Throughout the film so far, I have noticed the way Kay Adams stands out “like a sore thumb” as Mr. McGuigan said. Kay Adams was Michael Corleones 's girlfriend. She attended the family wedding with him, went Christmas shopping with him and was there when Mike found out about the death of his father.
The idea of the Scarlet Woman was briefly brought up in class, but I did not understand the term which lead me to do some research. According to the Collins English Dictionary, the Scarlet Woman is “a sinful woman described in Revelation 17, interpreted as a figure either of pagan Rome or of the Roman Catholic Church regarded as typifying vice overlaid with gaudy pageantry” or “any sexually promiscuous woman, esp a prostitute”. Originally this term was used to a woman mythical goddess mentioned in the Bible, but by the 1700‘s “the term was being used more generally for a woman with loose morals” (“scarlet woman”). The Scarlet Woman is introduced in Revelation 17 of the Bible:
“There I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet beast that was covered with blasphemous names and had seven heads and ten horns. The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and was glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls. She held a golden cup in her hand, filled with abominable things and the filth of her adulteries. The name written on her forehead was a mystery:
BABYLON THE GREAT
THE MOTHER OF PROSTITUTES
AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH” (Revelation 17 NIV).
I think Kay portrays the Scarlet Woman in “The Godfather”. In all the scenes she is in, she is wearing the color scarlet, and as we know three is a pattern. When she attending the wedding she is wearing red, when she goes christmas shopping with Michael she is wearing red, and when she is on a dinner date with Michael she is wearing a red dress and jewelry. The clothing Kay wears throughout the film matches up to the appearance of the Scarlet Woman described above.
The Scarlet Woman is also characterized as an immoral woman. In the first scene, Kay seems interested when Michael tells her about the Corleone’s mafia business. She does not seemed appalled or shocked by the fact, but intrigued. Her facial expressions and body language convey the message that she is interested in the mafia. She may be more interested in mafia than Michael, or even in the “beast [which] she rides” (Revelation 17 NIV).
The Scarlet Woman has been known to ‘ride the beast’. In the “Godfather”, I haven’t seen how Kay has controlled, or ‘ridden’, Michael. She hasn’t dominated Michael or the Corleone family yet, but she may in the coming scenes of the film. She may seduce or interfere with Michael in the future. In many other works of literature, there is a character who represents ‘the temptress’ or ‘black goddess’. This woman ofter brings about the protagonists,downfall. I think that Coppola wanted to subtly show that Kay was not a good influence towards Michael and that she could have easily manipulated him by portraying her as the Scarlet Woman. I think Kay will come back and have a larger negative impact of Michaels life and role in the Corleone family.
So far, I haven’t seen much of the Scarlet Woman but I am hoping to see more. I’m not sure how exactly the idea of the Scarlet Woman connects to Kay or “The Godfather”, but it is interesting to see how this idea is repeated in many works of literature.
Bibliography:
"scarlet woman." Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition. HarperCollins Publishers. 01 Dec. 2011. <Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/scarlet woman>.
"scarlet woman." The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Houghton Mifflin Company. 01 Dec. 2011. <Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/scarlet woman>.
"Revelation 17 NIV." Bible Gateway. Biblica. Web. 1 Dec. 2011. <http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation+17&version=NIV>.
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I agree with your thoughts about how Kay portrays the Scarlet Woman. However, I think she has influenced Michael somehow to get him back into his family's Mafia business, although she did not intend to. I am not sure about how this is portrayed in the movie but maybe, her love and compassion for MIchael at a time which Michael's family has gone through a lot, depicts her real cruelness and how she wants to control him. She always wants him to be next to her even at times when his family is unwell. When Michael goes to a telephone both to phone his brother, Sonny, Kay is chasing after him and he just slams the door on the phone both on her. This shows that Michael is feeling that Kay is somewhat cold hearted, she does not really care about the Corleone family and their problems, she is trying to take Michael (the real hero in the movie) away from the family, so they will not have a chance to flourish with Michael's new ideas and wisdom. Kay, may be part of one of the other families that are involved with organized crime that is also an outsider like Michael was to the Corleone family in the beginning. Kay, may also be a spy sent from her family to control Michael and to ruin the reputation of the Corleone family. These thoughts may be a total stretch from the real reason that Kay is portrayed as the scarlet woman; however, from the research and evidence that you have extrapolated from the movie above,backs up my conclusion of how Kay is the scarlet woman of "The Godfather".
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