Tag: 2010s movies

2013 Oscar Week: ‘The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey’: The Addition of Feminine Presence During a Quest for the Ages

Guest post written by Elise Schwartz.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey directed by Peter Jackson is the prequel story to The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It begins by introducing the protagonist, Bilbo Baggins, on the day of his 111th birthday, the same day that the Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings movie begins. It is the day that Baggins begins writing about the greatest adventure of his lifetime: an unexpected journey. The movie dialogues Baggins’ first encounter with Gandalf the Grey, a host of Dwarves, Elves, Orcs and Goblins, while assisting the Dwarves in their quest to reclaim the Lonely Mountain. 
This Hobbit movie, which will eventually be the first part in a trilogy, is based on roughly the first half of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit. The book was published in the late 1930s and was intended to be a stand-alone children’s book. The LOTR trilogy only came to be as a request from Tolkien’s publisher. It was during this trilogy that Tolkien really developed Middle Earth and the characters that lived within its regions. It’s possible that due to the fictional world not being truly developed prior to The Hobbit being published, we only meet the 15 male characters that make up the traveling party and their enemies. Jackson took it upon himself to bring the two stories together as a whole movie series by introducing additional characters to the audience of The Hobbit that play a large roles in the LOTR. One main example of this is through the character Galadriel, the Elf Queen. 
Galadriel appears in a scene that was created specifically for the movie adaptation. During this scene there is a meeting of the White Council, which consists of Gandalf the Grey, Saruman the White, Elrond the Lord of Rivendell and Galadriel. The council meets to discuss the mission of the traveling party to take back the Lonely Mountain and the role of Baggins as part of the company. Galadriel remains quiet and watchful during much of the meeting’s discussions. Though, she does interject during a heated debate between Gandalf and Saruman, and insists that Saruman let Gandalf speak. At the conclusion of the meeting, she offers Gandalf guidance and assistance if he were to ever need her help. 
The members of the council treat Galadriel in an ethereal, yet mindful way. They show her respect in a manner that almost makes it seem like she should be placed on a pedestal. It is much how she and other female characters are regarded in the LOTR. Jackson was careful to show this in the style that it was intended – with dignity and admiration towards women of power. 
Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Many other reviews such as this one have questioned why Galadriel was included in the film, when her character wasn’t introduced in the book. Was this just a way of adding females into the plot line? It’s possible. But we must remember that Jackson is tying the two series together and trying to create cohesion, which will turn into a much grander story overall. So why didn’t he include Arwen or Eowyn? Simply from a historical timeline, this is 60 years prior to the LOTR stories and Galadriel was the only female character Tolkien introduced that was alive at the time. As well, she is a character of authority that can add substance to the overall journey of the series. 
So, even though The Hobbit was not meant to hold a well-rounded cast, Jackson’s film adaptation of the first half of the book does an exceptional job of introducing the audience to the world of Middle Earth and the characters within. He was careful to insert only the most necessary characters that needed introduction while sticking to the main themes and plot directions of the book. Though, I’m still curious to know if he will end up pushing the envelope enough with the Hobbit series to take home another Best Picture award in the future.
———-
Elise Schwartz writes at HalloweenCostumes.com and has been known to spend an entire weekend watching the extended versions of the Lord of the Rings films start to finish.  

2013 Oscar Week: Heroic Black Love and Male Privilege in ‘Django Unchained’

Guest post written by Joshunda Sanders.
Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained was a movie I never thought I’d see or write about. As much as I adore movies and popular culture, particularly when black characters are front and center, well, the Crunk Feminist Collective put it best: 
“… I am not a fan of Tarantino at all. At all. Generally, I find his work contrived, overly self-conscious, and, frankly, boring. Plus, to me he’s like the worst kind of hipster racist, a grown up version of Justin Timberlake desperately trying to affirm his black card at all times, while thoroughly proving himself to be white as hell…”
I’ll add the caveat that I like Tarantino’s gumption, but that’s where the warm feelings end. Tarantino is the Kanye West of moviemakers: obnoxious as he is talented, arrogant and flippant as he is hard to ignore. America loves men like him. For that reason, he brings up all my contrarian cockles. Between the grotesque violence and excessive use of the N-word in his movies, combined with the fact that I did not appreciate Pulp Fiction or From Dusk ‘Til Dawn, (the only movie I stomped out of mid-way) I saw no reason to spend money to see another Tarantino production.
What led me to the theater, finally, was what always leads me there: deep curiosity and a good friend. 
Salamishah Tillet, writing for CNN’s In America blog, wrote: “There is much to criticize in this film: the excessive use of the N-word, gratuitous gun violence and its male dominance. Women are objects of apathy or sympathy and are not as nearly as complex or charismatic as any of the male characters. This is very much a movie about how men, white and black, navigate America’s racial maze.”
Dr. King Shultz (Christoph Waltz) and Django (Jamie Foxx) in Django Unchained

I enjoyed Jamie Foxx at the center of this inverted spaghetti Western. German King Shultz, a hilarious German bounty hunter riding in a carriage with a giant bouncy tooth swaying from its roof, plucks Django from a group of weary slaves and transforms him into a superhero. Viewers are shown flashbacks of Django with Broomhilda, (Kerry Washington) his slave wife who was taken from him. So we get the moments of tenderness without oversexed images. But as Tillet mentions, Washington, like other women, are one-dimensional with no agency. 

I feel that I should make the case for a better use of Washington in Django, but it makes sense to me that Tarantino wouldn’t provide any context for black women with agency — he did it with limited success in Jackie Brown as homage to Blaxploitation because the agency of Pam Grier was a seductive plot point. I also would have had to support Tarantino movies for the rest of my life if he had gotten it right. Instead, I felt a sense of relief that a black woman was depicted a damsel in distress, exoticized (she speaks German) but not hypersexualized. 
Hildi is worth fighting for and she maintains her dignity. It’s a story I’ve not witnessed before in a Western on the big screen, and rarely anywhere else. 
Obstensibly, Django is allowed to exact his revenge on white slave-owners and black men who would keep him from being great. Foxx is the best at this kind of cool glee. He has come a long way from playing the buffoonish Wanda on In Living Color. That his bloodlust is inspired by love and winning back a black woman as a prize allowed this black woman viewer to construct an alternative narrative for his motivations and for the justification of mass murder. 
I have also never had the privilege or pleasure of laughing deeply or sincerely during any film set against the backdrop of slavery in the antebellum South. It is humor and wit that carries Tarantino in Django, the unexpected surprise. 
In a scene that evokes the KKK with white racist men wearing bags over their heads, there’s a bit where they start arguing about the fact that they can’t see, that one of their wives put a lot of time and effort into the thing and can’t y’all just get over this whole can’t seeing thing? I’ve got a goofy, dark sense of humor, so maybe it was just me, but I could not stop laughing loudly during that scene, in part because it humanizes virulent racists while also mocking their stupidity and vanity in a surprising way.
It also makes you forget what they are, though his accurate portrayal of the harrowing, sickening depth of racist terror reminds the viewer. That felt dangerous and provocative to me. The type of emotions we go to the movies for. Ditto for the score, which blends Blaxploitation with hip hop fantastically, updating the Western with a big of swag.

Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson) and Broomhilda von Schaft (Kerry Washington) in Django Unchained

Because slavery and violence are rarely spoken about as a kind of spiritual terrorism to say nothing of emotional and psychological antagonism against blacks, I was pleasantly surprised by that accuracy here, explained by Jelani Cobb as violence “deployed as a kind of spiritual redemption” at The New Yorker:
“And if this dynamic is applicable anywhere in American history, it’s on a slave plantation. Frederick Douglass, in his slave narrative, traced his freedom not to the moment when he escaped to the north but the moment in which he first struck an overseer who attempted to whip him. Quentin Tarantino is the only filmmaker who could pack theatres with multiracial audiences eager to see a black hero murder a dizzying array of white slaveholders and overseers. (And, in all fairness, it’s not likely that a black director would’ve gotten a budget to even attempt such a thing.)”
Like Cobb, and, more famously, Spike Lee, some of my hesitance to support Django had to do with the unfair privilege afforded Tarantino to take creative liberties with not just using racist language with such entitlement (which is how it comes across even if it’s not his intention) but also with the power and assumption of greatness that would never happen for a black director. I find the idea that Tarantino should not be allowed to be great because he calls black folks out of our names to be a symptom of our greater anxieties. The issue to me is not whether or not Tarantino is racist, but that he benefits from the privileges afforded him as a white male to pick and choose his racist tendencies.
There are tons of creative men — white, black, brown — who have this privilege. If they make mediocre films or books, do we stop to analyze why? Well, sometimes. With Tarantino, all the time. In the case of this film, that criticism was a relentless din. I don’t have an answer for why I find that odd and complicated, except that creativity, racism and privilege are embedded in American culture. All creative products are considered superior if they are made by white people. That Tarantino benefits from this is neither his fault, nor is it new. I’m not apologizing for him, I’m simply pointing out why I think the discussion of the flaws in his movie as historical sticking points and the use of the word Nigger miss the point.

Django (Jamie Foxx) and Broomhilda von Schaft (Kerry Washington) in Django Unchained
But I’m also a sucker for a love story, so because Django is about heroic love, about the kind of victory that necessitates revenge, it thrilled me unexpectedly.
Not just any heroic romantic love, which we never see, really, between black men and women anymore, but also about the love of freedom, the universal thirst for power. At the end of the day, I cared much more that Tarantino was true to that than I do about the Spaghetti Western genre or whether or not the details of slavery were historically accurate. I know enough about history that I would not ever expect Tarantino to offer me an accurate lesson on the institution of slavery.
So, the film is not perfect but as critics agree, it is clever. It is also as close to perfect as we can hope for until someone writes the perfect heroic black love story and revenge fantasy.
———-
Joshunda Sanders is a writer and journalist based in Austin. She blogs at jvictoriasanders.com.

2013 Oscar Week: Maya from ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Is an Emotional Character

Guest post written by Alison Vingiano, originally published at AGV Notes. Cross-posted with permission.
The movie theater was already packed when I found my seat on Sunday afternoon. When the lights dimmed, the screen stayed dark. Phone calls from September 11, 2001 echoed throughout the room. I don’t think anybody breathed for the first three minutes of the film.
Zero Dark Thirty was one of the best movies I saw this year. The protagonist, Maya, captivated me with her focus and passion. She was a realistic, interesting character to watch, despite how little we learn about her life. At times she was overwhelmed, but she never collapsed with emotion or passion. Maya was no Carrie Mathison. On Monday, still thinking about the film, I read that day’s TIME Magazine piece. The author interviewed Kathryn Bigelow about the deeply perplexing final shot. She wrote:
“You may be wondering why Maya — so stoic and static throughout her years of hunting — breaks down into sobs when the mission is over… All this comes after a decade of ruthless pursuit, in a career to which she has sacrificed her entire life and, for the audience, more than two hours of watching a character display no hint of an emotion other than vengefulness, dedication, patriotism or anger.”
Okay there, TIME Magazine, check yo’self. No emotion other than anger? Stoic and static throughout her years of hunting? Yes, Maya does not cry until the final shot. Deeming her emotionless, however, narrows the complexity of her character. It assumes that a women who does not cry does not feel. It is important to recognize Maya as an emotional character because doing so illustrates the depth of her strength. It shows that emotional women are competent, focused and determined as well.
Maya displays a wide emotional range. In fact, had her character been a man, reviews would likely comment about his brave sentimentality. We would discuss he queazy response to torture, for example, or his frightened reaction to being attacked by gunfire. She is too emotive for a man, yet not emotive enough for a woman.
Jessica Chastain as Maya in Zero Dark Thirty
Let’s look at specific examples of Maya’s emotional reactions. When Maya’s colleague is killed, we see her curled up in her office, paralyzed by (what I interpreted as) sadness and shock. Many scenes later, we see that a picture of Maya with this friend is her computer background. When Maya first experiences the interrogation of detainees, she looks away.  The sight upsets her. In fact, when she is left alone with a detainee and he asks for her help, the audience cannot predict if she will succumb to his request. Finally, she delivers a strong but difficult answer: “You can help yourself by telling the truth.” Later, when Maya is shot at by a group of young men, we see a panicked, unrestrained reaction. When Maya receives the call that US troops are raiding the mansion in Abbottabad, she hangs up the phone with such a fierce expression of fear and excitement that I wanted to hug her.
Maya is a stronger character because of these natural emotional responses; she lets herself feel and fully experience the trauma she endures. She responds like a human being and a CIA veteran, not as some stoic, cold-hearted robot. When Maya cried in the final shot, it was a logical progression of her character’s growth. She just achieved her greatest career goal, while also changing the course of the war on terror. How could she not be overwrought with emotional display? I was not at all shocked, as the TIME article suggests viewers must have been.
We should not assume all female characters will emote similarly. Real women display their feelings in various ways, some of which include “not crying.” It is wrong to see a woman thriving in a high-stress job  – without tears – and think “wow, she is emotionless!” I doubt we would assume that about a powerful career oriented man. We would simply discuss how well he performed his job.
Strength largely derives from how one processes their feelings. Cinematic portraits of powerful women are not just the Catwoman or GI Jane. We also need to see and accept powerful, emotional women in film. Yes, Maya was angry, determined and combative for much of the movie. But she also showed fear, sadness and defeat. The beauty of Maya is that she was written with the same complexity as any male character. And you know why? Because she’s based on a real-life, three-dimensional woman. Calling her emotionless insults the depth of her intricately formed character.
———-
Alison Vingiano is a writer, comedian, filmmaker and feminist residing in New York City. Her work has been featured on many websites, including Thought Catalog, Feministing, After Ellen and The Jane Dough. Follow her at www.agvnotes.tumblr.com and on Twitter at @agvnotes.

2013 Oscar Week: Cosmology, Gender, and Quvenzhané Wallis: ‘Beasts of the Southern Wild’

Written by Max Thornton.
In my studies, I work with the intersection of pop culture and religion. This is a frustrating field: a lot of the discourse from the theological side is exceedingly shallow, and the explicit pop-culture engagements with religion are rarely any better.
Honestly, I often find I can have the richest theological dialogue with popular culture that is not explicitly religious, and Beasts of the Southern Wild is a superb example.
It is, of course, religious in the broad twentieth-century existential sense of “ultimate concern” and “meaning-making.” The film tackles Big Themes of loss, belonging, growing up, but it does so through a very specific story – that of six-year-old Hushpuppy, living with her difficult father in an imperiled swampland community called the Bathtub.
Quvenzhané Wallis is astonishing as Hushpuppy. I own T-shirts older than this girl, but she knocked my socks off and I hope she wins a billion Oscars. Like the film itself, she had to pull off a delicate balancing of the cosmic and the intimate. As the cinematography veers between wide sweeps of polar ice caps and close, intense shots of life in the Bathtub, so Wallis seemingly effortlessly manages both the very embodied work of near-wordless acting and the lyrical voiceovers that punctuate the film. With lines like “The whole universe depends on everything fitting together just right. If one piece busts, even the smallest piece, the entire universe will get busted,” Beasts of the Southern Wild reminds me a little of Terrence Malick’s The Tree of Life, but whereas that film bored me rigid, Beasts moved me to tears.
Or, to express that in Internet…

Part of that dynamic is simply that both films exist in an entertainment culture overwhelmingly dominated by white middle-class people. Before The Tree of Life ever came out, I had reached a point where if I never again in my life saw another piece of entertainment about a white suburban family, it would be too soon. A film about a poor, largely African-American community in a Louisiana bayou automatically grabs my attention to a much greater degree (and, let’s be perfectly honest, the fact that it’s 45 minutes shorter than Malick’s endless bloody movie doesn’t hurt).

Interestingly, the film was initially a play about a father and son. Writer Lucy Alibar’s initial choice to distance herself from the young character through the gender-flip is reversed for the screen, and she is not unaware of the politics of gender:

“We made a hero story with a little girl in it, and she is fighting for her family, not her boyfriend. I never saw that growing up, I thought I had to be a little boy to be a hero.” (BlackBook interview)

“I always felt like there wasn’t a blueprint for father daughter relationships — for them or for us. Because what are they supposed to do with us, treat us like boys, or small women, or what? Father daughter relationships are so unique from family to family, and I’d love to watch it explored more onstage.” (Barnes & Noble interview)

Suddenly it makes sense that Hushpuppy’s father encourages her to be “a man”: it’s the only way of relating that he knows. He simply has no other way of expressing his feelings or his hopes for his young daughter.

Hushpuppy, being a man.

The film beautifully navigates the relationship between independence and interdependence. From the very beginning, where Hushpuppy and her father live in separate but adjacent tiny houses, the six-year-old is never babied or coddled in any way; and yet she consistently stresses her understanding of the world and her place in it. She has a remarkably holistic idea of the cosmos, completely lacking in anthropocentrism – her description of a hospital: “When an animal gets sick here, they plug it into the wall” – and astounding in its sense of perspective.

Although the film itself doesn’t directly address the concept of God, it is pervaded with a religious sense. Lucy Alibar again:

“God isn’t this distant thing. God is right here with you all the time. He’s your buddy, and you can talk about everything. And writing this play and working on the film, seeing it, I felt God’s presence. I just had more of a sense of my place in the whole scope of everything.” (Elle interview)

Alibar’s triumph is that the film perfectly walks the line of contradictory impulses, affirming the individual’s “place in the whole scope of everything” without being deterministic, stressing the need to (as Hushpuppy’s teacher puts it) “take care of those smaller and sweeter than you” without being paternalistic, portraying an aching realism through a fantastical story of long-dead beasts. Cinema’s triumph is the emergence of an amazing young talent in QuvenzhanéWallis.

“I see that I’m a little piece in a big, big universe. And that makes things right.”



Max Thornton blogs at Gay Christian Geek, tumbles as trans substantial, and is slowly learning to twitter at @RainicornMax.

2013 Oscar Week: ‘Les Misérables’: Some Musicals Are More Feminist Than Others

Guest post written by Natalie Wilson, originally published at Ms. Magazine. Cross-posted with permission.
While Les Misérables is not your typical musical–or, as this Guardian review puts it, “There’s no dancing, there are no jazz hands and there is next to no speech”–it is typical of the genre in that, like opera, it includes more female characters than do many plays, movies and novels. Regardless if this is due to the fondness for female voices or to the swoon-inducing love ballads adored by so many, this viewer is thankful for the diverse female characters so wonderfully played by Anne Hathaway(Fantine), Amanda Seyfriend (Cosette), Samantha Barks (Éponine) and Helena Bonham Carter (Madame Thénardier).
The film adaptation, based on the musical (seen by over 60 million people), which is itself based on Victor Hugo’s novel, arguably heightens the proto-feminist elements of the original narrative as it allows for a more close-up, more harrowing depiction of the key female characters, all of whom are “miserable” for justifiable reasons.
Though the film has been referred to as a “lobotomized opera,” it can more aptly be described as an operatic musical that not only focuses on macro problems of human existence–morality, freedom, power, forgiveness–but also on how these problems play out at the micro level, particularly how the macro power of men effects women on a micro level. As noted at Democratic Underground, Victor Hugo gets:
“…the plight of women in his society, especially the grisettes (working class young women) and prostitutes, and how they were helpless against not just men of power, but men in general, and how nice poor girls could so easily be discarded and have [their lives] ruined because of becoming pregnant or rebuffing sexual advances.”

Fantine is the key character to have her life ruined in such a manner. Abandoned by the man who impregnates her, she is working in the 19th century version of a sweatshop when we first meet her in the film. She ultimately turns to sexual slavery so as to continue sending money to the unscrupulous caretakers (the Thénardiers) who, unbeknowst to her, are abusing and exploiting her young daughter, Cosette.

Anne Hathaway as Fantine in Les Miserables
Fantine is portrayed sympathetically in the text and musical, but the film adaptation emphasizes the horrors of forced prostitution, something the musical renditions of the song “Lovely Ladies” frequently belie. Often performed in an upbeat, jokey manner, in the film the song instead becomes a battle cry against sexual slavery, with the costuming, make-up, sets and lighting bringing the horrors behind the lyrics to life as the sickly, starving, cold, tattered and abused women sing:
Lovely ladies
Ready for the call
Standing up or lying down
Or any way at all
Bargain prices up against the wall

After her hair has been cut, her teeth removed and sold, Fantine joins the song, singing,
Come on, Captain
You can wear your shoes
Don’t it make a change
To have a girl who can’t refuse
Easy money
Lying on a bed
Just as well they never see
The hate that’s in your head
Don’t they know they’re making love
To one already dead!

Widely lauded in the role (as here, here, and here), her rendition of “I Dreamed a Dream” further encapsulates the pathos and desperation of her character–something which is sometimes lost in more “Broadway” renditions of the song (a la Susan Boyle).
Of playing Fantine, Anne Hathaway notes,
“What I did was I tried to get inside the reality of her story as it exists in our world. … I read a lot of articles and watched a lot of documentaries and news clips about sexual slavery. And for me, for this particular story, I came to the realization that I had been thinking about Fantine as someone who lived in the past, but she doesn’t. She’s living in New York City right now. She’s probably less than a block away. This injustice exists in our world, and so every day that I was her, I just thought—this isn’t an invention. This isn’t me acting. This is me honoring that this pain lives in this world and I hope that in all our lifetimes — like, today — we see it end.”

Anne Hathaway as Fantine in Les Miserables

Regardless of what can be said about Hathaway’s weight loss for the role (critiqued here), her framing of Fantine as a sexual slave, NOT a prostitute, is key, as it refuses to glorify or joke about what is so often swept under the rug regarding sex work: that the majority of women do not “choose” it but are forced into it–a realization emphasized by Hugo but often lost in musical renditions. Hugo writes of Fantine,

“What is the history of Fantine? It is society buying a slave. From whom? From misery. From hunger, from cold, from loneliness, from abandonment, from privation. Melancholy barter. A soul for a bit of bread. Misery makes the offer, society accepts … it is said that slavery has disappeared from the European civilization. This is a mistake. It still exists: but it weighs now only upon woman, and it is called prostitution.”

The film, like Hugo’s novel, blames society for sexual slavery, rather than individual men or women. Each also portrays her “choice” as that between life and death for her and her daughter.
Hugo’s progressive view of sexual politics, as well as his critical attitude towards “polite society” (discussed here) imbue his work in other Les Mis plotlines as well–as with his depiction of the vengeful Inspector Javert (Russell Crowe) and the valiant prisononer 24601, Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman), imprisoned 19 years for the crime of stealing bread. Though these two males are at the center of the story, the females are just as (if not more) memorable (and certainly outperform and out-sing Crowe in his bombastic version of Javert).

Amanda Seyfried as Cosette in Les Miserables
Cosette, both as the child abused by the Thénardiers and then as the adult who falls for the revolutionary Marius (Eddie Redmayne), is also a micro picture of a macro problem — the abuse of female children, especially those in foster care and/or poverty, and the fact that one of the few “escapes” offered to such women is love and romance. The same “escape” is the only one that similarly maltreated Eponine is forced into. As noted here, she is “Raised by sociopathic parents and then forced into a life of poverty and crime” and “only wants the man she loves to love her, and sacrifices all to prove her love.”

Samanta Barks as Eponine in Les Miserables

The Funny Feminist takes issue with this plotline in particular, noting that Eponine has sadly become “the international spokeswoman for girls crushing on their male best friends, who swoon over the richer, more popular girl.” Like a 19th century Bella Swan, Eponine is hopelessly devoted to her Edward, in the form of Marius, but he only has eyes for Cosette. If the musical falters in its quasi-feminist politics anywhere, it is here, with the strong , resilient Eponine belting out her song of unrequited love, “On My Own,” while the male revolutionaries prepare to fight for a more egalitarian France–or, as the Funny Feminist puts it “when the poor folk rally against the 1 percent and the Mitt Romneys,” Eponine is busy singing a  “pity me, my life is so sad” song. To be fair, while she is indeed lovestruck, she also disguises herself as a boy in order to join in the revolution, and ultimately gives her life to save Marius.
While some reviews slam the film for not being political enough, as here (where the film is described as “a picturesque 19th-century version of Occupy Wall Street” lacking political context), I would counter that the film drips with politics, especially the micro politics captured in the feminist mantra “the personal is political.” From the tragic Fantine to the orphaned Cosette to the maltreated Eponine, the film depicts a story that is still all too true, and does so better than any musical version I’ve seen, showing that women–revolution or no–are all too often beaten, abused, exploited, raped and murdered. While it’s long ranked as one of my favorite musicals, it now holds the number one spot in this feminist heart for best musical film ever.
———-
Natalie Wilson, PhD is a literature and women’s studies scholar, blogger, and author. She teaches at Cal State San Marcos and specializes in areas of gender studies, feminism, feminist theory, girl studies, militarism, body studies, boy culture and masculinity, contemporary literature, and popular culture. She is author of the blogs Professor, what if …? and Seduced by Twilight. She is a proud feminist mom of two feminist kids (one daughter, one son) and is an admitted pop-culture junkie. Her favorite food is chocolate.

Classic Literature Film Adaptations Week: ‘For Colored Girls’ Reveals Power of Sisterly Solidarity & Women Finding Their Voice

Written by Megan Kearns, originally published at The Opinioness of the World.

I was excited to see For Colored Girls. A film about 9 women, as a feminist, how could I not be? But I have to admit, I questioned whether or not I should even be writing this review. Writing about a film revolving around African-American women, based on a seminal play on race, and I’m not a woman of color…would it be inappropriate? Would I be breaking some kind of taboo? But then I realized after reading the play and watching the film, while it speaks to women of color and the experiences they endure, it portrays myriad experiences women face.

I don’t want to diminish the unique racial struggles that women of color encounter in this film and in life for that matter. I will never know what it’s like to be followed in a store because of the color of my skin. I will never be told that I should have babies with a white man so my children will have lighter skin and be prettier. But I think this is an important film for women and men to see for the commentary it makes on gender and race and the struggles women of color endure.

For Colored Girls follows 9 African-American women whose lives intersect in a New York City brownstone. A mosaic of stories as their lives weave together. Janet Jackson is an unyielding corporate magazine mogul with intimacy issues; Loretta Devine, a nurse opening a non-profit clinic dating an unreliable boyfriend; Anika Noni Rose, an effervescent and optimistic dance instructor; Kerry Washington, a happily married social worker who can’t have the one thing she so desperately wants; Kimberly Elise, Jackson’s personal assistant and a mother of two living in an abusive relationship; Phylicia Rashad, the all-knowing wise neighbor; Whoopi Goldberg a devoutly religious woman and mother of Thandie Newton, a promiscuous woman with a thirst for life and a painful past, and Tessa Thompson, a teen who aspires to be a dancer. Almost every aspect of a woman’s life is shown: sex, losing virginity, abortion, rape, falling in love, jealousy, domestic violence, murder, sisterhood, motherhood, infidelity, infertility, break-ups and friendship.

The film For Colored Girls is Tyler Perry’s adaptation of the critically acclaimed Obie award-winning 1974 play and choreopoem For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf written by Ntozake Shange. I had never even heard of the play until a couple of years ago when my co-worker Nai adamantly insisted that I must read it. I was so glad she did as I was blown away by Shange’s brutally honest yet devastatingly beautiful prose. It’s raw and rhythmic, moving with a fierce visceral cadence. In the play, each woman is represented by a color: red, blue, yellow and so on. With striking visuals, the film incorporates this theme by having each of the women who signify wear outfits and garments that symbolize that color. When one of the women is raped, she stops wearing her bright color, donning black clothing instead, as if the trauma had drained her color, her vibrancy. Each woman was so unique: different classes, ages, shades of black (as my co-worker pointed out). It’s rare to find a powerful woman lead a film; it’s almost unheard of for a film to tell nine women’s distinctive tales. The movie and the play both open with these pleading words:

“somebody / anybody sing a black girl’s song bring her out to know herself to know you but sing her rhythms carin / struggle / hard times sing her song of life she’s been dead so long closed in silence so long she doesn’t know the sound of her own voice her infinite beauty she’s half-notes scattered without rhythm / no tune sing her sighs sing the song of her possibilities sing a righteous gospel…”

Perry incorporated most of the play’s language into the dialogue of the film. The powerful poetry is so strikingly beautiful and haunting, so lyrical, that at times it can yank you out of the film, reminding you that it’s not real.All of the women gave fantastic performances, particularly Thandie Newton, whose portrayal could have meandered into a caricature yet never did, Anika Noni Rose, yielding a heartbreaking depiction, and Kimberly Elise, whose restrained and poignant performance made it feel all the more authentic. I noticed that the dialogue separated the decent actors from the outstanding ones. The phenomenal actors (Rashad, Newton, Jackson, Divine, Rose, Elise), inhaled Shange’s words, tasted them and exhaled seamless monologues, making them truly their own.

Women knowing their own worth and finding their voice are messages continually conveyed. Thandie Newton utters one of my fave lines (which differs slightly from the play’s text),

“Being alive and being a woman is all I got, but being colored is a metaphysical dilemma I haven’t conquered yet.”

While it speaks to the unique intersectional experiences of race, gender and identity black women confront, I found I could still relate. I’m proud to be a woman; my gender shapes my identity yet I don’t want it defining who I am. Shange wrote the play in 1974, just after Roe v. Wade had been passed. Yet the material still rings true today. It was surprising to see one of the characters not only seeking an abortion but actually obtaining one. As I’ve written before, it’s still rare for a film or TV show to portray women getting abortions. When describing a back-alley abortion, one of the women cries:

“…metal horses gnawin my womb / dead mice fall from my mouth…”

Some of the characters contend with unspeakable hardships. When one of the characters is raped, she has to defend her actions to a police officer, how she didn’t ask for it. She whispers:

“the stranger we always thought it would be, who never showed up, cuz it turns out the nature of rape has changed…”

But watching the scenes with Kimberly Elise, in which she tiptoes, avoiding upsetting her abusive boyfriend, were some of the hardest for me to sit through, especially as a domestic violence survivor. Elise’s subtle performance makes the pain that much more palpable.
The film shows how far many women will go to please men. For Colored Girls doesn’t blame women. Rather, it shows the responsibility women bear in navigating their lives through the choices, good and bad, they make. When the hilarious Loretta Devine finally has had enough with her cheating boyfriend letting her down, she yells:

“I got a real dead loving here for you now, because I don’t know anymore how to avoid my own face wet with my tears! Because I had convinced myself that colored girls have no right to sorrow!”

She goes on to tell the women at her clinic:

“somebody almost walked off wid alla my stuff…like a kleptomaniac workin hard & forgettin while stealin this is mine / this ain’t your stuff…did you know somebody almost got away with me / me in a plastic bag under their arm…”

Many women often do too much for men, putting up with too much mediocrity. Janet Jackson experiences a similar epiphany when she tells her husband that she’s tired of hearing his apologies. She says,

“…I got sorry greeting me at my front door you can keep yours …I’m gonna haveta throw some away I can’t even get to the clothes in my closet for all the sorries… …well I will not call I’m not goin to be nice I will raise my voice & scream & holler… …& I wont be sorry for none of it”

Perry’s film has been simultaneously criticized and lauded with reviewers at both ends of the spectrum. Some have called it a “choppy mess”, claimed he “butchers” Shange’s play while others have criticized it for its men bashing. While the overly negative depictions of men may be valid, the point of the play was that men can and do inflict pain and suffering on women. Women need to look for happiness and fulfillment not with men but in themselves. But maybe some people have a problem with a film in which the men are superfluous. Manohla Dargis of the NY Times gave a favorable review discussing the tragic storylines:

“That might sound unbearable, but done right it’s thrilling — specific in its pain, universal in its reach — and Mr. Perry works very hard and gets it mostly right.”

Matt Zoller Seitz at Salon praised the film and Perry:

“[Perry] gathers together some of the greatest African-American actresses in America — actresses who are lucky to get one or two scenes in a film with a predominantly white cast — in leading roles that let them chase dreams, make mistakes, fall in love, have their hearts broken, flirt, seduce, manipulate, preen, pout, rail against injustice, and endure and transcend Old Testament-level suffering. And they reward Perry with performances so heartfelt, and often so accomplished, that they make all of his films worth seeing no matter what you think of him as a director.”

For those who hated it, I can’t help but wonder that if the tribulations these women confronted were faced by men, people would have enjoyed the film more. Perhaps people are uncomfortable seeing this much pain, this much torment. But women do experience these painful situations, even the shockingly horrific domestic violence scene near the end of the film. I think people miss the movie’s point by scoffing at it for being too depressing. I’m not going to sugarcoat it and claim it’s not gut-wrenching and horrific. Oh it is, at times dipping into the melodramatic. And yes, I felt like a mack truck had run me over halfway through the film. Yet the ending was ultimately hopeful, a testament to sisterly solidarity amongst women.
In the beginning of the film, the women fight with one another and can’t get along. I was worried saying to myself, “What the hell has Tyler Perry done to Ntozake Shange’s beautifully feminist play?!” But my fears were unfounded. Women in the film face a crossroads in their lives. They suffer unspeakable tragedy and then must find a way to move forward. After the women brave wave upon wave of heartbreak and terror, the film ends, as the play does, with the women coming together; a united front, knowing their self-worth. Kimberly Elise declares,

“…I wanted to jump up outta my bones & be done wit myself leave me alone & go on in the wind it waz too much I fell into a numbness till the only tree I cd see took me up in her branches held me in the breeze made me dawn dew that chill at daybreak the sun wrapped me up swingin rose light everywhere the sky laid over me like a million men I waz cold / I was burnin up / a child & endlessly weavin garments for the moon wit my tears I found god in myself & I loved her / I loved her fiercely”

I was initially apprehensive about Tyler Perry directing and writing this adaptation, as was Shange who said in an interview that she was “worried about his characterizations of women as plastic.” While a more adept filmmaker might have done something different or even better, I don’t think people are giving Perry due credit. He portrayed fully dimensional characters, showing the respect for women I’ve always assumed he feels despite his previous lackluster films. Perry added some important pieces to the film, like Whoopi Goldberg, as my co-worker Nai pointed out, divulging how her father gave her to a white man as he didn’t want ugly grandbabies. He also added Janet Jackson’s line where she says, “Women give up too much of their power.” I think Perry did a fantastic job of knowing what to keep and what to leave out. He remained faithful to the play, capturing its breathtaking essence.
Professor and writer Reza Aslan said in an interview on the Colbert Report:

“the best way to reframe perceptions is not through information or knowledge or education…but through the arts, through literature, through film. These are the things that really break down the boundaries and borders between us…”

Making this argument tangible, in Elle Magazine’s Women and Hollywood November 2010 issue, director/actor Victoria Mahoney (Yelling at the Sky) said that if we want to see more women’s films, we must go and see them; we need to vote with our dollars, a sentiment uttered by Melissa Silverstein at Women and Hollywood. If we want to see women on-screen, if we want to open the dialogue on racism and sexism, if we ever hope to open our minds to experiences that both differ from and echo our own, then we need to support films with women and women of color as protagonists.
The theme of a woman’s voice echoes throughout the film. Women being silenced…by shame, fear, abuse, their mothers, the men in their lives, society…is threaded throughout. Shange’s play and Perry’s film testify the power of women finding solace, self-acceptance and strength in themselves and reclaiming their voice. It’s time we listened to women’s voices and hear what they have to say.

‘Hansel and Gretel Witch Hunters’ Trailer



The trailer doesn’t provide the full context for why Gretel (Gemma Arterton), in the upcoming movie Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters, headbutts a grumpy fella (Peter Stormare) after he says, “I’m not going to have you telling me what to do.” I really hope the exchange between grumpy guy and Gretel escalates as rapidly as the trailer implies. As in: did she really just headbutt a person for asking not to be bossed around?

Meet Gretel: our strong female character.

Gretel is the sort of gal that will easily turn an absurd macho flick into the sort of film all genders could enjoy, right? She’s beautiful, but oh-so-deadly. Her bad-assed tone of voice and ability to slowly walk away from explosions means she will be more appealing to women than a Bond girl would.

Don’t worry though, gender-norm-sensitive-mainstream, she’s plenty palatable too. Even though she appears alongside her brother throughout most of the trailer – swaggering, punching and weapon-wielding – she still screams at the end of the trailer beckoning for Hansel to save her.

In what has become typical in fantasy/sci-fi action flicks; we are presented with the façade of a strong female character only to be reminded of their passivity and dependence upon their male counterpart.

Because this particular film isn’t out until next week, this characterization of Gretel may be off. She may be consistently strong. She may rescue Hansel. But, we know that we are being sold the movie with those aggravating and too-predictable gender expectations. Studios want to bring people into this movie with a women desperate to be saved, and they lazily present her strength to smooth over the sexist edges. 

The ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Controversy: What Does Jessica Chastain’s Beauty Have to Do With It?

The beautiful Jessica Chastain in Zero Dark Thirty

This was originally posted at The Funny Feminist.

David Clennon does not want you to vote for Zero Dark Thirty for any single Academy Award.

Who is David Clennon, you might ask? An actor and activist who is a voting member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He does not want you – and by “you,” I mean other members of the Academy – to vote for Zero Dark Thirty in the five categories which the film was nominated. He does not want anyone to vote for Zero Dark Thirty in the Best Picture, Actress, Original Screenplay, Film Editing, or Sound Editing categories.

Kathryn Bigelow? NO MORE OSCARS FOR YOU!

He does not want anyone to do this because he believes Zero Dark Thirty promotes torture. He also believes that Jessica Chastain should not be rewarded for her performance in the film because actors have moral obligations to choose their projects well. He writes on truth-out.org:

“Everyone who contributes skill and energy to a motion picture – including actors – shares responsibility for the impressions the picture makes and the ideas it expresses. If I had played the role that was offered to me on Fox’s 24 (Season 7), I would have been guilty of promoting torture, and I couldn’t have evaded my own responsibility by blaming the writers and directors. So Jessica Chastain won’t get my vote for Best Actress. With her beauty and her tough-but-vulnerable posturing, she almost succeeds in making extreme brutality look weirdly heroic.”

There are many things about this piece that are reactionary and completely misinterpret the point of Bigelow’s complicated film, and many things about the extreme backlash to Zero Dark Thirty that are ill-considered.

For now, though, I have only one question: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

The gorgeous Jessica Chastain

Clennon mentions Chastain’s beauty later in the piece as well:

“Later, the female interrogator (and Zero’s heroine Maya [Chastain]), supervises the beating and near-drowning (aka waterboarding) of another detainee, Faraj; he gasps for air, gags, shudders and chokes; director Kathryn Bigelow then shows Chastain in a clean, well-lighted restroom, looking pretty, but tired and frustrated; Bigelow does not give us a view of Faraj after his ordeal.”

Again, I ask the question: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

The lovely Jessica Chastain

It seems strange to me that her looks are mentioned twice in an article that has a count of fewer than 600 words.

Clennon isn’t the only one who uses that adjective in describing Chastain’s character. Marjorie Cohn’s piece at The Huffington Post also calls Maya the “beautiful heroine” – a beautiful heroine who says that she’s “fine” in response to watching a detainee get tortured:

“Torture is also illegal and immoral — important points that are ignored in Zero Dark Thirty. After witnessing the savage beating of a detainee at the beginning of the film, the beautiful heroine ‘Maya’ says ‘I’m fine.’”

Once more, with feeling: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

Did we mention she’s a hottie?

I don’t think Jessica Chastain’s physical attractiveness is remotely relevant to the film’s stance on torture, but apparently, these writers do. They link her beauty with her supposed heroism. Clenon does this most blatantly by stating that Chastain’s beauty, combined with her tough-yet-vulnerable personality, almost makes torture seem heroic.

It seems to me that these writers, Clenon particular, has swallowed the Beauty Equals Goodness trope hook, line, and sinker. At the very least, they’ve been conditioned to believe that “beautiful woman = heroic woman” in a Hollywood movie, that Chastain’s beauty is the director’s way of telling the audience that we’re supposed to see her as the moral center of the film.

This is a sign, to me, that much of the criticism surrounding Zero Dark Thirty has roots in a very latent, subtle form of sexism. Jessica Chastain is a beautiful woman, and therefore her character must be the moral center of the film, a spokesperson for both the film’s message and the director’s beliefs. Beautiful women only exist in mainstream film to be rescued, to be prizes for the male characters, or to be the film’s moral center. Maya does not need to be rescued and is no prize for a male lead (because there isn’t one), so therefore she’s the moral center, and omg this movie supports torture!

Girl purdy, ergo she must be stating the film’s message

 
Am I reaching with this theory? Perhaps. But I can’t help notice that, even though Clenon cautions the Academy to avoid awarding any Oscars to Zero Dark Thirty, Chastain and Bigelow are the only two people he mentions by name. He never once mentions the name of Mark Boal, the screenwriter who penned those torture scenes he found so offensive and morally wrong. He never says “the screenwriter,” period. All of the attention is on either Chastain or Bigelow, not writer.

He mentions that when he was choosing parts, it would have been unfair of him as an actor to put all the blame on the director and writers for their material. Yet in his article on Zero Dark Thirty, he does put some blame on the director – yet not the writer.

Screenwriter Mark Boal. Attractiveness level irrelevant.

It doesn’t take a genius to play “one of these things is not like the other” with Jessica Chastain, Kathryn Bigelow, and Mark Boal. Anyone with a background of watching Sesame Street can guess why Boal’s name was left out of this plea to other members of the Academy, why the screenwriter let completely off of the hook.

Bigelow, on the other hand, is apparently no better than Leni Riefenstahl.

Pictured: Leni Riefenstahl. Not Kathryn Bigelow.

Bigelow, like Chastain, is also an attractive woman. So attractive that prominent writers (or writers who were once prominent ages ago) believe that she only receives acclaim because of her physical beauty.

It appears that when women step out of their designated roles to be moral centers of a story, they are no better than Nazi propagandists.

When beauty fails to equal goodness, Beauty is Bad.

The face of evil, apparently

Interestingly enough, Jason Clarke, the actor who plays the torturer CIA agent Dan in Zero Dark Thirty, is a handsome man. I never assumed that I was meant to find his actions morally correct, or view him as a moral authority, because he was handsome.

I also never assumed that I was meant to find his actions morally correct, or view him as a moral authority, because he was a man.

It’s a shame that Bigelow didn’t cast an ugly woman or a man in the lead role of Maya. Then the audience would have known right away that the protagonist was not necessarily meant to be a hero, and this confusion over the film’s stance on torture would never have occurred.

Actor Jason Clarke. Attractiveness level also irrelevant.

Lady T is an aspiring writer and comedian with two novels, a play, and a collection of comedy sketches in progress. She hopes to one day be published and finish one of her projects (not in that order). You can find more of her writing at The Funny Feminist, where she picks apart entertainment and reviews movies she hasn’t seen.

The ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Controversy: What Does Jessica Chastain’s Beauty Have to Do With It?

The beautiful Jessica Chastain in Zero Dark Thirty

This was originally posted at The Funny Feminist.

David Clennon does not want you to vote for Zero Dark Thirty for any single Academy Award.

Who is David Clennon, you might ask? An actor and activist who is a voting member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He does not want you – and by “you,” I mean other members of the Academy – to vote for Zero Dark Thirty in the five categories which the film was nominated. He does not want anyone to vote for Zero Dark Thirty in the Best Picture, Actress, Original Screenplay, Film Editing, or Sound Editing categories.

Kathryn Bigelow? NO MORE OSCARS FOR YOU!

He does not want anyone to do this because he believes Zero Dark Thirty promotes torture. He also believes that Jessica Chastain should not be rewarded for her performance in the film because actors have moral obligations to choose their projects well. He writes on truth-out.org:

“Everyone who contributes skill and energy to a motion picture – including actors – shares responsibility for the impressions the picture makes and the ideas it expresses. If I had played the role that was offered to me on Fox’s 24 (Season 7), I would have been guilty of promoting torture, and I couldn’t have evaded my own responsibility by blaming the writers and directors. So Jessica Chastain won’t get my vote for Best Actress. With her beauty and her tough-but-vulnerable posturing, she almost succeeds in making extreme brutality look weirdly heroic.”

There are many things about this piece that are reactionary and completely misinterpret the point of Bigelow’s complicated film, and many things about the extreme backlash to Zero Dark Thirty that are ill-considered.

For now, though, I have only one question: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

The gorgeous Jessica Chastain

Clennon mentions Chastain’s beauty later in the piece as well:

“Later, the female interrogator (and Zero’s heroine Maya [Chastain]), supervises the beating and near-drowning (aka waterboarding) of another detainee, Faraj; he gasps for air, gags, shudders and chokes; director Kathryn Bigelow then shows Chastain in a clean, well-lighted restroom, looking pretty, but tired and frustrated; Bigelow does not give us a view of Faraj after his ordeal.”

Again, I ask the question: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

The lovely Jessica Chastain

It seems strange to me that her looks are mentioned twice in an article that has a count of fewer than 600 words.

Clennon isn’t the only one who uses that adjective in describing Chastain’s character. Marjorie Cohn’s piece at The Huffington Post also calls Maya the “beautiful heroine” – a beautiful heroine who says that she’s “fine” in response to watching a detainee get tortured:

“Torture is also illegal and immoral — important points that are ignored in Zero Dark Thirty. After witnessing the savage beating of a detainee at the beginning of the film, the beautiful heroine ‘Maya’ says ‘I’m fine.’”

Once more, with feeling: what does Jessica Chastain’s beauty have to do with it?

Did we mention she’s a hottie?

I don’t think Jessica Chastain’s physical attractiveness is remotely relevant to the film’s stance on torture, but apparently, these writers do. They link her beauty with her supposed heroism. Clenon does this most blatantly by stating that Chastain’s beauty, combined with her tough-yet-vulnerable personality, almost makes torture seem heroic.

It seems to me that these writers, Clenon particular, has swallowed the Beauty Equals Goodness trope hook, line, and sinker. At the very least, they’ve been conditioned to believe that “beautiful woman = heroic woman” in a Hollywood movie, that Chastain’s beauty is the director’s way of telling the audience that we’re supposed to see her as the moral center of the film.

This is a sign, to me, that much of the criticism surrounding Zero Dark Thirty has roots in a very latent, subtle form of sexism. Jessica Chastain is a beautiful woman, and therefore her character must be the moral center of the film, a spokesperson for both the film’s message and the director’s beliefs. Beautiful women only exist in mainstream film to be rescued, to be prizes for the male characters, or to be the film’s moral center. Maya does not need to be rescued and is no prize for a male lead (because there isn’t one), so therefore she’s the moral center, and omg this movie supports torture!

Girl purdy, ergo she must be stating the film’s message

 
Am I reaching with this theory? Perhaps. But I can’t help notice that, even though Clenon cautions the Academy to avoid awarding any Oscars to Zero Dark Thirty, Chastain and Bigelow are the only two people he mentions by name. He never once mentions the name of Mark Boal, the screenwriter who penned those torture scenes he found so offensive and morally wrong. He never says “the screenwriter,” period. All of the attention is on either Chastain or Bigelow, not writer.

He mentions that when he was choosing parts, it would have been unfair of him as an actor to put all the blame on the director and writers for their material. Yet in his article on Zero Dark Thirty, he does put some blame on the director – yet not the writer.

Screenwriter Mark Boal. Attractiveness level irrelevant.

It doesn’t take a genius to play “one of these things is not like the other” with Jessica Chastain, Kathryn Bigelow, and Mark Boal. Anyone with a background of watching Sesame Street can guess why Boal’s name was left out of this plea to other members of the Academy, why the screenwriter let completely off of the hook.

Bigelow, on the other hand, is apparently no better than Leni Riefenstahl.

Pictured: Leni Riefenstahl. Not Kathryn Bigelow.

Bigelow, like Chastain, is also an attractive woman. So attractive that prominent writers (or writers who were once prominent ages ago) believe that she only receives acclaim because of her physical beauty.

It appears that when women step out of their designated roles to be moral centers of a story, they are no better than Nazi propagandists.

When beauty fails to equal goodness, Beauty is Bad.

The face of evil, apparently

Interestingly enough, Jason Clarke, the actor who plays the torturer CIA agent Dan in Zero Dark Thirty, is a handsome man. I never assumed that I was meant to find his actions morally correct, or view him as a moral authority, because he was handsome.

I also never assumed that I was meant to find his actions morally correct, or view him as a moral authority, because he was a man.

It’s a shame that Bigelow didn’t cast an ugly woman or a man in the lead role of Maya. Then the audience would have known right away that the protagonist was not necessarily meant to be a hero, and this confusion over the film’s stance on torture would never have occurred.

Actor Jason Clarke. Attractiveness level also irrelevant.

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

Guest Post: Feminism in ‘Aiyyaa,’ and Why It Ain’t Such A Bad Movie

Aiyyaa

Guest post written by Rhea Daniel.

Aiyyaa shows how a perfectly loving Indian family, specifically a Marathi family (but this sort of traditionalism runs right across this arranged-marriage loving country so an Indian woman can relate) can make their female offspring miserable over the subject of her single-hood up to to the point where she’ll resort to taking any low-paying job as an excuse to stay out of home as long as she can. But leave home on her own terms she won’t, she needs a man first. She keeps fantasizing about packing up in the middle of the night, grabbing her mum’s gold jewellery and running away with her dream-man. Yes, she’s a romantic, a Bollywood fan and her ambitions extend thus far to falling in love and living HEA.

So why is this even feminist? I’ll explain:

Understanding the Arranged Marriage:

Speaking from my own observations, the concept of an arranged-marriage works well when the network of well-informed relatives can tell you what kind family you’re marrying your daughter/son into. This well-informed network will let you know if the family is traditional enough and boy isn’t of the wife-beating breed (that is if you care). Ancestral records are generally exchanged.
For the girl, if she’s marrying into an Indian family, she’s marrying the entire extended family of sisters, brothers, sils, bils, cousins, grandmas and grandpas, who feel they have a right freely express their opinion on your shape, colour, behaviour, job, hobbies, sexuality, dress sense, reproductive capabilities, domestic skills and also your parenting skills. This could happen to a triple PhD. or an aeronautical engineer, it don’t matter, because a brilliant career is only good to up one’s resume in finding the perfect mate of equal or more ped-degree. Smart people are generally expected to produce higher quality offspring. Yeah, however organized… this stuff gets intensely patriarchal. That’s why it’s okay if the entire family lands up at the dissecting table, not just the dude. Plus, it’s a good investment to have a Dil who’ll take good care of you when you’re old (another good reason to have at least one son). It’s archaic, but there you have it. Feelings can be manufactured.

Also, get ready to take on the roles Meenakshi’s already faking, you have very few moments to be yourself. Meenakshi dresses up seemingly voluntarily for the sit-downs, seems to be making an effort, but the audience knows that it’s an act. So why can’t she just say no, right? To understand why being in such a situation is like being stuck between a rock and a hard place take a look first at this fascinating TED talk by Sheena Iyengar on how Asians view choice:

I’ve come across people who are super-ready to marry whoever their parents choose for them, make their choice within an hour of meeting, marry within the week and go back to their jobs. I don’t really get it and I guess they have a great relationship with their parents, but the closest thing that explained it for me was this study by Sheena Iyengar. There’s no such thing as individual choice, there is only The Best Choice. While the system works well for the collective it wrecks havoc with individual desire. For some people stuck in this system it’s a leap in light-years to choose one’s own partner without the whole family acting like it’s criminal, or with threats that the family will fall apart of you do such a thing*. So Meenakshi‘s parents put an ad in the newspaper to attract potential grooms. The sexism begins. The boy gets First Choice, the girl can be Convinced. As far as cultural imperatives go with boys, they need be good providers, (and reproduce capably, I suppose).
Sabotage:
Her parents are getting desperate. None of the boys like her, but then finally comes the nice boy who likes her within ten minutes of the meeting. He likes her crazy family too. She knows she’s fucked, because she’s not allowed to say no, so her only recourse is sabotage. She tries to drive him away with her singing. He likes her even more. He remembers to ask her whether she’s okay with it too, she doesn’t get the opportunity to answer, but the parents are ecstatic, even more reason not to open her mouth. Thanks to the director for making this a hard decision for Meenakshi: her fiancé is incredibly nice, he respects her choices, he likes her the way she is. It’s the sort of subtlety the directors of Brave failed to employ when creating their potential grooms. His only failure is his inability to tell that under that mask, she doesn’t really like him at all.
The Patriarchal Mother:
Meenakshi indulges a small rant that her mother laughs off as melodramatic. Don’t expect any sympathy from the Patriarchal Mother (a woman who subscribes willingly to patriarchal views), a daughter married off to a man her parents deem suitable only gives them a sense of continuity, they don’t consider their children’s lives separate from theirs, even if they suffer the same misery. “I did it too, it didn’t kill me” “You’re so selfish, he’s such a good boy!” “You’re mad!” are perfectly justifiable responses to a daughter’s unhappiness. Nobody in her family seems to get it, but then comes the only opposing voice from wheelchair-bound Grandma, who shouts: “Run away, Meenakshi, I couldn’t!”–when she makes a leap to freedom from the balcony of her fiancé’s house, providing a contrast to Meenakshi’s mother’s subservient simpering.
‘Man-hunting’**:

She falls for Surya, a Tamilian artist who visits the library she works in. She does her own version of the arranged-marriage research, asking people he’s acquainted with all sorts of questions about his personality etc. Her colleague informs that he is rumoured to drink and do drugs, that’s why his eyes are so red, but it doesn’t faze her. She tries to find out more about his culture. She’s advised to watch Tamil movies. She learns the language, beginning with sexually suggestive compliments, learning how to say “please leave your shirt button open” in Tamil. She goes dreamy-eyed every time he passes and swoony over his after-shave (or body-odour, whatever it is). It might help to know that the entire movie is the based on one of stories from the Marathi movie Gandha (2009) (translated to ‘smell’ or ‘fragrance’) by the same director. Meenakshi seems sensitive to any noxious type smells. Her olfactory sense seems to be her love-guide. She hates the smell of the college toilets, but there’s a scene where she trance-walks into the men’s loo because she can smell Surya in there. Lucky for Surya he was just washing his face. Imagine someone standing outside your toilet cubicle smelling your farts.

Anti-feminism:
While the research she does is justifiable, the stalking is not. Granted, she’s shy and he treats her like wallpaper, even when she tries speak to him directly in Tamil (we find out later he’s doing this deliberately) so she has to find other means to approach him. As the day of her engagement draws closer she grows more and more desperate to see in him an ideal partner, so her investigation leads her down some unsavoury roads. She then escapes her home on the eve of her engagement and follows him to his incense stick factory (that’s why he smells so good), finds out he’s not such a bad dude, and his eyes are so red because of the incense fumes. He finally confronts her, knows she’s been following him, says he likes her guts and wants to marry her. There’s another cute scene where they happily share their mutual academic failures. I know the stalking’s a play on role-reversal considering Bollywood’s long history of stalking-as-romance, many girls and women are victims of this imitative ‘romance’ in real life, but entering his home under false pretences and stealing his t-shirt crosses a line, even though she is portrayed as harmless. Stalking is a recourse in a society where there is firm divide between the sexes, and it’s one of the primary things that has to go with archaic notions of love and romance, boy or girl. In this movie Surya knowingly strings her along to see how far she’ll go. Very well, but the sooner we get to enthusiastic consent or polite decline (and acceptance), the better for both parties.

Anita Date as Maina in Aiyyaa
I don’t care if Meenakshi’s librarian-colleague Maina is an an exaggerated comic-relief character, I found her funny. I couldn’t find much on Anita Date, the actress who plays her. She serves as advisor to Meenakshi, encouraging her to marry Maadhav, because he’s good ‘husband material’ and later on have an affair with Surya. Meenakshi prefers to go by the direct route. Poor Maadhav, her fiancé, gets the raw end of the deal when she lands up at her own engagement ceremony with her preferred love Surya. He takes the rejection sorrowfully but gracefully, and refuses her patronizing offer to remain ‘just friends’. In the midst of all the madness director Kundalkar gives his minor characters their dignity.

Despite this movie’s sprinkling of annoying Bollywood fantasy numbers (which I skipped) and occasional mind-numbingly loopy, loud scenes, most of it was gratifyingly funny. In Meenakshi’s declaration of love for dark people (technically what she says translates to “I don’t like light-skinned people, I like black people”) she’s referring to her love for South-Indian Surya, but it comes across as a taunt to the Indian majority that views ‘fairness’ as as a prerequisite for attractiveness. The only incongruity of this statement is that Malayali actor Prithviraj doesn’t qualify as ‘dark’ by any Indian standard, so it makes her declaration specific to his race (South-Indians are stereotyped as dark-skinned) and her willingness to integrate with them. Dreamum-wakuppam, a parodied version of South-Indian dance numbers (not to mention the language) can seem insulting at first***, but by the end of the movie she’s transformed into a traditional Tamil bride, and speaks Tamil like she can’t help it. Her exclamations of ‘aiyyaa!’ change into the South-Indian ‘aiyyoo!’ Having visited a traditional Marwari household in Pondicherry and Gujarati household in Chennai who regularly feast on idli–dosa made by their super-traditional sari-clad wives, I’d believe the integration is not just for survival, it’s embraced.

I know that wives have cheated on their husbands in Bollywood before, I know they’ve also shown cheating husbands the door, but these stories have remained distant scandals before. Caught between one’s desire for freedom and one’s cultural call of doody ie., to marry and reproduce, is a common cross to bear in this country, and I’ve never come across a Bollywood movie that didn’t conveniently villainize the parents/society in order to dramatize the girl or boy’s situation. So despite all the mayhem Ayyiaa manages to make itself a predominantly feminist film, and had some subtle observations to make that shone like little jewels through the script.

*Preferring to remain single is an alien concept, let’s not even go there.

**Didn’t really like the way that was advertized, man-hunting seems to refer to a search ranging across several men, when she quite obviously interested only in The One.

***I thought it was hilarious.
———-
Rhea Daniel got to see a lot of movies as a kid because her family members were obsessive movie-watchers. She frequently finds herself in a bind between her love for art and her feminist conscience. Meanwhile she is trying to be a better writer and artist and you can find her at http://rheadaniel.blogspot.com/.

2013 Golden Globes Week: ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Raises Questions On Gender and Torture, Gives No Easy Answers

Jessica Chastain as Maya in Zero Dark Thirty

Written by Megan Kearns. | Warning: Spoilers ahead!!

Driven, relentless, bad-ass women in film always hold a special place in my heart. Ripley from Alien and Aliens, Patty Hewes from Damages, Carrie Mathison from Homeland. Maya, the female protagonist of Zero Dark Thirty, is no exception. But can a film be feminist if it depicts horrific violations of human rights?

Played effortlessly by Jessica Chastain, Maya is a smart, tenacious and perceptive CIA analyst who navigates the 10-year hunt for al-Qaeda terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. Intense and focused, she relentlessly pursues her work with one singular goal: finding bin Laden. Unyielding, she refuses to give up. She’s a cinematic version of Carrie Mathison. Interestingly both women have an irrefutable compass when it comes to being right. They boldly trust and follow their uncanny instincts.
Zero Dark Thirtyis riveting, fascinating and jarring. It assaults the senses with evocative images, haunting music, booming explosions and chilling 911 calls on 9/11. Powerful and exquisitely crafted by Kathryn Bigelow, it is unrelenting in its vision.

As Candice Frederick asserts, Maya anchors and propels the film. With a woman at the center of this story, it’s hard not to question gender. Zero Dark Thirty doesn’t overtly discuss gender politics, as Bigelow points out. Yet it reveals gender dynamics in subtle and important ways.

In the beginning of the film, Maya appears queasy about torture. Yet she refuses to turn away. When Dan (Jason Clarke), another CIA analyst, says she can watch the interrogation on video, she insists on being in the room. Early on, a colleague calls her a “killer,” a moniker that doesn’t quite seem to fit her composed demeanor and soft-spoken voice. Or is that supposed to challenge our stereotypical gender assumptions? But it certainly fits as the film progresses.

Maya (Jessica Chastain) in Zero Dark Thirty

We witness a hyper-masculine environment in which Maya’s boss George (Mark Strong) slams his fist on the desk screaming at CIA analysts, “I want targets. Do your fucking jobs. Bring me people to kill.” After years in the field, after her friends have died, after relentlessly pursuing bin Laden, Maya swears, screams at a superior and boldly tells the CIA Director (James Gandolfini) in a room full of men, “I’m the motherfucker that found this place, sir.” Inoo Kang asserts this one statement draws attention to her gender: “anyone can be a motherfucker, man or woman – just like anyone can find bin Laden.” Does she adopt stereotypical masculine behavior to adapt? Or is her aggression merely a manifestation of her frustration and obsession? Or is she merely a bundle of contradictions, like most people?

Writer Katey Rich said she was fascinated how Maya’s “femininity is never talked about out loud, but influences everything she does and the way her colleagues react to her.” All of the male colleagues and superiors refer to her as the infantilizing term “girl” rather than “woman.” Yet Maya engenders enormous respect from her colleagues and superiors. Two times in the film, a superior asks one of Maya’s colleagues if she’s up for the job. In each instance, she’s described as “a killer” and “intelligent,” although James Gandolfini as the CIA Director dismisses that assertion by saying, “We’re all intelligent.” A Navy SEAL trusts Maya’s judgment on bin Laden’s location because of her unwavering confidence.

One of the best things about having a female director? Not only do we see an intelligent and complex female protagonist. We also see female friendship. Passing the Bechdel Test, we see Maya and her colleague and friend Jessica (Jennifer Ehle) debate, strategize, unwind and challenge each other. Reinforcing their friendship with a visual cue, Maya’s screensaver on her computer is a picture of her and Jessica.

Jennifer Ehle as Jessica in Zero Dark Thirty

After Maya becomes convinced that a vital lead is dead, it’s young analyst Debbie (Jessica Collins) who makes a crucial discovery through researching old files. She tells Maya that she’s been her inspiration. It was nice to see female admiration and camaraderie, even if Maya is too busy, too focused on work to acknowledge her compliment.

When Jessica asks Maya if she has a boyfriend or is sleeping with a co-worker, Maya firmly tells her no. Jessica encourages her to get a little somethin’ somethin’ to take the edge off. She says, “I’m not that girl that fucks – it’s unbecoming.” Now I’m not exactly thrilled with that statement. But I’m delighted Maya isn’t defined by her relationship to a man. She defines herself.

Some have called Zero Dark Thirty “a feminist epic” based on “the real women of the CIA.” But it’s also been criticized for its perpetuation of the Lone Wolf Heroine trope. When asked about the role of Maya’s gender, Bigelow – who was pleasantly surprised to discover how many women were involved in the CIA’s search for bin Laden – said “the beauty of the narrative” is that Maya is “defined by her dedication, her courage, her fearlessness.”

Maya (Jessica Chastain) in Zero Dark Thirty

I’m honestly not entirely sure if Zero Dark Thirty is a feminist film. But with its subtle gender commentary, female friendship, and female protagonist who’s defined by her actions rather than her appearance or her relationships, it’s hard for me to say it’s not.

Bigelow is a talented filmmaker who made an exceptional film. Which is why it’s shocking she didn’t receive an Oscar nomination. Kathryn Bigelow has continually faced sexism, whether it’s with asshat writer Bret Easton Ellis calling her overrated because she’s “hot,” or by not being awarded an Oscar nomination, despite winning numerous film awards. It’s also unfortunate because the Academy so rarely nominates directors of women-centric films.

Only 4 women have ever been nominated for a Best Director Oscar: Lina Wertmüller (Seven Beauties), Jane Campion (The Piano), Sofia Coppola (Lost in Translation) and Kathryn Bigelow (The Hurt Locker). Out of these 4, only the Piano was female-centric. Bigelow is the only woman to ever win. Ever.

Did the Academy ignore Kathryn Bigelow because of sexism? Did they not want to honor a female director twice? Or was it because of the raging shitstorm of controversy regarding the film’s depiction of torture? Or was it because of the pending Senate investigation? And would the Senate have even investigated Zero Dark Thirty had it been directed by a man? I have a sneaking suspicion that sexism resides at the root of each of these questions.

Maya (Jessica Chastain) in Zero Dark Thirty

Many have raised the question whether Zero Dark Thirty excusesor glorifiesor endorses torture while others have refuted these claims, arguing it depicts but doesn’t defend torture or is ambiguous in its stance. Some of the same people who didn’t give two shits about torture and halting human rights atrocities in Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo – including Senator John McCain, himself a torture survivor with a “spotty record on torture” as he speaks out against torture yet votes in favor of it  — are the same vocalizing outrage over Zero Dark Thirty. Both Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal have vehemently denied the film being an endorsement of torture. Yet Bigelow has been called a Nazi making propaganda, “torture’s handmaiden” as well as having “zero conscience.” Wow. That’s ridiculously harsh, don’t you think? While I’m all for critiquing art, as Stephen Colbert (of all people!) pointed out, why are we railing against a filmmaker rather than the government who still hasn’t fully investigated the use of torture in the War on Terror?

Now does depicting horrific atrocities equate approval? Absolutely not. Films like The Accused and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo portray rape graphically yet exist to combat victim-blaming rape culture. What matters is in the film’s portrayal.

Zero Dark Thirtydoes not shy away from graphic depictions of torture. Bigelow said that while she wished torture “was not part of that history,” it was. Within the first 20 minutes, we witness detainee Ammar (Reda Kateb) waterboarded, beaten, humiliated, starved, sleep deprived, stress positions by being forced into a tiny box, disoriented with lights and heavy metal music, and walked around with a collar and a chain like a dog. Later, we see other detainees in jumpsuits with wounds and scars. The abuse is horrifying and disturbing to watch. It’s repulsive to see the culmination of the racist, xenophobic colonialism that spurred the use of torture against Muslim Arabs.

Torture does not yield accurate information. Yet Dan repeatedly says to Ammar, “You lie, I hurt you.” When Ammar begs Maya for help, she tells him, “You can help yourself by telling the truth.” Not only does it subvert our gendered assumptions that she would be sympathetic to him. It puts the onus on the tortured detainees, not on the racist atrocities committed by government officials.

Admiral Bill McCraven (Christopher Stanley) and Maya (Jessica Chastain) in Zero Dark Thirty

But Zero Dark Thirtyalso shows the inefficacy of torture. When Ammar is put into the box, he lies that he doesn’t know if there will be another attack. And yet we quickly see an attack in Saudi Arabia. We see CIA analysts uncovering intelligence without torture. After Ammar has been abused, demoralized and dehumanized repeatedly for months (years?), Maya and Dan eventually treat him with a modicum of decency and respect. Only then does he finally provide accurate and vital information.

Most tellingly, Dan says he’s leaving as he no longer can torture people. He says he wants to go to DC and do something “normal.” He warns Maya not to be “the last one holding a dog collar when the oversight committee comes.” This sense of awareness doesn’t acquit Dan’s or Maya’s actions. But it does convey that Dan knows that torture is fundamentally wrong.

But Zero Dark Thirtyalso portrays characters who repeatedly say that they can’t do their job without torture — or as they put it “enhanced interrogation techniques” — even after finding leads without torture and even after torture fails to stop terrorist attacks, which undercuts the message that torture is ineffective and reprehensible. It frames torture more as a Machiavellian means to an end: it’s not pleasant but still kinda necessary. But maybe that’s the point — to showcase the traditional thinking of the CIA in how to obtain intelligence, even when everything points in the opposite direction. While it certainly doesn’t condone torture, sadly Zero Dark Thirty doesn’t outright condemn human rights atrocities either.

It is this back and forth, this ambiguous juxtaposition of narratives and views that makes it difficult to analyze and open to interpretation. Zero Dark Thirty has been called a “reverse Rohrsach test” where everyone will see in it “something they would rather not see, but no one can agree on what’s wrong.” Take the opening: some will see replaying voices calling 911 on 9/11 as inciting fear and terror, while others (aka me) will see it as transporting us back to that time, reminding us why we as a nation reacted – right or wrong – the way we did. Bigelow herself said “there’s certainly a moral complexity to that 10-year hunt” for bin Laden. Bigelow and Boal didn’t spell everything out for us and “didn’t spoon-feed their opinions to the audience in a way that made for easy digestion.”  They expect us to complete the puzzle for ourselves.

Maya (Jessica Chastain) in Zero Dark Thirty
However, the biggest clue as to the film’s overall stance appears in its finale. Zero Dark Thirtymay not criticize torture as much as it could or should. But that doesn’t mean it panders to politics. Rather it questions the course the U.S. has taken. It makes a bold and damning statement critiquing post-9/11 failures and the emptiness of the War on Terror. When bin Laden’s compound is invaded and he’s killed, it’s a taut and suspenseful albeit disturbing sequence. In the end, there’s no rejoicing, no celebration.

The last image we see is Maya, alone shedding silent tears. She allows herself a much-needed emotional release. While she should be satisfied at the culmination of her life’s work, pain tinges this moment. Lost and forlorn, she doesn’t know where to go next.

Zero Dark Thirtydoesn’t provide any easy answers. Rather it asks complex questions. Like any masterful work of art, it challenges us and pushes us, at times in uncomfortable ways. It forces us to look at ourselves as a nation, to our collective pain and to our response to tragedy. Zero Dark Thirty essentially asks us if it was all worth it. It asks how we can move forward. Just like Maya, where do we go from here?

2013 Golden Globes Week: It’s “Impossible” Not to See the White-Centric Point of View

Written by Lady T, originally published at The Funny Feminist.

So this is a trailer for the upcoming film, The Impossible, telling the story about the 2004 tsunami:

There are a few title cards in the trailer that provide the necessary background for the story. The trailer helpfully tells you, “In 2004, tragedy struck southeast Asia.”

However, I don’t think those title cards are specific enough. I’d like to revise those title cards so they read, “In 2004, tragedy devastated entire nations, but we’re going to focus on one white family that was on vacation there.”

The Impossible is based on a true story of a real family that was separated during the tsunami and eventually reunited, each family member miraculously surviving. I can easily see why this story would appeal so much to filmmakers. “Family separated, in peril, in a devastated nation that is completely foreign to them” is such a great hook that it’s practically Captain Hook. Who wouldn’t be interested in the story of a family who have to survive in a country that isn’t their own?

On the other hand, this is a real-life tsunami that affected entire nations, that devastated the lives of the citizens who lived there, and the first prominent film about the tragedy is about white people who were staying at a hotel?

The family in The Impossible

Landon Palmer at the Culture Warrior has more to say on this:

“There is no reason to say that this experience wasn’t any less traumatic and devastating for those visiting (regardless of their particular race) than the inhabitants (once again, regardless of their particular race) of any of the affected nations. The problem with The Impossible trailer isn’t the depiction family’s experience of the tragedy itself, but its implications about what happens when, say, the film ends. While watching the trailer for the first time, an image kept appearing in my head of an exhausted, scratched-up family sleeping comfortably on a plane returning them safely to their home of origin. Being able to survive and then leave a tragedy is altogether different than having everything that is familiar, including one’s home, fall apart before your eyes. However, years of uncertain reconstruction and rehabilitation doesn’t fit the formula of a Hollywood ending quite like a welcome return to a home far, far away from moving tectonic plates.”

Or, you can read a briefer, much more blunt article at 8Asians here, titled “The Impossible Trailer Features Pretty White People Surviving Indonesian Tsunami.”

There are some who might say that one can’t judge a film before seeing it, but to quote our illustrious vice-president, that’s a bunch of malarkey. The purpose of trailers is to market the film and let viewers decide whether or not they want to see it. If a person does not want to see The Impossible because they don’t want to see, as my friend put it, “the tsunami from the perspective of the 1%,” that is a legitimate reason to not see the film.

You tell ’em, Joe.

As for me, I will probably see The Impossible. Naomi Watts scored a Best Actress nomination for the part , and I’m a huge Oscar fan who likes to see as many nominated films as possible from the Picture, Director, Acting, and Screenplay categories. The film also looks beautifully shot. Who knows? The Impossible could be a legitimately good movie.

Still, I can’t help but feel that the real impossible task is making a movie about tragedies that affect non-white people and expecting the film to get the same attention as one that stars Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor.

———-
 Lady T is a writer with two novels, a play, and a collection of comedy sketches in progress. She hopes to one day be published and finish one of her projects (not in that order). You can find more of her writing at www.theresabasile.com, where she picks apart entertainment and reviews movies she hasn’t seen.