March 2015 – Page 3 – Bitch Flicks

‘Pygmalion’ vs. ‘My Fair Lady’

If the story is a gay man attempting to make over a straight woman, it simply emphasizes that all men of all sexualities in a male-dominated society need to respect women, and women should feel free to and be able to express confidence in themselves.

Written by Jackson Adler.

Last year, and 100 years after George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion premiered on London’s West End, film producer Cameron Mackintosh announced that his remake of the Lerner and Loewe classic musical My Fair Lady, and its subsequent 1964 film adaptation starring Audrey Hepburn and Rex Harrison, which are based off of Bernard Shaw’s play, was being shelved after “various things that happened with the rights and the studio and everything like that.”

Emma Thompson had written the screenplay for this new adaptation, and it was supposedly to have been truer to Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion. The same reason I was excited about Emma Thompson’s screenplay was probably the main reason the project was shelved. I say this because aspects of Pygmalion, especially its ending, have been under fire for what is now over a century. Pygmalion is a play on the Greek myth in which a sculpture falls in love with his own creation of a beautiful female statue. In Bernard Shaw’s 1914 story, a phonetics professor Henry Higgins and his new friend Colonel Pickering make a wager that Higgins can give a makeover in speech, manners, and dress to flower girl Eliza Doolittle and successfully pass her off as a duchess. However, it is Eliza’s efforts that win Henry his bet, and when she isn’t praised for it, she learns to stands up for herself, and eventually Henry learns to respect her for it. Unlike in the Greek myth, there is no romance at the end.

Eliza confronts Henry of his mistreatment of her in Pygmalion (1938) starring Wendy Hiller and Leslie Howard. — Eliza confronts Henry of his mistreatment of her in *Pygmalion* (1938) starring Wendy Hiller and Leslie Howard.

Bernard Shaw, though not always a great ally, was a feminist, and his play was only adapted into a musical after his death. He had refused to allow a musical adaptation of his play, afraid the relationships between his main characters Eliza Doolittle and Henry Higgins would be romanticized and the ending, in which they do not enter a romantic relationship or marriage, would be changed, something the 1938 film adaptation of Bernard Shaw’s play had already done, with Eliza pretty much crawling back to Henry at the end. Bernard Shaw did not want a musical version to do the same. His feelings were completely ignored after his death, and lyricist and librettist Alan Jay Lerner and composer Frederick Loewe stuck on a conventional Hollywood ending to the story and created My Fair Lady, with an ending similar to the 1934 film.

Hollywood still likes its romantic and “happy” endings, and no doubt there were disagreements over how Thompson’s and Mackintosh’s My Fair Lady should depict Eliza’s and Henry’s relationship. Bernard Shaw wrote an entire epilogue to his play to emphasize that, no, the characters did not nor never would marry each other or have a romantic or sexual relationship. This is not tragic or sad, it’s just that they don’t belong together, but still respect each other and continue to be friends long after the events of the play.

Hollywood still struggles with the ridiculous question “Can (cis and heterosexual) men and women be just friends?” even though common sense and observation have always proven that, yes, they can, many are, many always have been, and many will continue to be so. As Henry Higgin’s mother tells him, in what seems to be every incarnation of the play and musical, Eliza is not an “umbrella” – not an object or a piece of property that can be owned or mistreated or thrown aside. Yes, women are people, and do not merely exist to support men. Both Henry and Eliza live in a world in which close friendships between men and women are discouraged, and marriage encouraged. That they each defy this, refuse to marry each other, and continue to be friends regardless of their other friendships or romantic partnerships, is wonderful – and, seemingly, something Hollywood still refuses to see as a valid choice. Whether its When Harry Met Sally, or No Strings Attached, or Friends With Benefits, Hollywood still teaches us that close relationships between (cis and hetero) men and women should ideally only be close if they are romantic, though occasional exceptions can be made if one of them is “taken,” such as in the case of How I Met Your Mother’s Ted and Lilly.

Though the argument can certainly be made that Higgins is homosexual (he and Colonel Pickering move in together at the start of the story, and continue to live together the rest of their days, despite both being financially independent) or asexual, and many have claimed that Bernard Shaw himself was closeted, Henry’s sexuality is perhaps not as important in the overall story as Eliza standing up for herself and Henry respecting her for it. This is emphasized in the 1983 TV adaptation of Pygmalion in which Peter O’Toole, who had previously and famously played gay or bisexual Henry II of England in Becket and The Lion In Winter, plays Henry Higgins, and Higgins’ mother knowingly states that “I should be uneasy about you and her if you were less fond of Colonel Pickering.” While this line was also added in the 1981 TV adaptation with Robert Powell, and also knowingly states, O’Toole’s reply of “nonsense” in regard to himself and Pickering is less adamant than Powell’s. If the story is a gay man attempting to make over a straight woman, it simply emphasizes that all men of all sexualities in a male-dominated society need to respect women, and women should feel free to and be able to express confidence in themselves.

Rex Harrison as Henry and Audrey Hepburn as Eliza in My Fair Lady (1964) — Rex Harrison as Henry and Audrey Hepburn as Eliza in *My Fair Lady* (1964)

Hollywood has loved and still loves the story of the makeover, whether shown in the newest Cinderella, or in the recent film Kingsman (in which My Fair Lady is referenced, a move all the more insightful since Colin Firth had supposedly been set to play Henry Higgins in the now shelved adaptation), in 1999’s She’s All That, or in various episodes on various Disney channel shows throughout the years. As Pygmalion points out, issues of class, gender, sexuality, and beyond cannot be solved overnight, or even in a few months, and certainly not just by a change of clothes and habits. In Bernard Shaw’s story, respect for one another is of vital importance, more important than romance. Eliza does find romance, but it is on her own terms and with someone who has shown her more “kindness” than Henry. Though she and Henry have multiple scenes together, assist each other, and clearly care for each other in their own way, they have no obligation to enter into a romance with each other, a message that, hopefully, Hollywood will remember the next time they choose to adapt Pygmalion or My Fair Lady.

‘Coherence’ Is the Best Movie You Didn’t See Last Year

‘Coherence’ is a triumph of low-budget filmmaking, a reality show about an extreme acting challenge, a disturbing science fiction take on human nature and identity, a fascinating puzzle box, and a movie with a well-written, well-acted female lead. Bet you wish you’d seen it, now.

Written by Katherine Murray.

Coherence is a triumph of low-budget filmmaking, a reality show about an extreme acting challenge, a disturbing science fiction take on human nature and identity, a fascinating puzzle box, and a movie with a well-written, well-acted female lead. Bet you wish you’d seen it, now.

It’s awfully hard to talk about Coherence without wrecking all of the surprises in the story – even the central conceit is secret that’s buried until you’re well into the film. Without giving away too much more than the trailer, the story is about a group of friends at a dinner party where really weird shit starts to happen. There’s a comet passing overhead, and – we are told – the last time this comet passed by, people got confused about who they were, and where they were, and what was going on.

During the dinner party, cell phone service goes down, and the power goes out. Two of the characters walk to a house two blocks over, which seems to have power, to ask if they can use a landline phone. When they get back, they’re visibly shaken and don’t want to share what they’ve seen.

From that point forward, everything starts to get weird. People act strangely; they repeat themselves; events seem to happen out of order; the characters discover a box that seems like it shouldn’t exist. As they try to piece together what’s happening, and what they should do to survive, the stress of the situation puts pressure on their relationships, and the darker sides of their personalities come to the surface.

The explanation of what’s happening, when we get it, is internally consistent with everything we’ve seen – and the finale is disturbing, but eerily believable. It’s a movie you have to watch twice – once for the experience of suspense and confusion, and once for the experience of piecing all the clues together, and seeing how carefully plotted each event was. It’s the kind of awesome, well-made film that grabs you right away, makes you want to find out more, and then delivers on its promises in the final act.

Although this isn’t clear at first, the protagonist of Coherence is Emily (played by Emily Foxler), a dancer who regrets the trajectory her career path has taken. Without giving too much away, it’s fair to say that the film follows her from beginning to end, and that she’s the character who’s forced to make a choice in the final moments – about who she wants to be, what she wants to have, and what she’s willing to do to get it.

The second most important character, from a narrative standpoint, is Mike – played by Nicholas Brendon as an exaggerated version of himself (spoilers in the link). Mike is the former star of a cult-hit TV show and doesn’t like who he turns into when he’s drinking. He goes dark as soon as things start to get strange, exhibiting a mix of paranoia and self-hatred, followed by radical, destructive behaviour. Eventually, he starts drinking again, much to the others’ dismay.

By the end of the film, it’s clear that Mike’s story exists to prepare the audience for the choices that Emily’s going to face later on. The dark side of his personality is so close to the surface that it comes spilling out right away, priming us to look for signs of darkness in the other characters. He also states one of the movie’s biggest themes during a small, self-pitying speech, but I can’t tell you, here, what it is.

The reason I bring this all up – in annoyingly cryptic terms – is just to say that, in a lot of ways, Coherence is one of the movies I wished for when I wrote about how big idea movies usually don’t have female leads. This is a story about selfhood and the way we understand ourselves as individuals, in very broad, universal terms, and we’re invited to follow and identify with a woman as the centre of that story.

Also – perhaps because this is a dinner party made up of heterosexual couples – half of the characters in this movie are women. I notice that, in general, the male characters are more action-oriented and push the story forward through doing things, whereas the women tend to push the story forward by talking about and discovering things, but I don’t think that’s necessarily bad. If Emily weren’t the central character, then the way that men seem to make all the really explosive decisions would be more annoying, but, since the story comes back to her in the end, the whole thing feels more balanced.

The other really cool thing about Coherence, and the reason I recommend watching it, is that, in addition to telling a good, suspenseful, interesting story, this movie is also a reality show about acting. Writer/director James Ward Byrkit, and one of the actors, Alex Manugian, spent a year plotting the story before filming it in Byrkit’s home. Manugian was the only actor who knew the whole plot – the others were given notes every day, explaining background information that their characters would have, talking points that they should try to hit in group discussions, and what their motivations were at present. They then had to improvise their way through each scene, working together to tell a story that only one of them knew, trying to stay in character while it was happening.

Not to sound like I normally overlook acting, but this is the kind of movie that reminds you of what actors actually do, and of the skill, self-control, and self-awareness required to do it.

I’m sure that good editing plays a role in making Coherence look seamless, but there’s still something really exciting about watching eight people (seven, if you don’t count Alex Manugian) dive into an acting experiment and just try to do their jobs. Knowing how the film was made, and then watching it play out on screen, I’m reminded that acting is about collaboration – in every scene, each of these actors has to split their attention between hitting the marks set out before them, and helping the others do the same – in this case, without knowing ahead of time what’s actually going to happen. And while all of that’s going on behind the scenes, inside their heads, they have to make it look like it’s just natural, and like they’re the people they’ve been cast to play.

Coherence, for me, involves that sense of pleasure that comes from watching people who are good at something do that thing well. It also makes me wonder what other cool things actors could do, if there were more experiments like this.

When you put it all together, you’ve got an interesting, suspenseful, tightly-plotted movie about identity, starring a female protagonist, full of good acting and editing. There is absolutely no reason you would not want to watch this, so go watch it now.

Katherine Murray is a Toronto-based writer who yells about movies and TV on her blog.

‘Trainspotting’ Is ‘Pretty Woman’ For Boys

From the ‘Bitch Flicks’ that brought you “‘Birdman’ Is Black Swan For Boys” and “‘Fight Club’ Is Pride And Prejudice For Boys,” comes the thrilling conclusion of our Filmic Forced Feminization Trilogy: “‘Trainspotting’ is ‘Pretty Woman For Boys”! No, really.

Written by Brigit McCone.

From the Bitch Flicks that brought you “Birdman Is Black Swan For Boys” and “Fight Club Is Pride And Prejudice For Boys,” comes the thrilling conclusion of our Filmic Forced Feminization Trilogy: “Trainspotting is Pretty Woman For Boys”! No, really.

Consider the openings: Renton runs down the road to the voiceover of the iconic “choose life” monologue, before colliding with a car. The camera shares the perspective of the car’s occupants, stalled in their protective shell of metal, as this threatening creature of countercultural anarchy peers in at them. And laughs. Now consider our camera sharing Richard Gere’s perspective, stalled in the protective shell of his luxury vehicle, as the threatening prostitute of countercultural anarchy peers in at him. And laughs.

Vivian is an antidote to the stale marital maneuverings of mainstream culture. She flaunts her lack of pantyhose to scandalized elderly couples. She tells matchmaking materialists that she’s simply using Edward for sex. She regards the hypocrisy of mainstream respectability politics with undisguised contempt. Our assumptions about the inferiority of a prostitute’s life choices are challenged by the defiant anthem that plays as she struts: “things you only dream about, wild women do.” Just as Trainspotting dignifies its hero’s autonomy by openly acknowledging the attraction of heroin and the logic of his choice, so Pretty Woman openly acknowledges the attraction of sex work as social rebellion, financial autonomy and independence. Vivian might as well have her own monologue about the pressure to “choose wife.” Why would she want to do a thing like that?

Renton and Vivian laugh at your respectability.

Of course, the film ends with Vivian choosing wife, just as Renton finally chooses life, but they choose it on their terms. I’ve written before about how the supposed antifeminism of “whores” and “white knights” has blinded us to the politics of autonomy in Pretty Woman. Scratch its candy-coated surface, or scratch the edgily aggressive snarl of Trainspotting, and you reveal a shared approach to the challenges of stigma raised by prostitution and drug addiction. Such as…

The Failure Of Paternalism

The remarkable results that Portugal has achieved by decriminalizing drug use and treating addiction as sickness rather than crime, mirror the impressive achievements of New Zealand’s decriminalizing of sex work. Our urge to discipline and punish individual choice has been ineffective in preventing “vice,” sustaining organized crime and social inequality in the process. Trainspotting and Pretty Woman reflect this reality. Renton’s initial decision to come off drugs is presented as a spontaneous choice from his inner resolve. Later, his parents attempt to enforce a cure by locking him in his bedroom to go cold turkey. The legal system attempts to enforce a cure through the courts. Neither of these paternalist pressures are shown to be effective. Similarly, Vivian consistently refuses Edward’s attempts to treat her as an object of pity or a mistress, preferring the independence of sex work to the subordination demanded by paternalist savior narratives. Only by admitting his own need to be rescued, and offering full romantic equality on Vivian’s terms, can Edward persuade her to mainstream.

More than ineffective, each film presents social stigma as actively counterproductive. It is while independently trying to come off heroin, without medical support, that Renton must make his iconic dive into the crap-filled Worst Toilet In Scotland for his suppositories. It is when trying to mainstream that he becomes mentally vulnerable to the condescending pity and judgmental attitudes of others, driving his relapse. Likewise, it is when attempting to mainstream that Vivian must endure the metaphorical crap of the Worst Boutique On Rodeo Drive and it is while passing as respectable that she becomes mentally vulnerable to the humiliating judgments of Stuckey, where a prostitute’s uniform would make her feel defiantly “prepared.” Both Trainspotting and Pretty Woman argue that social stigma fuels defiance and deters mainstreaming. Though each film freely acknowledges the hazards of the lifestyle portrayed, from Pretty Woman‘s dead hooker in a dumpster and assault by Stuckey, to Trainspotting‘s dead baby and AIDS casualties, they remain firmly opposed to the hypocritical righteousness of dominant culture. Witness their choice of Begbie and Stuckey to represent mainstream ideology.

Begbie and Stuckey: Dominant Hypocrites

Phil Stuckey is a cunt, in the utterly unreclaimed, gender-neutral, Scottish sense of that word. He is a man who will eagerly solicit prostitutes, yet defend his right to hit them with a superior snarl of “she’s a whore!” In this, he mirrors Trainspotting‘s Begbie, who is content to profit from drug deals while righteously sneering over an addict’s choice to “poison their body with that shite.” Both Begbie and Stuckey have a toxic combination of arrogance and insecurity, a continual need to prove their status at the expense of others. The suppressed violence in Stuckey’s craving for the corporate “kill” erupts in his assault on Vivian, after being denied financial satisfaction. Begbie is chronically violent, craving the adrenalin of a brawl as much as addicts crave their drug of choice. In short, in remarkably similar ways, Begbie and Stuckey are deeply unpleasant cunts. It is into the mouths of these cunts that each film places the judgments of dominant society. Begbie expresses dominant opinions about drug addicts and trans* women. Stuckey expresses dominant opinions about sex workers. Both are depicted as dominant, domineering, and thriving.

Trainspotting and Pretty Woman choose to use the repulsiveness of Begbie/Stuckey as the spur that finally decides Renton/Vivian on mainstreaming. A classic savior narrative would use a righteous role model to represent the attraction of mainstream values; Trainspotting and Pretty Woman instead use the nauseous vileness of their representatives as catalyst. As an addict, Renton is forced to fill the pockets of the world’s Begbies. As a prostitute, Vivian is forced to service the ego of the world’s Stuckeys. By presenting mainstreaming itself as an act of resistance to mainstream exploitation, both films are able to realistically acknowledge its health and safety benefits without sacrificing their raised middle finger to mainstream righteousness. They resist the narrative of the mainstream’s moral superiority, not only through the repulsively mainstream Begbie and Stuckey, but through the lovable, marginalized Spud and Kit.

Spud and Kit: Performance Anxiety

With God's help, they'll conquer this terrible affliction — With God’s help, they’ll conquer this terrible affliction

The triumphant Renton is separated from Spud, and the triumphant Vivian is separated from Kit, not by their moral superiority but by their superior ability to perform socially. In Trainspotting‘s court scene, Renton effortlessly convinces as a clean-cut “pretty addict” (the kind you’d like to meet) as he plausibly swears “with God’s help, I shall conquer this terrible affliction,” avoiding jail. By contrast, Spud is nervous and inarticulate. He lacks Renton’s presentation skills and faces jail as a result. Kit suffers similar anxiety. Where Vivian effortlessly adapts to luxury clothes, Kit is afraid to hug Vivian in case she wrinkles her. She seems defensive in Edward’s hotel, taunting the clientele. Kit could not fake the respectability and “class” required from Edward’s escort. By pairing Renton with Spud, and Vivian with Kit, both films expose the nature of respectability as essentially hypocritical performance.

Admirably, neither Spud nor Kit ever punish their friends for their success. Spud allows Renton to steal the group’s drug money, knowing that Renton will be harshly punished if the alarm is raised. Kit appears genuinely delighted at Vivian’s good fortune for meeting Edward, and roots for her to find lasting happiness with him. In many ways, both Spud and Kit are morally superior to the protagonists. This moral worth is recognized and rewarded financially by both heroes: Vivian gives Kit a share of Edward’s payment and Renton leaves Spud a share of the drug money. Will Kit be able to become a Renton of recovered addiction and a Vivian of romantic success? Will Spud? We are only able to root for Kit and Spud’s success because Trainspotting and Pretty Woman present a world in which doom is not inevitable and good fortune is possible.

Inevitability vs. Agency

It is fundamentally dehumanizing to suggest that a group in society is inevitably doomed. We know that our own lives are at the mercy of luck and chance; our rewards and punishments are uneven and not proportional to what we deserve, if deserving can even be measured. We make choices, from moment to moment, and we struggle for our own happiness as best we can. To deny someone that choice, that chance and that struggle is to deny our identification with them, as well as any possible support of them. If their doom is inevitable, none of us can be held responsible for failing to prevent it, or even for causing it. Which helps to explain the disposable hookers of Grand Theft Auto.

Renton’s doom is not inevitable. He stood the same chance of contracting AIDS as his fellow addicts; some were lucky, others were not. Likewise, a prostitute who climbs into the car of a slick, suited yuppy could be finding love and fortune with Pretty Woman‘s Edward, or facing gruesome death at the hands of American Psycho‘s Patrick Bateman. The difference is in film genre, not life choice. Here’s an interesting point: have you ever heard anyone point out that Trainspotting depicts heroin use as the direct result of hetero-male sexual failure? Renton and Spud are both shown relapsing after humiliating failures in their attempts to connect with women. Tommy turns to heroin after a bad break-up. Yet, somehow, no causal relationship is assumed between a man’s sex life and his choices. So, why is it so impossible to imagine a prostitute as a survivor of sexual abuse, without the dehumanizing implication that this has mindlessly predetermined her choice to do sex work? Trainspotting‘s Sick Boy and Renton are equally allowed to be haunted by their failures in childcare, and Renton to hallucinate an accusing baby, without being judged “babycrazy” as Ally McBeal. Why is Vivian a “tart with a heart,” yet Renton can show scruples over underage sex and give cash gifts to Spud without being a “magic addict”?

Though Hollywood no longer has a Hays Code demanding punishment for characters who break the law, films still enforce that convention for both sexes. Stuckey’s devastating corporate “kills” are socially acceptable; Vivian’s provision of sex acts for a mutually agreed fee is not. Therefore, it is Vivian that we are conditioned to expect to see suffering consequences, until Pretty Woman flips that script. According to cinematic convention, stealing a bag of drug money should be the beginning of a No Country For Old Men-style thriller of inevitable doom. In Trainspotting, it is the hero’s happy ending. By offering its heroin addict a chance to evade all consequences for his actions, and to claim the prosperity and respectability that is supposedly the social reward for virtue, the film calls our bluff. If we truly pity the tragic fate of society’s doomed victims, we should rejoice in Renton’s lucky escape. However, as Oscar Wilde puts it: “anyone can sympathize with the sufferings of a friend, but it takes a very fine nature to sympathize with a friend’s success.” Spud and Kit might have that very fine nature, but do we? Mark Renton has no time for your puritanical need to see him punished for his life choices. Renton is going to blend in with the mainstream and become indistinguishable from all the other hypocrites. Renton was born slippy, and he’s going to get away with it. Because Renton has secretly been Cinder-fuckin-rella all along.

What more proof do you need that Trainspotting is Pretty Woman for boys?

Brigit McCone always thought Vivian should have chosen Barney the hotel manager, but recognizes he’s probably married. She writes and directs short films and radio dramas. Her hobbies include doodling and irritating Fight Club fanboys.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Check out what we’ve been reading this week–and let us know what you’ve been reading/writing in the comments!

A pantheon of one’s own: 25 female film critics worth celebrating at BFI

#FilmHerStory: 10 Female Biopics That Desperately Need to Happen by Elisabeth Donnelly at Flavorwire

Ava DuVernay: Focusing the Lens on Equality by Kitty Lindsay at Ms. blog

The Workplace Is Even More Sexist In Movies Than In Reality by Walt Hickey at FiveThirtyEight

13 Gay Things You Can’t Miss at South By Southwest by Neal Broverman at Advocate

SXBlog: The Future of Film Criticism: Diversify or Die by Erik Paschall at mxdwn

“Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” is Funny, But Has Its Flaws by Parker Marie Molloy at Bitch Media

India’s Daughter: Can a Movie Change a Country’s Attitude Towards Women? by Melissa Silverstein at Women and Hollywood

Kerry Washington Will Play Anita Hill in HBO’s Movie About the Clarence Thomas Sexual Harrassment Supreme Court Case by Tambay A. Obenson at Shadow and Act

‘Walking Dead’ Producer Sets Out to Tell Wilma Mankiller’s Story at Indian Country

50 Shades of Boring. by Scarlett Harris at The Scarlett Woman

Black Women Don’t Need Another Diversity Initiative by Nneka M. Okona at For Harriet

Why America Ferrera Takes Hollywood’s Lack of Diversity “Extremely Personally” by Cristina Arreola at Latina

In the Documentary ‘GTFO,’ Female Video Gamers Fight Back by Robert Ito at The New York Times

Univision Race Gaffe Shows Culture Gap by Maria Murriel at NPR’s Code Switch

Disney says Frozen sequel is on its way by Esther Zuckerman at Entertainment Weekly

11 Shocking Stories Of Everyday Sexism, As Told By Women In Entertainment by Candace Lowry at BuzzFeed

For Some Women in Hollywood, Movie Roles Are Getting Better With Age by Eliza Krigman at takepart

What have you been reading/writing this week? Tell us in the comments!

Seed & Spark: Why Men Need More Female Storytellers

As I move closer to publicly putting three generations of our multicultural family’s racial situations into a film, I think back to the valuable lessons I’ve also gleaned from five female storytellers that have made me a better male and male storyteller.

This is a guest post by Jason Cuthbert.

I am a man who has zero problems admitting that we have been wrongfully taught to believe that males should do all the thinking and women can only do all the feeling. But we all do all the thinking; it’s just us guys that unfortunately ignore those tingly emotions. But if boys and men don’t have real life feminine angels to bless their development like I did, they will need to turn to female storytellers to unlearn the wrong ways to treat women in life and in fiction: those people that so graciously carried every single human being in their bodies for 3/4ths of a year.

I am taking great pride in directing a true story featuring the first two leading ladies of my life: my mother and sister in Colouring Book: The Mixed Race Documentary. As I move closer to publicly putting three generations of our multicultural family’s racial situations into a film, I think back to the valuable lessons I’ve also gleaned from five female storytellers that have made me a better male and male storyteller.

Ava DuVernay

Way before it was ever announced that Ava DuVernay would become my choice for Best Director when she rose her head high above the hills of Mount Hollywood with her Martin Luther King drama Selma – we followed each other on Twitter. I completely appreciate this digital window into her very personal filmmaking process. By adding Ava’s prolific 140 character-or-less points of view to my Twitter timeline, I shared her victory as the first African-American to win Best Director at the Sundance Film Festival for Middle of Nowhere. I watched as she erected her African American Film Releasing Movement (AFFRM) to assist storytellers from a similar experience, building audiences for Big Words and Vanishing Pearls before my very eyes.

There were also those deep DuVernay tweets of solidarity during the Trayvon Martin horror show and the #Ferguson demand for justice. Then my inspiration reached above the clouds when Ava DuVernay began sharing her research trips, production updates and promotional runs as the director and co-writer of Selma. Whether it is a love story in her hometown of Compton, or passionately portraying the biggest figure of the Civil Rights movement, DuVernay has taught me the importance of making cinema personal. If a piece of me isn’t in the work…it aint working.

Diablo Cody

I admittedly was more than fashionably late to the Diablo Cody party that started off with stripper tales told in her popular blog. But once I happily suffered from unapologetic laughing fits in front of complete strangers while watching Cody’s story Juno, I was instantly in awe of this Academy Award winner’s whimsical way with words. I loved how the bold “Diablo Dialect” vomited out of her character’s mouths with zero fear of being considered pretentious. This inventive keyboard killer wielded words that were born to be reincarnated as bumper stickers and t-shirts.

Juno defied stereotypes: she was not brainless, half naked or waiting to be rescued. She was a young mother-to-be that was actually striving to be responsible and take ownership of her actions. These coming-of-age elements normally get traded out for fart jokes and keg parties. But Cody with the devilish first name taught me the importance of coloring outside of the lines and to not be afraid of writing a script that feels like I had way too much fun concocting it.

Sarah Polley

While developing the structure for my first full-length film: Colouring Book: The Mixed Race Documentary, I rewatched Sarah Polley’s super brilliant documentary-within-a–documentary-with-a-taste-of-lime: Stories We Tell. It carries a similar approach to Colouring Book in that I will also be the Sarah Polley narrator in my doc, probably making my family just as uncomfortable with my personal questions like she did.

I love how Sarah Polley uses humor when things get serious while getting us misty-eyed moments later. Polley taught me that documentaries don’t have to stay reluctantly chained to the wall as dusty talking head book reports. You are allowed to incorporate hybrid meta-dramatic approaches and peek-a-boo “its just a movie” moments while you arrive at the truth.

Kathryn Bigelow

As the director of explosive hard-hitting thrillers like Point Break, The Hurt Locker, and Zero Dark Thirty, Kathryn Bigelow refuses to drop to her knees before the feet of gender stereotypes. I dare you to find a single romantic comedy on her report card as of today’s date. Kathryn Bigelow has educated me on the idea that if a protagonist is going to be really violent then there has to be more than just courage and a brain inside that soldier of misfortunate – there needs to be a beating heart.

Bigelow’s opinion on being a female director, or more accurately, a director who just happens to be a female can be summed up in one of Kathryn Bigelow’s many fine quotes: “If there’s specific resistance to women making movies, I just choose to ignore that as an obstacle for two reasons: I can’t change my gender, and I refuse to stop making movies.”

Francesca D’Amico

The female storyteller I have actually learned the most from is Francesca D’ Amico – the producer of Colouring Book: The Mixed Race Documentary. When I brainstorm out loud or quietly deliver thoughts in cell phone texts, she isn’t brutally honest–she is soothingly honest. She puts my imagination at ease with her clearly drawn reasons to bring a concept to life, or drop a bad idea off the face of the Earth–fast!

Francesca cares about everyone’s feelings and it is her self-less compassion for everyone who will ever exist that has helped to organically attract people to our documentary. I’ve learned from Francesca D’Amico that those silent emotional connections between human beings are little timeless stories of eternal universal truth. If the audience can’t relate to the characters on a primal level, no amount of glamour will remove how useless the story will be.

Jason Cuthbert is a screenwriter, writer and the biracial (African Trinidadian and Caucasian American) creator, director and co-producer of Colouring Book: The Mixed Race Documentary, a full-length film comparison of multiculturalism in the United States to Canada, paralleled by the exploration of Jason Cuthbert’s own mixed race experience.

For more information on Colouring Book: The Mixed Race Documentary:

Jason’s Twitter: @A2Jason

Francesca’s Twitter: @HipHopScholar82

Colouring Book’s Twitter: @ColouringBk

Website: ColouringBook.info

Support: http://www.seedandspark.com/studio/colouring-book-productions

Cookie and Co.: The Women of ‘Empire’

Fox’s midseason drama ‘Empire’ is a huge hit, and it is easy to see why. The gloriously soapy family melodrama is chockablock with “watercooler moments” (are those still a thing?), many provided by the series’s breakout character Cookie Lyon, played with obvious joy by Taraji P. Henson. But despite all the well-deserved attention Cookie is getting, she’s not the only great female character ‘Empire’ has to offer.

Written by Robin Hitchcock.

FOX’s midseason drama Empire is a huge hit, and it is easy to see why. The gloriously soapy family melodrama is chockablock with “watercooler moments” (are those still a thing?), many provided by the series’s breakout character Cookie Lyon, played with obvious joy by Taraji P. Henson.

Taraji P. Henson as Cookie Lyon in 'Empire' — Taraji P. Henson as Cookie Lyon in *Empire*

Cookie, the ex-wife of legendary hip hop mogul Lucious Lyon (and mother the three sons vying to inherit his empire), has just been released from a 17-year stint in prison. She co-founded the company (somewhat clunkily called Empire) with Lucious, and wants the riches, fame, and power she was denied when she took the fall for the drug dealing that financed the company in its early days. Surrounded by schemers, Cookie in contrast works to get what she wants by sheer force of will. And an abundance of charisma floating on her fearlessness, brazenness, and enviable style. Cookie is glorious.

Despite all the well-deserved attention Cookie is getting, she’s not the only great female character Empire has to offer. This is a refreshing surprise, given co-creators Lee Daniels and Danny Strong (the same creative team behind The Butler, a movie I loved) pitch the series as “King Lear in the hip hop world,” but swapped daughters Regan, Goneril, and Cordelia for sons. These sons are all compelling characters: business-focused Andre, struggling with bipolar disorder; and promising artists Jamal, whose favor with Lucious is challenged by his homosexuality; and Hakeem, whose favor with Lucious is challenged by his tendency to be a little shit. And it does seem more true to the character of Lucious to want to leave his legacy in the hands of a male heir. But part of me will always be disappointed we couldn’t have female versions of Andre, Jamal, and Hakeem.

But, as I said, Empire still delivers a range of complex female characters to love and love to hate.

Anika (Grace Gealy) is "a bitch who can slice your throat without even disturbing her pearls" — Anika (Grace Gealy) is “a ho who can slice your throat without even disturbing her pearls”

Anika (Grace Gealy), is head of Empire A&R and Lucious’s new woman. Anika and Cookie immediately strike up a fierce rivalry, first for power in the company (Anika backing Hakeem’s rising star, Cookie pushing for Jamal), and inevitably for Lucious’s affections. The rivalry works because each woman is equally savvy, but with opposing styles: where Cookie is all unbridled assertiveness, Anika is cool-headed and graceful even at her most sinister. It’s pretty much impossible not to root for Cookie, but Anika commands respect as a worthy opponent.

Kaitlin Doubleday as Rhonda in 'Empire' — Kaitlin Doubleday as Rhonda in *Empire*

Another schemer is Andre’s wife Rhonda (Kaitlin Doubleday), who also lusts for power through the proxy of her husband. Rhonda at first seems completely unsympathetic, seeking to put Jamal and Hakeem “at war” with each other to benefit Andre. The Lyon family find Rhonda inherently suspect because she’s a highly educated upper class white woman. When Andre defends his wife as “brilliant,” Cookie responds “Pretty white girls always are, even when they ain’t.” Lucious straight-up tells Andre, “the moment you brought that white woman into my house, I knew I couldn’t trust you. I knew then that you didn’t want to be part of my family.” But Rhonda truly cares for Andre and is in many ways a good match for him (as he also has a mind for business). And her alternating support of and frustration with her mentally ill partner shows her at her most genuine.

Lucious (Terrence Howard) being typically dismissive of his assistant Becky (Gabourey Sidibe)

While not major characters, I would be remiss not to mention Lucious and Cookie’s all-star assistants. Gabourey Sidibe plays Becky, Lucious’s long-suffering but resilient PA. Becky expertly anticipates Lucious’s needs and exudes stunning patience with his routine dismissal of her. Cookie’s assistant Porsha (Ta’Rhonda Jones) is somewhat less competent (although nowhere near as inept as Cookie’s constant berating would have you believe). Porsha wins the audience’s respect by becoming something of a double agent after Anika asks her to betray Cookie. She can clearly hold her own in Empire‘s tangled web of manipulation.

Hakeem (Bryshere Y. Gray) with his older paramour Camilla (Naomi Campbell)

Even Empire‘s most minor female characters are interesting. Hakeem’s love interests Tiana (Serayah) and Camilla (Naomi Campbell) both have their gif-able moments. When Hakeem catches Tiana cheating on him with a woman, she points out he also has “a side piece” and asks him if her indiscretion bothers him more because it was with a woman. She then demands respect for her girlfriend, making space for her on the set of a music video shoot. Older woman Camilla calls Hakeem out on the Oedipal element to their trysts (Hakeem was a baby when Cookie went to jail, so he grew up without a mother figure), and manages to hold her own in a showdown with Lucious, refusing his offer to pay her off to leave Hakeem.

So despite swapping its King Lear‘s daughters for sons, Empire manages to present an array of strong female characters. Cookie Lyon is a force of nature and an undeniable gift to pop culture, but the other women of Empire aren’t entirely eclipsed by her awesomeness. Which is really saying something. Here’s one more gif to prove it:

Cookie says "The streets aren't made for everybody. That's why they invented sidewalks." — Cookie says “The streets aren’t made for everybody. That’s why they invented sidewalks.”

Robin Hitchcock is an American writer living in Cape Town who hopes to one day be 1% as fabulous as Cookie Lyon.

Interesting Lives Made Dull: ‘Still Alice’ and ‘Queen and Country’

I had been curious to see what the filmmakers would do with this adaptation of the Lisa Genova novel. The writer-directors are a married gay male couple (Wash Westmoreland and Richard Glatzer) who not only made the underrated ‘Quinceañera’ (the rare film about Chicanos that doesn’t have a white savior or even a white main character), but also live with the relatively recent ALS diagnosis of Glatzer (whose disease has progressed enough that he can’t speak or eat without assistance). While ALS is not the same as the Early Onset Alzheimer’s Disease the title character has in ‘Alice,’ I thought Glatzer’s experience might give the film more insight than the usual able-bodied writer and director’s view of disability. What I didn’t expect from this film was how mild and polite it is about the challenges and loss Alice (Moore) faces.

Written by Ren Jender.

Like apparently many others, I was avoiding this year’s blindingly white “boy” and “man”-centered Academy Awards, so I missed seeing Julianne Moore win the Oscar as Best Actress for her performance in Still Alice. Instead, at the suggestion of Indiewire’s Women and Hollywood I was on my way to see a film with a woman protagonist: Still Alice. I didn’t have a lot of choices. I’d already seen Wild, Two Days, One Night, and Ida and had no desire to see Gone Girl; the only other films about women nominated for major awards. I ended up going right back home: the theater was closed for emergency roof repair. When I saw the film the next Sunday, I thought maybe I should have taken the previous week’s circumstances as a sign.

I had been curious to see what the filmmakers would do with this adaptation of the Lisa Genova novel. The writer-directors are a married gay male couple (Wash Westmoreland and Richard Glatzer) who not only made the underrated Quinceañera (the rare film about Chicanos that doesn’t have a white savior or even a white main character), but also live with the relatively recent ALS diagnosis of Glatzer (whose disease has progressed enough that he can’t speak or eat without assistance). While ALS is not the same as the Early Onset Alzheimer’s Disease the title character has in Alice I thought Glatzer’s experience might give the film more insight than the usual able-bodied writer and director’s view of disability. What I didn’t expect from this film was how mild and polite it is about the challenges and loss Alice (Moore) faces.

As an expert on dementia writes, we should feel a lot more tension in the final diagnostic test Alice takes (and fails) because the stakes are so high. Similarly when one of Alice’s children is found to have the gene that means a 100 percent chance of developing the disease as well, we hear a phone call and then… nothing else, not even a hint, in later scenes, of how this information would affect the way an adult child would see and react to the deterioration of a parent.

The only fire in this film are the interactions between Alice and her youngest daughter Lydia (played by Kristen Stewart in a performance that reminded me of her meaty roles in Adventureland and The Runaways). In a family of over-achieving professionals (brother Charlie is in med school, sister Anna is a lawyer), Lydia is a struggling actress who has always had a prickly relationship with her Type-A, college professor mother (even after she is diagnosed, Alice continues to teach at Columbia and prepares, alone, the entire Christmas dinner, from scratch, for the whole family).

After Alice has to leave her job, she tells Lydia all the things she wants to see while she can still take them in, ending with, ” I want you to go to college.”

Exasperated, Lydia tells her, “You can’t just use your situation to get everything you want.”

As anyone who has had family members who need care can attest, sometimes the people who step up and help can be as surprising as the ones who are suddenly “too busy” to stop by. Lydia is the one who asks her mother (as Alice again prepares food for the whole family–even moderately advanced Alzheimer’s can’t save women from doing all the work in the household) to describe what she is experiencing. Alice wears a “memory impaired” medical bracelet but also has moments of clarity. She answers, “I can see the words hanging in front of me and I can’t reach them.” Then she adds, “Thanks for asking.” If the film had made these two characters its main focus it could have been a worthy successor to Quinceañera and the unlikely, symbiotic duo at its core: a pregnant teenager and her macho, closeted, gay cousin.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrXrZ5iiR0o” iv_load_policy=”3″]

Equally disappointing is Queen and Country, the latest–and what is being billed as the “final”–film, from 82-year-old writer-director John Boorman, whose long career includes Excalibur (probably due for a revival since its medieval setting is so much like Game of Thrones–and it features a young Helen Mirren) and the film to which Queen is a belated sequel, 1987’s great, autobiographical comedy, set in World War II London, Hope and Glory.

Queen begins with one of the closing scenes of Glory in which 9-year-old Bill, the director’s stand-in, finds, after an idyllic summer in his Grandfather’s house on the Thames, his friends dancing around the school building, on fire after the Germans bombed it. The opening day of school is postponed. “Thank you, Adolph,” says one of Bill’s friends as he smiles and looks to the sky.

Queen jumps to a decade later, when Bill is conscripted into the British Army to serve what was then the requirement of two years duty. Although Callum Turner (Glue) as Bill is physically believable as a grown-up version of Sebastian Rice-Edwards, who played Bill in Glory, he lacks the earlier Bill’s watchfulness: seeing his older sister let her boyfriend into her bedroom through her window or overhearing his mother and friend-of-the-family Mac talk about their romance (which predates and overlaps both their marriages). The earlier film was through young Bill’s eyes but we saw clearly into the lives of the other characters, especially the women and girls in the family.

This time around we are, for most of the action, stuck with just Bill and his erratic, “immoral” army friend Percy (Caleb Landry Jones, grating in a poorly conceived role) as they try, in small ways, to sabotage the small-mindedness and tedium of non-combat army life. They teach typing to fellow conscripts but stray from the official lesson plan, dictating to the class “Arses. a-r-s-e-s.” They conspire with Redmond (Pat Shortt playing the role of the funny Irish friend, which, in British productions has historically been the equivalent of the funny Black friend in American movies and TV) to get back at the officers who constantly malign them.

They also try to pick up women. After a double date with two nurses, Percy and Bill try to peep, Animal House-style, into the nurses’ dorm. Percy on the shoulders of Bill sees a more realistic scene than Animal House’s topless pillow fight: women in curlers and practical bathrobes but tells Bill he’s seeing “20 student nurses in various states of undress.” When Bill gets on Percy’s shoulders one of the nurses they went out with, Sophie (Aimee-Ffion Edwards) sees him and slides down her dress to press her bare breast to the window pane.

Bill pursues an upper-class older woman (of 24!) “Ophelia” (Tamsin Egerton playing a badly written role in the woman-with-psychological-problems mold) while Percy makes a connection with Bill’s married sister Dawn (Vanessa Kirby, every bit as irritating as Jones. She’s no match for the original Dawn, the sublime Sammi Davis). Bill’s other sister never appears or is mentioned. In the mother’s big scene she and Bill have a conversation about her affair that is two sentences long–as if Boorman wanted to remind us of her infidelity, but wasn’t quite sure why. After two long hours the film comes to its conclusion just as Alice does, not with a bang but a whimper.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y5oVLWqRSUU” iv_load_policy=”3″]

Ren Jender is a queer writer-performer/producer putting a film together. Her writing. besides appearing every week on Bitch Flicks, has also been published in The Toast, RH Reality Check, xoJane and the Feminist Wire. You can follow her on Twitter @renjender

‘Glee’ and Transmen

As I hope is obvious by me being a writer for ‘Bitch Flicks,’ I am a feminist, as well as a transman, and it therefore positively enraged me when I found out which character ‘Glee’ was outing as a transman.

Written by Jackson Adler.

FOX’s Glee, a show about a high school glee club, its teachers, and, later, its alumni, is airing its final episode March 20, after six seasons. Glee has been a show aimed at families, teens especially, and has no doubt been an introduction to LGBT issues and representation to many. While not always perfect in how it addresses various issues, it has certainly raised awareness in America to LGBT rights and acceptance. Due to the show having had a fair amount of tokenism of various groups, although it has improved in terms of representation in regard to some of those groups, when it was announced that one of the show’s characters was going to come out as a transman, I was simultaneously unsurprised and excited. I was several seasons behind on the series, and that announcement made my ears perk up and lead me to binge-watching the show again. At that point in time, I had literally seen zero representations of transmen and transboys in fictional media, and it was going to mean a lot to me to see my identity validated. As I hope is obvious by me being a writer for Bitch Flicks, I am a feminist, as well as a transman, and it therefore positively enraged me when I found out which character Glee was outing as a transman.

Football Coach Sheldon (formerly known as Shannon) Beiste has been one of my favorite characters on the show. Dot-Marie Jones is a phenomenal actress, and though the writing quality of her character is incredibly fickle, she commits beautifully to every moment. She and her character are tall, broad, muscular people, and much of Bieste’s character arc is about how every woman deserves to be respected, to feel pretty, and to have a chance at love. Her character has been repetitively bullied by those whose narrow definition of femininity and womanhood is beyond her character’s reach. It is therefore highly important that other characters started to acknowledge Beiste’s femininity, and to see Beiste as a woman who should be treated and respected like any other. When the writers of Glee decided to make Coach Beiste their token transman, it undermined her character arc and a powerful lesson about sexism and bodyshaming. It was a slap in the face to girls who had written to Dot-Marie Jones sharing their personal stories of being bullied for not meeting the narrow physical image of feminine beauty that is wrongfully promoted in our culture. I felt insulted for the actress, because it is her own body that is on display and is argued about in the episodes in which she stars. I felt awful for every woman and girl, and those raised as such, who has ever faced bodyshaming. There are so many other characters on the show from which the writers could have chosen to be their token transman, so choosing Coach Beiste was far from the only, and definitely not the best, option. In my opinion, two of the best characters the writers of Glee could have chosen to be a transman would have been Emma Pillsbury and Quinn Fabray.

School counselor Emma Pillsbury has anxiety and OCD, and for much of the show was terrified of sex. Many transpeople develop anxiety and OCD due to the pressures they have felt to present and pass as a gender that was assigned to them, and not their true gender. While it would have been great for the character to be out as asexual, another possibility would be that the character is uncomfortable with sex due to physical dysphoria in regards to their own body. Emma Pillsbury coming out as a transman would have also required glee club teacher Will Schuester to address his stance on homosexuality on a more personal level, due to his romantic relationship (and now marriage) with Emma.

Quinn Fabray was always obsessed with being the best girl at the school, the best cheerleader with the best boyfriend, the best hair, the best clothes, with being the homecoming and prom queen. Wouldn’t it be interesting if this obsession was revealed to be a way of compensating for not being a girl at all? What if her attraction to fellow blonde Sam Evans was because he was a representation of the type of boy Quinn secretly wanted to be? Then Quinn’s various past partners, including Quinn’s on and off boyfriend hypermasculine Noah “Puck” Puckerman, would have to contemplate their own sexuality and their opinions on homosexuality in a more personal way.

Both Emma and Quinn are skinny, White, and fit what society deems to be attractive. They often wear makeup and “feminine” clothing. Writing either Emma Pillsbury or Quinn Fabray as a transman would have challenged societal views and myths in regard to femininity and masculinity. It would have meant more thorough discussions about identity and sexuality, and the societal biases towards them. Glee so often provides “lessons” for its viewers, so why not address the subject of transmen in a way that thoroughly addresses issues surrounding that identity, instead of going the route that it did and promote a misogynistic message that Coach Beiste really isn’t and never was a woman who should be respected and treated like any other? Though Glee is ending, hopefully other shows, especially family and teen shows, will promote LGBT issues just as often, if not more so, than Glee – though hopefully in a more thorough and respectful way.

‘Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt’ Is a Feminist and Comedic Triumph

White men are background players in the world of ‘Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt’ (and, of those who do appear, there’s scarcely a one who isn’t either comically inept or flat-out evil). As the lyrics of the theme song state, “White dudes hold the record for creepy crimes, but females are strong as hell, unbreakable. They alive, dammit!” The show is fundamentally about the collective trauma of growing up female in a woman-hating world.

Written by Max Thornton.

Like sitcom enthusiasts all across America, I spent my weekend mainlining my latest obsession, Tina Fey’s new show Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. NBC’s critical darlings – The Office, 30 Rock, Community, and Parks and Recreation – have all trickled off our screens over the past few years, and Kimmy was to have filled the void; but NBC can’t let itself have anything nice without self-sabotaging, and passed the show on to Netflix. Someone in the network’s upper echelons has presumably spent the whole weekend in bitter self-recrimination for throwing away what would have been NBC’s best new show since 2009.

This poster promises to upend How I Met Your Mother's yellow umbrella and its white, heteropatriarchal norms. — This poster promises an inversion of *How I Met Your Mother*‘s yellow umbrella and the white, heteropatriarchal sitcom norms it represents.

A cynic might suggest that NBC’s cold feet had less to do with the show’s premise (a young woman adjusting to life outside the underground bunker in which she has spent the last 15 years as the captive of an apocalyptic cult) than with its profound lack of interest in the white men who so dominate the television landscape. The opening credits make this abundantly clear: only one white man’s name appears, that of co-creator Robert Carlock. White men are background players in the world of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (and, of those who do appear, there’s scarcely a one who isn’t either comically inept or flat-out evil). As the lyrics of the theme song state, “White dudes hold the record for creepy crimes, but females are strong as hell, unbreakable. They alive, dammit!”

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYNbp0u8WjA”]

All of the reviews I’ve seen have lauded the show for handling its dark premise so pitch-perfectly, attributing the comedic transmutation to the showrunners’ biting 30 Rock-honed wit or to Ellie Kemper’s wonderful performance as Kimmy. The real reason it works so well, though, is because the show is fundamentally about womanhood in general. Kimmy’s specific trauma is a reflection of, and metaphor for, the collective trauma of growing up female in a woman-hating world.

The underground bunker, into which Kimmy is forced as a newly pubescent 14-year-old, represents the constraints of heteropatriarchal gender norms, which are most fully embodied in Jon Hamm’s creepy cult leader. He emotionally abuses and manipulates the women he has imprisoned, gets inside their heads, interprets the Bible in a way that supports his lies, and – once he’s on trial – charms and dazzles everyone around him into accepting his nonsense. The bunker-as-patriarchy metaphor is made explicit more than once: in the pilot episode, when Matt Lauer observes, “I’m always amazed at what women will do because they’re afraid of being rude”; when Kimmy realizes her wealthy employer’s loveless marriage is a bunker in its own way; when a certain upscale fitness trend is revealed to be yet another way to keep women in a dark room doing what a man tells them to.

This robot is much more sympathetic than most white men on TV (and off it).

The women of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, who have all been victimized by heteropatriarchy, use an assortment of coping mechanisms. Cyndee exploits her victim status to get free stuff from all the people who feel sorry for her. Donna Maria keeps her skills close to her chest and doesn’t let on that she’s savvier than the rest put together. Gretchen goes deep into denial. Kimmy tries to put her past behind her and get on with life. These different coping mechanisms sometimes bring them into conflict with one another; however, it’s only by working together that they can confront and defang their aggressor. This idea, of people who aren’t white men banding together to pull back the curtain and reveal the patriarchal Wonderful Wizard as a sham, is a major theme of the show. It’s as though Tina Fey took on board certain feminist criticisms of 30 Rock‘s tendency to be male-dominated and decided to do something very different.

The show addresses manhood, too, in a wonderful plot where Kimmy’s magnificently queeny roommate Titus takes classes on how to pass as a straight man. Hilariously, his mentor is Hank from Breaking Bad, a show which was also about the destructiveness of white male patriarchy, but which – because it chose to portray this from the perspective of the said white male patriarch – was dangerously susceptible to misreadings from misogynistic fanboys who found Walter White’s badassery admirable. No such danger with Kimmy, in which the reveal that Entourage 2 will not be happening causes a bar full of strangers to break out into cheering and applause. What Titus learns about heterosexual masculinity is that he possesses the ability to fake it, but it’s aggro, destructive, and (contra the sexist mythos of heteropatriarchy) more artificial than the fabulous femmeyness that comes so naturally to him.

It’s worth mentioning that this show can be read as a metaphor for trans womanhood specifically, an idea suggested by the last line of the theme song: “That’s gonna be, you know, a fascinating transition.” Consider: after many years of being lied to about the world and her place in it, Kimmy moves to the big city, changes her name, and conceals her past for her own safety and peace of mind. She is an adult who is still to some extent an emotional adolescent, temporally out of sync with the world around her, which is not wholly unlike the experience of beginning transition as an adult. Again, it’s not a huge leap to read this as a deliberate correction of some of 30 Rock‘s missteps.

There are also ongoing threads skewering wealth and class, the immigration system, and white supremacy – Titus realizing he is treated far better on the streets of New York as a werewolf than a Black man is on the nose, but it’s timely and it’s very funny. I realize I haven’t said much about the actual comedy aspect of the show, but rest assured that it is absolutely hilarious. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt succeeds as a work of intersectional feminism, and it also succeeds as a comedy. It’s everything I want in my entertainment, and I can’t wait for season two.

Max Thornton blogs at Gay Christian Geek, tumbles as trans substantial, and tweets at @RainicornMax. A Buzzfeed quiz pegged him as Kimmy, but he feels like more of a Titus.

Reading Mae West’s ‘Sextette’ as a PUA Manual

Watch and learn, average frustrated chumps

Written by Brigit McCone.

PUA (pick-up artistry) is a strange beast. Its core technique relies on teaching men to dehumanize women as “targets” in order to numb themselves to rejection, making it psychologically easier to approach larger numbers of women and therefore, statistically, to enjoy greater sexual success, though at the cost of emotional connection. PUA thus represents the art of maximizing sexual success by minimizing sexual satisfaction. Mae West’s 1978 film Sextette is also a strange beast, and a fascinating film. When I say that it’s fascinating, I don’t mean to suggest that it’s good. Sextette is a car crash of a film, a head-on collision between a lavish MGM musical and Tommy Wiseau’s The Room. It is a perfect candidate for interactive midnight screenings and ironic appreciation, which should be mandatory at every festival of women’s film.

The usual responses of male reviewers label Mae West as “delusional” and “grotesque” for her iron conviction in her own seductive power at the age of 84 (minimum). West was Billy Wilder’s original inspiration for the aging, predatory narcissist Norma Desmond in Sunset Blvd., while reviewer Nathan Rabin says of Sextette, “stick in a coda revealing that the whole thing was a ridiculous fantasy by an impoverished washerwoman nearing death, and the whole film would take on an unmistakably bittersweet, melancholy dimension.” Yes, the guy who invented the “Manic Pixie Dream Girl” label, to criticize self-centered male sexism, suggests that female fantasies of lifelong desirability are only valid if they are affirmed to be impossible in real life. The irony. It burns.

Real life, however, differs from such critics’ expectations of “realism.” Far from ending her life as a sex-starved, “impoverished washerwoman,” Mae West actually had a flourishing relationship with the ruggedly handsome wrestler Paul Novak, almost 30 years her junior, who remained devoted to her for 26 years in one of show business’ greatest romances, nursing her at her death but discouraging her from including him in her will.

We may squirm at Sextette, to see an 84-year-old lady claim irresistible attractiveness without the apologetic, self-deprecating irony that we demand of older women’s sexuality, but Mae’s claims are securely grounded in her proven track record of seduction. If you will it, Dude, it is no dream. If Mae had listened to dominant culture’s messages about the female sell-by date, she would never have dared to play a sex-bomb in her late 30s, her age in her Hollywood debut, or selected a much-younger and undiscovered Cary Grant for her co-star. We owe Cary Grant’s career to Mae’s “denial,” while her selection of a young Timothy Dalton for the leading man of Sextette shows a similar eye for star potential, the film prophetically comparing him to 007.

I don’t necessarily recommend Mae West’s narcissistic seductress as a role model for all women, but I strongly recommend her as Laverne Cox’s definition of a “possibility model”; Mae is a reminder that we define our own roles and culture is created partly by our consent. Mae West’s Sextette is the most perfect illustration that the values of dominant culture depend on its male authorship, while female authorship (Mae insisted on writing or co-writing all her films, dictating to directors on set) can just as easily create images of octogenarian vixens commanding the lustful worship of entire “United States athletic teams” of half-naked musclemen, and brokering world peace through their irresistible sexual power (why haven’t you seen this film yet?). Sextette uncomfortably tears down the curtain and reveals the balding wizard behind the Great and Powerful Oz of cinema’s “realism,” just as Singing In The Rain exposed the artificiality of Lina Lamont’s glamour by swapping the sex of the voice behind the curtain. Here lies Sextette‘s true countercultural anarchy, and the reason it deserves midnight screening immortality. But the film also represents, as we shall show with our trusty pualingo.com, a classic PUA manual.

Abundance Mentality

Abundance mentality is defined by PUA lingo as “the belief and life perspective that there is no shortage of hot girls to meet in any man’s lifetime.” This principle is continually reinforced within male-authored culture, from the female disposability fantasy of James Bond to the geriatric desirability dreams of Woody Allen, which influential New York Times critic Vincent Canby might have considered “a poetic, terrifying reminder of how a virtually disembodied ego can survive total physical decay and loss of common sense” if he hadn’t already said that about Sextette. Conversely, our culture constantly depicts narratives of female anxiety over their “biological clocks” and their “last chance for love,” reinforcing a scarcity mentality whose psychological impact is dramatized with wincing accuracy by the desperation romcom of Bridget Jones’s Diary. Mae West, however, modeled an abundance mentality throughout her life, in defiant immunity to cultural pressures. Though acknowledging her life partner, ruggedly handsome Mr. Baltimore, Paul Novak, was a “good guy,” she quipped in her mid-80s “course there’s 40 guys dyin’ for his job!”

The filmmakers originally intended West’s character, Marlo, to weep over Timothy Dalton’s abandonment, while goth-rock legend Alice Cooper (with tangerine tan and poodle perm, naturally. Why haven’t you seen this film?) serenaded her with piano ballad “No Time For Tears,” but Mae insisted that her character would not cry and forced Cooper to perform the jazzy, uptempo “Next, Next” (“he blew his chance with you! Next, next! Lost you to someone new!”), maintaining her character’s positive vibing so that the film’s advocacy of abundance mentality would not be compromised. West and Dalton’s final reconciliation suggests that this was only a soft next on Marlo’s part, however. Male critics interpret such abundance mentality as delusion, in a woman who resembles a macabre apparition and the monster from beyond time, but West’s track record of sexual success suggests that such protests be understood as token resistance.

Midnight screening suggestion: bring a loud buzzer to hit before yelling “next!”

DHV: Demonstration of Higher Value

Marlo's target, acknowledging her higher value — Marlo’s target, acknowledging her higher value

While male sexual value peaks between the ages of 21 and 30 (as clarified by Sextette‘s “happy birthday, 21!” anthem and Mae’s criticism of Tony Curtis as an unsuitably elderly screen lover, only 30 years her junior) and is largely dependent on the man’s rugged looks and muscle-tone, a woman may increase her sexual market value (SMV) at any age by a canned routine of humorous quips, positive vibing, displays of wealth and willingness to walk away or “soft next,” as Mae demonstrates throughout the film. The best technique for a DHV is to avoid direct bragging (which can actually read as desperation, and thus a demonstration of lower value, or DLV), through the use of wings to praise you on your behalf. In Sextette, the role of “Marlo’s wing” is played by Everyone Who Is Not Marlo. Before the central couple arrive, Regis Philbin brands Marlo “the greatest sex symbol the screen has ever known,” while an obliging crowd sings her DHV anthem “Marlo! The female answer to Apollo! As lovely as Venus De Milo! A living dream!” the press corps laugh at her every word and even ex-husband Ringo Starr shows willingness to wing for her: “You know when your wife was my wife? Your wife was some wife!” Such consistent DHV naturally provokes Timothy Dalton’s target into the production of expensive diamonds as well as verbal IOIs, in this clearly approval-seeking ballad (click. I dare you). Claims by male reviewers that this moment is like “gazing upon one of H. P. Lovecraft’s Old Ones, something so momentously and unimaginably monstrous that even perceiving the edges of it threatens one with madness” are best interpreted as manifestations of their bitch shields (BS).

Midnight screening suggestion: wing for Marlo by wolf-whistling and dangle bracelets of sparklers whenever she mentions being turned on.

NLP: Neuro Linguistic Programming

Neuro-linguistic programming is the art of conditioning the target‘s responses through ambiguity and anchoring. In an NLP context, ambiguity is the use of normal, innocuous words that sound like sexual terms, to unconsciously stimulate a man’s sexual senses. Mae West reveals herself a grandmistress of this art, with statements such as “I’m the girl who works at Paramount all day and Fox all night,” referencing her busy schedule as an actress, but subconsciously suggesting sexual stamina to the receptive male mind. “Everything goes up for Marlo!” literally refers to a pink cassette trampolined into a statue’s mouth (don’t ask) but on a deeply subtle and subconscious level could be regarded as sexually suggestive, while “when I’m good, I’m good, but when I’m bad, I’m better” might conceivably be associated with a sexual “bad girl” rather than with theft or arson. After this ingenious technique has made all men uncontrollably aroused by the octogenarian West, she is free to select her targets at will from their superabundance. Next!

Anchoring, meanwhile, is the art of associating gestures with emotional states through their repetition. In Sextette, Mae uses her anchors, such as trademark hair-patting, to elicit Pavlovian arousal by evoking her earlier performances, while groping her own breasts is a classic point to self (PTS) to anchor her feeling of success. A related art is kino, the regular touching and stroking of the target that prevents octogenarian actresses from ending up in his friend zone, which Marlo can be observed demonstrating on Ricky, the 21-year-old team mascot, throughout Sextette‘s gym scene. When male commentators describe the film as “like watching your grandmother at a gangbang,” the key is to reframe that observation, for example by cocking an eyebrow and purring “does that excite you?”

Midnight screening suggestion: Recognize NLP Ambiguity by clicking fingers and barking “you’re under!” in the style of Little Britain’s Kenny Craig, while all PTS maneuvers should be mimicked.

Peacocking

By wearing something showy, like a huge feather headdress or semi-transparent gown, a PUA is able to differentiate herself from her competition. Peacocking is a term derived from the biological behavior of peacocks and from Darwinism, not from the ginormous plumes crowning Mae West like a kooky cockatoo. Peacocking lures the PUA’s targets into starting conversations with her, offering her openings such as “what is that thing on your head? You look like a kooky cockatoo!” By wearing something completely ridiculous, the PUA also opens herself up to shit tests from men, such as New York Times critic Vincent Canby’s claim that Mae resembles “a plump sheep that’s been stood on its hind legs, dressed in a drag-queen’s idea of chic, bewigged and then smeared with pink plaster.” By demonstrating that she can deal with this social pressure, Mae shows her irresistibly alpha characteristics. It must be admitted that, in the striking costumes of legendary, eight-time Oscar-winner Edith Head, Mae looks like a damn chic sheep dressed as sexy lamb.

Midnight screening suggestion: the most ridiculous feather boas and fascinators you can get your hands on, for regular stroking throughout the screening.

So what’s the moral of this study? Should we be inspired by Mae’s conquests of the screen and of ruggedly handsome wrestler, crowned Mr. Baltimore, Paul Novak, to endorse the indomitable positivity of PUA philosophy (go West, young woman)? Or point to the reactions of squirming male viewers to finally prove that PUA is creepy, once and for all? Or does the truth lie somewhere in between, in cultivating a confident independence and immunity to cultural pressure, while still respecting the consent of others? Who knows? Only one moral is certain: never, ever play a drinking game in which you do a shot for every sex pun in this movie. Seriously. You could die. [youtube_sc url=” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nH_j-DNJwZA”]

The trailer alone would get you bombed

Brigit McCone over-identifies with Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard. She writes short films and radio dramas. Her hobbies include doodling and making bad puns out of the corner of her mouth.

In ‘Appropriate Behavior’: What Does It Take for a Woman to Author Herself?

What’s more, to understand ‘Appropriate Behavior’ as the bisexual Iranian version of someone else’s work would be to miss the point of the film entirely. While on the surface, the film is about a bisexual Iranian American coming to terms with a breakup and with the messiness of her sexuality, it’s really a film about identity, about what it means not to take the easy way out by shaving off or hiding the parts of yourself that don’t fit into a neat package. By failing, spectacularly, to fit, the film, like its main character, becomes something more than the sum of its seemingly discordant parts, something entirely of its own.

This is a guest post by Dena Afrasiabi.

It’s tempting to try to fit Desiree Akhavan’s unique and hilarious first feature, Appropriate Behavior, into the appropriate box. In the age of tagging and buzzwords, a film of its kind lends itself to a plethora of catchy categories: Iranian, Brooklynite, lesbian, coming of age, categories that have never all been represented on the same screen at the same time. Add to that some awkward (i.e. realistic) sex scenes and it’s no wonder that so many reviewers have described Akhavan as the bisexual Iranian version of Lena Dunham. Or is it? Upon reading other articles on the film, as well as interviews with Akhavan, on the topic, it becomes glaringly apparent that the comparisons say a lot less about the film or about Akhavan as an artist than they do about the relationship between the media and women artists of color. Granted, Akhavan and Dunham do share some surface similarities: both filmmakers are young women, both make work set in Brooklyn that features flawed (i.e. real), intelligent female characters, characters who harbor real desires, make real mistakes and find themselves in real, awkward, often cringe-worthy sexual encounters. And in all fairness, the comparison is certainly a flattering one, as Akahavan herself has acknowledged.

Nor is Akhavan the first filmmaker or writer to be compared to Dunham. Both Greta Gerwig, writer and star of Frances Ha and Gillian Robespierre, the director of Obvious Child, have also held the somewhat dubious honor, one that’s apparently granted to any talented young female filmmaker who makes a funny film about a smart woman who lives in Brooklyn and doesn’t have her life all figured out by her mid-20s. Indeed, linking filmmakers to one another seems to be a favored pastime of film critics. Dunham herself has oft been dubbed the new Woody Allen. And the interwebs does yield its share of comparisons between male filmmakers as well (Paul Thomas Anderson has been compared to Quentin Tarantino, Tarantino to Scorcese, Judd Appatow and Ed Burns to Woody Allen). But these linkages occur much less frequently and carry less weight than comparisons between female filmmakers, and especially the ubiquitous comparisons between Akhavan and Dunham.

Great artists locate themselves in a tradition. Most filmmakers, including Allen himself, are quick to name their biggest influences. But the above-mentioned comparisons point to something more than just the creation of a genealogy. They reek of a tokenism that only makes room for one successful woman at a time and that fosters acceptance for women of color by linking them to their white counterparts. This tokenism diminishes or even erases the nuances of these filmmakers’ distinct voices and minimizes the range and complexity of experiences they convey.

What’s more, to understand Appropriate Behavior as the bisexual Iranian version of someone else’s work would be to miss the point of the film entirely. While on the surface, the film is about a bisexual Iranian American coming to terms with a breakup and with the messiness of her sexuality, it’s really a film about identity, about what it means not to take the easy way out by shaving off or hiding the parts of yourself that don’t fit into a neat package. By failing, spectacularly, to fit, the film, like its main character, becomes something more than the sum of its seemingly discordant parts, something entirely of its own.

The film’s narrative follows Shirin (Desiree Akahavan), a 20-something bisexual Iranian American living in Park Slope whose barely held together life is coming apart at the seams. She and her girlfriend, Maxine (Rebecca Henderson), have just broken up, sending Shireen out of Park Slope domestic bliss and into a self-destructive spiral inside a dark and cluttered apartment in Bushwick that she shares with a hipster artist couple who look like they just walked off the set of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She quits her job at the Brooklyn Paper, where she has been replaced as the token Middle Easterner by a Syrian woman whose Syrianness is more exciting to her coworkers than Shirin’s more understated Iranianness and goes to work as a teacher for an after-school filmmaking class full of Park Slope toddlers more interested in eating their cameras than shooting precocious art films she imagines them making. As Shirin deals with her grief over the breakup, we learn of the relationship through a series of bittersweet flashbacks—that’s right, Annie Hall style. In one scene, Shirin and Maxine meet on a stoop just before midnight on New Year’s Eve, where they bond over their mutual disdain (“I hate so many things, too” Shirin tells her, just before their first kiss). In another, they make the romantic discovery while smoking pot together for the first time that they’re “the same type of high person.” The romance quickly unravels, however, as Shirin and Maxine repeatedly butt heads over Shirin’s unwillingness to come out to her socially conservative Iranian parents (Hooman Majd and Anh Duong).

Throughout the film, we watch Shirin repeatedly fail to fulfill the expectations of those around her. She doesn’t embody Maxine’s idea of the right kind of lesbian, one who reads queer studies classics like Stone Butch Blues, embraces gay activism with earnest enthusiasm and wears her sexuality as a badge. Nor does she fit her family’s definition of the right kind of Iranian offspring, by contrast to her successful doctor brother (Arian Moayed) or his polished Iranian fiancée (Justine Cotsonas), who performs reconstructive surgery on pediatric burn victims. She also fails to be the right kind of Iranian in the eyes of Park Slope’s upper middle class liberals, who expect her to be one of the hip young Tehranis they read about in the Times. When asked by her new boss (Scott Adsit) if she’s part of the underground hip-hop scene in Tehran, she answers, “I spend most of time in Iran watching Disney videos with my grandmother while she untangles jewelry.” The slapstick film she makes with her class also clashes hilariously with Park Slope’s collective Disney-like fantasy of a harmonious multicultural world, epitomized by her bohemian coworker, Tibet (Rosalie Lowe), who attends West African dance classes religiously and makes a film featuring white and African American children poetically climbing trees. Shirin’s eventual coming out to her mother, too, defies expectations of the genre with its quiet ambiguity. “Mom, I’m a little bit gay,” Shirin tells her mother one night at her parents’ New Jersey home. And rather than set off a show of hysterics or threats to ship her off to Iran or to straight camp, her mother meets this confession with a simple dismissal, the tip of a cultural iceberg that alludes to beliefs and attitudes that will not melt overnight. It’s such moments of ambiguity that set Akhavan apart as a filmmaker, moments that can’t be separated from her unique vantage point and that get lost in the Dunham comparisons and the branding.

What makes the story so resonant is that Shirin doesn’t ever tie up her identity’s loose ends. A lesser film may have shown the protagonist reaching an epiphany of self-acceptance or end with a celebration of her sexuality or of her identity as an immigrant. Instead, the film vividly details Shirin’s loneliness and discomfort (albeit with much hilarity) as she stumbles from one awkward discovery to another and eventually into a more honest self while also acknowledging, in its own subtle way, the empowerment that comes with resisting the pressure to wrap your identity around any one thing, be it your sexuality or your ethnicity or the neighborhood where you live. This isn’t to say the film is a Song of Myself celebration of American individualism. She doesn’t receive a trophy at the end for “being herself.” Shirin doesn’t defy categorization to make a point or prove herself; she does so because it’s ultimately the only way she knows how to be, a way of being that comes at its own price but whose benefits far outweigh the cost of self-erasure.

Like Shirin, who finally comes into her own by the film’s end through her inability to meet other’s expectations of her identity, it’s Akhavan’s deft and nuanced, not to mention hysterically funny, chronicling of this journey that makes her a filmmaker bound to defy and surpass the already high expectations of her future work—and perhaps in this one sense, it is fair to say she does have something in common with Lena Dunham, a.k.a the straight white Desiree Akhavan.

Dena Afrasiabi is the co-editor of the literary magazine Elsewhere Lit. Her fiction has appeared in Kartika Review, JMWW and Prick of the Spindle. She resides in Austin, Texas and sometimes vents or raves about films here.

‘Marnie’: What We’d Like To Forget About Old Hollywood

With all the talk of ’50 Shades of Grey’ in the past few weeks, boycotts and debates, and a planned re-release of the superior BDSM-romcom ‘Secretary,’ the film that has really been on my mind is ‘Marnie.’ The 1964 Hitchcock outing is about the capturing (through marriage) and breaking of a young, beautiful and damaged con artist, played by Tippi Hedren, the grandmother of ’50 Shades’ star Dakota Johnson. The cinematography is beautiful, the performances are captivating, but the story? Watching it, I keep expecting someone to jump out and scream that it was all a joke, that we weren’t expected to swallow this. Maybe it’s dated, but I want to believe that the relationship in ‘Marnie’ was recognized as horrific and abusive even then.

Written by Elizabeth Kiy.

With all the talk of 50 Shades of Grey in the past few weeks, boycotts and debates, and a planned re-release of the superior BDSM-romcom Secretary, the film that has really been on my mind is Marnie . Since I first saw it several years ago, I’m been intermittently perplexed by the film, a 1964 Hitchcock outing about the capturing (through marriage) and breaking of a young, beautiful and damaged con artist, played by Tippi Hedren , the grandmother of 50 Shades star Dakota Johnson. The cinematography is beautiful, the performances are captivating, but the story? Watching it, I keep expecting someone to jump out and scream that it was all a joke, that we weren’t expected to swallow this. Maybe it’s dated, but I want to believe that the relationship in Marnie was recognized as horrific and abusive even then.

Mark dominates Marnie and breaks her down to reveal her weakness

If you didn’t already think Alfred Hitchcock was a horror movie villain , Marnie sure makes this clear. For starters, James Bond himself, Sean Connery plays Mark Rutland, is misogynist and unrepentant rapist who is the movie’s hero. Yes, he’s the hero. A wealthy industrialist and armchair zoologist, who discovers the young woman who just robbed a business acquaintance and blackmails her into marrying him.

As a con artist, Marnie slips and out of identities and hair styles, though blonde is always the constant, the “real” her. The one constant presence in Marnie’s life is her mother, who lives in a poor area down by the docks of an unknown town. She acts as the breadwinner for her mother, painting her as “unnaturally” masculinized. One of the things she brings her mother is a fur coat, a typical gift given by a rich lover at the time.

While Hedren was being abused by Hitchcock off-screen, on-screen Mark finds his new wife is cold and disinterested in sex. In Hitchcock world, this must mean there is something wrong with her. She is after all, the classic ice blonde taken to extremes. She holds her head high and meets men’s gazes and pulls her skirt down over her knees if she feels she is being gawked at. She’s disgusted and afraid of the thought of Mark touching her and extolls her hatred and mistrust of men, which lends the film to queer readings.

He rapes her on their wedding night when she refuses to have sex with him. It is not at all ambiguous. She screams and tries to fight him off but he keeps going. It’s as explicit as it could be at the time. Never are we told that what Mark did was wrong, or that it makes him a bad person. Instead, we are meant to sympathize with his urges. He is a red-blooded American man, he can be patient about other things, can treat Marnie as an animal, a case study to be analyzed at arm’s length, but on his wedding night? Moreover, as he is presented as normal while Marnie is damaged, his actions are represented as markers of his psychological superiority. He know Marnie better than she knows herself, he can tell it’s what she wants even when she says no; the standard defense of the rapist, only we’re meant to take it seriously here. Even when Marnie attempts suicide the next morning, it’s portrayed as a symptom of the things that were already wrong with her, not a reaction to being victimized.

In married life, Mark continues to hold Marnie under this thumb. He tells her how to dress and act and forces her to attend parties and act as his supportive partner. She must live in his house, trapped like a captive animal and studied, by her husband, zoology or Freudian text in hand. Privately she screams how much she hates him, how much she wants to get away from him, but he owns her, both as a husband and blackmailer.

And though she puts up a strong act, she seems to need him. The slightest flash of the color red or crash of lightening send her into hysterics and Mark’s arms. She seems to get a sense of sexual release from riding her horse (a hamfisted Freudian touch) and it’s his death that finally breaks Marnie’s spirit, like she is indeed the wild horse in need of taming that Mark viewed her as.

Marnie is only truly happy with her horse

This all leads up to the final confrontation with Marnie’s mother, wherein Mark blames her for “ruining” Marnie. It begins when he literally drags her to her mother’s house, crying and weak from the earlier trauma and ends with the heavy-handed revelation that of repressed memories of a near sexual assault in her childhood. Hearing this, grown up Marnie regresses back to her childhood, a little girl crying for her mother’s love and leaning on her husband’s strong shoulder.

In the last scene they walk out into an uncertain future but it seems like things might be all right for these crazy kids. They’re ready to love each other. Mark is our hero, he’s fixed this girl and she can now have a normal sex life. She can be a wife, like a woman is supposed to be.

Marnie is forced to stand by Mark’s side as his society wife

Of course this is crazy and nauseating and its rightfully a lesser Hitchcock. But the film is beautiful and seductive, dressed up in Classic Hollywood glamour and its easy to be lulled into ideas of the unilateral superiority and wholesomeness of old films. But not everything a great director touches turns to gold. For all the ills of contemporary filmmaking and modern culture, at least you couldn’t make a film like Marnie anymore.

At least, I hope so.

Elizabeth Kiy is a Canadian writer and journalist living in Toronto, Ontario.