Women's issues can clearly be seen in The Day of the Outlaw. This film was made in 1959, a year when women still didn't have many rights. Most of the women at that time were housewives who cooked, cleaned and raised the children. This view of women can be seen in the movie at various points.
One of the most important issue is that of women being treated as objects. We can see several times in the movie that the women are just tossed back and forth. Bruhn's men even refer to the women something to give them pleasure for the time being. They also treat the women like objects, always trying to grab at them and molest them as if they have no feelngs. The women also go wherever they are told to go, as if they are objects under the men's possession. This issue just translates into society at that time. Women were not treated as human beings in 1959, they were just objects that men kept at home.
Another very important issue that ties in with women being objects, is the thought of rape. In 1959, rape still wasn't illegal. The Anti-Rape movement actually only started picking up in the 1960s through 1970s. Therefore, at the time that the movie was made, women were not coming forward. The women stayed quiet, because they almost felt ashamed for being raped. We can see this in the movie when two of Bruhn's men go upstairs to find any other people who are in the house, and they find a woman. We just hear her scream and rush down the stairs with her clothes ripped in several places. She does not accuse them of trying to rape her, but just stays quiet. This is what the women in the 1950s were doing also.
It is sad to think about how long it took women to have the rights that we have now. Unfortunately, this movie is just a reminder of the struggles that women half a century ago and even before that, went through.
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