Giselle Defares – Page 2

The Female Archetypes Through the Lens of Roberto Rossellini

The character development of Pina and Marina used by Rossellini shows the influence of the war on Italian life and femininity. The suffering women are the epitome of the country at war.

This is a guest post by Giselle Defares.

Italian neorealism. Who would have thought that a genre that existed for a short period of time–1944 to 1952 to be precise–could have such a significant influence in the world’s cinematic history? The quintessential works of the Italian neorealist directors such as Vittorio De Sica (Ladri di biciclette), Luchino Visconti (La Terra Trema, Ossessione) and Roberto Rossellini (Roma, città aperta) are now anchored in our cultural lexicon. The genre has influenced the work of famed directors such as Truffaut, Antonioni and Godard. After all, didn’t Jean-Luc Godard state “All roads lead to Rome, Open City”?

Roma, città aperta, the first part of Rossellini’s neorealistic trilogy, is often cited as the prime example of the neorealist genre. In ravaged Rome of 1945, recovering from Nazism and fascist oppression, Rossellini formed a team with Federico Fellini and Sergio Amidei to create two documentaries. Amidei and Fellini encouraged Rossellini to combine the scripts to create realistic fiction. The film was shot on location in Rome on a shoestring budget (mustered with many loans). Rossellini used parts of a 35 millimeter film and the scenes were silently shot–Renzo Rossellini would later post-synchronize the sound. Voilá, Roma, città aperta was born.

The neorealist movement arose as a reaction against the glamorous melodramas that had previously dominated the Italian film industry under the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini. The fascist Mussolini used cinema as a place where the Italian citizen could dream of the lush–unattainable–images and temporarily forget their own harsh reality a.k.a cinema of distraction.

The neorealist directors sought out to present a degree of unfettered realism that wasn’t presented on the Italian silver screen. The films addressed social problems such as the ravages of war, crime, unemployment, and poverty. The sense of immediacy throughout the film–scenes shot in locations where eight months before the city was occupied by the Nazis–had no correlation with any other Italian film produced in the 40s. Upon its release, Roma, città aperta, was received with mixed reactions in Italy. Luckily the rest of the world was transfixed by this form of new realism. The film won the Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival in 1946. Fellini, Rossellini, and Amidei were nominated for an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Roma, città aperta centers around the plight of the core members of the Italian resistance against the occupational Nazi government. We follow Giorgio Manfredi also known as Luigi Ferraris (Marcello Pagliero), a communist and leader in the resistance who’s wanted by the Nazis. His friend and underground Communist newspaper printer Francesco (Francesco Grandjacquet); his fiancée, the widow Pina (Anna Magnani); and the priest Don Pietro Pellegrini (Aldo Fabrizi). The trio will help Manfredi get a new identity. Pina’s son, the young Marcello, has been active in the resistance against the Nazis. In the tumultuous events that follow, Francesco is arrested but later manages to escape. While Manfredi gets betrayed by his lover, femme fatale pur sang, Marina (Maria Michi).

Most research on the film–see for example the work of David Forgacs, Peter Brunette, Tag Gallagher–is focused on the politics of filming, the catholic church, or other neo-realist features. Not much is written on the archetypical roles of the women in this film (bar the work of Marcia Landy. The character development of Pina and Marina used by Rossellini shows the influence of the war on Italian life and femininity. The suffering women are the epitome of the country at war.

Fascism encouraged the rise of the so called New Italian Women (Nuova Italiana). During Mussolini’s reign, Italian women struggled with the dilemma of the lure of modernity versus the rut of tradition. Though their freedom was curbed: no voting rights for women, no female participation in the labor market, and a ban on abortion. The role of the women herein was in essence purely to bring forth children. These contradictions were emphasized by the gap that existed between the traditional Italian society of the First World War and the division of modernity that fascism entailed. In 1933, Mussolini’s stated, “ Woman must obey… My idea of her role in the State is in opposition to all feminism. Naturally she shouldn’t be a slave, but if I conceded her to vote, I’d be laughed at. In our State, she must not count.” Right.

In Roma, città aperta we are introduced to two archetypes. First, the headstrong Pina, the rock who supports her husband, yet is allowed to be vulnerable. Then there’s Marina, the “weak” and venal woman who will succumb to all her desires. This dichotomy between Pina and Marina is the classic example of the Madonna-whore complex. Marina is presented as the complete opposite of Pina. Pina can be seen as the new Italian woman. Her whole look and attitude throughout the film is that of an ordinary, disheveled woman. She almost seems stripped of her “femininity.” This is a stark contrast with Marina, who works as a showgirl and enjoys her silk stockings, fur coats, and cigarettes – all the finer things in life. Marina seems like the new embodiment of the earlier femme fatales that reigned in the Fascist cinema–women who lived by no discernible laws and destroyed men who crossed their paths. Although, Rossellini’s version of the femme fatale is portrayed as a frail woman. Marina doesn’t fully embody the vivacious and sexual role the previous Italian femme fatales had. She’s doesn’t sashay her way through life, instead she’s considered weak and unable to deny herself any desires. This is also illustrated by Rossellini’s portrayal of her “liaison” with the Nazi Ingrid (and to underline the “moral depravity” during the war). It’s important to note that while Marina is depicted as the sexual deviant, it is Pina’s motherly and devout character who ultimately comes across as impulsive and irrational.

In arguably one of the most famous scenes, Pina runs after a prison truck while shouting “Franchesco!” as her husband is taken by the Nazis. It’s a quick montage of short takes and one very dramatic tracking shot that underlines the abruptness and finality of death – the scene is inspired on a real life event in 1943 where Maria Teresa Gullace participated in a protest and was shot in front of her husband and son.

Roma, città aperta is one the most conventional films of Rossellini, well, at least in terms of narrative and dramatic structure. Through cinematic codes like shot / reverse shot, mise-en-scene, framing, and continuity montage, directors can reveal gender relations. Critic Laura Mulvey refers to it as the male gaze and states that cinema ideally is meant for the male audience. She divides the term in two: active male and the passive female. The problem lies in the fact that the woman is just a lust object on the screen, but that the male viewer meanwhile still has an irrational fear of the woman.

In Roma, città aperta the gaze shifted in the sense that the role of Pina and Marina is dialectical. The strong, motherly and modest woman knows her weak moments. Throughout the film the gaze lingers on the tired face of Pina. Marina realizes what she did, who she betrays and struggles to looks at herself in the mirror. Through this narcissistic gaze, the viewer is also hit with this realization. Pina is portrayed as the caring mother, and Francesco had found the perfect woman to start a family with. Marina is the epitome of the whore; she’s only there for men (or women) to have sex with, but cannot be tied down or feel true love. This is shown in her relationship with Manfredi. Manfredi’s looks and glances at Marina are nothing more than lustful. His gaze holds contempt for the fact that Marina is so weak, she’s willing to sell herself in order to establish a luxury life. Marina is clearly a passive female, but Pina has a more active stance. Nevertheless, her activity was not accepted and she comes to her untimely end.

Throughout the film, Rossellini leaves room for your own interpretation and strengthens the feeling of uneasiness that the story evokes – see the ambiguous “open” ending. The strength of Roma, città aperta lies ultimately in the images of Rome, the “amateur” actors (see the wonderful Magnani and Fabrizi), and the film’s aesthetic. It all lifts the film to the next level. Rossellini’s film depicts the reality of war and the displacement of women out their stereotypical roles during moments of distress.

Roma, città aperta has brought us some of the most indelible images in world cinema.

Giselle enjoys googling random things, late night conversations, and can’t stray far from the impulse to write it all down. She writes on fashion, film, and pop culture here.

The Invocation of Inner Demons in Andrzej Żuławski’s ‘Possession’

Mark’s doppelgänger reflects Anna’s fascination with Heinrich’s persona: narcissism, religion, imagination, and his sexual freedom. Anna’s doppelgänger, Helen, is a pure, calm, and collected woman. That’s precisely what Mark wants–the opposite of Anna.

This guest post by Giselle Defares appears as part of our theme week on Demon and Spirit Possession.

Possession in horror is often linked to the control of a person by a demon or spirit. It’s an impending revelation of an evil outside one’s self. Why are we so enthralled with this concept in horror? If you follow the “Beast Within” approach, Joseph Grixti argues that horror stories evoke a certain catharsis as an important mechanism to give a place to deep psychoanalytic and suppressed desires. He believes that “human beings are worried at the core.” In other words: the catharsis within the horror genre can in this way serve as a safety measure. Is that not precisely what Aristotle said on tragedy: “Catharsis through tragedy accounts for the transformation of what would be painful in real life to what is deeply enjoyable when embodied in the structure of a work of art. ” Possession (1981) is often shelved with the other classic horror movies of the 1970s and ‘80s–think of The Exorcist (1973) or The Amityville Horror (1979)–but the horror genre doesn’t fully reflect the intricacies of the movie. Possession is a cult-drama-psychological-thriller- horror to the max.

The Polish director Andrzej Żuławski left his homeland after his second movie, The Devil (1972), was banned. He moved to France and his project Possession got financial backing from a French production studio and was shot in West Germany. His success in France gave Żuławski the opportunity to move back to Poland and work on a project of his own choice. Unfortunately, the Ministry of Cultural Affairs halted the production of his movie On The Silver Globe (1988).

Possession is inspired by real life events (well, sort of). Żuławski penned the script after his marriage to Malgorzata Braunek (Polish star of his first movies) crumbled down and he was left with the care of their son Xawery– who is now a celebrated director in his own right. After its release, the film was heavily cut in the US and banned in Britain, until an uncut VHS release in 1999. Isabelle Adjani received accolades for her role and she won the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival, and vowed that she would never play a similar role again.

Possession takes place in gloomy, washed out Berlin. Mark (Sam Neill) comes back from a duty journey–as an international spy does–to his wife and young son, and finds that in his home nothing is as it seems. The opening scene of Possession is focused on the end of a marriage. Anna (Adjani) tells Mark that she feels that she has to leave him. Although she doesn’t quite understand why, she laments “Maybe all couples go through this..?” The tone is set in the first three minutes, and the unraveling of the marriage begins. Anna shows disruptive behavior, becomes unhinged, and sneaks off to her unseen lover. While Mark was away, she had a relationship with Heinrich (Heinz Bennent), who is a kung fu practicing psychiatrist and apparently sexually superior to Mark. Slowly the “family” drama is unfolding.

Possession gives us a marriage where the protagonists are conjuring the demons that we have within ourselves. It was interesting to see Mark decompose himself when Anna asks for a divorce. You slowly see him breaking down, rocking back and forth on his bed, the fear and despair seeping out of his pores. He can’t hold on to his idyllic image he created of Anna. He has to let go, but he can’t. The first half of the film focuses on the dissipation between Mark and Anna. We are voyeurs in their claustrophobic apartment. The second half has a sudden psychedelic and macabre feel. The events are more in the open and all the craziness bursts out. Mark hires a private detective to check on Anna’s whereabouts. She’s been living in an abandoned apartment where she–literally–can hide her monster. Slowly we see the monster evolving and his appearance becomes more human while Mark and Anna fall into despair, violence, and hysteria. The apocalypse is coming.

The movie is filled with metaphors. In one of their numerous shouting matches, Żuławski directly puts a car crash into the shot. Every action in Possession has a double meaning. Whether it’s the location (divided Berlin), or Anna’s hysteria, which is countered by Mark, who remains stiff and stoic. There’s a lot of excess in the movie, whether it be bodily fluids such as vomit, blood, milk, mucus, or the over spilling of emotions from Mark and Anna. While emotions run high, we’re introduced to the presence of the couple’s doppelgängers. Mark’s doppelgänger reflects Anna’s fascination with Heinrich’s persona: narcissism, religion, imagination, and his sexual freedom. Anna’s doppelgänger, Helen, is a pure, calm, and collected woman. That’s precisely what Mark wants–the opposite of Anna. Helen exclaims she comes “from a place where evil seems easier to pinpoint because you can see it in the flesh.” Alright.

“What I miscarried there was Sister Faith and what was left was Sister Chance.”

The relationships are complex. Anna is depicted as the hysterical one in the relationship. Their son Bob functions as their bridge. Bob is the sole reason Anna keeps being lured back into Mark’s arms. Bob spends a lot of time underwater, while practicing his “world record in tub diving.” Anna is driven by a primal instinct, which is repressed by Marks’s cold conservatism. Mark proclaims “God is evil” and succumbs to adultery and abuse. Throughout the film there’s a shot of him gripping his wife and son’s torso, a way to out his dominance and control their body. After the infamous subway passage scene, Anna is finally able to let go of her inner evil and embraces it.

Żuławski’s directorial style is electric yet graceful. The DOP, Bruno Nuytten, uses imaginative camerawork. In various points, he shifts from handheld and shaky camerawork to fluid, kinetic shots while following the couple around. The music by Andrzej Korzunski gives the movie an extra layer of uneasiness while we see the interwoven lives of Mark and Anna unravel and we’re speeding alongside them crashing to a forceful split. Neill and Adjani’s performances are mesmerizing, and they completely submerge themselves in the unfolding hysteria. The FX master Carlo Rambaldi’s humanoid-tentacled-sex-quid monster is mainly shown in dark, shadowy shots which amps the level of gore (Rambaldi is also responsible for giving us the cuddliest of aliens E.T. The Extra- Terrestrial).

It almost seems redundant to mention it, but the comparison is easily made. Possession was the inspiration for Lars von Trier to make Antichrist (2009). Both directors use the horror genre to capture marital strife; the scenes are sexually explicit, and show self-mutilation and gruesome gore.

Żuławski kept the atmosphere dense with subcutaneous tension throughout the film. Possession is a two-hour rollercoaster of emotions and wailing, screaming, violence, sex, and bodily fluids. It shows the complexity of human relationships. Żuławski doesn’t give you the answers. The film is open to interpretation. The demons are not an outside force, but sleep in the hidden depths of our being. At least it will give you some food for thought on your intimate relationships.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWbJbOu9Nxc”]

Giselle Defares enjoys Googling random things, late night conversations, and can’t stray far from the impulse to write it all down. She writes on fashion, film and pop culture here.

The Allure of the Female Ghost in ‘Ringu’

Horror. It’s a genre that ignites different reactions: excitement, disgust, fear or indifference. Who would have thought that an inanimate object – and the female ghost that comes with it (free of charge) – could be so frightening? The enigma of the monstrous female can be found throughout history in literature, movies, and contemporary pop-culture. An array of female monsters are waddling around in our hazy pop-culture memories. Think of the witch, vampire, psychopath, and the scorned ghost. The term “ghost girl” has now even levitated itself to our cultural lexicon.

This is a guest post by Giselle Defares.

The Japanese horror genre gained popularity since the fifties, thanks to a group of visionary directors such as Masaki Kobayashi (Kaidan), Nobuo Nakagawa (Ghost Story of Yotsuya) and Kaneto Shindo (Onibaba). These directors usually brought adaptations of traditional Japanese stories, but they were not afraid to experiment with other genres or even psychedelic influences. The crux is that the appeal of the Japanese horror movie lies in the fact that the genre constantly renews itself, while ensuring to remain faithful to its roots.

In 1998, a new creative and commercial momentum took place thanks to Ringu (Ring), an adaptation of the bestselling novel by Koji Suzuki. The story has some elements from the 18^th-century Japanese ghost story Bancho Sarayashiki. Director Hideo Nakata managed to visualize a clever but vulnerable heroine, and themes were subtle interwoven by using the power of the media to portray the heroine’s fears. Ringu, an unusually oppressive movie, became a blockbuster, followed by the inevitable sequels, American remake, a television series, and a series of comic books.

Ringu follows the storyline of the TV journalist Reiko Asakawa (Nanako Matsushima) who investigates a bizarre rumor: her niece Tomoko and three of her friends apparently died after seeing a videotape. Reiko hears stories that the videotape kills the people after they have watched it, and they all die in the exact the same way. Reiko investigates the story, finds the videotape, and ends up watching it herself. Soon after, Reiko receives a phone call with the news that she has only one week to live. What follows is a race against the clock, in which Reiko tries to figure out the origin of the videotape. Her ex-husband Ryuji (Hiroyuki Sanada) tries to help her break the curse and find the true story behind the cursed videotape and the connection with a psychic who died 30 years ago and her child Sadako.

Reiko has to make a though choice. To watch or not to watch.

Why are we so enthralled with female monsters? In The Monstrous Feminine, cultural critic Barbara Creed refers to Freud’s controversial theory of castration anxiety – children notice the difference between boys and girls aka penis or vagina, boys are of the opinion that something is taken away from girls, and this makes them worried – in dreams, myths, and in movies this fear translates to the symbolic loss of a phallic symbol. It can be a sword, a motorcycle, or car. When you flip the coin, the vagina is portrayed in a less favorable way. All too often the vagina is depicted as a dangerous – monstrous – hole to be avoided at all costs. This is described as the “vagina dentata,” the symbolic representation of a vagina with teeth, making the Freudian castration anxiety tangible within the story. In popular culture, the vagina dentata can for example be seen as the eye of Sauron in The Lord of The Rings or the desert monster Sarlacc in the Star Wars trilogy.

Creed also connects the creation of female monsters with abjection. She refers to Julia Kristeva who defines abjection as that which crosses borders, positions, rules and identity, system and all that disturbs the peace. In other words, anything beyond the strict limits of the phallic order and that aims to disturb the order. The abject not only crosses borders but draws the existence of limits itself into question, and thus the existence of the phallic order. This abjection is strongly related to the patriarchal vision of femininity. Creed describes horror movies where the monster is portrayed as abject as an “attempt to separate out the symbolic order from all that threatens its stability, particularly the mother and all that her universe signifies.”

For this reason, there are many movies that don’t have a male but a female monster. Abjection includes everything that we consider to be dirty. It’s what we learn as a child that is seen as bad and what we need to suppress. In particular, bodily secretions such as blood, urine, mucus, and pus. The horror genre plays with this fear of the abject and wants to break taboos. In Ringu, Sadako, the female ghost is portrayed as a lurchy and dirty, rotting dead girl with long, dark hair that obscures much of her face, dressed in white, and her fingernails are broken and bloody. Yuck.

We find Freud’s idea of castration anxiety also within the psychoanalytic film theory in terms of the male gaze. Laura Mulvey argues that cinema ideally is meant for the male audience: “The determining male gaze projects its phantasy onto the female figure which is styled accordingly. In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness. ” The problem lies in the fact that the woman is just a lust object on the screen, but that the male viewer meanwhile still has that (irrational) fear of the woman.

In Japanese horror movies, they flip the script, and more often than not the focus is only on the eyes. This is also the case in Ringu. For a long time we do not even see the eyes of Sadako, and the tension builds up until the moment when we get to see them. In general, people blink around 15 times per minute. Ghosts don’t blink. They seemingly stare with an endless gaze ahead. But there’s another ambiguity. Sadako’s eyes show no sign of life; they are merely hollow, black orbs. At the same time they seem to register all the movement in her environment, and her looks are purposeful and deadly. It’s almost like the gaze of Medusa. In that sense, Sadako’s Medusa’s gaze is projected from the male gaze. The woman stares back at the man. In Ringu, it’s the woman who actually kills with her looks. Ryuji symbolizes the male voyeur and gets punished. The fear of the man is a reality here.

Throughout the movie, director Nakata leaves room for your own imagination and strengthens the feeling of uneasiness that the story evokes. To be quite honest, on paper, the plot for the story line is at first sight not scary at all. The strength of Ringu lies in its absence and not particularly the gore that is visible on the screen. The hard, screeching and metallic, non-diegetic sounds, ups the creepiness of the movie. The editing, camera angles and lighting, lift the mediocre plot to the next level. The videotape – a seemingly innocent inanimate object (!) – of Sadako stands symbol for the mass media and for the pernicious influence they have on society. After all, only the people who watch the videotape die.

Ringu keeps your attention because – let’s be real here – the female ghost is a fascinating entity. All too often the source of their pain has nothing to do with the supernatural, but it’s a painful residue of their human lives. Sadako wanted vengeance, but her vengeance was randomly destructive. This makes her all the more powerful. You can see this in Kabuki and Noh theater also known as Oiwa, in which the spirit of a woman returns to her husband, who poisoned her. Unlike the average monsters in other horror movies, ghosts can think, feel, and they have a certain consciousness. Sadako holds the power to haunt us in our dreams. Yikes.

Ringu gave our pop-culture some of the most indelible images. The movie came out in 1998, and since then a variety of female ghosts have graced our screens. It would be interesting to see how this genre can renew itself over and over again. Let’s see what the future of horror brings.

[youtube_sc url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JruLV_Wjkp4″]

Giselle Defares loves television shows like Äkte Människor and The Fades; movies like The Fall, The Invader, High Fidelity. See her tumblr here.