the pressure of intensive motherhood, maternal vulnerabil ity and the emotional burden of motherhood, double burden and the unequal distribution of care, and maternal identity, agency, and the struggle for control. The film challenges the image of the calm and endlessly capable mother by making maternal exhaustion, guilt, and the need for personal space visible. However, it does not fully reject the ideology behind Linda’s suffer ing, since the expectation of constant maternal responsibility remains internalized by the pro tagonist. The film is therefore best understood as negotiating idealized motherhood, exposing its personal costs without offering a complete alternative to it.