Emily Perkins – Bitch Flicks

Puberty and the Creation of a Monster: ‘Ginger Snaps’

This guest post by Kelly Piercy appears as part of our theme week on Violent Women.

Turn on any TV at primetime and you’ll likely see a sex worker dead in a dumpster. Or you’ll see a sex worker telling a cop all about that other sex worker who ended up dead in a dumpster. Because being aware and/or in control of your sexual identity can often be the most dangerous thing a woman in pop culture can be. Slasher films are overpopulated with hot young ripe things just ready to be plucked by a cartoonish serial killer. There will be jeering. There will be mutilation. Of this we can be sure. These things are sold to us on a regular basis.

What we can’t be so sure of however, is what fresh hell each teenage girl experiences with their hormones on an individual basis. Or what really happens when you get bitten by a werewolf. There will be blood in both instances, yes. But there will be a whole host of weird surprises. In Ginger Snaps, those two things just so happen to combine in one film, and you’ll soon become endlessly irritated that you didn’t think of it yourself. It is one of body horror’s great allegories. And there is so much room for snark. With Ginger Snaps, we have one of the most interesting examinations of violence in this bleak world that is representation in film. Certainly the only one where the teenage girl does the mutilating. And truth be told, it’s hard not to feel completely exhilarated by it. Even when you’re heaving.

Describing Ginger Snaps in a sentence might sound something like “an excellent example of subversion of genre norms coupled with language that belongs in the pop culture hall of fame.” Something that would also work is “two teenage girls being fucking awesome.” Because in Ginger Snaps, teenage girls are smarmy and moody – of course they are – but also passionate and resourceful. The dialogue is funny and brimming with wicked imagery as opposed to sleeping through clunky exposition and gender conformity. Horror films have a history of violent transformation or destructive host and the repercussions of these changes in public spaces, but not many examine the female body specifically and it’s place in society, the specific “monstrous feminine.” The genre path of teenage sexual behaviour leading to monstrosity strangely never stopped to think about periods. Ginger Snaps takes a long hard look at “the curse” and plays with both its stereotypes and its biological facts incredibly honestly.

Ginger, despite morphing into a werewolf, becomes our protagonist killer in a very human way, and the complexity of her journey is a cinematic rarity. A large part of its appeal is the addictive excitement-and-relief cocktail that comes with seeing your experiences reflected on screen–to see menstruation from a menstruating perspective. Who wouldn’t see want to see the violence of their PMS daydreams being played out? Ginger Snaps gives its characters a small town and a big world, and the result for its viewers reflects as both deeply personal and pure escapism. Also known as the ingredients for the perfect horror. Get ready to fall in love with the Fitzgerald sisters.

How early does the violence start in Ginger Snaps? A more appropriate question might be “How many films can you recall opening with the massacred corpse of a family dog?” Marley and Me, this isn’t. There’s a wild animal killing the canine population of the sleepy town of Bailey Downs, and nobody really seems too concerned. But we don’t have time to dwell because soon we’re met with the sight of 15-year-old Brigitte, both slouchy and creepy, emerging from her garage, hooked up with tools. Like Dick Van Dyke with all his instruments in Mary Poppins, but a teenage girl with wires and shit. I’m not going to get into Emily Perkins’ physicality in this film because the level of scowl perfection alone is truly inspiring, and it deserves an article in its own right. Suffice to say, this is when I knew I was with Ginger Snaps for the long haul.

As well as Brigitte, we also get the privilege of Ginger, who is the older, edgier, decidedly more daring sibling partner in crime. Ginger and Brigitte muse on suburban mundanity in their shared basement bedroom, while Ginger traces her arm with a knife: “Wrists are for girls, I’m slitting my throat,” she scoffs. We move to Ginger impaled on their garden fence, ruptured at the abdomen, limbs splayed, blood everywhere. Then Brigitte leans in and takes a photograph. Yes. These little shits are staging various death poses for a school project! It is so glorious I smile immediately, wickedly even. I feel pure joy radiate out. This is my comfort zone. And so our titles roll and with them comes dozens of DIY photos of Brigitte and Ginger, meeting variously creative gruesome ends. They’re showing this as a slideshow to their classmates, for a school project. It drips with bad taste. Their teacher can’t believe it. I told you you’d love the Fitzgerald sisters.

It’s not long before the fake blood is replaced with real blood. Sixteen-year-old Ginger’s first period and her transition into a werewolf happen simultaneously. What a day, huh? Society punishes women for being women, this is another one of those things we can be sure of. In this particular instance, Ginger is punished for becoming a woman by being violently savaged by a wild beast, which doesn’t sound too different from the online comments section. In a lot of ways Ginger Snaps seems even more relatable in today’s climate than in 2000, the year of its release.

Ginger’s own metamorphosis masquerades as regular, as mundane. Adult women assure her of her normality. But one transformation is obscuring the other, as highlighted by the excellent scene with the school nurse that hits every parallel beat with precision. Menstruation is the birth of Ginger as a threat. Hurtling toward womanhood, she is now decidedly different than a male, she is now the monster that lies within the feminine, and more accurately the feminine that intimidates the masculine. The unattainable, confusing and unfathomable, the unknown onto which the fear is projected. Oh, and she’s also physically becoming a gnarling brute that really wants to rip human flesh to shreds. So there’s that.

But at first Ginger doesn’t recognise her yearning for splattered organs, she just thinks she needs to get laid. Pre-menstrual, Ginger is vaguely disinterested in boys at best. When the schools resident Bro Boy first makes a move she is almost puzzled, and a simple “Er, no…” will suffice as she continues walking, a fly swatted. Later, when he tells her about his sisters and insists that when it comes to cramps “nothing takes the edge off like a toke,” she replies simply again, “Maybe I like my edge, thanks.” The way that Katherine Alexander’s delivery complements the dialogue is unmistakeable in many of Ginger’s best lines. Her attitude could be reactionary, bratty, and dramatic, but instead it is deliciously restrained. This brings with it an awareness of the shouty, quick tempered, usually improv-based insult scenes prevalent in films currently–the “say the grossest thing you can as loud as you can” approach. Getting increasingly shouty in a very short space of time seems to be the default in a lot of comedies (looking at you, America) and Ginger Snaps felt like a reminder. Shouty is funny when it’s the rarity. And a lot of comedies could benefit from Ginger Snaps’ example of less is more. They could also benefit from Mimi Rogers’ more is more, perfectly cast as the girls’ excessively perky mother. The implication being that Ginger Snaps is not only a superior horror film, but a superior comedy as well.

But back to Ginger. Her sexual ambivalence is marked by a classic slow motion strut-slash-glide through the school hallway. She is now Sexually Awakened™ and interested in Bro Boy. After getting rough with him in the back of his car, Brigitte finds her in their bathroom. “I get this ache,” Ginger says, head in the toilet, hair silver and covered in blood, “I thought it was for sex, but it’s to tear everything to fucking pieces.” She just lost her virginity, and it could have essentially been soundtracked by Duran Duran’s “Hungry Like The Wolf.” So she killed a dog after.

Ginger’s acts of violence are now accelerating, with her temper becoming increasingly explosive. Both the hockey field and the neighbour’s garden offer chances for instant relief, but it’s not enough. Ginger’s hunger is all-consuming. Hormones multiplied by a taste for blood equals death and infection. Brigitte’s got a real problem on her hands trying to fix this. As she panics, racing to find a cure to save her sister, Ginger remains devilishly nonchalant. She justifies her actions simply: “No one ever thinks chicks do shit like this. A girl can only be a slut, a bitch, a tease, or the virgin next door. We’ll just coast on how the world works.” You can’t fault her insight. But Brigitte is in a dangerous situation now, facing off with GingerWolf, so it sounds like it’s about time for a knight in shining armour to draw a sword and fight the Big Bad, doesn’t it? Nope, Ginger Snaps still doesn’t let you down, because when Brigitte’s drug dealer sidekick Sam (think Canadian Jason Dean) suggests taking the cure and fleeing the monster, Brigitte shouts “HOW ABOUT NO!” in his face. The sisters have a pact, “out by 16 or dead on the scene, but together forever.” In the end, we know that Brigitte has to figure this out alone.

Throughout their lives, the Fitzgerald sisters operated exclusively as a unit. Ginger can be bolder, domineering and baiting, and Brigitte grounds her, more prone to analysing and logistics. There is a repetition of the mantra “this is so us” coursing through – if Ginger leaves the dinner table, Brigitte follows, if Ginger offers up a judgement, Brigitte extends it. They have matching bone pens. They are functioning as one, in spite of an obviously unbalanced power dynamic and personality difference, and they are both aware of this, becoming increasingly vocal about it as the film progresses. When Ginger’s acts of violence become more heinous, the distinctions between the two of them mobilise and the separation gains speed. As Ginger becomes a killer, Brigitte becomes an individual. Brigitte forces her own journey to Werewolfdom by actively sharing blood with Ginger, and she proceeds with complete self-awareness, in control of her body and the changes she knows are coming. She goes into the fight equipped not only with the experience of witnessing Ginger’s destruction, but with the necessities to survive womanhood: a strong sense of self, the courage to call out bullshit, and a fierce possessiveness of your own body.

Despite always wanting to be a screenwriter, I have never wanted to write horror. Now I do. This is representation in action, folks! I am living proof of it! Power to the Ontario Gothic. This is how it’s done.

Kelly Piercy is a Lit grad and comedy writer based in London. She mostly enjoys Leslie Knope, Sleater Kinney, and Cher’s twitter feed.

From ‘Ginger Snaps’ to ‘Jennifer’s Body’: The Contamination of Violent Women

Thematically, ‘Jennifer’s Body’ mirrors ‘Ginger Snaps’ in many respects: the disruption of suburban or small town life, the intersection between female sexuality and violence, the close relationship between two teen girls at the films’ centers, and—perhaps most strikingly—the contagious nature of violence in women.

This guest post by Julia Patt appears as part of our theme week on Violent Women.

“Hell is a teenage girl.” So Anita “Needy” Lesnicki (Amanda Seyfried) informs us in the opening voiceover monologue of Jennifer’s Body.

At first glance, it’s kind of a throwaway tagline sort of quote reminiscent of Mean Girls or Heathers. Teenage girls are the worst—they might even be evil, but just “high school evil,” to borrow another line from Diablo Cody’s highly quotable script for Jennifer’s Body. But we should note that the line isn’t, “The devil is a teenage girl” or “Teenage girls are demons.” Rather: “Hell is a teenage girl.” Which suggests not only evil, but also suffering. Teenage girls may make other people suffer but, more than that, they suffer profoundly themselves. And although Needy’s flashback indicates she’s thinking about her friend, Jennifer Check (Megan Fox), when she makes this observation, her present tense delivery and its placement in the script at least suggest the possibility that she’s also thinking about herself.

Megan Fox as Jennifer Check

Jennifer’s Body comes from a long, proud tradition of possession movies about women, particularly young women, from The Exorcist to Paranormal Activity. But given the conspicuous absence of old priests and young priests—indeed any mention of exorcism at all—the film’s closest analogue is, I’d argue, its pre-9/11 sister movie and cult werewolf flick, Ginger Snaps. Thematically, Jennifer’s Body mirrors Ginger Snaps in many respects: the disruption of suburban or small town life, the intersection between female sexuality and violence, the close relationship between two teen girls at the films’ centers, and—perhaps most strikingly—the contagious nature of violence in women.

Look familiar?

Ginger Snaps takes place in a Canadian suburb called Bailey Downs, where a mysterious creature, the Beast of Bailey Downs, has been picking off house pets, mainly dogs. The movie begins with the discovery of another such canine victim, but the attacks happen with enough frequency that, aside from the hysterical owner, no one bats an eye at this newest fatality. Other than the beast, the community is distressingly normal to the film’s two protagonists, Brigitte (Emily Perkins) and Ginger (Katharine Isabelle) Fitzgerald, who as children vowed to be “out by 16 or dead in this scene, but together forever.” Ginger at least appears to have opted for the latter option, as the sisters’ first scene together is a lengthy discussion and staging of various forms of suicide, which they put together as a photo slideshow for class. Although Ginger hails suicide as the “ultimate fuck you,” Brigitte is markedly less certain, worrying aloud that people will just laugh at her in her casket, her death having changed nothing.

Excellent show-and-tell project

There is of course much about the Fitzgerald sisters’ plan that conforms to the status quo. Suicide is an undeniably violent act, but it’s a self-directed violence, physically harming only the sisters and expected of women whom society views as predominantly nonviolent towards others. Given the abandonment of “out by 16,” it seems evident, too, that the sisters have succumbed to what they believe to be an inalterable, futile situation. They have no power to truly challenge the structures that make them so miserable. That is, until the Beast of Bailey Downs, a werewolf, attacks Ginger and she begins to change.

That the change happens simultaneously with puberty—her first menstrual cycle literally begins on the night she’s bitten—only heightens the sense of power Ginger now feels. Although still a weird Fitzgerald sister, her sexual appeal only increases throughout the movie until she fully transforms. This on its own is insufficient to manifest as a disruption. Ginger’s male classmates are only too happy to view her as a sexual object, albeit a slightly unsettling one. Even her confidence is unthreatening as long as it is confined to the context of their own desires. No, the difficulty is that Ginger remains unsatisfied and is no longer content to be so.

Unfortunately, nothing in this aisle for lycanthropy

In Jennifer’s Body, Needy and Jennifer play somewhat different roles in an otherwise familiar setting. Rural Devil’s Kettle, named for an unusual waterfall, may differ geographically from Bailey Downs but the sense of limitation and confinement remains. At the beginning of the film, Jennifer urges Needy to come to a concert with her because the band, Low Shoulder, is from the city. Her desire to leave Devil’s Kettle is evident in her enthusiasm, a fact Needy appears to wistfully recognize as they watch Low Shoulder perform at the local drinking hole. But Jennifer is no social outcast in the vein of the Fitzgerald sisters. She is, as Needy unnecessarily informs us, “a babe.” And though she characterizes herself as a dork in comparison, Needy herself hardly qualifies as a weirdo. “We were our yearbook photos,” she explains in her voiceover. “Nothing more, nothing less.”

Hard to make Amanda Seyfried look “dorky” but they tried

Jennifer and Needy’s desires similarly do not disturb societal structures. Even Jennifer, extremely cognizant of her sexual powers, is ultimately unthreatening. She is not much of a party girl either, saying longingly at the bar: “I can’t wait until I’m old enough to get trashed.” In other words, she plays by the rules. And despite her assertive attitude, willingness to manipulate men, and apparent confidence, the right sort of masculinity is enough to overcome her. This is painfully evident in her interactions with Nikolai, the lead singer of Low Shoulder, who continues to fascinate her, even after he insults Jennifer and the town.

Satanists with awesome haircuts

In fact, Nikolai brutally uses Jennifer’s desire for and idealization of the outside world against her. After a fire breaks out in the bar, killing several people, she and Needy flee through the bathroom window. Outside, Nikolai finds them and leads Jennifer away to the band’s van—the last time Needy will see her alive, as the members of Low Shoulder intend to sacrifice her in exchange for their commercial success. (It’s a hard world for an indie band. They’re just all so pretty.) When Jennifer appears again, covered in blood, she is possessed by a demon—and as with Ginger, her desires can no longer be sated by ordinary means. As Devil’s Kettle becomes a place of tragedy, Jennifer transforms into an agent of gleeful destruction, lusting not for attention or boys or society dictates for a teenage girl, but rather for power, violence, and fear.

The new Jennifer doesn’t care about gender roles

Ginger comes to a similar conclusion about her longing. “I get this ache,” she confesses to Brigitte. “I thought it was for sex, but it’s to tear everything to fucking pieces.” This conflation between sex and violence is hardly unique to Ginger Snaps or Jennifer’s Body, but the emphasis on female sexuality and female power subvert our expectations in the violent scenes. Nor are these neat, orderly killings—both Ginger and Jennifer tear open and partially consume their victims. These films are bloody and that blood belongs almost exclusively to men. Of the two, Ginger is much more erratic in her selection of victims, striking out mostly at male authority figures as they threaten her. This is fitting for her affliction and the gradual nature of her change, which, in an unusual twist on the werewolf trope, happens over the course of the month until the full moon instead of all in one night.

Jennifer, conversely, makes a full transition to her new undead, possessed state of being although her feeding patterns notably also occur on a monthly schedule as the life forces of her victims wane. As a hungry demon, as Needy points out, Jennifer appears remarkably like a woman in the throws of PMS: “She gets weak and cranky and ugly.” Being full, Jennifer explains, is an incredible high—and she’s basically indestructible. It’s no wonder that each month she seduces and consumes another boy after the juice from the last runs out. Externally, this does not manifest as a large behavioral shift. Jennifer is flirty, appealing, and deliberately submissive as she lures in her next meal. The difference is she no longer figuratively attains her sense of self-worth from her conquests—they are literally making her more beautiful and powerful.

Confidence is terrifying

We can understand why Ginger and Jennifer become so insatiable and simultaneously why their hunger appears so monstrous in the context of patriarchal society. Their love of killing makes them a serious threat. It’s the full realization of their powers and the traditional means by which they might be subdued—control over their self-image, social standing or physical wellbeing—no longer work. For the first time in their lives, both are completely uninhibited. They are free to want. There is something almost laudable about their transformations, too; they’ve gone from almost certain victims to powerful killers. And it’s all the more telling that we can characterize both films as macabre comedies as well as horror flicks; they are often as funny as they are frightening and their delight in the upending of social convention is palpable.

But it is the way of horror that normalcy often reasserts itself and the monster is destroyed. In the case of both Ginger Snaps and Jennifer’s Body, the agent of that destruction is not a man but another teenage girl—and not just any girl, but a literal or metaphorical sister.

Inseparable…until one of us gets bitten by a werewolf

Ginger’s relationship with her sister remains the only reliable element in her life, although her encroaching transformation certainly strains it, as she abandons, threatens, and ignores her at various turns. It’s clear from the outset that their relationship has always been one of distinct inequality with Ginger as the leader and Brigitte the follower. Brigitte, who grows more assertive as the story progresses, is determined to find a cure for her sister’s condition and teams up with local drug dealer and apparent lycanthrope enthusiast Sam. However, this new alliance irritates Ginger, who as they go to consult with him drolly remarks, “Romeo, Romeo, where for art thou, Romeo?” In fact, although there is real affection at the heart of their relationship, Ginger is undeniably possessive and jealous regarding Brigitte, accusing even the school’s elderly janitor of checking out her sister and then killing him in a fit of werewolf-induced rage. Neither is it accidental that Sam becomes her intended target, as she first attempts to seduce him and then attacks him when that fails. However, she does not target Brigitte until the very end of the film, at which point Brigitte resigns herself to killing Ginger in self-defense.

There are striking similarities in the relationship between Needy and Jennifer. Jennifer is often possessive and controlling of the weaker-willed and aptly named Needy. But they genuinely care for one another, as Needy observes, because, “Sandbox love never dies.” Despite her altered state, Jennifer avoids harming her friend, even when the demon inside her would clearly be glad to rip her to pieces, too. Instead, Jennifer settles for consuming the boys around Needy, including her goth friend, Colin, and her boyfriend, Chip. This last murder drives Needy to finally take action against Jennifer and the two exchange barbed insults in two confrontations that eventually result in Jennifer’s death. Needy flatly exposes Jennifer’s insecurities, revealing a dynamic that has subtly developed over the course of the film: Needy is the stronger and more capable of the two.

Jennifer confides in Needy

It is tempting to read these two endings as a reassertion of patriarchal values in the vein of conservative horror: the well-behaved, sensible girl saves the day and survives to tell the tale while the sex-crazed, uninhibited female monster is destroyed. This is accurate but for two facts: the tragedy of our two heroines and the contagion of violence. Brigitte and Needy are devastated by what they have to do, both visibly mourning the women they loved. For them, these moments are personal, not political. It’s worth asking if they would have intervened at all had Ginger and Jennifer ranged farther afield. Both look for other solutions; both permit at least one person to die despite what they know; both keep the confidences given to them. At the end of Ginger Snaps, Brigitte leans over the body of her transformed sister and sobs; having killed Jennifer, Needy is broken, bitter, and changed, spending her days in a mental health institution for criminals. Neither looks much like a heroine of the patriarchy; neither returns to the strictures of society.

Not so Needy anymore

And both are marked in more significant ways. Brigitte deliberately infects herself to gain Ginger’s cooperation. Jennifer scratches Needy as they struggle, thus communicating some of her demonic powers to her friend, a fact Needy reveals at the end of the film as she levitates out of solitary confinement and escapes. Although Ginger Snaps 2: Unleashed show us more of Brigitte’s fate—which also involves institutionalization—it’s unclear at the end of the first movie what the outcome of her infection will be. Jennifer’s Body gives us rather more, because Needy has one thing on her mind: revenge. The closing credits of the film reveal the gruesome deaths of Low Shoulder, and security footage shows Needy strolling towards their hotel room, her intent unmistakable.

Brigitte and Needy’s reactions remind us what we might forget over the course of these films: both Ginger and Jennifer are victims. They did not intentionally become what they are. But their survival makes them strong, even as it changes them in other more horrific ways. Those changes and that power are, the films seem to suggest, communicable. And despite their destruction, something of what they’ve gained persists in the women who love them and survive. Although the immediate threat may have passed, the possibility for further violence lingers.

Julia Patt is a writer from Maryland. She also edits 7×20, a journal of twitter literature, and is a regular contributor to VProud.tv and tatestreet.org. Follow her on twitter: https://twitter.com/chidorme