‘Star Trek Into Darkness’: Where Are the Women?

Star Trek is the future for Christ’s sake. There’s no reason to continue to parrot the shortcomings of a series that always strove to show us a better, more egalitarian future but failed on many levels because it couldn’t see the ways in which it fell victim to the limiting ideology of its own era.

Star Trek Into Darkness movie poster
Written by Amanda Rodriguez
Spoiler Alert
JJ Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness came out this weekend, so with fingers crossed and fledgling hope, I went to review the film for Bitch Flicks. Though I love me some Benedict Cumberbatch as well as most TV permutations of the Star Trek franchise, the movie was overly long with a predictable plot and an over-reliance on the image of people being sucked into space like ants into a vacuum. Not only that, but the lack of female characters was stark, and their accompanying lack of depth and three-dimensionality was, frankly, depressing. This latest iteration of Star Trek didn’t even pass the Bechdel Test. In fact, I’m not even sure the two women with speaking roles were even in a single scene together.First, we’ve got Lieutenant Nyota Uhura portrayed by Zoe Saldana. In Abrams’ reboot of the Star Trek series, Uhura is extremely intelligent, ambitious, capable, and sees Kirk’s misogynistic bullshit for what it really is. Though she is generally a strong female character, the film still exploits her femaleness by overemphasizing her sexuality. They do this by keeping her and all the other female Starfleet members in those ridiculously impractical short dresses and having a gratuitous scene of her in her underwear.

Uhura strips in her quarters not realizing that Kirk is lecherously looking on.

She is attracted to the intelligence of Spock, and the end of the film has the two falling in love. That, my friends, is the end of Uhura as an autonomous, interesting character. At the beginning of Star Trek Into Darkness, Uhura is dressing Spock for an away mission. How is that even remotely her job as a communications officer? She then proceeds to be childishly passive aggressive toward Spock because he’s displeased her and bickers with him during a dangerous away mission to Kronos, bringing her captain into the argument. Talk about unprofessional. Not only that, but her single valiant effort to placate a Klingon group that discovers them through the use of her knowledge of their language and culture fails miserably, nearly getting them all killed, thus proving diplomacy and non-violence are not valid tactical options for Starfleet.

Next, there’s Dr. Carol Marcus, played by Alice Eve, who is strong and spunky (stowing away aboard the Enterprise in order to investigate her father’s top secret weaponry), but, for some reason, it’s important to show her in her underwear as well.

Guess it was crucial to the plot to learn that science officers do, in fact, wear undergarments to match their blue uniforms.

Dr. Marcus is a female character who could’ve been so much more. She is given no history and her presence has little context other than to break up the sausage-fest with a bit of blonde eye candy. While she stands up to her father, who is the most powerful man in Starfleet, the original series character upon whom she is based is infinitely more compelling than this simple doctor of physics with a focus on weaponry. In fact, the original Dr. Marcus was a biologist who discovered how to create new worlds and new life. A weapons specialist is antithetical to that kind of focus on sustaining life and ecosystem balance, nevermind the powerful intellect and will that go into such a scientific endeavor. Though Abrams changes the timeline, it’s unrealistic to think that the doctor’s long path down the road of biology toward Project Genesis would’ve started after that timeline change. Due to the original character’s romantic history with Kirk replete with their son being born and Marcus choosing to pursue her work and raise the boy on her own, we know that Abrams is setting up Kirk and Marcus to fall in love in the third installment of his reboot. If we’ve learned anything from Uhura, we know that’s the kiss of death for any possibility of Marcus’ unfolding complexity and agency within the films.

I would’ve been happy, however, if Star Trek Into Darkness could have admitted to itself what its true genre is: Brokeback Mountain in space. This is actually a bromance about the love between Kirk and Spock that climaxes when Kirk sacrifices himself to save his ship. The two men are separated by glass as Kirk is irradiated in an inversion of the finale of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan when Spock dies. In both versions, the two men press their hands to the glass, but in Abrams’ reboot, Spock is overcome and weeping; the intensity of both men’s emotions is overwhelming as they say their impossible goodbyes.

Spock and Kirk say their tearful, love-filled goodbyes.

Spock then goes on an enraged rampage to destroy Khan and avenge Kirk’s death. Nothing about his demeanor throughout both films suggests that he would display this intensity of emotion in relation to Uhura. In fact, we have as an example his resigned acceptance of death earlier in the film, in which Spock is able to detach from his emotions towards Uhura and the impending reality of his own death. Not so with the death of Kirk.

Though the homoerotic subtext is strong in the finale of this film, JJ Abrams never really takes any risks with his reboot. The film hints at widespread corruption among Starfleet coupled with a clandestine militarization of the Federation, but Abrams chickens out from truly shaking up the Star Trek universe by having the corruption be limited to a single megalomaniac admiral. Abrams doesn’t depict women in power. How many women were around the table when the highest ranking members of Starfleet and their first officers assembled? I didn’t see any. Aboard the Enterprise, there are only the two women in this article (of dubious depth and agency) who have more than a single line of dialogue, and their outfits continue to model an outdated 70’s mode of sexism.

Our beloved Enterprise goes down, unable to fly under the weight of so much mediocrity.

Star Trek is the future for Christ’s sake. There’s no reason to continue to parrot the shortcomings of a series that always strove to show us a better, more egalitarian future but failed on many levels because it couldn’t see the ways in which it fell victim to the limiting ideology of its own era. This reboot may even have regressed from the days of Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager, all shows that took the tenets of the original series and progressively attempted to push the boundaries on subjects of race, gender, sexuality, capitalism, imperialism, etc. In fact, Star Trek Into Darkness reveals that, as a culture, we are still falling victim to that same limiting ideology. Star Trek Into Darkness even has trouble imagining a future that is free from racial hierarchy and the gender binary. This film struggles and fails to see a world that has advanced beyond our limitations as a people and as a culture. Frankly, that is the poorest kind of science fiction because we look to sci-fi to either expose our contemporary hamartia or to teach us how to dream of a better, freer existence that is full of possibility and progress.

Does Uhura’s Empowerment Negate Sexism in ‘Star Trek Into Darkness’?

Lt. Nyota Uhura (Zoe Saldana) in Star Trek Into Darkness

Written by Megan Kearns | Warning: Spoilers ahead!

Yes, I am a Trekkie. I’ve been a huge fan of Star Trek ever since I was a kid. The camaraderie of Star Trek: The Original Series, the intellectual and moral conundrums on Star Trek: The Next Generation, the political intrigue and exploration of social issues on Deep Space 9 — I love them all.

I really enjoyed JJ Abrams’ Star Trek and Star Trek Into Darkness. Both are fun, gripping movies paying homage to the original series. While I enjoy the nostalgia and revisiting these characters, I can’t ignore Star Trek Into Darkness’ vacillating depiction of empowerment and sexism.
In the 60s original TV series, Lieutenant Uhura was a ground-breaking role. It was one of the first time audiences saw a black woman on TV who wasn’t a maid or a servant. She was also part of the first interracial kiss on TV, although that always bothers me as it was against her wishes due to mind control. Uhura’s occupation as the Enterprise’s Communications Officer inspired women (Dr. Mae Jamison, Sally Ride) and African-Americans (Dr. Mae Jamison, Guion Bluford) to become astronauts. We can’t be what we can’t see, one of the reasons media impacts our lives so deeply.
Yet the original Star Trek didn’t exactly delve deeply into Lt. Uhura’s personality. However, we can glean a few things about the Communications Officer. Adept at languages, she was ambitious, climbing through ranks to eventually become a Commander. She enjoyed music and loved to play instruments and sing. She doesn’t really have a tangible persona, not compared to roguish and rebellious Kirk, rational and logical Spock or emotional, metaphor-spewing Bones. So it’s great to see the extremely talented Zoe Saldana — who I will seriously watch in anything — imbue the iconic character with more complexity and depth as an opinionated and assertive woman.
In the original series, Kirk, Spock and McCoy form the central trio. But in Star Trek Into Darkness, Uhura replaces McCoy so now there’s a woman of color in the triad. A lady broke through the boys’ club barrier!! But won’t her ladyparts contaminate the brotastic bond??
Is Uhura in Star Trek Into Darkness a strong-willed, intelligent, assertive badass? Or merely relegated to the role of a dude’s girlfriend? She’s both.

Spock (Zachary Quinto) and Uhura (Zoe Saldana)
Uhura and Spock share an effortless chemistry. As we saw in the first Star Trek film, despite their difference in rank, they appear to be equals in their romantic relationship. Uhura possesses agency, despite her romantic involvement. She’s the one who demands Kirk let her negotiate with the Klingons rather than shooting first. She’s the one who insists on being beamed down to help Spock in the film’s climax. No one is making decisions for her. She’s making them. She’s not afraid to voice her opinion. When she’s pissed at Spock, thinking he held little regard for his life, she’s unafraid to confront him even though Kirk, her boss, is present.
Part of me loves that Uhura, a black woman, is the one in the romance. Too often we see white women play out that plot. Black women often remain on the sidelines as the feisty sidekicks, giving their white friends advice on love. Lucy Liu recently lamented about racist stereotypes in Hollywood, how people don’t think of her in a romantic comedy. While not a rom-com, it’s great to see a woman of color get the guy.
But it pisses off another part of me that Uhura’s role in Star Trek Into Darkness is ultimately defined by her relationship to a man, even though that relationship often takes “a back seat to the bromance between Spock and Kirk.” Uhura’s role as girlfriend exists to convey Spock’s humanity. Uhura is upset at Spock that he seems so cavalier in a life-threatening situation, not giving their relationship a second thought. He assures her that he cares deeply but doesn’t want to endure the anguish of fear. They have a genuine conflict that I wish had been explored more. In the emotional climax, Spock loses control of his emotions due to his feelings for Kirk, not Uhura. Again it feels like it’s all about a dude.
Even though the other female character in the film Dr. Carol Marcus, a weapons specialist for chrissake, she’s ultimately defined by her relationship to a man too — her father, an ambassador and head of Starfleet. She’s also been called the worst damsel in distress ever. Not sure I’d say the worst but yeah it’s pretty bad. Oh and of course we see her in her underwear, for no reason other than to show Kirk ogling her. (In case you’re not familiar with original Star Trek, Dr. Marcus also happens to be the mother of Kirk’s son — another way her character is defined by a man — although she’s also the creator of the Genesis Project, which is pretty badass. But who knows if this will even transpire in the subsequent reboot series.)
Dr. Marcus’ gratuitous half-naked, eye-candy shot has rightfully pissed off a ton of people. Screenwriter and frequent Abrams collaborator Damon Lindelof recently responded to the criticism, proving he doesn’t fully comprehend sexism or misogyny:

I copped to the fact that we should have done a better job of not being gratuitous in our representation of a barely clothed actress.
— Damon Lindelof (@DamonLindelof) May 20, 2013

We also had Kirk shirtless in underpants in both movies.Do not want to make light of something that some construe as mysogenistic.
— Damon Lindelof (@DamonLindelof) May 20, 2013

 

What I’m saying is I hear you, I take responsibility and will be more mindful in the future.
— Damon Lindelof (@DamonLindelof) May 20, 2013

 

Also, I need to learn how to spell “misogynistic.”
— Damon Lindelof (@DamonLindelof) May 20, 2013

 

While it’s nice that he acknowledges their folly, even after he apologizes, it’s more a half-assed excuse as he mentions Kirk is shirtless. No, no. I just can’t. I’m not going to go into all the reasons why reducing a woman who’s defined by men to a sex object specifically for the Male Gaze is so NOT the same as showing a man shirtless. Just trust me. It’s not the same. At all.
I complained in Iron Man 3 of Pepper Potts’ faux empowerment, essentially fulfilling the Damsel in Distress trope. While others have claimed Uhura becomes the Damsel in Distress too, I disagree. While women overall get a pretty shitty treatment in the film, Uhura’s agency is not stripped away. She voices her ideas, desires and annoyances. Unlike Pepper, Uhura fearlessly expresses her opinions and holds steady to them.
When Klingons surround Uhura, Spock and Kirk’s small spacecraft, Uhura decisively asserts herself. She tells hot-headed Kirk — who of course wants to charge out with guns blazing – that he brought her there to speak Klingon. “So let me speak Klingon.” Uhura wants to be the diplomatic negotiator resolving the situation. Huzzah! Oops, when negotiations go awry things, it’s testosterone to the rescue. And yes, Uhura gets saved by a dude. Annoying. However, in the ensuing melee, Uhura grabs a dagger off a Klingon who was going to kill her and kills him first in self-defense. Later in the film, she asserts herself again when she beams down to help Spock against villain Khan.

Uhura
Star Trek Into Darkness also makes an interesting commentary on stereotypical masculinity. While Ambassador Marcus is aggressive, looking to kill Khan, Kirk learns the importance of following the rules to ensure justice. It initially seems like a denouncement of toxic hyper-masculinity. Ahhhh but not so fast. The climax of the film, the showdown with Khan, isn’t resolved with logic or cunning. Nope, it’s with good old fashioned testosterone as Spock, now in touch with his anger after a Wrath of Khan reversal and the death of Kirk, beats the shit out of him.
Speaking of Khan, while it’s awesome to have an intelligent woman of color featured so prominently in the film, the egregious whitewashing of Khan cannot be ignored. In Star Trek the Original Series and the film Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Khan Noonian Singh was a genetically engineered human augment, a product of the eugenics wars. As a Sikh from Northern India, he was a composite of a variety of ethnicities played by the charismatic Ricardo Montalban, aka one of the awesomest villains. Ever. But in Star Trek Into Darkness, it’s a white dude. Sure Benedict Cumberbatch does an okay job. But this racist whitewashing “is a slap in the face” to the audience as well as Gene Roddenberry’s vision of bringing people together from around the globe and galaxy “by a mission of exploration and diplomacy.”
So why am I going off on a tangent about Khan when this is an article about Uhura? Because the ancillary racism and sexism bolsters the film’s message. The original Star Trek series was groundbreaking in its depiction of gender and racial diversity and exploration of social issues. But we don’t live in the fucking 1960s anymore. JJ Abrams clearly doesn’t want to do anything different or “boldly going” anywhere when it comes to dismantling oppression and heralding diversity.
JJ Abrams created strong female characters in Alias (a female-centric series) and Lost, two of my favorite TV series. He showcased female friendship between Sydney and Francie, Sydney and Nadia, Kate and Claire, Kate and Sun. And Lost would have been female-centric too if the networks hadn’t made him change the leader of the survivors from Kate (whose character was more like Rose) to Jack. However, when you start to look at his treatment of characters of color, sadly most of them die on both shows. But in Star Trek Into Darkness, he seems a bit too concerned with harkening back to the good ole’ days of yore. You know, the ones filled with sexism and racism.

Uhura
Is Uhura empowered? Yes. But does it matter when all other women in the film are silenced, absent or objectified? Does it matter when she’s defined by her relationship to a man?
It’s strange in a film that objectifies women and defines them by their relationship to men, we simultaneously see an intelligent, decisive and opinionated Uhura. Aside from Uhura’s rank as a lieutenant, we see no women in leadership roles. No women captains, no women ambassadors, no women number ones (second in commands to captains). Uhura possesses no female friends. She doesn’t talk to a single woman at all. Not one. Not even underwear-clad Carol.
No, Star Trek Into Darkness can’t pass the fucking Bechdel Test but it doesn’t pass up the opportunity to show Kirk having a threesome. A fucking threesome. Because women are nothing more than fantasies and sex objects. Can’t forget he’s a lady-loving, bad-boy rules-breaking playboy. Now, I love Kirk in all his swagger and bravado too. But if we’re going to show women on-screen, can it please for-the-love-of-all-that-is-holy NOT just be women in their underwear? Can we please not just focus on dude’s friendships, sexual conquests, struggles and tribulations?

As actor and nerd icon Felicia Day says, by Star Trek Into Darkness not showcasing women, “we are telling people that only men are worth centering storytelling around, and that’s just bullshit.” As I’ve written before, the Bechdel Test matters because the overwhelming majority of movies fail, indicating the institutional sexism and rampant gender disparity prevalent in Hollywood.

Yes, Uhura rocks. And yes, she asserts her agency. But no matter how opinionated, smart and fabulous she is, the gains made by Uhura begin to erode when you factor in the incessant sexism swarming around.

As I’ve said time and again, if you depict your female characters, no matter how empowered, as only talking to men and not other women, it reinforces the notion that women’s lives revolve around men. Even when women possess agency and intelligence and a budding career, Star Trek Into Darkness perpetuates the trope that women are not complete or whole unless they’re helping a man, looking sexy for a man, or a man stands at their side.

Bearing the name of an iconic boundary-busting, visionary series, I expect more.

Sarah Polley’s ‘Stories We Tell’: A Radical Act

Movie poster for Stories We Tell

 

Written by Stephanie Rogers.
We live in an age now when things seem … less “real” to me. Facebook lets us put our private lives on display, and even then, it’s a version of our lives that we edit, exaggerate perhaps, and invent—all for public consumption. People become overnight stars when homemade YouTube clips go viral—often another version of an edited public performance. Our television shows, especially Reality TV—and even shows such as American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance—present stories that appear to be true but are, in fact, edited for a public audience.

So, how do we define “real” anymore or, for that matter, what is “true”?

 
Polley and her father in Stories We Tell
Sarah Polley explores this concept in her wonderful documentary, Stories We Tell. While the film focuses on her family background and a long-kept family secret of sorts, it ultimately explores memory—how it aids and fails us, and how the act of storytelling sometimes requires us to fill in the gaps. This isn’t a new concept by any means, but Polley’s decision to tell her story through film, and to put that story on screen for a wider audience—in a society (and film industry) that consistently devalues women’s work and women’s stories—is a radical act.

Mary Jo Murphy gives some background on the film in her New York Times review:

A bit more about “the story”: Ms. Polley is the youngest of five siblings. Dad was an English actor in Toronto; Mom, an actress, had two children from a marriage before she met him. She died of cancer when Sarah was 11, and at some point after that, one or more of her much older siblings began to tease her about her paternity. Eventually she did a little investigating.

When she found her answer, and talked to her father and siblings about it, she became fascinated with how each of them was “telling the story and embellishing the story and making the story their own.” The act of telling the story, she said, “was changing the story itself.”

Polley’s father in Stories We Tell
I love the idea of the past existing as fluid, ever-changing. And Stories We Tell touches on that, reminding us that people truly do live long after their deaths—in the memories and celebrations of those most important to them. I certainly don’t mean to sentimentalize the story because it’s not a sentimental film (which isn’t to say that the audience in the theater wasn’t a weeping mess), but I want to convey that a woman making an emotionally gripping film about herself, about her mother, about motherhood even—is absolutely a radical act. Some disagree. Mike LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle wrote the following in his review (titled, “Stories We Tell Review: Not Worth Telling”):


Polley is making a film about her father, her late mother, her siblings. She should protect them. What she shouldn’t do is offer up the resulting feel-good whitewash to the scrutiny of a watching world. She shouldn’t force on strangers the task of sitting through this. And she shouldn’t present a work of vanity and closed-in narcissism as an exercise in soul baring, because it’s embarrassing for everybody.

Polley’s mother and father in Stories We Tell
In actuality, the most important part of this film—and what makes it feminist—is precisely its “vanity” and “closed-in narcissism.” Of course, I wouldn’t use those words to describe it—I’d say “intimacy” and “closed-in confidence”—because they play into the dominant ideology that women’s stories aren’t important. And Stories We Tell is exactly that—Sarah Polley’s story: embellished, re-enacted, unsure, important. She interviews her father(s), her siblings, her mother’s former lovers, and her mother’s friends, all while keeping herself outside the frame and directing her subjects, or “storytellers” as she calls them, to tell their individual version of events. How Polley chooses to direct the film, to edit it, to interrogate the assertions of her storytellers, and to learn from them—that is her story. And telling it is a radical act.



Leigh Kolb wrote a piece for Bitch Flicks last November called, “Female Literacy as a Historical Framework for Hollywood Misogyny” in which she suggested that, “When women finally break through and are able to tell their stories, those stories are immediately dismissed as silly and trivial.” She goes on to say:

Perhaps this bleak, largely anti-feminist landscape in Hollywood is more deliberate. If we acknowledge women’s long history of being neglected education and literacy, and that women have been repeatedly told (or observed) that their stories lack action and intrigue for a broad audience, how can this not have larger social effects? And at some point, do we come to the conclusion that these messages are what the dominant group wants?

Polley’s mother in Stories We Tell
The good news is that reviews like the one written by Mick LaSalle, who refers to Stories We Tell at one point as “the opposite of a courageous piece of work,” look ridiculous next to all the praise for the film. In fact, if we’re lucky, maybe the success of Polley’s piece will spark a larger conversation about the marginalization of women and minorities in our culture, about whose stories “deserve” to be told and who gets to tell them. This film—if “the personal is political” still means anything in the age of my multiple fake Facebook identities—needs to be seen. It deserves to be seen. It’s a film about women knowing and not knowing one another. It’s a film about forgiveness and disappointment and searching for one’s identity and place within the family. It’s about existing as both participant and observer in one’s own life. It’s about longing and loss and how we define families. It’s about the art of filmmaking itself. It’s about mistakes and motherhood and heredity and unconditional love.

And, perhaps most importantly, it’s about a woman in Hollywood—an industry that boasts less than 20% of women film directors and an ever-shrinking number of available roles for women—refusing to accept the devaluation of women’s work, getting behind a camera … and daring to tell a story. 
Sarah Polley, badass

Movie Makers from the Margins: Lorene Scafaria

Written by Erin Fenner.
In a 2012 interview with Vulture, Lorene Scafaria said she is not afraid of “quirky.” And why should she be? Indie-wood’s model to movie making seems to be dependent upon quirk. Whimsical women characters bring in the big money in the industry.

Michael Cera and Kat Dennings in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist

Scafaria wrote the screenplay for Nick and Norah’sInfinite Playlist, and I can forgive most of the quirk there. The dueling premises – rescuing a drunk friend and finding your favorite band at a mystery venue – worked to propel the narrative forward at a good pace. The growing optimism of the characters matched the lighthearted arc of the film. Most of the characters were palatable. It hardly passed the Bechdel test, unless you consider Norah’s (Kat Dennings) interactions with her drunk friend a conversation, but it did pass the GLAAD test by nonchalantly making an “all-gay” band Nick’s (Michael Cera) connection to underground music and his way to impress fellow music-lover, Norah.
What I am getting at here is: I am willing to forgive the over-abundance of quirk in Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist. But, I can’t be so lenient when it comes to the film Scafaria directed and wrote, Seeking a Friend for the End of theWorld.
Steve Carell and Keira Knightley in Seeking a Friend for the End of the World

The concept is poignant and hilarious, viewing the end of the world through an intimate lens. It forgoes the heroics of a Michael Bay movie and instead inspects the day-to-day challenges of fast-approaching mortality asking: How do we grieve as a community and how do we live with each other when we know that we won’t live any longer?

And, for the first part of the film, that exploration is funny and tender. Dodge (Steve Carell) is a middle-aged insurance man who was left by his wife as the announcement that the end was nigh came over the radio waves. (As in: his wife [played by Carell’s actual wife, Nancy Carell] full-on bolts out the car door after the announcement finishes.)

Dodge’s life doesn’t appear to change too much. He’s bored with the job he continues to go to and interacts with his friends who still remain shallow. You think this might just turn into another existential metaphor for trudging through life – but don’t worry. Dodge meets his manic pixie dream girl, Penny (Keira Knightley), so we don’t need to worry about in-depth examinations because we have our fast-food route to a resolution: love.

Penny is wacky and sentimental. As she’s leaving her boyfriend and apartment she remembers to bring along a stack of records. She’s a hypersomniac; sleeping even while Dodge vacuums around her. She has the sort of bad luck that means, oh shoot, they’re always getting into tricky situations. Penny talks fast and cries expressively. Without her, Dodge would not be able to grasp at the meaning we all want him to find.

She’s the classic MPDG, not because of the quirk, but because she is primarily a male character’s tool for his personal self-discovery.

Their relationship could have been ok. They start out as co-adventurers seeking out their own resolution but, after they have sex one time in the heat of an orgy-escaping moment – we, the Pavloved audience (this is the scene where you ought to cry) – know that the characters are doomed to romance of the cheesiest kind.

Their need to find love in each other to resolve a film about the world ending reduces a crisis of humanity in the way that most American films reduce a crisis of humanity: focusing on the individual struggle of one person trying to connect with one other one person in the carnal way.

They don’t die alone, which is all they wanted after all. Crisis averted.

Scafaria’s lens is interesting at first. It does make sense that a woman director would look at a topic that has been explored from every exploding angle and find something else. But, she explores it in an ultimately sentimental oh-too-predictable way that leaves us with a content male character gazing at his MPDG as the end envelopes them.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Where Have All the Women Gone in Movies? by Rebecca Keegan via Los Angeles Times

Lucy Liu: “People See Sandra Bullock in a Romantic Comedy, Not Me” by Jorge Rivas via Colorlines

Lucy Liu Talks Candidly about Racism and Stereotypes in Hollywood by S.E. Smith via XO Jane

My Medical Choice by Angelina Jolie via The New York Times

Angelina Jolie Removed Her Breasts to Save Her Life. Some Fans Wish She Hadn’t. by Amanda Hess via Slate’s Double X

‘Brave’ Creator Blasts Disney for “Blatant Sexism” in Princess Makeover by Paul Liberatore via Marin Independent Journal

Unsurprisingly, Disney Says It’s Not Backing Down on that Merida Redesign by Susana Polo via The Mary Sue

‘Star Trek’s History of Progressive Values — And Why It Faltered On LGBT Crew Members by Devon Maloney via Wired

The Unending Heartbreak of Great Expectations: Why I Can’t Watch The Mindy Project Anymore by Eesha Pandit via Crunk Feminist Collective

The Other Double Standard: On Humor and Racism in Feminism by T.F. Charlton via BlogHer

How ‘Scandal’s Shonda Rhimes Became Disney’s Primetime Savior by Meghan Casserly via Forbes

Women Front ‘Nashville’ Band: On Screen and Off, Female Power Drives the ABC series ‘Nashville’ by Deborah Vankin via Los Angeles Time 

Network Axes Fall Hard on Gay Characters by Lesley Goldberg via The Hollywood Reporter

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: Pilot Season 2013-2014 by Kendra James via Racialicious 

‘Brave,’ ‘Iron Man 3,’ and the Faux Feminism of Armed Women by Scott Mendelson via Forbes

Why ‘Frances Ha’ is the Feminist Must-See Film of the Year So Far by Imran Siddiquee via Miss Representation

The Number of Women in Top-Grossing Movies Hits Five-Year Low. What are Women for in Hollywood? by Alyssa Rosenberg via ThinkProgress 

Trailer Roundup: Women-Created Fall TV Shows by Karensa Cadenas via Women and Hollywood

Sitcoms are the Golden Land of Feminist TV Characters by Gabrielle Moss via Bitch Media

Stop Policing and and Questioning Beyoncé’s Feminist Credentials by Lauren Rankin via PolicyMic

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

Miyazaki Month: Howl’s Moving Castle

Written by Myrna Waldron.

Howl’s Moving Castle travelling through the mountains


The next film featured in my “Miyazaki Month” retrospective is Howl’s Moving Castle. It was the successor to Spirited Away, which was supposed to be Miyazaki’s Swan Song, but then again so was Princess Mononoke. Dude’s never going to retire, and that’s just fine. It didn’t repeat Spirited Away’s success at the Oscars (losing to Curse of the Were-Rabbit) but is still a fan favourite. It’s also one of his few films to be an adaptation (Ponyo’s retelling of The Little Mermaid being the other one) though it doesn’t even try to be faithful. I have read the original book by Diana Wynne Jones, but it’s been a few years (Yes, I promise to re-read it soon). I do know for sure that the war subplot was definitely not in the novel. TV Tropes says that Miyazaki was incredibly upset by the US invasion of Iraq (as any sensible person would be) so he wove that into his adaptation. Environmentalism isn’t a theme this time (beyond lavish depictions of nature, but that’s a Ghibli thing) but pacifism and feminism make a reappearance.
  • So far, the English dub script is the most accurate of the three films I’ve reviewed. I suspect this is because this film is an adaptation of a Western novel and, as such, includes a Western understanding of Fantasy Tropes rather than Japanese. Far less localization would be required in adapting the script. No Captain Obvious lines this time, thank goodness. There were a few line changes I took notice of, however. In the Japanese version, Sophie says that she hired herself as a cleaning lady. In the dub, however, she says that Calcifer hired her because he couldn’t stand how messy the castle was. Not really sure why the change was necessary here. Another change irked me a little. When Howl is telling Sophie about his past with the Witch of the Waste, in Japanese, he says, “She seemed quite interesting, so I approached her. But she terrified me, and I ran away.” In English, he says, “She was once quite beautiful, so I decided to pursue her. But I realized she wasn’t, so, as usual, I ran away.” The Witch is extremely overweight, but until her powers are stripped by Suliman, she’s clearly still beautiful. This script change reinforces the bullshit that fat women are automatically no longer beautiful.
  • Spirited Away’s English cast is still better than this film’s. I honestly really do not like the casting of Christian Bale as Howl. I’ve never liked his Batman voice, and that’s honestly all I can hear here. And really, for a character who is a flamboyant, foppish pretty-boy, they chose Christian Bale? Still, at least he had prior experience as a voice actor for Disney. Jean Simmons and Emily Mortimer are fine as Old and Young Sophie. Though it’s a little distracting that Sophie is the only one with a British accent here. And as a fan of old movies, I loved being able to hear Lauren Bacall’s husky voice again. As for Billy Crystal, well, I think they just gave him a basic translation of the Japanese script and told him to go nuts. Calcifer’s dialogue diverges from the original script the most, and definitely has an improvisational air to it. But I don’t mind, since his performance makes the movie. (He also had prior Disney voice acting experience.)
  • If I had one big complaint to make about this film, it’s that the 3rd act is a MESS. It’s taken me several re-watchings of the film to make heads or tails of it, because there is just way too much going on and very little is explained. This is a problem that is in a lot of Miyazaki films, but it’s particularly bad here. I believe the film’s ending diverges almost completely from the book’s, too. The really mindbending thing is that the film contains a causal loop. Sophie travels to Howl’s past via the black portal on the door, and witnesses him making the bargain with Calcifer. No reason is given for him to make this decision. She’s able to manipulate the events of the past rather than just watching them, and says that she knows now how to save both of them, and asks for him to find her in the future. And the first thing he ever said to her was, “I was looking everywhere for you.” But it is not explained how the black portal can travel to the past. And it is the black portal that Howl exits through when he’s out sabotaging the bombers. So…what exactly does that black portal DO? Was Sophie only allowed to go to the past because she was desperately trying to find a way to help Howl? This stuff still confuses me 10 years later. I know that showing rather than telling is an important filmmaking principle, but there’s a limit here.
Sophie can no longer put up with Howl’s vanity, saying she has never once been beautiful

  • Sophie is another wonderful Miyazaki female protagonist. Like the others, she has agency, and drives forward her own story. Howl’s name may be in the title, but he’s a secondary protagonist to her. Her character arc is centred around her low self-esteem, and is a commentary on how women are pitted against each other in the interest of attracting men. She’s shy and relatively plain compared to her glamorous mother and sister, so she dresses dowdy and keeps telling herself that she’s not beautiful (even though anyone who sees her would disagree). The Witch of the Waste, who desires to possess Howl’s heart, is jealous of Sophie (and presumably any woman that gets mixed up with Howl), so she casts a curse to make Sophie become a 90 year old woman. We could probably divine some Freudian implications here – The Witch removed her rival by taking her fertility away. The properties of the curse are another thing that aren’t really explained in this film. As the story progresses, Sophie gradually becomes younger (usually appearing 60ish rather than 90ish), but in times when she shows confidence, reverts back to her true age. Her hair even reverts to its original colour when she’s asleep, suggesting that she has to be conscious of the spell for it to work. The explanation given on TV Tropes which makes the most sense to me is that she is unknowingly recasting the spell on herself every time she puts herself down, and that it actually broke long before. Thematically, it seems that this film is arguing that age is in many ways a social construct, and that you only sabotage yourself when you put yourself down. But I can certainly sympathize with Sophie. Lord knows I’ve been there.
  • Although I find the ending convoluted, I enjoyed watching Sophie save the day. Howl only has his double-edged sword magic to rely on, whereas she has a quick wit that she didn’t recognize in herself until she became old. It wasn’t until there was no reason to doubt herself anymore that she started gaining confidence. Much of her actions are because of her love for Howl, but she does not have a slavish single-minded devotion to him. Instead, her love makes her want to stand up for him, and to want to care for the others in their “family.” She even forgives The Witch and uses affection to persuade her to give Howl’s heart back to him. Only weeks before, she was enjoying The Witch’s struggles to climb the palace steps. It shows how far both of them have come. And I liked that two people who originally considered each other romantic rivals could find an understanding and an affection for each other as family. How often does that happen?
The Witch of the Waste’s powers are stripped away by Suliman
  • Speaking of The Witch of the Waste, I’m still not sure how I feel about her character. I wonder how necessary it was to make her grotesquely fat (admittedly, I don’t remember if she was overweight or not in the novel). She’s clearly the kind of fat person who never moves around at all (she doesn’t even walk if she doesn’t have to), but I am getting very tired of depictions of fat people that make us out to be as lazy as possible. It’s inferred that her outward appearance is a reflection of the ugliness inside of her, but again, is that kind of inference really necessary? It was also kind of sadistic that Madame Suliman forced her to climb up an enormous amount of stairs in order to debase the Witch and make her physically weak. Still, I do like that once again in a Miyazaki film, here’s a supposed villain with some moral ambiguities. She’s clearly not completely to blame for her predicament, or for her greed for Howl’s heart, as she, too, gave up her heart to a demon. And once she’s depowered, she’s a sweet, senile old lady – this is who she really is inside.
  • Madame Suliman appears to be the real villain of this story. She allows the King to be a blustering, warmongering fool. She entices The Witch of the Waste into coming to the Palace with a promise that her powers will be respected at last, and instead springs a trap that removes The Witch’s powers (brushing it off as a punishment for The Witch’s selfishness). And she sends a royal invite to Howl under both of his pseudonyms, knowing that he cannot refuse and that both of them are him. She even plans to blackmail Howl into fighting for the Empire, or she will depower him just like she did to The Witch. Suliman is a total tyrant, and yet she gets away with it at the end because she’s planning to stop the war. Bit of an anticlimax there, but then again, there was already too much going on in the 3rd act. I wish I knew more about her, especially her time as Howl’s teacher. Surely some of the “War is bad!” stuff could have been dropped for a little more character development for her. (I’m already sympathetic to that message, after all.)
Howl presents to Sophie a beautiful field filled with ponds and wildflowers
I sound like I dislike this film more than I do. I really do love the fairy tale story, Sophie and Calcifer’s characters, and the trademark sumptuous visuals. I love the steampunkiness of the setting (which appears to be Victorian Germany). I love that this is a fairy tale where the heroine is the one who drives the story forward, and makes everything all right in the end. I remember reading some bullcrap from the screenwriter of Oz: The Great and Powerful complaining that there aren’t enough fairy tales with men as the heroes. (Yes, really.) If he’d seen this film, maybe he’d finally understand just how rare heroines like Sophie are. What I love, most of all, is this film’s approach to the issue of self-esteem of women. Miyazaki understands very well just how hard it is for us to be confident in a world that is constantly telling us that we’re inferior. And that we have to find the confidence within ourselves – being told we’re beautiful isn’t enough, we have to believe it.



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.

On ‘One Life To Live’: Two Young Women Spiral Into Predictable Complications On Hulu’s Soap Reboot

A brand new start for the young set of One Life To Live. (pictured: Andrew Trischitta as Jack, Laura Harrier as new Destiny, Kelley Missal as Dani, and Robert Gorrie as new Matthew)
When One Life to Live got canceled at the same time as All My Children, I felt crushed.
A part of me literally died.
It was easily one of the best written soaps on the air, and the ratings were pretty on par, rising rapidly since ABC’s brutal announcement.
Now, Prospect Park has taken over the reins and produces One Life to Live on Hulu.
Yet the cost of reinvention and brand new start (as vocalized in the autotuned new Snoop Dogg or Snoop Lion produced theme song) made the stories of two young women–Destiny Evans and Danielle “Dani” Manning fall into further character assassination. 
I understand that people change, but why have them both shift into individual shocking circumstances?

High school sweethearts–Matthew Buchanan (Eddie Alderson) & Destiny Evans (Shenell Evans).
Before we get into discussing the reboot, Destiny Evans and Matthew Buchanon’s story was the second teen pregnancy storyline in a matter of two years–the first being Starr Manning’s. Destiny even sought Starr’s counsel. Matthew had always been reluctant about fatherhood, but Destiny carried the burden of adolescent relationships–of the seeming age old philosophy that sex equated to the ultimate commitment and consequences be damned. Rarely is it ever advised to youth that love is sometimes stronger in other avenues.
Destiny, raised by grandparents feigning to be parents, fell in love with Matthew during their high school years. He didn’t return her affection at first and soon recanted, bearing his heart. Alas, they made love and conceived little Drew.

Shenell Evans’ school schedule prevented her return to her NAACP nominated role.
Now in present Llanview, on April 29th, a woman saunters her way into Shelter’s night club opening, cutting passed the long-lined crowd.
“What is your name?” asks the burly security guard.
“Destiny,” she answers, giving a saucy smile. Upon entry, she shifts into the crowd and begins dancing seductively.
It was an immediate double take! This is Destiny? She is certainly different interior and exterior wise. No longer a shy, quiet girl, she is a jezebel, all wild, free, and enticing to the male gaze–no signs of single motherhood in sight.

Laura Harrier is the new Destiny.

Shenell Edmonds couldn’t return and they cast Laura Harrier in her place–an older, skinnier, lighter skinned Destiny who wears midriff baring tops and dances to support Drew.
Recasts are a familiar ways of soap opera life, but it’s the stereotyping that is tough to swallow–one negative pill after another. Teen pregnancy was enough to deal with and now Destiny is going so far down the bad turnpike. One can only expect a surge into a complicated spiral of twisted knots. Her father was a doctor for crying out loud! Can’t something wonderful rub off on her? Why is it always the “Strippers with a Heart of Gold” path? With Matthew’s parents helping her with babysitting duties, shouldn’t Destiny be more liberated in finding passions that didn’t involve stroking the male ego?
Product of Tea Delgado and Todd Manning, things aren’t going dandy for former boarding school Dani Manning either.

Dani Manning (Kelley Missal) and her boarding school friend, Matthew (Eddie Alderson).

Out of control from Todd leaving town and Tea’s lack of attention–her newborn son died earlier this year on another soap, General Hospital–Dani has turned to drugs and alcohol as solace. In the first episode, Dani is barely dressed in an overtly sexy lacy mini and tumbling all over Shelter high on oxycontin and drinks.
I understand that she feels isolated and hurt by Tea and Todd’s parenting skills, but at the same time, it is disheartening that drugs or sex have become the comfort that young women sought. Seeing her rub against men in wanton fashion, looking for escape, is a tired dance routine that the most genius writers continue to utilize. It is as though women have no aspirations, no desires other than to seek intimacy in inebriation and wandering male affection.
Dani is a talented woman who could accomplish greatness and so can Destiny.
I hope that the writers stop going for the deadening shock value factor and bring about a new, refreshing perspective.
Sure, it is part of the soapy goodness phenomenon to break these two girls into complex adult situations, especially seeing as with the new online format cuss words fly like catfight slaps. They are certainly growing up too fast and viewers are brought into the center of this puzzle. I can’t say it is unbelievable because in this medium anything goes.
Sometime as an avid enjoyer, I do long for a little normality and less over-the-top spontaneity.
So where did Destiny and Dani’s maturities go?

A disoriented Dani (Kelley Missal) awakens from her near drug overdose ordeal.

Dani does appear to be on the brink of sobering from the drug habit, slowly. Yet she just moved in with two guy friends–Matthew and Jeffrey. Every dedicated soap fan knows what happens when a woman puts herself in that particular situation.
Still, it would have been nice if Dani and Destiny moved in together, had a young woman’s pad of survival and hope, rubbing off on each other in a way that strengthened a compelling feminine bond and kicked recovery’s ass. They’re around the same age and have similar experiences with hardship. Yes Dani went to boarding school and Destiny went to public; I could see them forming an authentic pact. Dani could gain experience from watching Destiny raise Drew and become a beneficial aide when Bo and Nora are unable to babysit their grandchild.
But of course, close female friendships always seem so frowned upon in soap operas. Catfights truly are the way to go. After all, look at Dorian and Vicki–they’re still at each other’s throats. Plus, Destiny didn’t like Dani in the beginning due to her camaraderie to Matthew. By the way the story is looking right now, Dani and Matthew are getting closer again, and that will likely burn Destiny’s biscuits. Yes. I definitely foresee a catfight (probably decades long if Hulu keeps One Life to Live going) more than bosom buddies in the future of these two women.
Is it any wonder why soaps are fading fast? Dying? Maybe one reason is because of the unoriginal concept of females despising and envying one another. There’s no strength in that.
Sigh.
I have no idea which direction these two women will take, but honestly keep praying that the writers give them happiness stemmed from valuing the importance of self worth. That one life to live doesn’t always have to be so treacherous and evil.
That gets old quickly.

Here’s a Fun and Depressing Graphic About Television, Ratings, and Dudes Who Create Shows

Canceled: Single Season TV Shows – An infographic by the team at CableTV.com

 
Do you have any graphics you’d like to share with Bitch Flicks readers? Share them in the comments or email them to btchflcks(at)gmail(dot)com!
 
 
 

Picture This: A Woman Goes to Film School and Becomes a Filmmaker

Filmmaker Violeta Barca-Fontana
This is a guest post written by Violeta Barca-Fontana.
INT. FILM SCHOOL, CLASSROOM – DAY 
First day of class at a film school in Madrid. Twenty impatient students are waiting for the teacher, PACO, a very well known film director. Also in the classroom is VIOLETA (20). 
The professor enters the classroom with a serious look and a decided walk. Taking a moment to look over the beardless students, some with incurable acne, who return his gaze with eyes wide open waiting for his wise words. 
MASTER 
You are twenty five students. 
Only three of you will ever direct a film.
The students look at each other hoping they misunderstood him. 
The professor continues with his welcome speech. 
MASTER 
I see there are some women here. 
(beat) 
In film women usually end up in make-up, wardrobe, or as script supervisors. 
The six girls, including Violeta, look at each other for moral support not knowing how to react. 
MASTER 
I say that, just so you take it under consideration. 
That was my very first contact with the film world. The first of many scenes I would live through during my career. 
But my professor was wrong. My first boss was a woman; one of the best line producers in Spain and, without a doubt, one of the toughest and most unscrupulous bosses I have ever had. I learned the most about film making from her. I learned how films were really made, and how a well organized production leads to certain success. 
Carmen, my boss, treated the women of her team much more harshly than the men. At first I thought she was very unfair to do so, but after all these years, reflecting on how much I learned being around her, I realized that maybe she did it because she felt she could bring out the best in them that way. 
I worked with her in two different productions. Without a doubt she treated me worse than any of my co-workers. I think she wanted to take the wind out of my arrogance and break through the wall every film school builds around you: “I know everything and I´m the best.” I think she wanted to show me the subterranean underground of real life, where real movies get made, grown-up movies; where if you want to be called Director, first you have to earn your place with lots of effort and years of experience. 
Violeta, in color.
Schools, and above all film schools, just serve to create confusion among the students leading them to believe that their initial easy success inside can be achieved in the professional world. No, ladies and gentleman; making movies is very complicated. 
In my second film with Carmen, she promoted me from PA to Second AD. The director was the very well known master CARLOS, already considered an icon in Spain. 
Pretty soon Carlos took a liking to me and wanted me to sit in front of the monitors with him all the time, explaining every shot to me. I was fascinated to observe how he would sketch the next shot on a scrap of paper with his Mont-blanc fountain pen to show his Director of Photography. As a film student I look back on those hours with him as a divine gift. 
I have great memories of Carlos as one of my greatest teachers, a true genius. Despite this I sensed that inside he believed the idea that women do not direct movies. Carlos constantly asked one of my male colleagues, strangely enough the script supervisor, when he would direct his next short film, and what was he writing lately. I always hoped that longed question would be asked of me, but it never came, as if he assumed that I was not writing, and I had no intention of directing either. I always wanted to expound about my many projects to my Master. 
INT. PLATÓ DE RODAJE – DAY 
A huge set with over fifty people coming and going, working, loading, unloading, cameras, rails, spotlights. Carlos in the background talking to three men in suits, producers. They talk, they laugh. 
Violeta walks in their direction. Within a few feet she feels observed by the group, who have a big laugh. Violeta is about to pass by when Carlos stops her. 
CARLOS 
Violeta, wait. Come here for a moment. 
Violeta draw close. The men in suits stop laughing but kept their smiles behind their ties. 
CARLOS 
Tell me, what are you working on? So you write? 
Have you ever directed anything? 
Violeta pauses. Uncomfortably, she looks at the group which is waiting for her to give them a failed reply. 
VIOLETA 
(timidly) 
Well, I just finished producing a feature film with two colleagues from school. It’s called La Fiesta and the Walt Disney Company has picked it up for distribution. 
Silence. Their smiles go away. Violeta smiles amiably and moves on to continue her work. 
I don’t know if it’s easier or harder to work with men or women. I feel very comfortable working with both. But what I do know is that most of the time working with women means not having to constantly prove your worth. We all know what we’re capable of and just do our job. 
The Color Thief crew.
This theory held up in my last project, Color Thief. A project, and I promise unintentionally, led almost entirely by females, which from the beginning has been characterized by its fluidity. Is this because it is guided by women? I do not know… 

Conspicuous Consumption and ‘The Great Gatsby’: Missing the Point in Style

The Great Gatsby (2013)
Written by Leigh Kolb
Critic Kathryn Schulz, in “Why I Despise The Great Gatsby,” bemoans the acclaim that the novel receives in literary circles. She says, “It is the only book I have read so often despite failing—in the face of real effort and sincere ­intentions—to derive almost any pleasure at all from the experience… I find Gatsby aesthetically overrated, psychologically vacant, and morally complacent…”
Well, yes.
Isn’t that the point? 
Had Schulz replaced The Great Gatsby with “The American Dream” (rags-to-riches wealth and power and the reward of lavish lifestyles and romantic fulfillment), then she would have been spot on, and would have captured the exact message that The Great Gatsby has conveyed to generation after generation, ceaselessly beating us against the current… sorry.
I was looking forward to Baz Luhrmann’s much-anticipated adaptation of The Great Gatsby, because I love his Romeo + Juliet so much it hurts. He got it so right, so I figured he could get this right too, especially with Leonardo DiCaprio on board.
Cheers, indeed.
He kind of got it. The first half of the film is lavish and screams “Baz Luhrmann.” It was exactly what I wanted. Jay-Z’s “100$ Bill” captured the 1920s “Jazz Age” aesthetic of white people co-opting black music. The driving hip hop in the first few scenes exemplified the “hip-hop fascination with money, power, violence and sex,” that soundtrack executive producer Jay-Z saw in Jay Gatsby. 
But something changes. It seems as if Luhrmann wanted too badly to include most of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s text, and his own style was lost in that translation. I wanted the film to be jarring and fast, or painfully slow, with experimental music and filmography throughout. During the second half of the film, the soundtrack became more traditional and subdued. Luhrmann seemed to flirt with style—the typed letters at the end of the film (that I’d like to forget), the slow-motion shot of Tom hitting Myrtle—but there was something lacking in consistency. 
That said, Luhrmann does let us focus—even temporarily—on some poignant themes of the novel. Tom’s destructive masculinity (his trophy room and his racism expose his character) go unpunished in his patriarchal society. Daisy’s vapidity highlights the expectations of a beautiful, wealthy woman, when her hopes for her daughter are that “she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Daisy herself attempts to live that role, and she escapes punishment because of who she is. Tom and Daisy’s privilege shields and protects them. Their “old money,” in contrast to Gatsby’s “new money,” shows the impenetrable American truth that you might be detestable, but you call the shots when you have money and connections. Gatsby’s desperate drive for that green light—to be loved—can be bought only momentarily.
The fact that “The Great Gatsby Still Gets Flappers Wrong” didn’t bother me, really (although Hix’s article is incredibly informative). Having an independent, empowered woman in The Great Gatsby would seem as false as the magical typewriter. No one in The Great Gatsby is supposed to be a character we want to identify with or aspire to be. The men are problematic, and so are the women.
Nick, Gatsby, Daisy and Tom at one of Gatsby’s parties.
Luhrmann’s characters are often more sympathetic than the novel’s, but the core of who they are and what they represent is stable.
Jordan Baker’s role was minimized, but she was still a foil to Daisy’s carelessness.
I would like to deny the storytelling technique that Luhrmann employs with Nick Carraway, but I cannot. I don’t think I would have minded if he’d framed the story as Nick writing a memoir; maybe I even would have forgiven the floating type if it had been consistent (but probably not). However, the fact that Nick begins telling the story to his therapist, who then encourages him to write it down, seems ridiculous. Nick seems just self-aware and self-involved enough to know he has a good story—he wouldn’t have needed someone to persuade him to write it down.
Tobey Maguire’s Nick has a doughy personality. He’s not too likable, but we don’t actively dislike him. Maybe we roll our eyes at him sometimes. He’s true to the novel, that’s for sure.
DiCaprio’s Gatsby is mysterious, beautiful, reserved and is able to elicit sympathy from the audience.
Why yes, you can buy this headpiece from Tiffany’s.
Carey Mulligan’s Daisy is not quite as off-putting as she is in the novel, which seemed to be Luhrmann’s goal. He didn’t completely deny the existence of the emptiness and disappointment the novel conveys, but he clearly wanted us to be swept up in the fashions and romanced by the gorgeous settings and people (and shirts!). 
That (along with the inconsistent style) was my biggest problem with the film—it wasn’t depressing enough. Perhaps it was the lack of Gatsby’s father showing Nick little Jimmy’s meticulous plans, or the lack of a funeral scene, or maybe it was the floaty letters typing out Nick’s thoughts—I didn’t feel the empty weight of the futility of the American Dream, and the bitter disappointment of a life spent wanting more.
Luhrmann gets caught up in the “romance.”
I know Luhrmann can do it—he did it with Romeo + Juliet, with its era-bending dialogue and music, stylized filmography and heart-wrenching ending—but I think he got too caught up with the romance of Gatsby’s lifestyle (just like Nick did). 
And that’s the great reverse dramatic irony of stories like Gatsby—yes, maybe audiences get on some level that Jay Gatsby’s story isn’t meant to be aspirational. But they relish it in anyway. Donald Trump’s hotel is offering the Trump Hotel “Great Gatsby” Package (for $14,999 you can live like an ill-fated socialite?); Brooks Brothers has “The Great Gatsby” collection. Gatsby is like Don Draper; their true legacy—disappointment, emptiness and the tragic nature of a re-imagined life that isn’t a dream come true—is packaged in fashion and good looks. That life looks exciting, we think. I want hosiery like Daisy’s, and parties like Gatsby’s. Conspicuous consumption is idolized. 
But that’s not the point.
The American Dream is disappointing. Wealth is disappointing. Idealized romance is disappointing.
And then you die. And no one cares.
All of this is meaningless.
Luhrmann’s film and the marketing ploys surrounding it don’t seem to quite get at that. While I was let down, I suppose I’m not surprised. We live in a society obsessed with wealth, status and pulling oneself up from one’s bootstraps. To topple all of that over into an ash heap would be problematic for both the core of American mythology and for Hollywood.

Because if we focus on the tragedy of Jay Gatsby’s aspirations and the injustice of Tom and Daisy’s escape, then we would have to face the fact that the party is really over. But we can’t, and we don’t, so we go on, endlessly dazzled and distracted by shiny things (which women are especially interested in, evidently).

And perhaps that’s what Nick’s final words mean—we keep trying to go back, over and over, to this belief that the green light is obtainable, and it will make us happy. However, that light was not real in 1922, and it’s not real now. It’s just in 3D.

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. 

The Remarkable Story of ‘Anne Braden: Southern Patriot’

Anne Braden: Southern Patriot (2012)

“I believe that no white woman reared in the South–or perhaps anywhere in this racist country–can find freedom as a woman until she deals in her own consciousness with the question of race. We grow up little girls–absorbing a hundred stereotypes about ourselves and our role in life, our secondary position, our destiny to be a helpmate to a man or men. But we also grow up white–absorbing the stereotypes of race, the picture of ourselves as somehow privileged because of the color of our skin. The two mythologies become intertwined, and there is no way to free ourselves from one without dealing with the other.” – from “A letter to white Southern women from Anne Braden,” 1972
Written by Leigh Kolb

Anne Braden didn’t think that guilt was productive. 
She thought that what got people involved in the civil rights movement was a vision of a different world.
Born in 1924, Braden grew up in Anniston, Alabama–where the Freedom Riders’ bus was fire-bombed in 1961. She talks about being a young white child in the south, and seeing her mother’s house cleaner’s daughter wearing her hand-me-down clothes. They were different sizes, so the clothes didn’t fit right, and Braden says, “Something happened to me when I looked at her. I knew something was wrong.”
Braden dedicated her life to exposing and fighting against racial and economic injustice. She was subversive. She was arrested. She was praised by Martin Luther King Jr.

She wanted a different world.

Anne Braden
Braden is the subject of the documentary Anne Braden: Southern Patriot, which is available on DVD and at select screenings nationwide.

Anne Braden: Southern Patriot trailer

Award-winning filmmakers Anne Lewis and Mimi Pickering created this first-person documentary, and its brilliance rests greatly on the fact that Braden herself and her contemporaries, biographer and mentees tell the story. The seemingly hands-off approach by the filmmakers (no audible interview questions or voiceovers) works incredibly well, and lets Braden’s remarkable legacy unfold on its own merits. The soundtrack is appropriately present, but not noticeably so, as it should be in a documentary.

This documentary, in short, is amazing. Aside from the technical success of the film is the fact that Braden herself was an extraordinary human being.

Braden says that when she had the realization that something was wrong, it was like photography: “You put the film in the developing fluid and it begins to come clear, but it’s been there all along.”

The images kept becoming clearer and clearer to Braden as she worked as a journalist in the south and covered the courthouse, seeing black men be imprisoned for looking at white women the wrong way, and seeing how murdered black people were not newsworthy.

She didn’t feel guilt. She felt motivated to change her world.

Early on in her career, Braden recognized that issues of class and race were inextricably linked. She says,

“I was in a prison and life builds prisons around people and I had the prison that I was born white in a racist society. I was born privileged in a classist society. The hardest thing was class. I don’t know that I could have ever broken out of what I call the race prison if I hadn’t dealt with class.”  

She married Carl Braden, who was a “radical” activist active in the labor movement. “We got married to work together,” she says. By 1951, Braden was combining marriage, motherhood and activism.

Early on, her activism focused mainly on writing for and talking to black audiences about white people’s roles in racism and classism. The head of the Civil Rights Congress, William Patterson, told her that black people already know what she’s telling them–she needed to talk to white people, because they are the problem. She remembers that he said to her, “You know you do have a choice. You don’t have to be a part of the world of the lynchers. You can join the other America–the people who struggled  against slavery, the people who railed against slavery, the white people who supported them, the people who all through Reconstruction struggled.” She says, “I was very young, and that’s what I needed to hear.” Her work began in earnest.

The Bradens bought a house for a young black family, the Wades, in an all-white neighborhood (it was a way around segregation–Andrew Wade gave them the down payment, the Bradens purchased it, and then transfered the deed). The Wades’ home was shot at, crosses were burned in the yard and a bomb was set off underneath their daughter’s window (remarkably no one was physically hurt).

The Wades, showing where rocks had been thrown and broken the windows of their home.

The bomber was never caught or tried, but the Bradens were, along with five other whites who helped defend the Wades’ house. They were charged with sedition–it was, prosecutors said, all a plot by communists to overthrow Kentucky and the nation.

Braden says that “If you use every attack as a platform, they can’t win and you can’t lose. It works like a charm.” They used their arrest and jail time as a platform. “You can’t kill an idea anyway,” she says. “To a segregationist, integration means communism.”

The film highlights footage from Ku Klux Klan rallies, newspaper stories, meetings, marches, beatings and shootings during the red scare and the civil rights movement. The footage–often presented without narration–is powerful and provides the visual, historical context to Braden’s stories.

The film moves forward through each decade, highlighting social justice struggles (especially regarding race and economic injustice) and Braden’s continuous role. The complexity of anti-communist sentiment, the freedom of speech and association and violence of the ongoing civil rights struggles are examined in depth.

It was difficult watching the momentous struggles and changes of the 60s make way into the 70s, when she says, “That sense of being part of something larger gets lost.” Political activists were repressed and imprisoned, and much of the momentum was lost.

Anne Braden

As the footage from the 70s surfaces, it’s in color; all of a sudden history doesn’t seem so far away. When white women are screaming and chanting about “Niggers” when busing was implemented in 1975, and throwing rocks at the buses, it’s jarring how close it all is. David Duke screams about white power. Communist workers at an anti-Klan rally are shot and killed in the late 70s.

In a statement that seems all-too true today, Braden says of the lasting legacy of this era:

“And this idea of reverse discrimination took hold of the country, and I think it’s the most dangerous idea that’s ever been inflicted on this country. It tells white people that the source of their problem is people of color and it’s such a damn lie because it’s based on the theory that what black people got took something away from white people, and that is the opposite of what happened, every piece of legislation everything that happened that the black movement won, helped most white people and certainly poor and working class white people.”

At a 1980 rally in response to the communist workers’ deaths, she said,

“The real danger today comes from the people in high places, from the halls of congress to the board rooms of our big corporations, who are telling the white people that if their taxes are eating up their paychecks, it’s not because of our bloated military budget, but because of government programs that benefit black people; those people in high places who are telling white people that if young whites are unemployed it’s because blacks are getting all the jobs. Our problem is the people in power who are creating a scape goat mentality. That, that is what is creating the climate in which the Klan can grow in this country and that is what is creating the danger of a fascist movement in the 1980s in America.” 

As the film progresses, we see Braden marching for economic justice and to end police brutality. She stands out, with her cropped gray hair, small body and denim jumpers. Her voice shakes into a megaphone when she speaks at rallies, but her age doesn’t stop her. She keeps marching. When she can’t march, she’s pushed in a wheelchair.

Braden passed away in 2006 at age 81. Right before she died, she said, “I just don’t have time.” She still felt she had too much to do.

Anne Braden and Cornel West

I don’t know that I’ve ever been so inspired by a documentary. By the end, I was crying, near-sobbing–in celebration of Braden’s life, in mourning her death and in feeling a burning fire in my white belly that I needed to do something in this world. Anne Braden had effectively told me that I needed to get to work.

At a march, Braden says, “We who believe in freedom cannot rest until it’s won.” It hasn’t been, and we must continue her legacy.

Anne Braden: Southern Patriot puts Braden’s lifelong activism into the developing fluid and makes it clear to all of us. We should all look carefully at these images and be moved to not just frame them for display, but to make them shape our world now.

The Flobots’ “Anne Braden”

Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. 

‘Oblivion:’ A Response to Ignatiy Vishnevetsky’s Review on RogerEbert.com

Oblivion (2013)
Jack Harper (Tom Cruise) stands on the landing pad to his home.
This is a guest post written by Gabrielle Gopie-Tree. 
I’m not a Tom Cruise fan and I usually don’t watch his films, but I quite like Oblivion. To be fair, I am partial to post-apocalyptic productions but often the action is overdone and the plot underdeveloped; this is certainly not the case with Oblivion, which is a film about monoculture. Monoculture lacks the essential elements for life: diversity, complexity, and struggle. 
Ignatiy Vishnevetsky sees it differently. While he offers a humorous critique of patriarchy and a welcome, albeit limited, view of misogyny from his perspective as a White male of eastern origins, his superficial review of Oblivion ignores the soulful theme of the film: self-recovery. This idea is central to every aspect of the movie and is quite an unusual perspective in a Hollywood film, particularly in a genre that is typically focused on stereotypical masculinity. While discussion of sex-inequality in film is an encouraging development, there are serious flaws in this element of Vishnevetsky’s criticism. Here is my point of view from my perspective as a Black female of western origins. 
Vishnevetsky starts with a spirited description of the colour (white) and shape of Jack’s ship, the docking station, and the interior of the central command’s arrival chamber as all being symbolic of female genitalia which he views as encapsulating a violent sexism. I disagree. Instead I see the distilled and contrived soul-lessness of these elements as juxtaposition against the reality of Jack’s former life; a life that keeps calling to Jack in the shape of his attachment to a very green getaway spot on Earth and romantic memories of a woman in pre-apocalyptic New York City. Jack projects an air of perpetual disorientation as his longing for a satisfying existence contrasts with his daily life. 
Jack works with Vica (Andrea Riseborough) character to ensure the logistical resource extraction process on a devastated Earth in the year 2077. Vica and Jack are colleagues as well as lovers. They both represent a futuristic version of the patriarchal family: Jack goes out to work each day returning to prepared meals and perfunctory intimacy. Vica is the classic Stepford Wife in both appearance and behaviour: her sheer plasticity and vacuity are her essence. Jack is depicted as having a ‘ruggedly capable masculinity:’ he fixes, fights, and fucks. Despite the mental manipulation of his masters, Jack has a heart. We see this via his expressions of service to others: his successful fight to save a lone dog as well as the woman who turns out to be his wife, Julia (Olga Kurylenko), from death by drone, and his communication of loyalty to the human resistance who awaken him from his alien-induced programming. These are traits typically associated with the feminine, making this a rather feminist/womanist element of Jack’s character and the film itself. 
Jack struggles with Drone 166 to get the machine to stand up.
While Vishnevetsky compliments the storytelling method used in Oblivion, he simultaneously lambastes the film as being “derivative” of “several science-fiction movies at once.” I see this critique as plausible in light of the theme of the film itself – self-recovery. However, it seems that while Vishnevetsky is comfortable advancing some semblance of a gender critique, he is much less comfortable discussing the racial element of Oblivion, although he does mention the colour of the pseudo-feminine monoculture that amuses him so greatly as “white.” For example, who could miss the racial dynamics in the fact that there is (as far as I can tell) only one non-white man, Beech (Morgan Freeman), and one non-white woman, Julia–or, that Beech has a similar wake-up talk with Jack as did Morpheus (Laurence Fishbourne) with Neo (Keanu Reeves) in The Matrix. Vishnevetsky’s failure to talk race brings the sincerity of his limited discussion of gender into question. 
Morgan Freeman as Beech, the resistance leader who helps Jack recover his identity.
Furthermore, Vishnevetsky’s claim that: Oblivion is about a “lowly technician sending unmanned drones to hunt and kill a demonized, alien Other — until it forgets that it ever was” is overly simplistic. He ignores the element of struggle in the film which is necessary for life and Oblivion is most certainly about the life/death struggle; from the start of the film with Jack and Vica’s life-parody to the story’s culmination in Jack and Julia’s life-reality on a lush green patch of earth, complete with offspring. 
Julia (Olga Kurylenko) and Jack recall a pre-apocalypse moment.
While Vishnevetsky sees Oblivion as “a wannabe mindbender that raises questions about its lead character’s identity — except that the lead character is too sketchy to make these questions compelling,” I see it as an exploration of a man’s struggle to recover himself from monoculture programming which in itself requires interactions with others for one’s self-development to occur. Curiously, Vishnevetsky condemns Jack using the archetype of the self-sufficient masculinised rugged individual but mislabels it as “creation myth.” Thereafter, he bemoans what he sees as none of the many women in the film being “able to do anything without Harper’s help.” This is a very strange critique and smacks of a highly neoliberal notion of sameness as the benchmark for sex-equality. Also, it does not hold up in light of the fact that Vica administers both the home and the office each day while Jack fulfills his duties outside on the ground and she engages in almost all communications with Sally (Melissa Leo) at central control, including the authority to terminate her working relationship with Jack by simply saying they are no longer an “effective team.” Additionally, toward the end of the film Jack and Julia collaborate to challenge the authority of the alien masters including Julia’s decision to undergo cryosleep as the best option for facilitating Jack’s assault on the alien’s central command. 
Do not be fooled by Vishnevetsky’s use of terms such as “uterus,” “vulva,” “mother figure,” “creation myth,” and “misogyny” which suggest a feminist critique of Oblivion that just is not there.
Gabrielle Gopie-Tree has a background in law, politics, psychology and spirituality. She is a nomadic social theorist trying to be the change she wants to see in the world; a believer in the lessons of the guide Qadhafi; and valiantly trying to allow the universe to unfold as it should.