Month: June 2013

Romantic Comedy (and Female Friendship) ‘Arranged’ Marriage Style

Written by Rachel Redfern
Arranged is a 2007 romantic comedy by Diane Crespo and Stefan Schaefer about two women, one a Muslim woman, the other Jewish, finding love in an unusual way. Setting a romantic comedy within two disparate but highly developed communities of Orthodox Judaism and Islam in New York City offered a unique perspective on the normally tired genre.

Zoe Lister-Jones is Rochel, a twenty-two year-old Jewish woman from New York, just beginning her new job as a special education teacher at a public school. Francis Benhamou is Nasira, an independent young Muslim woman also beginning her career teaching the fourth grade at the same school. Because of their shared students and more conservative beliefs, the two women become friends and help each other through their prospective arranged marriages. Both women are at a crossroads in their lives as they try to please their families and maintain their faith, while also seeking their own happiness.

As a quick side note, Schaefar and Crespo did an astounding job of placing the film within a religious setting and really giving the film a deep center in tradition and devout faith. During the opening credits, the film establishes itself within these religious neighborhoods in such a way that for the first five minutes I didn’t realize the movie was set in the United States until a character specifically stated it.

Original movie posted for ‘Arranged’
In one strong and fabulous aspect, Arranged is a feminist triumph; the film’s portrayal of female friendships might be at the very top (it also passes the Bechdel Test). These two women meet through a shared passion in their careers and their struggles to find their place and fit into their new school. But it is their ability to connect beyond their faith that is most striking; in one scene, a distraught Rochel desperately asks Nasira to join her at the cemetery and stand near her while she prays for guidance and peace. The image is one of generosity and love, since Nasira cannot participate in the ritual and must just stand by and watch her. But both women are intensely supportive of the other and it’s a positive portrayal of the ways that women build each other up in communities.

Similarly, the film is mostly women and mainly centers on the interactions among mothers and daughters, sisters and friends and the ways that they struggle to understand one another through the lenses of their own experience. I found the mother-daughter relationship between Rochel and Nasira and their mothers to be especially poignant. Rochel’s mother, Sheli (Mimi Lieber), and Nasira’s mother, Amina (Gina Schmuckler), are both incredibly sympathetic to their daughters, obviously wanting what’s best for them—Sheli is even willing to support Rochel in her decision to wait, against the judgments of the matchmaker and neighborhood women; however, they’re also dynamic forces in their daughters’ lives, fighting and pushing them to a decision they think is best. It’s simultaneously both frustrating and heartening to watch but also very realistic in how it captured many female, familial relationships.

Arranged is very focused on proving that modern ideals of love and dating are not always best and obviously wants to show that many women in these same situations are independent and beloved by their families, while also having a choice in who they marry. Unfortunately, the film does end up undercutting its own intentions to show that these women have a choice, but should they make the choice not to marry or choose someone other than a person their family approves of, it’s stated that Rochel (and probably Nasira) would have to leave their families and would ultimately be disowned.

Zoe Lister-Jones and Francis Benhamou in Arranged

Ideas about arranged marriages in the United States vary, from deeply traditional communities still using matchmakers and choosing for their children, to critics, both in and outside of these communities, who say that choices are still limited for women and believe that arranged marriages have similar levels of distress and unhappiness. No one knows the exact amount of marriages in the U.S. that are arranged (or forced for that matter), but researchers believe the number of arranged marriages globally to be around fifty percent.

The film attempts to show that love can build and grow from an arranged marriage since it belies the transience of infatuation, but by the end of the film, it feels like a too-convenient tying up of loose ends. I had hoped to see more exploration in one or two of the couples learning to love each other, or perhaps one of the women making the choice to wait or not to marry. It would have been productive to see how two very good actresses and their devout and intelligent characters would have dealt with such a situation.

It was also unfortunate that three of the four secular characters in the film were caricatures of western insensitivity, and it is sad to think that many intelligent and good people of faith, especially of more orthodox religions, have to deal with such harsh judgment (I’m guilty as well, I confess). But, the other characters seemed to be painted with a quick brush that was pretty heavy on the “airhead.” None of these characters was very informed or particularly smart, a glaring group of character flaws that need some more subtlety and diversity. The female principal of their school (Marcia Jean Kurtz) is especially inappropriate and condescending in the way that she speaks to Rochel and Nasira about their religions (in a way that I think no public school principal in New York City could act and still keep her job).

It’s interesting since this film was made over fifty years ago, but The Fiddler on The Roof is still more of a hard-hitting exploration in tradition vs. modernity, arranged marriage vs. choice, religion vs. race than Arranged.

Yet, all in all, Arranged is a sweet and uplifting film about the power of female friendship with great actresses, a beautiful score, and a uniquely positive portrayal of women. I would definitely recommend this film for a Sunday afternoon.

Rachel Redfern has an MA in English literature, where she conducted research on modern American literature and film and its intersection; however, she spends most of her time watching HBO shows, traveling, and blogging and reading about feminism.

 

The Grifters; Yeuch

Written by Robin Hitchcock
The Grifters poster
The Grifters (1990) is a movie that’s been on my “to see” list for years. I knew it had epic critical acclaim at the time of its release. I’ve liked nearly every film I’ve seen by director Stephan Frears. I absolutely adore all three members of the main cast (Anjelica Huston, John Cusack, and Annette Bening). And it gets bonus points for having two women as central characters.
But when I finally caught The Grifters this week, it was a big disappointment. There are plenty of things to recommend about this film: It’s not quite like anything I’ve seen before even though it’s in the trope-heavy noir genre. There is some wonderful acting, with Anjelica Huston in particular delivering a riveting performance. Frears brings in some directorial flourishes worthy of the opening credit “A Martin Scorsese Production,” but others feel awkwardly dated, such as the disjointed flashback sequences.
What overshadows these good qualities is that The Grifters is incredibly unpleasant to watch. Unlike most con artist movies, there is no outsider “mark” character to identify with. Roy (John Cusack), his mother Lilly (Anjelica Huston), and his paramour Myra (Annette Bening) are all in the game. The question becomes, as the poster reads, “Who’s conning who?” [sic, I think; I went to public school ;)]
Seductress Myra (Annette Bening)

But the question is actually a distraction from the real plot of the movie, a relationship-focused tragedy. None of the players is naive enough to trust anyone else, so no one gets conned. When Myra suggests to Roy that they team up, he flat out refuses. The inevitable betrayals and violence are all crimes of passion, not the planned schemes we’d expect.
Small-time con Roy (John Cusack)
Seeing this play out is an exercise in misery. And here is where I must issue spoilery trigger warnings for incest and violence against women. One scene that turned my stomach so badly I did not recover for the rest of the film depicts Lilly being intimidated by her racketeering boss Bobo Justus (how’s that for a character name with “sub”textual meaning?) after she fails at the odds-fixing racetrack scheme she works for him. I can’t even bring myself to type a description of the scene, but it is available streaming online if you want to look for it. Lilly is clearly terrified of Bobo (with good reason), but treats him with a kind humility; she hopes her sweetness and deference can save her life. The terrible thing is that it’s clear her actions and demeanor aren’t what let her survive the confrontation, but rather the whims of the man terrorizing her.
Lilly (Anjelica Huston)
Then there is the shocking violence of the third act, with such graphic gore as a woman with her face blown off on a morgue table. The Oedipal twinge to Roy’s relationship with Lilly, who had him when she was only 14 years old, comes to the fore in one of the film’s final scenes. I don’t enjoy incestual themes in any circumstances, but I found Lilly’s attempted seduction of Roy especially disturbing because she does it as a last-ditch effort to convince him to give her the cash she needs to flee Bobo’s wrath. It’s mutually non-consensual. It gets no further than a kiss, but that relief is immediately side-swept by more graphic violence.
And so The Grifters is a well-made and fantastically-acted movie that I would never recommend. Certainly some people will have a stronger tolerance than I do for its dark themes. My guess is that it’s easier to be entertained by this sort of thing when you are at the top of the kyriarchy like most film critics from the early 90’s (and sadly, today as well). But everyone else comes from a position of heightened awareness of their own vulnerability to violence and sexual assault. And that makes a movie like The Grifters seem more like a psychological weapon than a great film.

Robin Hitchcock is an American writer living in Cape Town, South Africa.

‘Arrested Development’s Mancession: Economic and Gender Meltdowns in Season 4

Arrested Development promo.
 
Written by Leigh Kolb
Spoilers ahead!
When Arrested Development first aired in 2003, the news cycle was heavy with stories of Enron-like corporate scandals and the escalating Iraq War. The first run of the series–from 2003 to 2006–relied heavily on inspiration from news stories about crooked corporations and wartime scandals to draw the Bluth family and their “riches-to-rags” story.
After a seven-year hiatus, during which rabid fans hoped, speculated and begged for more, the fourth season of Arrested Development debuted on Netflix on May 26, 2013.
During the hiatus, America has dealt with the housing bubble and economic collapse, high unemployment, sweeping legislation against reproductive rights and a lot of hand-wringing over the “Mancession” and the supposed “end of men” in American culture. There is plenty of comedy fodder buried in the depths of societal despair, and Mitch Hurwitz and company took full advantage.
In the first three seasons of the show, Michael Bluth was our good guy–the ethical, self-aware, hardworking man in a sea of familial dysfunction.
Michael considers his failings while a vulture watches on.
In the first episode of season 4, however, we first see Michael drunkenly ascend the stairs of the stair car (now emblazoned with the “Austero Bluth Company” logo) to try to settle a debt with Lucille 2. Sally Sitwell makes a snide comment about how she’s glad she didn’t marry him, and Michael attempts to seduce Lucille 2 for the money.
Michael is not the golden son we knew before. And while everyone in the Bluth family is, on some level, remarkably terrible, Michael’s fall from grace is especially jarring–and it’s supposed to be.
Lucille 2 is not interested in Michael’s desperate advances.
He’s living in George Michael’s dorm room and taking classes through the University of Phoenix. He’s clueless and desperate, lost after the housing market crashed and he loses control of his company. He tries to construct a new subdivision, but it doesn’t have the proper utilities. He can’t quite get anything right.
Arrested Development‘s new season is a comical, satirical look at the idea of the Mancession and the threat to traditional American masculine identity that writers and pundits have been analyzing and panicking about for the last few years. Jobs that have typically been held by men–construction and manufacturing, as well as finance–disappeared during the recession. Michael’s fall from grace echoes the fall from dominance that men in his position seem to have suffered during the recession.
The patriarch of the family, George Sr., is also a “victim” of emasculation in this season. Living in a commune-turned-corporate retreat with Oscar, a 21st century Roger Sterling and his female companions, George Sr. partakes in maca root that is downhill from a porta-potty. (A reddit commenter noted that the maca was probably affected by women who were on birth control pills using the toilet, which is a common anti-birth-control battle cry.) George Sr. is indeed feminized by his drug use, and a doctor confirms that he has the estrogen levels of a normal, healthy woman, and that he has almost no testosterone. He cries, feels weak, complains that he hates the way he looks and worries about looking fat (Lucille 2 responds by calling him a “drama queen”).
Her?
George Sr.’s continuous fall from power into obscurity is shown by his becoming more and more like a woman. While on another show this might be unbelievably offensive, it works on Arrested Development because we are laughing at the characters, and their dysfunction is highlighted by sexist remarks, cultural appropriation and casual racism.
Perhaps most noteworthy about Michael and George Sr.’s descents is that the two men have little to no control over what’s happening to them or around them. A hallmark of the recession’s effect on men, and the proceeding news that women are increasingly breadwinners and are out-pacing men in college and rising in the ranks in the workforce is just that: a desperate feeling of a lack of control. This is why pundits on Fox News engage in “man-panic” and try to say that science shows men are superior. This is why bloggers list all of the ways the “American man” is threatened by the changing economy.
The other men are involved in sub-plots dealing with masculinity and homosexuality. George Michael (who hates his name and tries to disconnect himself from his father) studies in Spain, growing a mustache and having an affair with a Spanish woman who he works as a nanny for. Gob’s episode is a spoof on the masculine-fueled Entourage, and he struggles with aging out of the youthful party scene. Gob and Tony Wonder, trying to enact revenge upon each other, fall in friendly love and blur the lines between friendship and romance. When George Michael says that his name is “George Maharis,” he chose the name of an actor who in 1974 was arrested for having sex with a male hairdresser named Perfecto Telles (the name of Maeby’s under-aged boyfriend).
For a brand of men for whom being emasculated is pretty terrifying, they are subjected to a great deal of it in season 4.
Buster, who grows from a “mother boy” to a “mother man,” has an affair with the wife of a politician (Herbert Love, a black Tea Party-inspired politician who is strongly against birth control coverage). He re-joins the Army and becomes a drone pilot, thinking he’s getting unlimited juice boxes and playing video games. His inability to kill a kitten, however, gets him discharged.
Arrested Development manages to parody everything–even drone strikes–and make it work.
Tony Wonder plays gay for his act, but he and Gob share an intimate relationship that evolves into a game of sexual chicken.  Speaking of chickens, here’s a National Geographic post that analyzes the Bluths’ chicken dances. Amazing.
Hannah Rosin turned her Atlantic piece, “The End of Men,” into the book, The End of Men: And the Rise of Women. She examines the changing roles of men in society, and how women are taking charge at home and at work.The women of Arrested Development often have a sense of agency and control that women don’t always have in comedic sitcoms. Lady T, who looked at the main female characters through a feminist lens in her piece for Bitch Flicks, says,

“The Bluth-Funke women make up some of the most entertaining, well-rounded characters on television. They provide just as much laughs as the male characters on Arrested Development and help to dispel the ridiculous claims that ‘women aren’t funny.'”

Lucille (1 and 2), Lindsay, Maeby and even Ann are powerful figures in season 4 and figure prominently in plot lines involving the leading men. I think it’s safe to say that compared to the male characters, we feel less sympathy for the women, because they are, on the whole, less pitiful.
Lucille on The Real Asian Prison Housewives of the Orange County White Collar Prison System.
Lucille Bluth and Lindsay are both shallow and conniving as ever. Lindsay’s spiritual journey is laughable (“I read some of Eat, Pray, Love,” she says), but she does what she wants, just like Lucille, who manages to infiltrate a gang of Asian women in prison. In flashbacks, Kristen Wiig is amazing as a young Lucille.
“I’m surrounded by squalor and death and I still can’t be happy.”
Lucille Austero is running for office against Herbert Love, and has a powerful corporate position.
Maeby, attempting to finish high school and feeling insecure about the fact that she hasn’t and the fact that her career in film production is ending, pimps out her mother and runs an aggressive PR campaign for George Michael’s fake FakeBlock.
Maeby’s film career gets cut short, so she gets creative.
Ann had a child with Tony Wonder and is planning on marrying Gob, but he backs out, and she manages to get back at both of them.
In short, the women of Arrested Development continue to have a great deal of twisted power, just as they did in previous seasons.
George Michael and his father have been dating the same woman, Rebel, and the two come to blows at the end of the season. George Michael rejects his name and punches his father, and enters himself into the canon of men with daddy issues in film and media, including his own father and grandfather.
This third generation of Bluths–George Michael and Maeby–are products of the arrested development of their family and are fulfilling the roles that have been laid out for them, even as they try to rebel.
The way that Arrested Development tackles–no, skewers–current issues and societal woes makes it brilliant and surprisingly timeless. From corporate fraud to war scandals to economic crashes to gender norms, the same issues and problems arise time and time again. Society is, indeed, one big roofie circle.
You can catch Tobias on the evangelical television network.
Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. 

Brit Marling Co-Writes and Stars in the Murky Yet Gripping Drama, ‘The East’

Sarah (Brit Marling)

 
This guest post by Candice Frederick previously appeared at her blog Reel Talk and is cross-posted with permission.

Brit Marling is one of the most authentic actresses of her generation. Remarkably so. She’s not a method actor, not someone who is particularly possessed by a character. Rather, her performances are organic, like they’re peeled from her own person, and not a distant portrayal. No matter how flawed her characters are, she plays them with the same amount of caress and kinship as if they were all varied parts of one whole.

And that’s just the type of actress needed to serve as the ambiguous moral compass in the riveting new drama, The East. In a film that right from its start questions its own intent, Marling (who co-wrote the script with the film’s director, Zal Batmanglij, who also teamed with her for 2011’s Sound of My Voice) quietly yet fiercely redefines the political drama genre in which it exists. Marling plays Sarah, a smart, recent college grad who’s just landed a job at an elite private intelligence firm. Her first task? To infiltrate a dissident group of individuals, a freegan collective, whose sole mission it is to punish and take down various pharmaceutical companies that they feel have indirectly poisoned consumers with their products (in a sense, giving them a taste of their own medicine). The East refers to their latest, largest, target company in which they have a more personal interest.

Despite their cause and their ultimate actions, this cartel, so to speak, isn’t an aggressive batch. They live not too far away from the political heartland, Washington D.C., in a wall-less house torched several years ago by their leader, Benji (Alexander Skarsgård in a solemn yet passionate role), who once lived there as a young boy. They munch on earthly cuisine mostly found on the ground or in dumpsters and avoid any processed or store-brought items to eat, wear, or consume in any way. Needless to say, they appear as vagrants, even though they consist of once-valued members of society who played their parts in the America machine. When one of them, Doc (Toby Kebbell), a physician, experiences first hand the effects of the industry’s conspiracy, he completely changes his life focus to join the cause. Each of the players, including Izzy (Ellen Page), who’s a little feisty firecracker, have had similar paths where the cause has affected them personally.

Izzy (Ellen Page) and Benji (Alexander Skarsgard)
It is Sarah’s job to learn their tactics and plans and report back to Sharon (Patricia Clarkson), her manager at Hiller Brood in D.C. But things change once she learns the truth behind their efforts.
What The East does that makes it more interesting than many other films that have saturated the political genre is its distinct intangibility. It doesn’t set out with a particular purpose. Rather, it embodies a general sentiment of frustration and complacency. The film paints a portrait of a young woman, already impressionable due to her age and unwavering drive to succeed. Sarah’s not a martyr because she’s not really sure she wants to be, despite an unspecified determination. She’s not sure which position to play; she knows she wants to be in the one that lets her win. Which makes her a prime target for both Hiller Brood and the anarchist group because she’s not on either side, really. She’s extremely accessible, in part due to Marling’s natural vulnerability, which makes her point of view that much more relatable even if it doesn’t specifically resonate with you.

Thankfully, Batmanglij and Marling’s screenplay approaches the subject on a much broader level so that it never comes off as a public service announcement, despite the course of events. Sarah’s strength, even when she becomes submerged with the group, is so magnetic to watch. The film also does a good job of clenching the viewer with a heart-thumping score that increases the intensity and pace of the events. If you’re a fan of Tony or Ridley Scott’s work, you can see their influence there. They are just two of the producers of the film.

When we first meet Sarah (Marling), we know her as a young woman who jogs to the sound of Christian music playing in her ears. With Marling’s introductory narration in the beginning of the movie, you can tell right away that Sarah is a soft, empathetic young woman who could easily fall prey to a more pragmatic personality (like her boss, Sharon, for instance). She’s just trying to do what’s right, what she knows to be pragmatic. She has a steady live-in boyfriend with whom she is in love, though she does not confide in him about her professional escapades. She does everything her boss tells her to do, but her actions become less dependable when she becomes affected by the group’s efforts, providing the film with its murky transition.

The beauty of The East is that it doesn’t take any side; it humanizes both sides and shows the weaknesses and strengths of both arguments. In that sense, it is an honest movie. It doesn’t tell you to think any one way or change your opinion on the pharmaceutical industry. Though the movie takes you inside the lives of those involved in the protest movement, and one pro-industry magnet who’s gone rogue, it doesn’t beat you over the head with either story. It’s the rather sensitive portrayals from each character that you will remember the most.

Candice Frederick is an NABJ award-winning print journalist, film critic, and blogger for Reel Talk.

‘Farah Goes Bang’: A Love Letter to Female Friendships

Farah Goes Bang movie poster
Written by Amanda Rodriguez
Spoiler Alert
“I wanted to do something I hadn’t done before. Change the world and be awesome.” – 17 year-old female John Kerry Campaign Volunteer in Farah Goes Bang
Meera Menon’s Tribeca Film Festival award-winning Farah Goes Bang is a lot of things: it’s a coming-of-age and sexual awakening story, a road trip narrative, a political tale, a multicultural expression, a chick flick, and a love affair with all the beauty and grit of the American experience. The strongest facet of this film, however, is its unflinching depiction of the strength and intimacy of female friendship.
The story centers around three young women who’ve just finished college and decide to take a road trip together as volunteers on the John Kerry presidential campaign. Our heroine, Farah, is tired of her pesky virginity and wants to lose it on the campaign trail. On the road, both Farah (Persian) and her friend Roopa (Indian) encounter racism along with its companions stereotyping and bigotry. Menon talked in an interview on KeralaNext.com about the culture clash the women encounter:
“Their odyssey through the heartland of America is meant to demonstrate the ways in which these girls are often not seen as American, though they are as American as any other. I really wanted the film to integrate their faces and races into a new sense of American identity, one that embraces the hybrid, cross-cultural form that I have experienced in my own sense of citizenship.”

All I have to say is: YES. As a feminist woman of color, this kind of representation of my experiences (and the experiences of countless women just like me) is invaluable. Showing these women as rounded human beings with troubles that are not so foreign or alien as white culture would have you believe is something we desperately need as part of a movement toward inclusivity, toward acceptance and the embracing of those our society typically marginalizes and others.   

“I think [the scarf] looks pretty, kinda like it belongs on you.” – KJ  “That is so racist.” – Roopa

Farah Goes Bang passes the Bechdel test all day long. The core of this film is the connection between these three women and how it supports them, gives them strength, allows them their fluidity of identity, and is fun as well as necessary for each of their unique journeys. Menon says, 

“The film, at its heart, is about the importance of female friendships during the rapid period of personal growth that is your twenties. I have learned so much through my friends, particularly female, about who I am and the woman I hope to be. This film is a love letter to how formative those relationships are when you are young.” 
Near the end of the film, Farah finally gets her hook-up on the much anticipated election night. It’s dark out, so we never clearly see the man she seduces, nor do we learn his name. (The seduction itself is a pivotal character shift because, until this point, Farah had always been meek and incapable of owning her sexuality.) After they have sex, she goes back to the cabin where her friends are, wanting to spend the rest of this meaningful night with the people who are most important to her: her girlfriends. It is the bond of friendship that sees these young women through the crushing disappointment of the election and the very adult realization that the world isn’t very easy to change.
KJ, Farah, and Roopa enjoying a special night of anticipation and fireworks.
Though the film is a bit rose-colored and unrealistic with some of its themes (Roopa’s lack of internal struggles render her one-dimensional when compared to her two friends, KJ’s cathartic conversation with a military vet, and Farah’s empowering encounter with a drag queen followed by her ideal one-night-stand with a beautiful, nameless stranger), it turns out it’s still nice to watch a movie about women that doesn’t involve a rape or murder (especially a women-on-the-road story), where the women don’t necessarily all get what they want, but they come out the other side together, happy, and ready for the next challenge.

Where Have You Gone, Sarah Connor?

Remember Linda Hamilton (playing Sarah Connor) and her guns in Terminator 2?
This guest post by Holly Derr is cross-posted with permission from The Ms. Magazine Blog.
Summer always makes me a bit nostalgic for childhood. I remember fondly the excitement of being out of school, the long days with nothing to do but read and the cool refuge from the hot Texas sun provided by a matinee of a summer blockbuster at the local movie theater.
Unfortunately, this summer’s action movies have left me nostalgic for more than the air conditioning. Only a few of the most highly anticipated movies of the summer feature more than one woman, and those women are primarily co-stars, not leads. After Earth and World War Z have wives who stay home while the man goes on the adventure. Elysium co-stars Jodie Foster as a bad guy, but from what little information has been released on the plot, her weapon of choice appears to be government red tape. Even Monsters University only has one female student—and she’s a cheerleader.
Anne Hathaway as Catwoman
To make matters worse, the characters who do get in on the action are mostly played by women who cannot believably fight. The Heat is a buddy cop movie starring Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy, but it looks to be more comedy than action. The female hero of Kick Ass 2 is a young girl. And though Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts in Iron Man 3, Zoe Saldana as Uhura in Star Trek: Into Darkness, Gal Gadot as Giselle and Michelle Rodriguez as Letty in Fast and Furious 6, and Rinko Kikuchi as Pacific Rim‘s Mako Mori are supposedly tough, they are so thin that it’s hard to believe that they’re actually capable of action. In fact, though Uhura is present for two of the fights in the new Star Trek, in the first, she mainly hides behind a wall, and in the second, she merely fires a phaser which, being a phaser, doesn’t even have any kickback.
This trend is disturbing but not accidental: The diets these women go on to prepare for their roles mean that no matter how much training they do, they’re not eating enough to build muscle. To prepare for Catwoman, Anne Hathaway went vegan and was, by her own account, exhausted all the time. Not surprisingly she failed to build any muscle despite intensive training: most scientists agree that the full range of amino acids responsible for muscle growth is only found in animal products. (Think about it–have you ever seen a muscular vegan?) Gwyneth Paltrow published her “elimination” diet in her book, It’s All Good, and indeed it does appear she does more eliminating than eating. And Alice Eve, whose totally unnecessary underwear scene as Carol Marcus in Star Trek: Into Darkness has prompted its fair share of criticism, told Allure that to prepare for the role she ate nothing but spinach for five months. Perhaps that’s why she and her counterpart in the film, Saldana (who clocks in it at a whopping 115 pounds) spend most of the movie looking like they are about to cry.
Ellen Ripley
I say we bring back Ripley. To prepare for her role in Aliens, Sigourney Weaver did dumbbell chest presses, squats, shoulder presses, and rows—all with weights—and she didn’t diet at all. Did you hear that? Not at all. I say we bring back Sarah Connor. In Terminator 2, Linda Hamilton did basic soldier training and ate a high-protein diet, and, indeed, she has guns in her hands and on her arms. Or remember when a 140-pound Jamie Lee Curtis did a strip tease to protect her “cover” in True Lies? Now that was a motivated underwear scene. (Note to J.J. Abrams: Having Eve take her clothes off in the middle of rushing from one place to the next for no reason at all is simply objectification.)
These female heroes of yore were popular not just because they were badass: They were also fantastic characters. Unfortunately, the summer movie with the best female fights (and the most diverse casting) is probably going to be the one that provides the least opportunity for character development. Gina Carrano, an actual Mixed Martial Arts professional, and Michelle Rodriguez did almost all of their own fights for Fast and Furious 6, and those fights are pretty damn cool. But because Rodriguez’s character Letty has amnesia, she moves through every moment of the film when she’s not driving or fighting like she’s in a daze. Carrano as Riley never speaks more than one or two lines per scene.

 

 

Saldana, Eve and Paltrow are gorgeous and talented, and the problems with their performances are largely the result of underwritten characters. I don’t mean to body shame this summer’s starlets for being slender, though I do wish they would eat. I mean to shame Hollywood for asking them to starve themselves, and to shame a culture that thinks starving women are beautiful. It’s not a coincidence that many women action heroes are actually children—that’s about as big as Hollywood lets women get these days.
Media-saavy Geena Davis, in an interview about her movie The Long Kiss Goodnight (in which she played amnesiac CIA agent Samantha Caine who, like Jason Bourne, has forgotten who she was but not how to fight), explained why this matters:

Thelma and Louise had a big reaction, there was a huge thing at the time, that, ‘Oh my god, these women had guns and they actually killed a guy!’ … That movie made me realize—you can talk about it all you want, but watch it with an audience and talk to women who have seen this movie and they go, ‘YES!’ They feel so adrenalized and so powerful after seeing some women kick some ass and take control of their own fate. … Women go, ‘Yeah – fucking right!’ Women don’t get to have that experience in the movies. But hey, people go to action movies for a reason; they want to feel adrenalized and they want to identify with the hero, and if only guys get to do that then it’s crazy.

Long live Samantha Caine. Long live Thelma and Louise.
Holly L. Derr is a writer, director, and professor living in Los Angeles. She writes regularly for The Ms. Magazine Blog on theater, film, television and reproductive rights. Her tumblr Feminist Fandom addresses representation of sex, gender, sexuality, and race in the media. Follow her @hld6oddblend.

 

‘True Blood’ Season Six Kick Off!

Written by Rachel Redfern

***Spoiler (or more aptly called, rumors) alert  

With the passing of one great HBO show comes the dawn of a new one. While we all cry for the season finale of Game of Thrones and the subsequent nine months without Peter Dinklage, it means now we have True Blood to look forward to.

Starting June 16th, the next great gratifyingly guts and love HBO show will be up and running with ten episodes pleasantly filled with Eric Northman (Alexander Skarsgard), Bill Compton (Stephen Moyer), and Alcide Herveoux (Joe Manganiello); while the show has a normal run of twelve episodes a season, it’s been shortened to a soul-crushing ten due to Anna Paquin’s pregnancy.

As a little recap, season five ended with Eric yelling, “Sookie, Run!” after the creation of Billith, the lovable Bill turned into a religious vampire fundamentalist who drinks the ancient blood of Lillith and becomes an evil liturgical nightmare. 

Artwork of Lillith

As a feminist, I find it fascinating that Lillith was chosen as the starting point for the vampire religion. In the original legend of Lillith, she was created before Eve to be Adam’s wife, but she refused to be Adam’s “slave” and so rebelled against god, left the Garden of Eden and then slept with Satan. She gave birth to many children by Satan, but when god demanded she give them to him she refused. Therefore, like so many female mythic figures (and modern day ones) she has been cast as either a demonic prostitute or as a great mother figure who protects children, more commonly known as the angel on the hearth.

This obviously transitions into the use of religious themes from season five, and that will be carried over into season six. (According to the season six trailer, an incredulous Sookie tells Bill, “You really do think you’re god.”) Whether True Blood intends to cast Lillith as a demon or an angel hasn’t been entirely determined (though my money is on demon); however, it’s incredibly unique to have a woman as the savior figure in a religion (the only other film/tv show I can think of is Dogma, and I’m not sure that counts). Unfortunately though, it seems Lillith can’t just stay a woman; Bill drinks Lillith’s blood and effectively becomes a part of her,  either taking on some part of her divinity or just becoming her in flesh. While it was a bit frustrating to have her become a man at the end of the season, it’s also still interesting to have a possibly androgynous religious figure.

True Blood is a show that has consistently dealt with some of the more mythological and pagan representations of women: Holly (Lauren Bowles) as a good witch; Marnie (Fiona Shaw) and Antonia in season four as the sometimes bad, sometimes good witches; Maryann (Michelle Forbes), as the evil ancient maenad in season two; and a whole host of good, bad and flighty fairies throughout the entire show.

Of course on the surface, True Blood gets a reputation as a vampire romance with lots and lots of sex; however, the show in general has powerful themes: religious fundamentalism, terrorism, racism, homosexuality, and even PTSD. Todd Lowe and his gentle search for earthly normalcy provided a great counterpoint to the search for supernatural artifacts or dominion of the other characters. Also, Lafayette (Nelsan Ellis) is one of the most interesting homosexual characters on television; Ellis plays the role with a physical masculinity but with a more feminine wardrobe and a flamboyant sexuality. For me, Ellis’ masterful acting as a playful joining of genders and stereotypes is able to move away from a trite rehashing of more mainstream representations of homosexuality. (Note: The following clip, while representative of Ellis’ fine powers of gender melding, also contains explicit language. NSFW.)

 

True Blood also did an amazing job with firmly insinuating a real sense of place into the series; there is a gritty realism to its deep south with the humidity, rich and poor suburbs, accent, clothing and behavior. Ultimately the show portrays poverty, varying levels of education, spiritual communities, even a few crappy old cars, and unlike many other shows, characters are of varying beauty and body type, have unstylish hair cuts and ill-fitting jeans (except for a lot of the vamps–most of them are just dripping sex). So at least the show maintains some sense of realism while the main cast runs around staking vampires and strip dancing with fairies.

We also have to recognize the incredibly kick ass soundtracks that the producers bang out over every season: Beyond the bland mixes of generic pop music of most shows, True Blood features punk rock, country, folk music, fabulous jazz and sleazy hip hop in a brilliant mashup. It also has in my opinion, one of the best, if not the best, opening sequences of any tv show. 
 

The cast of True Blood


So, on to season six: what can we expect? Spoilers and rumors to follow.

Sookie and Jason: Looks like Sookie and Jason are on the trail for Warlow (Rutger Hauer), the mysterious vampire who killed their parents and to whom Sookie was apparently promised. Sookie also looks like she’s coming in to her own and letting someone (Bill? Eric?) know she doesn’t belong to anyone and that she’s getting sick of the way her life is going.

Eric and Sookie: Eric and Sookie look like they’re getting it on in a few scenes and beyond that, Eric looks sweet, and sexy and amazing. Perhaps this season we’ll get to see him in the heroes’ role as he realizes the best parts of himself? Also, apparently Nora isn’t just his sister? Supposedly, there’s a little bit more of a secret there than we originally thought. Bigger than all of that though, is the rumor that Eric might meet the true death in this season, which if that happens, would entirely change the course of the show.

On a side note however, the show has received some criticism for its unwillingness to kill off major characters, so while I think that Eric dying is a low possibility, (though Skarsgard’s career has been gaining recently; he might want to move on to other projects) perhaps that’s why the show might be ready to take the plunge of major character death? Also, consider this season’s tagline “No one lives forever.” 

True Blood Season 6 and tagline

Pam and Tara: Pam and Tara will continue their relationship and the two definitely seem to be going it alone. However, I have heard that Tara has a near-true-death experience, which we hope will only be an experience and not a permanent change. 

Evil: The humans might just be the villains in this season, along with Warlow, since rumors have been leaked of scary anti-vampire weapons (one of which might end up hurting Tara). It also looks like there’s some intense secret lab where humans have been conducting experiments on vampires and other supernaturals. Perhaps a vampire/werewolf alliance will be on the horizon this season?

On a happy note, everyone’s favorite pastor family is back with Sarah Newlin (Anna Camp) and Steve Newlin (Michael McMillian), and Sarah looks like she’s probably gonna be a badass. 

Trailer #2

Trailer #1 

What do you think will happen this season? Is it time for a main character to die? 

Rachel Redfern has an MA in English literature, where she conducted research on modern American literature and film and its intersection; however, she spends most of her time watching HBO shows, traveling, and blogging and reading about feminism.

 

‘The Host’: Less Anti-Feminist Than ‘Twilight’, but Hardly a Sisterhood Manifesta

The Host posters

This guest post by Dr. Natalie Wilson is cross-posted with permission from Ms. Magazine.

I readily admit I did not read The Host. I couldn’t face it after immersing myself in all things Twilight while researching my book Seduced by Twilight. I started it, but less than 20 pages in I couldn’t stomach any more of Stephenie Meyer’s purple, flaccid prose. No, I agree with Nicki Gerlach—that “Meyer is not a particularly concise or elegant writer, never saying in one sentence what she could hammer at for three.”
As such, I went into the film of The Host with low expectations, presuming I would hate it and be bored to tears. I was prepared for a sappy ode to sparkly true love and immortal families. And while the narrative does indeed ultimately celebrate these things, it does so in a way far more engaging than its Twilight predecessor. This is largely due to a stronger lead—a fierce young Melanie Stryder (Saoirse Ronan), who resists the occupation by the alien known as Wanderer (later called Wanda). Early in the movie, after Wanderer is implanted into her neck, she informs her alien occupier through interior dialogue, “I’m still here. Don’t think this is yours. This body is mine.”
Max Irons as Jared and Saoirse Ronan as Melanie in The Host

While I would have been thrilled had this refusal of bodily occupation turned into a sci-fi version of “my body, my choice,” I am familiar enough with Meyer to know this would not be the case, despite her recent claims to being an uber-feminist. Yet while Melanie may not be more bell hooks than Bella Swan, she at least is not the passive sap that led us through thousands of pages and four films of not doing much more than ogling Edward the vampire in Twilight. No, Melanie jumps out of windows, steals cars, survives a trek through the dessert and fends off various humans and alien foes. Alas, she is, like Bella, anchored to the world of patriarchal heteronormativity and gender conformity via her positioning as nurturing sister to her younger brother Jamie, and love interest to first Jarad (Max Irons), then Ian (Jake Abel).
But I was pleasantly surprised when the film didn’t make me grimace through painful odes to abstinence or groan at a genuflection to the mighty power of patriarchs. Instead, I quite liked Melanie, a female character who could not only walk without tripping, seemed to have a mind of her own, chutzpah and, gasp, didn’t deny her sexual urges.
Meyer claimed she intended to “portray a positive relationship between the two women at the center of the story,” and, indeed, she does. Melanie fights Wanderer’s occupation of her body, but they ultimately become close allies, referring to each other as “sister” by film’s end. Is this the sisterhood manifesto Meyer’s recent “I am a feminist” claims suggest she supports? If so, it seems her brand of feminism involves women uniting in their love for men. Que feministe!
Saoirse Ronan in The Host

Admittedly, Melanie and Wanda also love one another by the end of the film, but they are still ultimately defined by their male love interests. (Ah, if only THEY could have become lovers, a la the fanfiction that has Bella  and Alice as the Twilight couple rather than Bella and Edward.)
Granted,  Melanie is far more of a Hermione type than a Bella one.  She is cognizant that the opening claim of the film that  “The Earth is at peace. There is no hunger. There is no violence. The environment is healed. Our world has never been more perfect” is false. When we first see her, she is fighting off the alien invaders of her planet and then willfully jumping from a window, choosing potential death over an alien-occupation of her body. (If only Bella had resisted wolf/vampire takeover with anything like such resistance!) But, alas, Melanie’s identity is also mired in a love triangle—well, more of a quadrangle, actually, wherein her reason to live is fueled not only by her filial love for her little brother but also romantic love for Jared/Ian.  This “unusually crowded romantic triangle—with four aching hearts but only three bodies to play for” (as CNN put it) results in a narrative that is less feminist utopia, more sci-fi romance.
While Melanie gets a feminist gold star for refusing to play the controlled virgin (in fact, she takes the sexual lead, insisting she and Jared should have sex given the apocalyptic alien invasion of the world), things become less copacetic when Wanda and Ian fall for each other—a narrative thread that makes the fight for body/self less between she and Wanderer and more of a question whether she “belongs” to Jared or Ian. While there are certainly queer possibilities in this love triangle of three bodies and four lovers, this is Meyer-world, so of course no such queery-ing happens. Instead, an alien who could have been genderless is decidedly feminized, and an inter-species romance that could have been queer/polyamorous is decidedly hetero-ized.
Movie still from The Host

In the scenes where the Wanda-occupied Melanie desires to kiss Ian, the internal dialogue delivered by Melanie has creepy undertones that smack of valuing only certain kinds of love. When Melanie tells Wanda “this is so wrong … you’re not even from the same planet…” she could just as readily be arguing against same-sex love and/or any romantic formations that do not accord with heterosexual monogamy.
Nevertheless, when Wanda informs Ian that even though “this body loves him” (meaning Melanie’s body) but “I also have feeling of my own,” there is the slightest suggestion that maybe, just maybe, hetero-monogomy is not the only option. Wanda, noting “this is very complicated,” can be read here as arguing for the possibility of polyamory/queer romance, while Melanie’s later insistence she and Wanda can both live in the one body similarly questions the notion of singular, fixed identity.
Regrettably, the ending of the film (spoiler alert!) fails to champion any such queer/feminist notions. No, instead of occupying the same body and loving both Jared and Ian, Wanda is implanted into another human body—a female one, of course—and one that is also white and traditionally attractive. You didn’t think this alien-human love could transcend gender or white privilege, did you? Of course not. This is Meyer-world, after all.
Chandler Canterbury as Jamie in The Host

Though The Host is more feminist-friendly than Twilight in ways, it is no feminist ode. Along the way to its happy-ever-after for the two central couples (Melanie and Jared and Wanda and Ian), it also takes some worrying forays into the violence-is-sexy meme and has undercurrents of pro-life messaging. In one scene, Wanda says “kiss me like you wanna get slapped,” and in others her discovery that the human holdouts are killing aliens can be read as a pro-life message wrapped in an alien invasion package— especially if we consider that some of the first words said of Melanie in the film are “this one wants to live.” Later, Wanda’s character continues this anti-abortion meme, telling the humans, after discovering embryo-sized aliens surrounded by blood on an operating table, “I can’t stay here, not with you slaughtering my family in the next room.”
Alas, while some laud “the significance of one of the most popular authors in the world standing up to say she’s a feminist,” I concur with Jezebel’s Madeleine Davis, who queries Meyer as follows: “If the world’s a better place when women are in charge, why not give them a little bit of agency between the covers of your books?” Admittedly, The Host gives female characters more agency than Twilight, but it is still mired (Meyer-ed?) in traditional romance, normative gender roles, hetero-monogamy as the happy ending and pro-life sentiment. It is more feminist-friendly than Twilight, but is that really a win for feminism when we have to argue the merit of stories that are not as rabidly anti-feminist as that four-book ode to patriarchal romance?

Natalie Wilson, PhD is a literature and women’s studies scholar, blogger, and author. She teaches at Cal State San Marcos and specializes in areas of gender studies, feminism, feminist theory, girl studies, militarism, body studies, boy culture and masculinity, contemporary literature, and popular culture. She is author of the blogs Professor, what if …? and Seduced by Twilight. She is a proud feminist mom of two feminist kids (one daughter, one son) and is an admitted pop-culture junkie. Her favorite food is chocolate.

How ‘New Girl’s Jess and Nick Avoided Common Rom-Com Pitfalls

Jess (Zooey Deschanel) and Nick (Jake Johnson) have their first kiss
Written by Lady T.  
This year’s season of New Girl introduced a sitcom plot that fans and audience members anticipate and dread in equal measure: the BIG KISS between two lead characters, and the will-they-won’t-they dynamic that followed.
Hooking up the two lead characters of any show is always a risky move for writers to take. No matter how much chemistry exists between the two actors, viewers and critics often fear–with good reason–that once the unresolved sexual tension is resolved, the relationship will become an endless cycle of breakups, reunions, and miscommunication, and no longer be entertaining to watch (ahem).
As a fan of New Girl, I was apprehensive about the idea of Jess and Nick getting together, because I’ve watched TV before and I’ve seen how even great sitcoms can be dragged down by tiresome will-they-won’t-they plots (such as Community’s Jeff/Britta dance of sexual tension before the writers wisely changed course with that storyline). Now that the season has come to an end, I can safely say that Jess and Nick’s kiss did not drag down the show, but elevated a good season into a great one. In fact, Jess and Nick have become one of the more delightful TV romances I’ve ever seen.
How did the writers pull this off?
1. They kept up the pacing and moved the story forward.
On another show, Jess and Nick might have only reached their first kiss by the end of season two, if that. Nick would have realized his feelings for Jess at the end of season one, right after she started dating someone else, and the reverse would happen at the end of season two. On New Girl, Jess and Nick kissed mid-season, had a few awkward conversations about it, kissed again, eventually slept together, and are now in a state where they are pursuing…something, fumbling as they do it. Their relationship is progressing at the pace of actual humans, not characters who know they’re on a television show.

Jess and Nick, before almost kissing.

2. They didn’t forget that the show is a comedy.
So far, there have been no huge declarations of love between Jess and Nick. The closest that came to a declaration was Jess admitting that she didn’t want to call off whatever they had in the season finale, followed by Nick kissing her passionately. Other than that, the writers have emphasized the “comedy” part of romantic comedy, and the results have been great. Whether it’s Nick panic-moonwalking away from Jess on the morning after their first kiss, or Jess finding herself turned on when Nick acts remotely like a responsible grownup (learning how to do laundry!), the characters are still being funny even as they try to navigate their feelings for each other.
3. The barriers to a Jess/Nick relationship are organic to their characters.
The writers on New Girl have not wasted their time with many romantic false leads or contrived subplots designed to keep Jess and Nick apart. They haven’t had to, because there’s enough standing in their way of having a functional relationship without the typical sitcom contrivances.

Nick carries Jess over the threshold.

On the plus side, Jess and Nick are friends and roommates who get along, care about each other, offer each other emotional support, and have plenty of sexual chemistry–all ingredients to a successful relationship. On the other hand, Jess’s sunny disposition, determination, and optimism clash horribly with Nick’s eternal grumpiness and lack of direction. The girl who makes up her own theme songs and the guy who gets so irrationally angry that he yells at doors can’t possibly have a relationship without some serious bumps in the road.
That’s why Jess and Nick’s conflicts have been so refreshing to watch. She’s unsure about his directionless nature and the fact that he has a credit score of a homeless ghost, and he knows that she’s unsure about him because of that reason, which leads to him feeling even more insecure. The fact that they’re friends who live together also complicates matters. If whatever they have becomes more serious, there will be many entertaining bumps in the road along the way.
4. The endgame is a question mark.



Jess dresses as Elvis for Nick’s father’s funeral (it makes sense if you watch the episode)


The relationship between Jess and Nick has been developing for a while, with mutual attraction acknowledged long before they actually kissed, but there’s no sense that Jess/Nick is an “endgame” couple. Considering their differences in personality, there’s a big chance that a relationship between them won’t work at all. They also might stay together for a long time. When they drive off together at the end of Cece’s wedding that wasn’t, there’s a sense that anything can happen between them.
From the perspective of someone who’s watched countless romantic comedies and rom-com pairings on television, I’m relieved to see a different take on a pairing of potentially mismatched friends. As a feminist, I’m happy that there’s no sense of an “endgame” with Jess and Nick, that Jess’s story isn’t all about whether or not she ends up with a guy (even if said guy is my current favorite character on television and Jake Johnson needs to win ALL the Emmys). Whatever she has with Nick is a big part of Jessica Day’s life, but it doesn’t define her, and she’s treated as a human being trying to figure out her life.
Would that all writers of romantic comedy treated their characters the way Elizabeth Meriweather and the staff of New Girl treat Jess and Nick–as people, not props in a foretold rom-com ending.

Nick and Jess, shortly before calling off their relationship (and then un-calling it later)

Lady T is an a writer with two novels, a play, and a collection of comedy sketches in progress. She hopes to one day be published and finish one of her projects (not in that order). You can find more of her writing at www.theresabasile.com.

Miyazaki Month: Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind

Written by Myrna Waldron.

Nausicaa hears the bubbling healthy water inside a petrified tree

  • Unlike the previous three reviews for this “retrospective,” I was going into this review almost completely blind. I had not seen Nausicaä before today, and only knew that it was a film with a strong female protagonist and a lot of flying around on gliders. Thinking back on it now that I’ve seen the film, it is definitely very good, but I do not consider it on the same artistic level as Princess Mononoke or Spirited Away. The film is unmistakably Miyazaki, as it has his favourite themes of pacifism, environmentalism, feminism, and “Things that fly are really cool.” I think the pacifism and environmentalism themes were a lot more heavy-handed in Nausicaä than they were in Princess Mononoke. I also found the characterization kind of lacking — I can’t even remember the names of most of the male characters. The animation is incredible, of course. The music is a mixed bag. “Normal” scenes are scored simply, with the soundtrack only adding necessary emotional pull. Scenes where the insects rampage, however, are scored with a distinctly 80s-sounding electronic fast-paced musical style which, I feel, conflicts with the rest of the film. It reminded me a lot of boss battle music that you find in video games. Oh well!
  • I decided to just watch the movie with the English dub on — as I was seeing the film for the first time, it would have been very hard for me to follow two scripts at once without already knowing what the characters are saying and what is going to happen. The English dub is…okay. I was practically gleeful to hear Patrick Stewart’s voice. He could narrate the recipes on the back of a soup can and I’d listen enraptured. I have to say that Alison Lohman was a lacking heroine. She said far too many of her lines in the exact same intonation. I have no idea why they cast Shia LeBoeuf in anything, because his voice isn’t particularly notable, and his delivery was average. Heh, remember when Hollywood tried so hard to make Shia LeBoeuf happen? Uma Thurman was decent as Princess Kushana — there was definitely a lot of coldness and bitterness in her delivery, which gave the character much needed development. And, because I did not check the Japanese script, I don’t know if this is a problem specific to the English script or what, but it drove me NUTS that the characters kept referring to Nausicaä as “The Princess” or “Princess” as if she didn’t have a name. Also, comparing my notes to the TV Tropes article, it seems that the English dub mispronounced/mistranslated a few terms — I heard Torumekian as “Tolmekian” and Ohmu as “Ohm.”  
  • Speaking of Princesses, Nausicaä and Kushana make a very interesting comparison to the traditional Disney-style fairy tale princesses we’ve come to grow up with. Most notably, both of them are tremendously proactive. They don’t wait for other people to do their tasks for them; they act immediately. Nausicaä is tomboyish rather than traditionally feminine. Kushana retains some femininity, but it heavily contrasts with her warlike ambitions and her armour-like prosthetics. There are no tiaras or poofy dresses here — neither woman has any time for that kind of crap. Neither one has any romantic ambitions or entanglements either, as both tremendously value their independence. I suspect that Kushana is meant to be a strong counterpoint to Nausicaä. Kushana is bitter where Nausicaä is optimistic, vengeful instead of peaceful, etc. There is one thing that bothers me though. Both of Nausicaä’s parents are dead, so shouldn’t she now be a Queen, not a Princess? I can understand the Valley of the Wind’s people being reluctant to acknowledge the murder of their sovereign and do not have time to hold a coronation, but to continue to call her Princess robs her of a chance to gain a significant leadership role. The Disney Princesses always remain Princesses. They can get married, have children, and the parents are nowhere to be found, but they must never become rulers. In Kushana’s case, I discovered via TV Tropes that in the extended Nausicaä manga, she has a living father and brothers, so it is understandable that she is still “Princess” despite her obvious leadership role.

Nausicaa flies into a rage after her father is murdered
  • Nausicaä is a well-developed female protagonist, and Kushana is also a decently developed female antagonist, but I found myself wishing that they had the moral ambiguities found in the characterizations of San and Lady Eboshi. Nausicaä is a rather obvious messiah archetype and practically has no flaws at all. I have to stretch a bit to find some — her sheer determination to help everyone and everything in danger, no matter what, borders on recklessness. Her lapsing into sheer lethal rage at finding her father murdered is a flaw she fears in herself. This dark side of her makes her not so different from Kushana in some ways. However, on the positive side, Nausicaä has a tremendous amount of agency, and is equally as brave, talented and selfless as any ideal heroic male protagonist would be. Her glider, which she effortlessly rides the wind on, is an obvious metaphor for freedom. She also has a distinct talent in that she can communicate effectively with the animals and insects in this post-apocalyptic world. The other people in the world fear these animals and execute them for their own safety, but Nausicaä resolutely believes that they have the ability to reason and are capable of kindness.
  • One aspect of Nausicaä’s character I appreciated was her interest in chemistry and botany. On her many expeditions, she gathers the supposedly poisonous spores in the Toxic Jungle, brings them back home, and then secretly cultivates them. She discovers that irrigating the plants with clean water and soil removes their toxicity completely. She was doing this in hopes of finding a cure for her father’s poisoning, but his murder almost forces her to give up completely. As time goes on, she even realizes that the forest and insects evolved specifically to clean the earth’s pollution. Observing ancient petrified trees, she deducts that the trees absorb the pollution so it becomes inert. The trees die, petrify, and then become purified sand. This plot point, of course, relates to Miyazaki’s usual message preaching environmentalism. The world of Nausicaä presents a dark future — the pollution humans have caused has gotten so bad that the earth itself is striking back at future human generations and slowly eliminating them. Nausicaä’s discoveries offer some semblance of hope, as she teaches her fellow villagers how to irrigate the plants safely.
  • Princess Kushana is a relatively sympathetic antagonist. Having lost an arm and both her legs to insect attacks, her wanting to enact vengeance on them is understandable. She even hints that there is further damage to her body that only her future husband will see. A TV Tropes writer interpreted that line to mean that Kushana’s reproductive organs were removed, which I don’t agree with. She’d have quite a bit trouble going to the bathroom if that whole area were removed! And, uh…I don’t really want to think about the subtextual implications of the female antagonist having lost her reproductive organs. I think that line just means that she has deep scarring on parts of her body that only someone who will see her naked would see. Regardless of what actually happened to her body, the contrast between Kushana’s beauty and her missing limbs is very striking. It relates to the contrast/contradiction inherent in her personality — she is clearly intelligent and reasonable, and yet full of rage and imperialistic ambitions. The design of her armour/prosthetics is quite interesting. It’s almost Greek/Roman in style, which makes me mentally compare her to Athena. Since Nausicaä’s name is taken from Greek mythology, I suspect this analogue is deliberate.
Kushana has difficulty getting the incomplete Stone God to attack
  • The pacifism message is hammered HARD in this movie, almost as hard as the environmentalism message. Nausicaä consistently chooses not to fight, even in the face of certain death, and deeply fears the one part of her that succumbed to rage in the wake of her father’s murder. When she meets her future pet fox-squirrel for the first time, she allows it to bite her finger — without flinching — in order to show it that she is not to be feared. The neighbouring countries/factions to the Valley of the Wind, Torumekia and Pejite, are competing with each other over a Giant Warrior, an ancient artefact left over from the nuclear wars that destroyed the world. When Kushana activates it, it demonstrates enormously devastating destructive power, but immediately collapses and melts when Kushana tries to force it to attack again. The message here seems to be that warmongers put far too much trust into their weapons, and get drunk on the destructive power they are capable of. In comparison to Kushana’s warmongering, Nausicaä’s capacity for self-sacrifice is her most significant character trait. She allows herself to be shot twice to save a baby Ohmu, and even lets it push her into the Acid Lake to demonstrate how dangerous it is. The Ohmu are shown to be intelligent, compassionate creatures, and they revere Nausicaä’s willingness to sacrifice everything for peace. Nausicaä is even a fairly obvious Jesus archetype, in that the Ohmu combine their abilities to resurrect her after she dies trying to stop the herd from rampaging. (Miyazaki claims the Jesus analogue was accidental…in which case, um, really? Maybe it’s my Western education that makes it so very obvious to me.)
  • I can say quite confidently that I liked Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind quite a bit, but I definitely prefer other Miyazaki films. Still, this film has a LOT going for it. As a feminist, I’m always glad to see a proactive and well-developed female protagonist, although I wish they’d given her a few flaws to make her more relatable. I especially appreciated a nuanced female antagonist who had a sympathetic reason for her extremism. I found the environmentalism and pacifism themes a little heavy-handed in this film (I almost felt like I was watching Fern Gully in some parts), but that may be because I saw his later films with a more balanced approach to presenting those themes. The imaginativeness of the film is probably its strongest point. The airships and gliders are a lot of fun, as is the design of the Toxic Jungle, which manages to be both menacing and beautiful at the same time. If I were to recommend this film, I would suggest to show it to someone who hasn’t seen other Miyazaki films yet, as I have a feeling that the messages in his film would be more effective if they hadn’t already been presented in other films. But, hey, strong female protagonist. A Miyazaki special. Can’t go wrong with that. Thank you for reading my Miyazaki Month retrospective!  



    Myrna Waldron is a feminist writer/blogger with a particular emphasis on all things nerdy. She lives in Toronto and has studied English and Film at York University. Myrna has a particular interest in the animation medium, having written extensively on American, Canadian and Japanese animation. She also has a passion for Sci-Fi & Fantasy literature, pop culture literature such as cartoons/comics, and the gaming subculture. She maintains a personal collection of blog posts, rants, essays and musings at The Soapboxing Geek, and tweets with reckless pottymouthed abandon at @SoapboxingGeek.

    Andrée Inspires Father And Son In ‘Renoir’

    Poster for French film, Renoir.

    Written by Janyce Denise Glasper


    Gilles Bourdos’ Renoir is a feast for an art appreciator’s enjoyment, opening on lush, brilliant cinematography and a flaming red-haired woman riding a vintage bicycle dressed in vivid orange coat, brown kid gloves, and rounded sunglasses.

    This is Andrée Heuschling bringing forth a brazen, illustrious spirit to a real life triad. 

    More than young, ripened flesh for master French Impressionist painter, Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s eyes, Andrée amuses and delights both him and his son, future filmmaker Jean Renoir.

    Set five years before his death, aging painfully with arthritis overwhelming old hands and body confined to a wheelchair, Pierre still finds pleasure in painting and undergoes wince-filled treatments just to sit at his beloved easel. He is surrounded by former models and lovers who proudly cater to his every whim–giving him baths, mixing paints, etc.



    Andrée (Christa Theret) poses for Pierre-Auguste Renoir (Michel Bouquet).


    Andrée doesn’t long for that servitude.

    She arrives at Renoir’s door solely wanting to model.

    Lithe and graceful, laying smooth alabaster skin among colored textile chaises inside cluttered studio or among outdoor grasses on blankets, Andrée courts Pierre’s every instruction and lavishes attentiveness in natural, beguiling light. As his gnarled, knobby hands sketch rounded figure, pencils lingering on back as though touching with fingers instead of eyes, she chatters away animatedly and is unabashed about nudity. She sees posing for art as a job and has no interest in becoming domesticated.

    Jean returns from war, injured and limping.

    Immediately, the quiet young man is enchanted by Andrée’s personality. She gets him to escape out of his comfort zone, and the two fall into a serene kind of love that is soft and at times erotically charged without overtly sensual love scenes. In one surprising act, the two are in bed, and she puts lipstick on his lips and kisses him passionately, redness coating her mouth upon exchange.

    Although nude and unapologetic, seen visually as a still life to wrinkled, nearly dying Pierre, Andrée’s relationship with Jean is much more intimate and private, an exchanging of tranquil stares and gentle touching that occurs away from the eyes of the household.



    Andrée (Christa Theret) finds love in Jean Renoir. (Vincent Rottiers)


    One short, small scene did incite a furious spark.

    Studio doors are opened and inviting while Andrée sleeps without a trace of Pierre. Fabric leaves bared breasts and rounded up thrust waist vulnerable to anyone’s gaze. In steps the younger, darkly disturbed son–Pierre the junior, circles Andrée with predatory sharpness. He then takes a bowl of blue pigment, hovers close, and blows wisps of it onto her skin.

    Whether it happened to be a dream or bumpy reality, this moment disturbed the order of things in Andrée’s carefree, liberated world, and it wasn’t even addressed. Pierre the younger certainly gave off a terribly sinister vibe that he would inflict harm unbeknownst to anyone and ignited an ire as if troubling behavior spoke of eventual abuse toward women. 

    Christa Theret captures a natural human richness into Andrée. With raspy voice and expressive blue eyes, she offers breadth into a brazen, outspoken character at a time where domesticity still placed women inside a box. To Pierre, she is a motherly comrade, cradling cheek and expressing gratitude to elder patron, but to Jean, she provides him keys necessary to unlock sensitive shell and incites an awakened passion to make film. Andrée knows that she is beautiful, but is also commanding, brave, and intelligent, valuing only for respect, decency, and to break the mold of her sensitively depicted gender.



    Andrée (Christa Theret) in most scenes is shown as a piece of art.


    However, picturesque Renoir suffers from too much opulence and grandeur, focusing too heavily on Andrée’s lusty body and lovely scenery that purposefully mimics Renoir’s infamously luminous compositions. But that’s supposedly Impressionism’s meaning–all the colors without a paintbrush dipping into black.

    Andrée simply stimulated the Renoir men’s taste for sensual inspiration and artistic expression–a muse catering toward creative distraction.

    Nothing more. Nothing less.

     


    The Male/Female Gaze on BBC America’s First Season of ‘Orphan Black’

    Orphan Black poster

    This is a guest post by Ms Misantropia.

    Last Saturday was the season finale of BBC America’s Orphan Black, a fast paced Canadian sci-fi series about human cloning. The show’s main protagonist, Sarah Manning (Tatiana Maslany), is a street-wise orphan just returning to Toronto after having spent a year abroad. She barely lands in the city before a woman who looks exactly like her commits suicide by train, right in front of her. In the following commotion — out of curiosity and hoping to score some cash — Sarah grabs the woman’s purse and walks away.
    She does find some money in the woman’s purse, but also a cell phone and keys to a nice flat. Having no place to live hiding from an abusive ex-boyfriend, Sarah hatches a crazy plan: she will temporarily switch lives with this woman — Beth Childs — and let the world believe that Sarah Manning is dead. Then she will pick up her young daughter, who is currently living with Sarah’s own foster mother, and she will clean out Beth’s bank account and skip town. To set the plan in motion Sarah enlists the help of her foster brother and best friend, Felix (Jordan Gavaris). However, things start to get complicated quickly when Sarah realizes that Beth was a police detective (with a nosy detective partner), that she lives with a man — Paul (Dylan Bruce) — and that there are even more women out there who look exactly like her. To make matters worse, there also seems to be someone out there trying to kill them all.

    Sarah kicking ass
    Orphan Black is what television could have evolved into after the 1990s, had not the Internet — with its masses of misogynistic and pornographic material — caused such a backlash during the beginning of the new millennium. The show does not have an overtly feminist agenda; it doesn’t present us with in-depth looks at inequality or the hardships of women, or serve up feminist slaps on the wrist. What it does is tell a story using a modern and more equal filming/viewing alternative, in female (and male) characterization and in camera focus/gaze. The formula is brilliantly simple: Whatever the story, simply avoid the habitual sexism and misogyny that the audience has, sadly, become so used to.
    There are many TV shows at the moment that are loaded with gratuitous female nudity. Game of Thrones might be the most widely discussed example, but even shows like critically acclaimed Homeland and the amazing The Americans employ the trick to gain or boost ratings. At a premiere or during sweeps week it becomes glaringly obvious that producers think they can’t promote or continue a show without throwing in random “boob-shots” here and there (and unfortunately they might be right). Sure, we sometimes get a token man-ass-shot during a sex scene, but in actual screen time most sex scenes are almost completely shot at an angle zooming in on the woman’s breasts, naked arched back or orgasmic face.
    While naked women in media are almost always beautiful, young and skinny — and constantly sexualized — male nudity is shown in other ways: a man preparing for battle, a man stumbling to the fridge for a snack, a man running down the street in a drunken stupor. Naked men are most often more “normal” looking and are allowed to be old, obese or even ugly. A naked over-weight silly man is funny, even relatable, while a naked over-weight silly woman is either completely invisible, shamefully pitied or horribly degraded — if not in the media itself, then on the Internet afterward. It always comes down to the same thing: a naked man is still a human being, a naked woman (and often also a fully clothed one) is an object.

    Paul with his morning coffee
    Orphan Black contains quite a few shots of naked bodies, but no obvious gratuitous “boob-shots,” and where there is female sexualized nudity there is also male sexualized nudity. As an example, in the first episode when we see Sarah jumping Paul’s bones in the kitchen (to avoid conversation that would tip him off that she is not Beth) we get to see actor Tatiana Maslany’s naked body for a moment, but it is followed up in the next scene by shots of only Paul’s naked body. The camera lingers on Paul, as Sarah’s gaze lingers on his body. This allows the audience the female gaze — for a change.
    Orphan Black hosts an entourage of diverse female characters. Considering that Tatiana Maslany has to introduce several different clone personalities over just a few episodes, the audience can forgive what only briefly feels like parodied acting. As the show develops, 28-year-old Maslany’s skills as a versatile actor become more evident. Though the fast pace of the show doesn’t leave much time for developing very complex characters, the diversity among them makes up for that. Orphan Black has female characters who are strong, weak, smart, caring, neurotic, sexy, tough and downright crazy.

    Helena, one of the clones

     With a more diverse and equal viewing experience also comes portraying other characters and relationships than just white straight people. Orphan Black has one main character — Art, Beth’s detective partner — and three other characters who are black, and it has two regular Latina/o characters. The show has not yet made it onto GLAAD’s LBGT characters list but I suspect it is only a matter of time, since two of the main characters are gay — Felix and Cosima — and they are both getting a lot of screen time in every episode.

    Felix is, as mentioned earlier, Sarah’s foster brother and best friend. He is an artist and a male prostitute. He can be silly and flamboyant at times, but he is also caring and funny. He’s an excellent sidekick in complex social situations, he always has Sarah’s back, and he gets to serve as the voice of reason more than once. Despite him having to resort to prostitution to make ends meet, he seems to be secure in himself and his sexuality. Cosima is one of the clones, a scientist who is trying to map them all out, and find out the wheres and the whys of their existence. She is smart and sweet, but her scientific curiosity at times gets the better of her and puts her in danger. The show gets extra points for portraying Cosima’s courtship with a fellow scientist without objectifying the two women for the straight male gaze — something most shows nowadays fail miserably at.
    Felix and his lover bidding adieu

    Orphan Black has been picked up for a second season and is slated to premiere sometime during the first half of 2014.
    Ms Misantropia blogs here.