Ladies of the 1980s Theme Week – Page 2

‘The Golden Girls’: The Legacy of a Lifetime of Wisdom and Laughter

In 1985, television audiences were reminded that women of a certain age are just as vibrant, sexual, and as full of life as women half their age. They may also share a few life lessons along the way. The TV series ‘The Golden Girls’ — which aired for seven seasons — reminded audiences of all ages that life does not end at fifty for women.

This guest post written by Adina Bernstein appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

Picture it: Brooklyn, 1991. My sister and I, aged 10 and 7 are spending a Saturday night at our widowed grandmother’s apartment. Her favorite show is The Golden Girls.

My grandmother was not a young woman at that point. The youngest daughter of Russian Jewish immigrants, my grandmother had been through quite a lot, starting with the death of her parents when she was a teenager. Marrying my late grandfather (who passed away the year before) in the late 1940s, she raised two sons (my father and uncle). My grandmother watched her sons grow up, get married, enter the working world, and become successful adults. She and my grandfather had a hand in raising her grandchildren (my sister and I). Through that lifetime of experience, my grandmother was and still is a beacon to our entire family.

Once upon a time, older women were revered for the experience, knowledge, and wisdom that take a lifetime to accumulate. Those days, unfortunately, belong in the distant past. Once she reaches a certain age, a woman is more likely to be discarded for a “newer model,” thought to be senile, or viewed only through the lens of her role as a wife, mother, and grandmother. Who she is as a woman, what she has accomplished in life, and the lessons she can teach to those younger than her is often deemed meaningless in society.

In 1985, television audiences were reminded that women of a certain age are just as vibrant, sexual, and as full of life as women half their age. They may also share a few life lessons along the way. The TV series The Golden Girls — which aired for seven seasons — reminded audiences of all ages that life does not end at fifty for women.

Blanche Devereaux (Rue McLanahan) was the Southern belle rarely without a date. Rose Nylund (Betty White) was the innocent Midwesterner who never quite got the joke. Dorothy Zbornak (Bea Arthur) was originally from New York who always quipped the smartass one-liners. Sophia Petrillo (Estelle Getty) was Dorothy’s mother originally from Sicily who escaped the nursing home and whose age allowed her to be as far from politically correct as she wanted to be.

With television (and the media in general), then and now, most older women are not seen as vivacious, independent, capable human beings who can still contribute to the world. They are expected to quietly retire (if they did work outside of the home), take care of their spouse, children, and grandchildren. Their work is done. It’s time to sit in the rocking chair, knit a blanket or sweater, and watch as the next generation steps up to the plate.

They say that sixty is the new forty, that means that forty is the new twenty. People also say that age is just a number. I prefer the latter. Blanche, Dorothy, Rose, and Sophia were just as dynamic, sexual, and spirited as women on-screen who are half their age. In fact, their age made them even more appealing.

The Golden Girls touched on many subjects over the course of seven years: friendship, dating, menopause, being a parent to grown children who may make decisions not approved of, LGBTQ rights, the relationships between family, etc.

Looking back I can see the crack that The Golden Girls put in the glass ceiling. It was a small crack, but an important one. The lesson was clear: just because a woman is over fifty does not mean she is unimportant. What she brings to the table is priceless; there is no dollar sign on life experiences or wisdom. There is nothing more attractive than a person who combines life experiences, intelligence, and confidence to be who they are. Perhaps that is what made The Golden Girls appealing to all audiences and perhaps why there was a string of boyfriends and potential boyfriends that passed through the house.

When I watch The Golden Girls in reruns, I notice several things. I see my childhood and my late grandmothers, who were of the same generation as the characters. I remember the wisdom and experience my grandmothers had, that only someone who lives for fifty plus years can possess. I see four women who not only get along, but are able to maintain a very strong friendship despite their differences. I see four independent and self-reliant women with full social lives and romantic lives. I see four women who are funny, real, and full of life. I see the reminder that when life hands you lemons, you make lemonade.

In Jane Austen’s classic novel, Sense and Sensibility, Marianne Dashwood, says, “A woman of seven and twenty… can never hope to feel or inspire affection again.” Granted, this statement is coming from a girl of sixteen, but the sentiment reflects an overall cultural value about women and aging. Women, especially women of a certain age, are supposed to eventually step aside. The Golden Girls did not step aside, nor did they quietly accept the limitations that women their age are supposed to accept. Their declaration was loud and clear: older women can do anything that a woman of thirty can do. In fact, they may be able to do more, not only because of a lifetime of experiences, but because they are free of the responsibilities that come along with a career (although 3 of the women still had careers) and raising a family.

After my grandfather died, my sister and I spend many Saturday evenings with my grandmother. Looking back on those memories, I wouldn’t change them for the world. I also would not change the lessons about age and taking life by the balls that The Golden Girls taught their millions of fans.

See also at Bitch Flicks: How ‘The Golden Girls’ Shaped My Feminism

Adina Bernstein is a Brooklyn born freelance writer and blogger at Writergurlny. You can find her on Twitter @Writergurlny and Instagram.

Women Musicians in the 80s Used Music Videos to Expand Notions of Womanhood

Women in music broadened visual representations of gender as their cacophony of voices inoculated the population to women of all ages, races, and socioeconomic backgrounds. … The ladies of 80s music video brought forth new visual representations of women including: experiences in the workforce, issues of class, messages of power, and unique expressions of love and sex.

This guest post written by Gwen Hofmann appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

Like any self-respecting child of the eighties, I watched the recent CNN series about the decade. In the episode aptly titled “Video Killed the Radio Star,” former MTV VJ Downtown Julie Brown put the decade into perspective by likening it to looking through a kaleidoscope. Similarly, musician Questlove articulated his take on the decade’s music as being more influential than the 1960s because it incorporated additional voices. Assessments such as these are a great starting point for a discussion of the significance of musical ladies of the 1980s.

Any discussion of ladies of the 80s is incomplete without the inclusion of women in music. Bitch Flicks is devoted primarily to visual media and focuses on viewing films and television through a feminist lens. However, on August 1, 1981 MTV brought music into the format of visual media when it aired its first music video. While most people recall the first video on MTV, few remember that the second video was one of the pioneering leading ladies of the eighties: Pat Benatar with “You Better Run.” With this inauguration, women in music broadened visual representations of gender as their cacophony of voices inoculated the population to women of all ages, races, and socioeconomic backgrounds. Most intriguing about this “kaleidoscopic” decade is the way women in 80s music videos displayed these distinct portraits of womanhood. (Of course, this is not to say that there are not troublesome representations of women in 1980s music videos. This was in fact the decade of decadence which included things like the unforgettable Tawny Kitaen cartwheeling over cars, “Hot For Teacher,” and “Girls, Girls, Girls.”)

The ladies of 80s music videos brought forth new visual representations of women including: experiences in the workforce, issues of class, messages of power, and unique expressions of love and sex. In the infancy of MTV video, female artists created a complex pattern of images that underscored lyrics of power and individuality. Women were able to be quirky, androgynous, and assertive in defining their image. Strong women artists are nothing new; the decades are speckled with them especially over the 1960s and 70s. Building on the legacy of women such as Janis Joplin, Loretta Lynn, and Aretha Franklin, the new 80s format forced female artists to supplement lyrics with images.

Women visually asserted power in music videos. Some key examples of this phenomenon are observable in the videos of Joan Jett, Cyndi Lauper, and Pat Benatar. In 1981, Joan Jett released the video for her single “Bad Reputation,” which serves as an interesting starting point since women throughout history have long been held captive by threats to their reputation. Joan Jett throws years of repressive history out the window with this song and subsequent video. Jett commands viewers’ attention as she sings: “I don’t give a damn ’bout my reputation. You’re living in the past, it’s a new generation. A girl can do what she wants to do and that’s what I’m gonna do.” She visually supplements this with images of her dressed in a black leather jacket giving the middle finger to the people who told her to dress a certain way or who wouldn’t sign her to their record label. The song is strong enough on its own, but the video adds the story of how Joan Jett was discouraged by traditional venues such as major record labels — so she created her own.

This pattern of words being supplemented with images continues with songs such as “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” and “Love is a Battlefield.” Annie Lennox and Aretha Franklin’s 1985 hit “Sisters Are Doin’ it for Themselves” does this via a screen which functions as a third person on stage alongside these intoxicating women. Annie Lennox’s androgyny and the regal beauty of Ms. Franklin are noted as they sing: “Now this is a song to celebrate the conscious liberation of the female state! … The ‘inferior sex’ got a new exterior. We got doctors, lawyers, politicians too.” The screen aside these women adds images to their words by displaying the ways women used to be portrayed followed by images of women in power. On a smaller scale Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” tells us,“Some boys take a beautiful girl and hide her away from the rest of the world. I want to be the one to walk in the sun,” as Lon Chaney steals a woman and runs off with her with the 1923 Hunchback of Notre Dame playing in the background. Also in this video, Cyndi Lauper thwarts representations of patriarchal authority, something that Pat Benatar did in her video “Love is a Battlefield” from the same year.

Cyndi Lauper and Pat Benatar rebel against the symbols of male repression. Both videos feature the father, who not only stands for authority but also is symbolic of the most rudimentary forms of patriarchal repression. As Captain Lou Albano wags his finger in her face, Cyndi turns it around and places her father in a submissive position as she giggles and walks off. Pat Benatar continues this by running away from her repressive father and navigating the male dominated streets of the urban jungle. Her video brings light to the seedy sex clubs indicative of early 80’s Times Square, NYC. Women are fondled and ogled as blank expressions crossed their faces, only ended by mobilizing the women and rebelling against the male “boss” and other oppressors. Without the visual storytelling of the video, these songs would tell a very different tale.

Women in 1980s videos offered a motley crew of visual representations. Annie Lennox and Tracy Chapman’s androgyny, Cyndi Lauper and Jane Child’s uniqueness, and Tina Turner and Jodi Watley’s sensuality brightened the rainbow of women. Most of these women broadened definitions of beauty by showing that women didn’t “have to take our clothes off to have a good time.” On a more three-dimensional level, these videos added the faces of working women. Between the 1970s and 1980s the percentage of women entering the workforce surged and women such as Dolly Parton, Donna Summer, and Chrissie Hynde gave visual representation to the working woman and the struggles of getting by amid a massive recession.

If Dolly Parton’s 1980 song “9 to 5” seems the most obvious pick for discussing working women, I believe Donna Summer best represents the double burden of women’s work in “She Works Hard for the Money.” While the title says a lot, the efficacy is erased without the video. The lyrics address a hard working woman who makes an honest living but the video takes it a step further. In doing so, the idea is driven home that this woman must work multiple jobs to make ends meet and her double shift continues when she gets home. This suggests several things, such as women possibly having to work multiple jobs to make the same money as a man as well as the idea that women’s work is twofold and does not end inside her home. Conversely, the simplicity of Tracy Chapman’s video for “Fast Car” serves to reinforce the lyrics of her intoxicating, compelling words. Sitting against a black and blue background wearing a black turtleneck, the viewer is systematically directed to the movement generated by the words falling out of her mouth and to the emotion on her face. Her quiet strength speaks volumes about the story of a woman taking on the challenges of her socioeconomic status.

Finally, key women musicians of the 80s defined their characterizations of love, relationships, and sexuality. Tina Turner was nearly 45 years old when she dominated in the 1984 song “What’s Love Got to do With It.” Her stunning beauty and sensuality commanded the streets of her video as she compelled the actions of the men and women around her. It appeared as if the men wanted to be with her and the women wanted to be her. Through this video, Tina challenged ageist ideas about women’s sensuality while touting that emotions are secondary to physicality. On a spectrum ranging from Janet Jackson’s 1986 ballad “Let’s Wait Awhile” to Samantha Fox’s racier song “Touch Me,” women dictated the terms of their relationships. Ms. Jackson emphasized the rituals of courtship and togetherness in her video while Samantha Fox stressed more primitive drives. Within these videos, the women portray images of what is important to them in their relationships. Minus the Janet Jackson video which depicts a woman dictating a slower pace, the others support a positive portrayal of pro-sex feminist ideas. While these women offered a variety of images representing love and sexuality, Suzanne Vega does even more important work by putting a face on the more nefarious side of relationships.

In the video for her song, “Luka,” Suzanne Vega is shot in simple fashion as a diminutive character who shrinks as she tells her story of domestic violence. Vega wrote the song from the perspective of a child being abused. The truth of hiding child abuse and domestic violence is represented by the video being shot in black and white, allowing Luka to blend in to the background hoping to go unnoticed so that no one asks questions. The secrets, shame, and guilt that lead people to hide their torment are assumed in the way Luka tries to be a part of the scenery. The work of “Luka” is important so that people can have a face to relate to while bringing light to a vital women’s issue (women are often the survivors of domestic violence) not easily solved. Discussion is the first defense against isolation, for with it comes visibility and belonging.

I never loved the categorization of waves of feminism because of their reductive implications, but many people tend to understand the history of women this way. That being said, the ladies of the 80s in music videos represented the ideas best understood in the second wave of feminism such as sexuality, family, and the workplace. They dressed how they wanted, rebelled against authority, laid down the rules, and they were loved by many of us for showing a broader representation of what it means to be a woman in the 80s. They used their own images and the stories of the women in their videos to show that much had been accomplished but there was still work to be done. While we can give the finger to “the man” we still gotta work hard(er) for the money.

Gwen Hofmann is currently a PhD student in the History Department at Lehigh University. She is working on her dissertation involving representations of the cruel child in popular culture. She is the co-creator of the website www.HorrorHomeroom.com and is a devoted fangirl of all things 80s.

‘Crossing Delancey’: Isabelle Needs a New Perspective on Life and Love

This romantic comedy has always been more of a cult classic. But it was unusual in its female writer and director, along with its distinctly Jewish cultural setting, its generational custom-clash regarding matchmaking, and its conflicted independent protagonist, Isabelle, who could be read as a late 1980s precursor to ‘Sex and the City’s protagonist Carrie Bradshaw.

This guest post written by Susan Cosby Ronnenberg appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s. | Spoilers ahead.

Crossing Delancey (1988) is a romantic comedy featuring Amy Irving, directed by Joan Micklin Silver and written by Susan Sandler, based on her original play of the same title. The tagline was, “A funny movie about getting serious.” This rom-com has always been more of a cult classic. But it was unusual in its female writer and director, along with its distinctly Jewish cultural setting, its generational custom-clash regarding matchmaking, and its conflicted independent protagonist, Isabelle, who could be read as a late 1980s precursor to Sex and the City’s protagonist Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker). An independent, straight single woman with a successful career, Isabelle has professional and romantic options, ambitions, and flawed preconceptions about the incompatibility of those options and ambitions as she tries to decide between an internationally acclaimed poet or a neighborhood. Yes, you read that correctly: poet or pickleman.

Isabelle “Izzy” Grossman (Amy Irving) is irritating and relatable at the same time. She’s an ambitious and successful publisher in Manhattan, where, as she insists to her grandmother, she organizes “the most prestigious reading series in New York City.” She sees herself as modern, forward-looking, cultured, and sophisticated. But she’s also self-centered, snobbish, dismissive, and deceitful. While she possesses many fine attributes, she’s flawed; I like both of those aspects of her that make her fully human. At 33, with one of her peers becoming a new mother, Izzy looks around at her life, wondering about advancing her personal life as she has her professional one. This is a common theme among 1980s romantic comedies, such as Baby Boom (1987) with Diane Keaton and Working Girl (1988) with Melanie Griffith. One of her romantic prospects, a novelist, quotes Confucius to her at dinner one night, “Ripe plums are falling. Now there are only three. May a fine lover come for me”, adding reassuringly, “Lots of ripe plums left on your tree, Izzy.” He seems to recognize her distraction over the passage of time and still being single, which has become an issue with her grandmother.

Izzy has three men in her life: Nick (John Bedford Lloyd), an old boyfriend/friend with benefits, now married, but who crashes at her place on a regular basis when he and his wife fight; Anton Maes (Jeroen Krabbe), a NYC-based Dutch critically acclaimed novelist, also married but separated, famous, creative, cosmopolitan, and intellectual; and Sam Posner (Peter Riegert), who lives and works on the Lower East Side near her grandmother’s home, the owner and operator of his father’s pickle shop on Delancey Street. Sam and Izzy meet through the pressure of her grandmother, “Bubbie” Kantor (Reizl Bozyk), and Mrs. Mandlebaum (Sylvia Miles), a traditional professional Jewish matchmaker.

To Izzy, to cross Delancey is to return to the past, “100 years” and “a million miles away” from her own life, to her grandmother’s world. She does so often and willingly, providing company and care for her beloved grandmother. But she has no interest in a man who has chosen to remain in that neighborhood, doing the same food sales work that his father did, and, she assumes, contracting a matchmaker to find a bride. It clearly seems archaic and a little desperate to her.

The setting takes place half in Manhattan — in Izzy’s apartment, her place of employment, and out socializing with friends — and half on the Lower East Side — in Bubbie’s vibrant and diverse neighborhood, historically a predominantly Jewish community. It’s clear that, in trying to leave the old world and its ways behind as she makes her way in the new, modern world, Izzy has made some arrogant and faulty assumptions that will require Bubbie’s willingness to interfere.

Passing the Bechdel test, Crossing Delancey features conversations between Isabelle and Bubbie about Bubbie’s health, the neighborhood, Izzy’s dreams and what they might mean, and Izzy’s parents. Izzy actively seeks to support her friend Rickie’s new role as a single parent with a sometimes supportive boyfriend. She also supports her publishing colleague Chinchilla Monk’s new public access show on the local performance art scene, which features a feminist performer.

Izzy attends a bris for the baby of a high school friend of hers, where the film shows us a group of four women in their thirties sustaining a friendship from their teenage years. Two are single, one is married, and one is a new mother with a boyfriend. One of the women refers to the bris as, “Our first baby!” We see the women friends together in varying pairs throughout the film. This group resembles Sex & the City’s foursome of Carrie, Samantha, Charlotte, and Miranda, minus the multi-thousand dollar stylish and sexy wardrobe. Marilyn, in particular, reminds me of Elaine Benes from Seinfeld, which debuted a year after this film came out.

The film’s costuming is refreshing given the frequent sexualization of women in film through wardrobe today in most mainstream movies. The late 1980s is the era of the three-quarter or tea-length casual dress, with both dresses and shirts buttoned to the top, but without appearing constricting. Izzy’s clothes are appropriate for her varied activities: jogging, working at the bookstore, spending time with her grandmother, going on a date. What struck me most was that she looked nice and comfortable and her shoes were practical; she was dressed as many women in real life dress. There were no extra tight outfits, short-short skirts, stiletto heels, or plunging cleavage — at her place of employment or anywhere else. She was obviously meant to be doing things, not just to be the object of the Male Gaze: on display but not functional.

Crossing Delancey and Sex and the City share parallels as both Izzy and Carrie Bradshaw are thirty-something straight white women with successful careers and a support network of female friends. Both long for romance, question the idea of meeting someone who meets their requirements for a boyfriend, much less a husband, and both make selfish and deceitful decisions.

Izzy decides she doesn’t have chemistry with Sam but she likes him, so she attempts to set him up with her high school friend Marilyn, who recently complained that on a given first date she has “forty-five minutes to make this guy think I’m great, when I’d rather be home in my pajamas watching baseball.” But Izzy doesn’t tell Sam that she’s setting him up. Instead, she offers an apology for some of the things she said to him earlier and invites him to have dinner. She plans with Marilyn to “run into her” at the end of dinner, then leave her with Sam. Only the more Izzy talks to Sam, the more she likes him, and the longer she delays the introduction until Marilyn calls her on it and introduces herself. Sam feels used, but blames Izzy, not Marilyn, demanding “What’s there to be sorry about? She’s funny, direct, honest,” with the clear implication that Izzy is lacking in the latter two areas in particular. Afterward, Izzy pines after Sam with her other friends and her grandmother, until Bubbie brings Sam back into contact with Izzy.

Despite things finally seeming to click with Sam, Izzy allows Anton to persuade her to stay late after work to read part of his new novel. He flatters her and, knowing she has a date with Sam, encourages her to make him wait. Foolishly, she does, despite having spent time and money purchasing a new dress for the date and being eager to see Sam. Izzy realizes belatedly her error, in thinking that the mysterious and suave Anton wants a romantic and professional relationship with her when he’s looking for a part-time assistant and a convenient casual sex partner. Astonishingly, Sam has waited for her. He’s a man with the patience of a saint, but he’s not a doormat. In some ways this is a gender-reversed romantic comedy. It’s Izzy who races frantically across town, having come to the belated conclusion that she has been grossly overlooking, underestimating, and underappreciating who Sam is and what he has to offer.

The film presents us with three vivid visual images of groups of women in the city: at the senior center the women’s defense workshop that Bubbie participates in as Izzy watches in amusement; the after-work crowd in the deli/grocery, which includes Izzy, selecting dinner for one to-go from the salad bar; and the long line of pregnant women who file past Izzy and Sam in the entrance to her apartment building. These seem to suggest possible futures for Izzy: older, alone, and in need of self-defense; a solo continuation of her life as it is, focused mostly on work, eating deli take-out at the end of a long day; or preparing to become a mother when paired with Sam.

To choose one is to leave one unknown. Izzy doesn’t want to choose wrongly, or perhaps Izzy simply doesn’t want to choose at all. She’s mistaken in her arrogant and condescending assumptions about Sam, though, when she believes him to be not well read, inarticulate, and not cultured. When she mentions feeling ambivalent and then offers a definition, he interrupts to say that he knows what the word means. He adds, angrily, “You think my world is so small, so provincial? You think it defines me?” His defense of himself moves her as much as learning that he was interested in her because he had seen her around the neighborhood with her grandmother long before Mrs. Mandlebaum showed up with a picture of her (given by Bubbie) to peddle to him. He’s not trapped in the past as Izzy believed.

Although Sam suggests that Izzy needs a new perspective (i.e. a new hat), the Harry Shipman story doesn’t make that point clearly. In the story, Shipman’s new hat allowed the girl he had his heart set on to see his eyes for the first time. She couldn’t see his face for his original hat. But it isn’t Izzy who needs a new hat to be viewed differently. Instead, she needs a more realistic view of him, rather than her preconceived and uncompromising one as she’s frustratingly obtuse when it comes to Sam. She’s selfish in her decisions to keep juggling all three of men and she’s ultimately dismissive of her friend Marilyn after setting her up with Sam.

In some ways this is a film about narrative, including the stories we tell ourselves. We’re given multiple smaller narratives within the main narrative. The excerpt from his novel that Anton reads to the bookstore audience; Sam tells Izzy the Harry Shipman-hat story; Mrs. Mandlebaum peddles other peoples’ stories, poet Pauline Swift’s only referenced story of her, the four men, and a cabbage; Sam’s story of how Izzy came to his attention; the story of Sam’s father, who did a Milton Berle impression in drag, recalled by Nick to Sam and Izzy; and Bubbie’s story of meeting her husband, which she tells Sam. Izzy’s description of Anton’s fiction also describes her story in this film: “Deceptive accessibility. Reads like pulp fiction, but then you hear music.” Some lines are so lyrical they sound like poetry. Some are poetry. And they don’t all belong to the novelist.

The film ends refreshingly only with the promise of a continued dating relationship between Izzy and Sam, no grand declarations, promises, sex, or vows. Sam’s question to himself, to her, “How do I talk to Isabelle?” is an invitation, an openness to collaborate, to teach one another how to better communicate. Although Bubbie seems assured that a wedding will be taking place for them in the future, neither of them takes it that far. They like each other, they’ve admitted that, kissed, and agreed to see one another again. And for this charming romantic comedy, that’s more than enough.

Susan Cosby Ronnenberg is a transplanted Southerner in the upper Midwest, where she has been an English professor for 16 years, specializing in the English Renaissance and Early Modern Women Writers. Currently working on a book through McFarland on Shakespeare and the HBO western series Deadwood. Email: sgcosronn@gmail.com Twitter: @Ouachita9 Blog: Caustic Ginger.

Reagan’s America: Waiting to Die in ‘Testament’s Radiation Zone

‘Testament’ is primarily about women’s suffering, yet this very acknowledgement of women’s powerlessness in a world that patriarchal governments have just blown up is feminist at its core. … This 1983 film created by women gave the audience such a grim picture of the near future, without the excitement of special effects or the hope brought by overcoming obstacles, that it was a call to action, a message to avoid this outcome at all costs.

This guest post written by Angela Beauchamp appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s. | Spoilers ahead.

Zombies, plagues, nuclear destruction — nightmares of a catastrophic future are all the rage in recent cinema. Most often, we see bleak, desolate landscapes in which a masculine or androgynous action hero emerges to save the day, aka Mad Max or successor Furiosa. However, in the shadow of President Ronald Reagan’s aggressive anti-Soviet rhetoric and a doubling of the Pentagon budget in the early 1980s, a different kind of post-nuclear story emerged on television in the U.S. and the UK. The fictionalized present, rather than futuristic science fiction, introduced a cinematic living hell, not spectacular or heroic, nor hopeful for humanity’s future. On November 20, 1983, The Day After portrayed the realistic aftermath of nuclear war to an ABC audience of over half of the U.S. adult population. BBC’s Threads (1984), an even more brutal portrayal of life after the bombs, went on to sweep the BAFTA awards.

PBS American Playhouse produced Testament (1983), the third in this nuclear disaster triad, so impressive that Paramount picked up the film for theatrical release before it screened on television. A domestic drama about a northern California family dealing with the effects of radiation sickness and one death after another, Testament garnered a Best Actress Oscar nomination for lead Jane Alexander. In his 2002 book Atomic Bomb Cinema, Jerome Shapiro disparagingly designates this woman’s story as a “postnuclear feminist weepie” — the kind of language that calls feminists to take a closer look. Carol Amen published the original short story in Ms., and Lynne Littman directed the film, already with four Emmys and an Academy Award for documentary under her belt.

Shapiro disregards Testament because it is primarily about women’s suffering, yet this very acknowledgement of women’s powerlessness in a world that patriarchal governments have just blown up is feminist at its core. Acts like carefully sewing a shroud for her teenage daughter’s body displays the female protagonist’s courage. Perhaps it is just that no one had ever seen a post-apocalyptic movie before (or few since) without male protagonists or protagonists who take violent action to survive. Not many of us are a Furiosa at heart, but Testament is about an ordinary woman whose struggles might empower an ordinary viewer in the United States to take steps to join the nuclear freeze movement working to prevent a nuclear war. Children, seniors, women, and ethnic minorities are the survivors we see after white male authority figures disappear; the very people whose lives are usually subordinated are those who carry on.

It is hard to recreate the nuclear anxiety of this era now after the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War in 1990, but Ronald Reagan and his administration actually spoke of limited nuclear attacks as a legitimate military tactic in the early 1980s. Anti-nuclear activism and marches on Washington were at their peak, and as a nineteen-year-old, I remember having a nightmare about waking up to a nuclear winter. When I actually awoke and looked at the florescent bulbs above the bed in my dorm room, I was unsure about the literal state of the world. The threat was real, and unlike our current cultural obsession with zombies (which likely serve as a reflection of fears of terrorism, pandemic, and the like), complete nuclear annihilation was a nightmare with time to prevent it from actually happening.

In Testament, Carol (Alexander) is a 1980s mom whose life revolves around her household, with three children and a husband (William Devane) who is, frankly, a jerk who rarely listens to either wife or kids. Later it becomes evident that he is a symbol for those in power who don’t listen to constituents. Carol’s small, northern California town is very white and middle-class, but Carol and her 13-year-old son Brad (Ross Harris) are differentiated by their friendship with Mike (Mako), a Japanese-American man who owns the nearby gas station. His son Hiroshi (Gerry Murillo) has Down’s syndrome and is an obvious metaphor for Hiroshima and Nagasaki. On one normal day when the kids are fighting over the television set and they are waiting for dad to return home from a business trip to San Francisco, the unthinkable happens. Flashes of intense light, the bombing of American cities, cut off a broadcast alert about a nuclear attack.

There are no mushroom clouds, no other immediate horrors, just the loss of electricity and a man who never comes home from his trip. Carols writes in her journal, “I’m so afraid. Everything looks the same.” They notice a strange dust on the next morning’s breakfast plates, the neighbor’s newborn quickly dies (a very young Kevin Costner has a bit part as the baby’s father), and then rationing food and batteries becomes a concern. Soon radiation sickness becomes apparent, as youngest child Scottie (Lukas Haas) succumbs after spending the night hemorrhaging in his mother’s arms, and since the graveyard is full, the family buries him in the backyard, wrapped with a child’s colorful bedding. Next, teenage daughter Mary Liz (Roxana Zal) passes away. This we know after watching Carol stitch the body into a crisp, white sheet.

The orphaned neighbor boy, the Asian gas station owner, the older man who runs the short wave radio, the elderly European piano teacher … everyone is dying. We know that Carol, Brad, and the ultimate innocent, Hiroshi, will die in the end, but they don’t give up. As director Littman said many years later, “I identify with the mother in the story, except especially as portrayed by Jane. She was much braver than I could ever be.” The story is about an everyday homemaker who spends her last days burying her children as she goes hungry and loses her hair, yet this woman is an inspiration. She doesn’t fold even after seriously contemplating suicide; she doesn’t lie about the future; she faces this end of life, end of her family, with an emotional honesty that is not the melodrama of the soap opera or a Lifetime movie. We don’t all have children and might live very different lives, but this 1983 film created by women gave the audience such a grim picture of the near future, without the excitement of special effects or the hope brought by overcoming obstacles, that it was a call to action, a message to avoid this outcome at all costs.

The initial story came to writer Carol Amen in a dream. In the DVD extra “Testament at 20,” Jane Alexander talks about her own nightmare of going on a camping trip and not being able to get home because of radiation. She felt the film was a catharsis for that nightmare, a working out of those fears, and soon after filming, she became a spokesperson for Physicians for Social Responsibility, an important activist group at the time. An adult Lukas Haas reads a letter that he dictated as a five-year-old to President Reagan, asking him “not to do the bombs.” He talks about fearing that every airplane overhead might be the one dropping a nuclear weapon.

Watching the film today calls back those fears, and although a homemaker as the protagonist may seem a bit old-fashioned, it is the long takes, slow pace, and muted colors that really call back to this period (a pleasure for those of us who enjoy “slow movies” and editing before shorter attention spans). Jane Alexander had already received an Emmy nomination for her portrayal of Eleanor Roosevelt, went on to win two Emmys, and became the director of the National Endowment for the Arts during its particularly embattled period in the mid-1990s. Testament was about facing the unthinkable in 1983 and being called to do something about it. Although replaced by other serious maladies, today we can count our lucky stars that those nightmares of full-scale nuclear war have largely gone away.

Angela Beauchamp is a cinema lover, film scholar, and most recently, a zombie mashup junkie. She is preparing to teach a course on Post-Apocalyptic Cinema in the fall.

‘Jem and the Holograms’: Diversity and Female Empowerment

What I didn’t remember, and was pleasantly surprised by, was all of the diversity present in the show and the incredibly positive female role models that it presented to its young viewers. … It offered a positive statement on cultural acceptance and feminine strength at a time when children’s programming was lacking in both areas (and often still is today).

This guest post written by Horrorella appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

Jem and the Holograms was a pivotal part of my childhood. I watched it religiously. I couldn’t get enough of Jem and her rock star cohorts. The music, the characters, the stories – I ate it up like the candy-colored mountain of awesome that it was. I had a chance to revisit the series as an adult when I received the complete series box set as a birthday gift (note – it is SO gloriously pink). I poured some Cap’n Crunch cereal and sat down to revisit this show that had brought me so much joy in true Saturday Morning Cartoon fashion.

Reconnecting with this series was an incredibly fun experience, albeit a surprising one. I remembered Jem and her friends getting into scrapes, playing concerts, and trying to outwit the Misfits’ dastardly plans. I remembered the foster girls that found a home and a family at Starlight House and who were overseen by the band members. I remembered the conflict that Jem/Jerrica dealt with in keeping her true identity a secret from the world, and the resulting friction that created with her boyfriend Rio. I even remembered some of the songs.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkQE5wuBFeY”]

What I didn’t remember, and was pleasantly surprised by, was all of the diversity present in the show and the incredibly positive female role models that it presented to its young viewers. Though often criticized as being little more than a vehicle to promote the Hasbro line of dolls that had inspired the series, the show was actually so much more. It offered a positive statement on cultural acceptance and feminine strength at a time when children’s programming was lacking in both areas (and often still is today).

The Holograms celebrated an ethnically and culturally diverse group of characters who came from a variety of different backgrounds. Though Jerrica and Kimber were biological sisters, band members Aja (an Asian woman) and Shana (a Black woman) were adopted by the Benton family as children. Later, as the band expanded, a Latina drummer called Raya was added to the mix. This theme went on to include the foster girls populating Starlight House. Ba Nee, for example, a little girl involved in several major plot threads throughout the series, had been born to a Vietnamese woman and an American soldier before immigrating to the United States. The series took the time to showcase these cultural and ethnic differences, highlighting different traditions and backgrounds while also bringing the characters together as a united family.

Series creator Christy Marx stated in an interview with Off Hollywood that ethnic diversity was important to her when developing the characters. She wanted to be sure that all girls watching the show had someone to identify with, and made that a core goal as she began to develop the expanded cast. This was definitely a rarity among 1980s animated programming, and is something that made Jem and the Holograms stand out among its contemporaries.

Juxtaposed with our heroes, we have The Misfits – the nemesis band of the Holograms who are constantly trying to derail any project our heroes might be working on in order to stay on top. They are comprised fully of white women, and the leader, Pizzazz, comes from a particularly privileged background. Raised in an affluent lifestyle, spoiled, constantly angry, and dedicated to nothing more than getting her way by any means necessary, Pizzazz is the embodiment of entitlement. She will do anything within her power to stay on top.

[youtube_sc url=”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7r6-Ie0un84″]

In many ways, The Misfits represent the privileged status quo. They came to stardom before the Holograms, and are determined not to give up their spot on top. They refuse to make way or share that space with anyone else. They demand a level of treatment they feel is in keeping with their status as rockstars, and care little for anyone besides themselves (Stormer is often the exception to this rule, as she proves early on to have a heart, yet is easily bullied and influenced by her bandmates). The Misfits are simply another example of the people in power remaining in power, while everyone else has to struggle to get by.

Conversely, the Holograms can be seen to embody a more ideal future; something to strive for. Inclusive, and aiming not for fame and fortune, but for acceptance, integrity, and the greater good. Their songs have meaning and a positive message, often focusing on teamwork, fair play and the like. They lead by example, and offer a blueprint for what we could be, rather than what we often are.

The feminism and the female empowerment in the series is also incredibly meaningful and noteworthy. Jerrica/Jem is an icon, both within the story and for the show’s legions of young fans. Not for her fame or for being the rockstar with the cool clothes and the pink hair (though, admittedly, the pink hair was pretty rad), but for being a successful, confident and capable woman. She was a different kind of role model for a little girl growing up in the 1980s. We tend to focus on the fashion and the music present in the show, but more importantly, Jem gave us a powerful and successful female character to look up to. In her, we found a character who was in charge of her own destiny. An intelligent, savvy business woman who maintained not only a record company, but a nonprofit that housed, cared for, and provided a supportive home for foster children. In Jerrica, we see a balance of a woman who is able to achieve professional, financial, and artistic success, while also contributing positively and meaningfully to the world around her.

Marx says:

“The thing I like about Jem and Jerrica is that she’s kick ass in how she cares about this entire household full of foster girls, or she’s kick ass because she has this musical career, or she’s a music executive. She’s someone who is strong and independent and directs her own life.”

Marx also notes that though the series, its fashion, and its technology are all very 80s, the stories still speak to us even today. They have a timelessness to them that allows them to carry on. And as much as last year’s film revival was a raging disaster, the silver lining is that the values and power of the property have found a new embodiment reaching a new generation in the form of the IDW’s comic series. The books take the characters, stories, and concepts that made the original series so important and meaningful and bring them forward into the modern era, with continued racial diversity, varied body types, and sexual orientations; a swath of powerful, well-developed female characters and new adventures.

Jem and the Holograms impacted its fan base in a way that few series of the time (or since) were able to. Through building a cast and a series of stories that reflected the people watching it, it connected with its audience in an entirely new way. It provided the viewers with a positive female role model who was strong and powerful in ways not typically seen on television, and certainly not in children’s programming. Jem and the Holograms influenced a generation, and the lessons we learned from that show and its stories were taken with us into adulthood. Hopefully, its new incarnation will continue to do the same for new legions of fans.

See also at Bitch Flicks: Was ‘Jem and the Holograms’ a Good Show for Little Girls?

Horrorella has written about film for Ain’t it Cool News, the Women in Horror Annual and on her blog at horrorella.com. She geeks out incessantly over movies, television, comics and kitties. You can gab with her on Twitter @horrorellablog.

‘She’s Gotta Have It’: The Audacity of Sex and the Black Women Who Have It

I appreciate this film now because it centers on a Black woman who unabashedly is exploring and thoroughly enjoying her sexuality. By doing this, Spike Lee took long held beliefs and perceptions of Black women and pushed back on the constrictions and perceptions of society.

This guest re-post written by Reginée Ceaser appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

When I was not quite a teenager, I watched Spike Lee’s movie entitled She’s Gotta Have It. I watched and enjoyed the characters’ monologues and the way Spike Lee’s character, Mars, repeated questions during conversation. I knew it was about a young woman who had three boyfriends but did not understand much else, let alone its importance in the framing of the sexuality of Black women. Released in 1986, She’s Gotta Have It chronicled Nola Darling balancing a relationship with three different men at the same. The three men know about each other and constantly vie for Nola’s attention and affections in hopes of being the one she chooses to have a monogamous relationship with.

An issue brought up in the film between the men is maybe Nola is being a “freak” because she’s lacking something emotionally (like daddy issues). The remedy to attempt this “freak” behavior is make Nola go to therapy to work out her issues. Her therapist, a Black woman, feels that Nola does not have the deep emotional issues originally perceived, and is enjoying her healthy sex drive. Satisfied that she’s had enough therapy, Nola continues her relationships with her suitors. Looking back on the film today, I appreciate this film now because it centers on a Black woman who unabashedly is exploring and thoroughly enjoying her sexuality. By doing this, Spike Lee took long held beliefs and perceptions of Black women and pushed back on the constrictions and perceptions of society. Films like She’s Gotta Have It come out few and far between due to the “sensitive” context.

Preconceived notions of Black women in society have permeated into the fabrics of the stories of Black women in film and television creating flat, one-dimensional characters that are forced to speak to the humanity and womanhood of all Black women. Black women characters have been defined for decades by barely developed characters to serve their “larger than life” trope. For instance, there is the angry Black woman, the sassy Black woman, the fat and sassy Black woman, as well as the fat Black woman with low self-esteem, and the fat Black woman that desperately wants the love of a man but in the end is humiliated by him. There is also the frigid Black woman or the hypersexual Black woman. Lastly, and an all-time favorite, the Black woman that must choose between having a career or having a man (read: a dependable, steady sex life) to be fulfilled.

Many stories regarding Black womanhood are deeply rooted in sex and the respectability of sexual behavior projected upon them. Black women are often forced to live in a very tiny box with huge expectations of them and anything less than is being a renegade and a menace to society. We are supposed to be high achievers, while wearing our skirts to our ankles and necklines to our chins. Sex before marriage is frowned upon, having sex outside of a serious relationship can garner side-eyes and distance from friends, and having the audacity to freely explore sexuality outside of the norms of committed relationships and marriage is a disownable offense. There is no gray area allowed, no progression of full womanhood to be pursued and any open, honest conversation about sex and sexuality of Black women is relegated to girls’ night with friends.

Fast forward to 2013, and Mara Brock Akil debuts a new scripted drama, Being Mary Jane, centering on a Black journalist named Mary Jane, portrayed by Gabrielle Union. I fell in love with Being Mary Jane when Mary Jane sat her in office and masturbated with the help of a mini vibrator before going on a date. Another aspect that I loved about the scene is that Mary Jane didn’t immediately turn to porn to aid in her arousal; she had a computer and a smartphone and yet depended on herself and the vibrator. It is a choice that audaciously and efficiently wrestled down and shattered the myth that only way Black women achieve sexual pleasure is through men. It was gratifying to watch a long-held belief of Black women being scared, frigid and afraid to touch themselves and love themselves sexually evaporate on prime-time television.

Mara also crafted a nuanced woman that balanced a progressing career, taking care of family, evaluating and redefining friendships and of course, navigating an intricate and messy personal life. With Mary Jane’s intricate and messy personal life, Mara takes another bold opportunity to rebuff sexual respectability and cement agency and consent by introducing Mary Jane’s friend with benefits.

Friends with benefits is a subject that is frequently discussed but is tap danced around to avoid being labeled as promiscuous and “loose.” Also hinging on that fear is the thought of losing control of the ability to just have sex with no other emotional attachment. Mary Jane’s friend with benefits, or Cutty Buddy as he is affectionately known by fans, is paramount because he represents more than just surface level sex. He’s a beautiful, muscular, handsome man with a voice that sounds like hot butter on a fresh oven biscuit. He respects her and even cares for her but is fully aware of their agreement, makes no illusions about it, and is committed to upholding it. There is a mutual understanding and reciprocation of attraction that is delightful to see play out. That reciprocation is exciting to see, because too often we see or read about men who have casual sex or play the role of friend with benefits and then immediately degrade and shun them for engaging in sex outside of societal norms of a relationship. For example, in She’s Gotta Have It, Nola Darling did choose a man to have a monogamous relationship with and he in turn verbally attacks her and sexually assaults her for making him feel used. It is the ultimate act of “punishment” that is unfortunately used when sex isn’t played by the rules.

Navigating womanhood is not a straight shot; it’s not perfect but the chance to develop and nurture it on one’s own terms is a perfect realization in the feminist school of thought. Being Mary Jane provides the dialogue and the safety net in saying out loud ,”I see you, I’ve been there too and you are not alone.” The embracing of positive sexuality of Black women on television is not progressive feminism. It is the hope that future depictions of such will not be labeled progressive, but just as common as the stereotypes that have lingered for too long.

Reginée Ceaser is a New Orleans native who is a rockstar in her daydreams, retired daytime soap opera viewer, and proud television binger. Reginée can also be found giving dazzling commentary on Twitter @Skiperella and on her blog, Skiperella.com

Did Gender Alter the Tone of the ‘Alien’ Series? Narrative Implications of Femininity

It is science fiction fact however, that Ellen Ripley should not have been “Ellen Ripley” at all. Dan O’Bannon’s original script for ‘Alien’ stated: “The crew is unisex and all parts are interchangeable for men and women.” … In ‘Aliens,’ both Ripley and the alien are further solidified as female. …We come to an implied understanding that is wholly complicit in their both being mothers, adding a subliminal layer that would not have been present had either Ripley or the alien been male.

This guest post written by Kayleigh Watson appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s. | Spoilers ahead.

When Ridley Scott cast Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) in Alien, he created The First: The First Action Heroine; The First Female in a Science Fiction Film That Did Not Have To Be Rescued or Was Not Brunch for a Swamp Monster. Such titles may as well be monikers attached to her name. Ripley was important, and still is, her legacy living on in many an action heroine that followed: Buffy (the Vampire Slayer), The Bride (Kill Bill), G.I Jane, Trinity (The Matrix), Furiosa (Mad Max: Fury Road) and Sarah Connor’s transformation in Terminator 2.

It is science fiction fact however, that Ellen Ripley should not have been “Ellen Ripley” at all. Dan O’Bannon’s original script for Alien stated: “T he crew is unisex and all parts are interchangeable for men and women.” In the climate of the time, it is wholly plausible that Ripley was intended to be a male, as despite the script’s stated gender ambiguity, the original name for the character was still “Martin Roby.” So far so standard for horror and sci-fi, for the genres had always been male-dominated whether it be characters on-screen or in literature or those who create them. After all, it was not until the New Wave of sci-fi that women began to truly stake their claim on the genre, birthing feminist science fiction and writers such as Margaret Atwood, Joanna Russ, Marge Piercy, Ursula K. LeGuin and the singular entity that is Octavia Butler — C.L. Moore and Leigh Brackett being exceptions in the “Golden Age,” and Brackett went on to contribute to the screenplay of The Empire Strikes Back.

O’Bannon once stated that:

“I don’t see it as that revolutionary to cast a female as the lead in an action picture,” said O’Bannon. “It didn’t boggle me then, and it doesn’t boggle me now. My conception from scratch was that this would be a co-ed crew. I thought there was no reason you had to adhere to the convention of the all-male crew anymore.

After all, Star Trek had already had a mixed gender crew for years, and Ridley Scott had a similar reaction when the prospect of making the character female was pitched to him (“I just said, ‘That’s a good idea.”’). Scott later said in an interview:

“My film has strong women simply because I like strong women… It’s a personal choice. I’m no male chauvinist, nor do I understand female chauvinism – I just believe in the equality of men and women. It’s as simple as that.”

In Alien itself, Ripley – portrayed by the then largely unknown actress Sigourney Weaver – blended into the background of the team of the Nostromo crew; she was straightforward in conduct, voicing her opinion, making decisions, contributing to physical work and not waiting for someone else to save her. It can be intrinsically interpreted that these factors are entwined with the fact that Ripley’s character was intended to be male and, should “Martin Roby” have existed in her place he would have led the way as a main protagonist, one that is ultimately smarter than crewmembers with more authority.

Except nobody expected that of Ripley, solely because she was female. She was the ultimate unexpected protagonist, with the audience wholly expecting her to be snuffed out somewhere between the second and third act – because they had been conditioned their entire lives to do so. Her gender made her disposable – one only has to recall the aforementioned damsel vs. swamp monster scenario to consider how this should have played out. Yes, Ripley was female, but she was not feminine. That is the distinctive line here; she was not overtly sexualized (until she strips to her underwear near the culmination of the film: you can’t have it all, it seems), she fought back, she did not need to be rescued by a male, she wielded weapons: she defeated the “bad guy.” Due to the duality of the writing, Ripley became an androgynous entity in a fictional universe so symbolically enveloped in gender.

The Alien universe is primarily constructed around the perception of the “monstrous feminine” and plays into a lot of male-centric fears to do with gender alienation, with an aesthetic to follow suit. Renowned artist H.R Giger was in charge of designing the alien and set, and his explicit and sexually symbolic imagery can be viewed throughout, with phallic monsters hiding in a womb-shaped interior ready to pounce on unsuspecting victims. The Nostromo is the monstrous womb that births death, the gestation of that alien creature involving male rape – orally, impregnation and birth via the destruction of the male body; who can forget that iconic scene mid-film where the baby alien bursts through John Hurt’s chest, takes a look around at the crew’s horrified faces, before scurrying off into the unknown?

This narrative decision turns gender roles on its head and plays into male fears of human reproduction and that which they will never experience. It also draws from 1970s fears of “no longer being in control of our bodies,” as film studies professor Mark Jancovich asserted, thanks to “pollution, pesticides, food additives, man-made cancers” causing mutation. Extrapolating and combining the two sure makes for one horrific film. This monstrous amalgamation is culminated in a predatory creature that was designed by Giger to be both vaginal and phallic with a mysterious omnipresence onscreen. No character is sure what it is that they are facing.

Yet gender implications are reinforced in the making of the antagonist – the alien itself – female. Had Ripley’s character been “Roby” and the alien been male, the conflict would have been conventional. Had there been a binary gender-based conflict, e.g. Roby fought a female alien or had Ripley been a woman and the alien been male, it would have played into the perception of the “monstrous feminine” on alternate sides; the alien being primarily grotesque and man eating, with Ripley being similarly so for possessing male attributes of character. However, both Ripley and the alien are female, which makes for an interesting dilemma: both are considered to be “monstrous” and “feminine” despite neither possessing attributes of human femininity. Both are also capable of deploying death, to which men are either a spectator or a victim, which sparks Freudian psychology, simultaneously castration anxiety in males and possession of the phallus in females. So even though Ripley is female, are viewers actually still watching a protagonist that is essentially male?

This crisis of gender is complicated further as the Alien series progresses, as in Aliens – the 1986 sequel directed by James Cameron – both Ripley and the alien are further solidified as female. Cameron pushed the series into being specifically feminist, having Weaver reprise the role in more extreme circumstances. She gained a surrogate daughter – Newt – to protect, more men to fight and an Alien Queen – one who breeds – to defeat. Both the protagonist and antagonist (not the same alien) have graduated from being maidens to mothers. Both have dependents to protect. We first saw this side of Ripley when she went to find Jones – the Nostromo’s cat – in Alien, however it is important to point out aspect was part of the original script and not dependent on Ripley being female. Through the course of the film, we come to an implied understanding that is wholly complicit in their both being mothers, adding a subliminal layer that would not have been present had either Ripley or the alien been male.

By the time Alien 3 rolls around, it is quite clear where we stand, for whilst Alien subverted the genre and Aliens showed itself to be intrinsically feminist, Alien 3 fulfills the cycle of female purpose by casting Ripley as the “crone” of the “maiden-mother-crone” of the Triple Goddess interpretation of the female life cycle. She chooses to perish after discovering she is hosting an alien queen inside of her body, and as such, despite the franchise being perceived as a feminist one, the female protagonist has still been dragged back into a trope. It is an end that feels almost inevitable for the character – one that could have still been plausible had Ripley been “Roby” instead – yet is far more telling: the genre has to regain control of this strong female protagonist. Perhaps, in that manner, the real winner in this is the alien itself, for despite its specified gender, both it and its children continue to persist as a threat to humankind. Perhaps, the alien queen is the true exemption of this 1980s franchise.

See also at Bitch Flicks: Ellen Ripley, a Feminist Film Icon, Battles Horrifying Aliens… and Patriarchy

Kayleigh Watson is a writer and occasional illustrator from the UK. After realizing that her childhood ambition of being a vet would mean she would actually have to cut up pets (ew), she decided life would be better spent absorbing art and telling others about it. Her years spent studying for her BA (Hons) English and Creative Writing also involved music blogging, reading SF, and watching lots of Buffy. She currently writes about music for female-centric site The Girls Are as well as talking film and TV (or trying to) at her new blog Post-Modern Sleaze. A collection of her work can be found at what kayleigh said, and she tweets about all of the above under @kaylwattson. Her GIF game is strong.

The Feminisms of ‘Born in Flames’

It’s no coincidence to me that three years later Lizzie Borden would direct ‘Born in Flames,’ a film that depicts a collection of different feminist voices all aligned in a common goal of resisting what bell hooks terms the white-supremacist-capitalist-patriarchy.

Written by staff writer Heather Brown, this re-post appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

What is the role of difference in feminism? When in doubt, ask Audre Lorde. In 1980, she delivered a lecture entitled “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference” (later published in Sister Outsider) in which she states, “There is a pretense to homogeneity of experience covered by the word sisterhood that does not in fact exist.” It’s no coincidence to me that three years later Lizzie Borden would direct Born in Flames, a film that depicts a collection of different feminist voices all aligned in a common goal of resisting what bell hooks terms the white-supremacist-capitalist-patriarchy.

The film takes place 10 years after a social revolution in the United States (!). However, despite the political structure of a socialist democracy, social, and economic justice for the historically marginalized is still a long way off. Filmed in cinema verité style with non-professional actors and against the backdrop of Reagan-era New York City, the post-revolution future looks appropriately gritty, unflinching, and chaotic — much like the film’s narrative. So, too, are the voices of feminist activists that structure the film. First, we meet Adelaide Norris (Jean Satterfield) an African American woman who, along with Hilary Hurst (Hilary Hurst), a white woman, leads the Women’s Army. Both are disenfranchised by the government’s “work-fair” program, and we see them work to mobilize their respective communities across racial lines. And most importantly, we see them disagree about how to do it. Adelaide, influenced by her mentor Zella (played by the late feminist activist Florynce Kennedy), weighs the necessity of the Women’s Army to take up arms against the state, which has only ever perpetuated militarized violence toward women, lesbians, communities of color, and the poor in general. Zella tells Adelaide, “All oppressed people have a right to violence.”

In addition to seeing women converse with and debate one another, we also see them speaking from dedicated feminist platforms on pirate radio. Isabel (Adele Bertei), the DJ of Radio Ragazza, is an outspoken critic of the Women’s Army. She and her community represent the white, anarchist-punk perspective that promotes creative resistance through art. Then there’s Honey (Honey) of Phoenix Radio, a DJ who Adelaide seeks as an ally by extension of overlap of their membership in Black communities. Yet another voice is the Socialist Youth Review, a liberal magazine whose reporters (white women, including a young Kathryn Bigelow) occasionally weigh in to critique the Women’s Army for its agenda and question the need for it to exist at all, given the social gains achieved by the revolution. And finally, a distinctly anti-feminist perspective that provides a counter-narrative to the action unfolding is the voiceover of FBI agents, who aim to take down the Women’s Army, starting with Adelaide Norris. We hear them remark, “We don’t know who to find out who is charge” and “it’s not clear how they function.” These statements reveal just how confounding it is to the very centralized government that a social movement could share authority amongst its members.

One of the ways that the Women’s Army shares this authority is shared is through collective anti-street harassment activism and anti-rape squads. In a harrowing but triumphant scene, a woman is being assaulted by two women on her way to the subway, and out of nowhere appears a fleet of women on bicycles, blowing whistles and circling the men. The men leave the scene and the Women’s Army come to the aid of the attack victim. What is particularly important about this scene is not just how little things have changed when it comes to the endurance of street harassment and violence against women, but that the Women’s Army creates its own policing solutions to these problems. Instead of acting out carceral feminism, which relies on law enforcement and state violence to combat violence against women, the feminisms of Born in Flames create justice rather than restore “order.”

Though much is made of the differences between the activist groups, one thread runs through the film: the shared experience of work. There are several montages — set to the soundtrack of Red Krayola’s “Born in Flames,” which will get lodged in your brain for weeks — in which close-up shots of hands and all kinds of bodies are engaged in all kinds of labor. From bagging groceries, to child care, to sex work, each act is equated as valuable in its own right. One of the acts of resistance occurs after Adelaide, like many other women who are lower in the social caste, is laid off from her construction job and organizes a demonstration to fight for jobs that have the potential for growth.

The film’s rising action occurs when Adelaide is detained by the FBI on suspicion of arms trafficking — a fabrication intended to stamp out her and the Women’s Army. Without spoiling the film, let’s just say that the different feminist subgroups are called to combine their efforts and create Phoenix Regazza Radio to stand in solidarity as they enact a final act of terrorism. While this particular act is a bit chilling to watch post-9/11, it powerfully symbolizes the danger that will befall society should the marginalization of women and the white-supremacist-capitalist-patriarchy persist.

Heather Brown is a Bitch Flicks staff writer. She grew up in Connecticut but hopes that having lived in Virginia and North Carolina — and being married to an Arkansan — gives her occasional license to have a Southern accent. She recently fled a full-time job as a professor in central New Jersey, where she taught classes in gender studies, feminist theory, linguistics, and rhetoric. Long story short, she decided to leave the ivory tower to have more fun on the outside. Now she teaches online part-time, works as a freelance writer and instructional designer, and is currently pursuing professional coach certification training in Chicago, Ill., where she moved at the end of 2013 with her partner and cat, Edie. She lives for live music, road trips, and good movies. She blogs sporadically at PhDilettante.

‘Videodrome’ and the Pornographic Femme Fatale

David Cronenberg’s sci-fi-horror-noir ‘Videodrome’ updated the femme fatale as a response to media-saturated late twentieth-century culture. …The femme fatale is reborn and unleashed to warn of contemporary dangers, including how women’s media representation as sex objects is connected to capitalist propaganda, often with the intent of making a violent agenda seem pleasurable.

This guest post written by Stefan Sereda appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

“The beams become my dream
My dream is on the screen.”
— Blondie, “Fade Away and Radiate”

In Paul Schrader’s 1972 article, “Notes on Film Noir,” the soon-to-be screenwriter-director predicted with accuracy that the noir style would experience a revival in the decade ahead. While the list of New Hollywood noir films is too extensive to list here, encompassing everything from Point Blank (1967) to Blade Runner (1982) and several of Schrader’s own efforts, the Hollywood Renaissance is also known for genre revisionism, and one film noir convention that all but disappeared in the 1970s was the femme fatale.

Critics and audiences argue about whether classical femme fatales were “progressive” representations of American womanhood. From one perspective, fatales such as Kitty Collins (Ava Gardner) in The Killers (1946) and Kathie (Jane Greer) in Out of the Past (1947) embodied paranoia about crime, urban decay, family collapse, capitalist competition, and the sexual promiscuity associated with mid-century American womanhood. Of course, the villainous femme fatale archetype gained popularity in a decade wherein men found themselves competing with women in the workplace. On the other hand, femme fatales exercised agency and autonomy, unlike women found in most classical genres and especially in contrast to their domesticated “good girl” foils in noir. Although femme fatales were always destructive manipulators punished for their transgressions, these bad girls were resourceful and ambitious drivers of their own agenda who weaponized their sexuality.*

In the 1970s, film noir’s women were recast as social victims. The most glaring example of the femme fatale’s reformation takes place in Roman Polanski’s Chinatown (1974), where Evelyn Mulwray (Faye Dunaway) is a false suspect who only lies to protect her daughter, the offspring of an abusive, incestuous relationship with her father. Deadly women lurked off to horror films such as Brian De Palma’s Sisters (1973) and Carrie (1976). By 1981, the femme fatale came sauntering back wearing ironic virgin white when Kathleen Turner appeared as Matty Walker in Body Heat (1981). Blade Runner (1982) featured two fembots-turned-fatale (and another faux–fatale) whereas David Cronenberg’s sci-fi-horror-noir Videodrome (1983) updated the femme fatale as a response to media-saturated late twentieth-century culture.

A Postmodern Fatale

Andy Warhol hailed Videodrome as “A Clockwork Orange of the 80s.” The Canadian film stars James Wood as Max Wren, a television producer-turned-amateur detective looking for “something that will break through,” until he finds “Videodrome,” a pirate broadcast showing only detached scenes of torture and murder. Max is captivated, but “who would want to watch a scum show like Videodrome?” Max’s casual girlfriend, Nicki Brand, played by Deborah “Debbie” Harry of Blondie fame, is certainly an enthusiast.

Max first meets Nicki on a talk show, where they debate mediated sex and violence. Nicki bemoans contemporary Western existence as “overstimulating times,” but Max challenges her for wearing red (it’s worth noting the famous blonde appears with red hair in Cronenberg’s film), suggesting, “You know what Freud would say about that dress?” Nicki confesses Max is right about her — she also hosts the “Emotional Rescue” show, a talk radio advice program where she blithely addresses her callers as “lover,” signaling her detached post-sexual revolution approach to intercourse and personal attachment, if not her listeners’ attitudes as well. Nicki is a forward first date: the scene cuts to Max’s apartment, where she flippantly inquires, “Got any porno?” Nicki finds a copy of “Videodrome,” which she admits is a turn-on, despite it having no ostensibly sexual content. Max quips, it’s “torture, murder… not exactly sex,” but Nicki answers, “Says who?” She also reveals a history of S&M with “a friend” who she let cut her, and encourages Max to pierce her ear as foreplay while “Videodrome” plays in the background.

It soon becomes apparent Nicki is more sexually versed than Max and beyond his containment, as she progressively seems less naïve than she first appeared in each of her scenes. When Nicki announces she’s going to audition for “Videodrome,” Max warns her “these mondo weirdo video guys… they play rough… rougher than even Nicki Brand wants to play.” Nicki responds with a fatale’s obstinacy, extinguishing a cigarette on her breast. The next time Max sees Nicki, she’s performing on “Videodrome.”

Besides what Freud might call the subconscious “death drive” apparent in her masochism, Nicki shares superficial characteristics with the archetypal fatale. Her makeup and dresses recall the 1940s. As with many fatales, and Harry in real life, Nicki is self-aware of her status as a sex object, to the point where she craves objectification. In a screenplay loaded with double entendres, the name “Nicki” sounds sharp, but also resounding with the false innocence of fatale names like Kathie, Kitty, and Matty. “Brand,” on the other hand, connotes medieval torture and image commodities. Eventually, Max learns a corporate brand, Spectacular Optical, developed “Videodrome” as a mass brainwashing device in preparation for global warfare. Through “Videodrome,” Nicki — or, at the very least, the fatale’s simulacrum — ensnares, tortures, and directs Max.

Moreover, Cronenberg casts Harry to perfection. Before appearing in Videodrome, Harry was already a postmodern shapeshifter, the only woman to be a Playboy Playmate, a punk rock phenom, a pop star, and a household name big enough for The Muppet Show. A New Yorker up on the trends, she was even rapping as early as 1980. Blondie sprinted along a razor line between punk and pop, attracting Andy Warhol’s attention: his likeness of Harry graces the cover of Phaidon’s Andry Warhol Portraits.

Several Blondie songs, some with Harry-penned lyrics, demonstrate what made Harry an ideal choice for the role of a thrill-seeking sex obsessed woman adrift in a consumer-capitalist landscape. On the BDSM-themed debut album opener, “X-Offender,” she plays a sex worker who threatens to “perpetrate love” with her cop crush after he slaps the cuffs on her. “One Way or Another” relates post-sexual revolution mores to consumer excess, with Harry in stalker-mode, ready to pounce on a love-object in the supermarket and discard him thereafter like any other replaceable commodity. Of course, the song title, “Die Young, Stay Pretty,” offers a paradox that parallels Nicki’s early demise and uncanny life thereafter as a televisual seductress. “Fade Away and Radiate” is more specifically about screen performers surviving death as image commodities, with bandmate Chris Stein’s lyrics beating both David Cronenberg and Jean Baudrillard to the punch with regard to commenting on the hyperreal. Despite their sneering punk credentials, several Blondie songs are about gleeful abandonment to the consumer culture landscape of postmodernity — “Platinum Blonde,” “I’m on E,” “Rapture,” and the American Gigolo theme, “Call Me.” “Roll me in designer sheets,” Harry purrs, “I’ll never get enough.”

Pornography and Propaganda

Cronenberg’s techno-horror film is partially a response to porno chic, released a little more than a decade after Gerard Damiano’s Deep Throat (1972) broke through to mainstream audiences. Throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s, Toronto television station Citytv — the basis for Videodrome’s CIVIC TV — broadcast softcore adult films. Nicki becomes the film’s personification of pornography’s seductive and desensitizing potential.

Unlike the majority of horror films, Cronenberg’s ouevre torments male protagonists (by contrast, horror auteur Dario Argento made the sexist, objectifying remark, “I like women, especially beautiful ones. If they have a good face and figure, I would much prefer to watch them being murdered than an ugly girl or man.”). In Videodrome, much of the terror results from Max discovering his capacity for sadism. Yet the narrative and its iconography also interpret the media as a penetrative force. Max eventually learns “Videodrome” is not fiction but snuff, and that the violent imagery is meant to lubricate the brain to be more receptive to a signal that causes hallucinations. The film refuses to distinguish between these hallucinations and the narrative proper. Soon Max hallucinates/grows “new flesh”: a vaginal wound in his stomach that conspirators use as a tape player to remold him as an assassin. In other words, Videodrome also locates its horror in a man discovering in himself “feminine” traits such as openness and vulnerability for mass media to exploit. Cronenberg, the so-called “Baron of Blood,” likens violent media’s propagandist assault on the senses to rape when various parties forcibly penetrate Max with videotapes.

Nikki’s first appearance on Videodrome marks what Federico Fellini would call the film’s volta: its pivot-point between a narrative “reality” and the surrealist (or hyperreal) events that follow where “reality” becomes an outmoded concept. Soon after McLuhan-esque figure Dr. Brian O’Blivion (Jack Creley) finishes telling Max via video, “Television is reality, and reality is less than television,” Nicki is strangling him, and then seducing Max to consummate with his writhing tv set. Later, she appears to him via a VR headpiece, handing him a whip to encourage his penchant for violence in a dreamlike S&M scenario.

Similar to many fatales, Nicki has a “good girl” foil in Brian O’Blivion’s daughter, Bianca O’Blivion (Somja Smits), who runs a “Cathode Ray Mission” to give derelicts their fix of time in front of a television screen. Yet Bianca is as ruthless as Videodrome’s creators when it comes to brainwashing Max, and she turns him against the conspirators who sent him to kill her. Before Bianca sends Max off to kill while reciting the dictum, “Long live the new flesh,” she shows him an image of Nicki being strangled, insisting the “Videodrome” people killed her and used her image to seduce him, not unlike what she herself is doing to Max. It would seem Videodrome’s femme fatale is indeed punished for her transgressions.

Yet after Max believes he has put an end to “Videodrome,” he wanders to an “abandoned vessel.” There, he finds a television showing Nicki’s image. Nicki tells Max that to become “the new flesh” he must leave “the old flesh” and displays a scene of him shooting himself in the head. The film ends with Max saying, “Long live the new flesh,” and a cut to black synced with the sound of a gunshot.

The finale is ambiguous: is Bianca behind Max’s suicide or is “Videodrome,” and how much of what transpired was “real” or hallucinatory? Will Max have a second life preserved as a simulacral image? Regardless, in Cronenberg’s prophetic film, the femme fatale is reborn and unleashed to warn of contemporary dangers, including how women’s media representation as sex objects is connected to capitalist propaganda, often with the intent of making a violent agenda seem pleasurable.

References:

*For a more thorough academic reading of the classical femme fatale and “nurturing woman,” see: Janey Place, “Women in Film Noir,” in Women in Film Noir. Ed. E. Ann Kaplan. London: BFI, 2001.

Dr. Stefan Sereda is a writer/researcher with a PhD in English and Film Studies and an MA in Literature with a focus on gender and genre. His publications on American cinema and global media have appeared in A Companion to Martin Scorsese, The Memory Effect, Viewing African Cinema in the Twenty-First Century, the Directory of World Cinema: Africa, and ARIEL: A Review of International English Literature.

‘Working Girl’ and the Female Gaze

We so often view films through the Male Gaze with camera shots that are more interested in capturing the way a woman’s body looks under the guise of “sex sells” that it’s become somewhat of the norm. While ‘Working Girl’ is appreciative of the beauty between Sigourney Weaver and Melanie Griffith, it employs a “female gaze” so to speak with Harrison Ford.

This guest post written by Allyson Johnson appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

In any other film (9/10 times at least) just reading the synopsis of this movie would have greatly aggravated me and, to be frank, still did a little. There aren’t many films about women competing that paint the characters in question as anything more than shrewd, conniving and petty. Working Girl, much to my delight, doesn’t do that. Or, at least, it isn’t the main character’s objective. Hers is to simply find success and prove to herself and others that she has the talents and the skills to be more than what meets the mind.

The she in question is Tess McGill (Melanie Griffith), who lands a job as a secretary at a big company with a powerful woman, Katharine Parker (Sigourney Weaver) as her boss. At the start Tess is utterly enamored with Katherine, seeing her as a woman to look up to and admire, someone who has already achieved what she’s seeking and, in another film, I would have loved to see a buddy work comedy between the two, because who doesn’t want to be friends with Weaver? Of course, this isn’t to be because movies don’t like it when women are friends and instead, Katherine steals ones of Tess’s ideas and passes them as her own, leading Tess down a path of claiming her agency as a business woman looking to make a mark in the working world. What’s interesting is to see that despite her mounting disdain towards Katharine, Tess still adopts her mannerisms of how she operated in a work environment from the way she dresses and cuts her hair, playing a part to imbue herself with confidence she’s not sure she has yet. The difference is she’s coming at the role with a sense of selflessness and ambition, opposed to Katharine’s selfish nature.

Part of this is impacted by the actresses performances in the roles. Griffith who had been known for much more flightier characters brings a warm sense of empathy to Tess and a thread of naturalism as she too was undervalued as a performer until this Mike Nichols film gave her a bigger break out chance. Weaver, meanwhile, had at this point already played one of cinema’s greatest badasses in Ridley Scott’s Alien as Ripley, and her screen presence was one that captured attention; Weaver to this day is effortlessly enigmatic and it’s easy to understand why someone — real or fictional — would want to follow in her footsteps.

The contrast is one of the stronger aspects of the film which, to its benefit, never pits the characters against one another due to petty or contrived reasons. Tess is never aiming to purely undermine Katharine or trying to steal her position, but rather using Katharine’s absence to pursue her own career, even if it’s through dubious means.

The added element that solidifies the difference between Working Girl and other workplace dramedies — something that more fully flips the script?

Enter Jack Trainer.

A film that understands Harrison Ford’s beauty (and, frankly, exploits it) and treats it as such is a winner in my book automatically (Raiders of the Lost Ark — hello) and late 80’s Ford was on a roll as it is in taking more challenging work with some of cinema’s greatest talents, Mike Nichols being a wonderful addition to that list. While he certainly isn’t played strictly for eye candy (that would be something) he is, in a way, played a “prize” between the two women while also having his own role to play. We so often view films through the Male Gaze with camera shots that are more interested in capturing the way a woman’s body looks under the guise of “sex sells” that it’s become somewhat of the norm. While Working Girl is appreciative of the beauty between Weaver and Griffith, it employs a “female gaze” so to speak with Ford. So much so that there’s a scene that goes to great lengths to express this as he changes in his office and women looking in through the window catcall and whistle.

Perhaps it’s not enough to turn convention on its head, but it’s a welcome change of pace.

Also a change of pace is the fact that by the end of the film, Katharine and Tess aren’t fighting over Jack. They’re fighting over their place in the working world and, to narrow it down to a single moment, they’re fighting over a great idea that Tess had, one Katharine wishes she could have come up with and resents Tess for.

I wouldn’t call Working Girl a feminist call to arms and this is largely due to how broadly Katherine’s character is painted towards the end of the film. At the start she’s written to be calculated, sure, but not the caricature that she becomes halfway through and if she’s distrustful of other employees there’s sense to that too, considering she’s found herself in a sea of suits, in a position of power that’s so at odds with what society had dictated she be. There’s reason to her hostility even but then, rather than exploring her further to make the dynamics between she and Tess more intriguing, the film takes the rather easier route and lets Katharine remain in the two dimensional realm with Weaver doing everything in her might to make her into something more.

Add to that the lack of diversity and there was definitely room to grow — a lot of room.

Writer Kevin Wade and director Mike Nichols crafted a film that is both celebratory of the female experience while also skewering the system that placed them in gendered boxes in the first place. The biggest success of the film isn’t the romance or the drama, but the implications of what lead the characters to their positions in the first place. Katharine fought for the position she has and Tess fought to catch up and achieve the same goal. It’s imperfect, but ambitious, just like its leading ladies.

Allyson Johnson is a 20-something living in the Boston area. She’s the Film Editor for TheYoungFolks.com and her writing can also be found at The Mary Sue and Cambridge Day. Follow her on Twitter for daily ramblings, feminist rants, and TV chat @AllysonAJ.

“You Have No Power Over Me”: Female Agency and Empowerment in ‘Labyrinth’

So what distinguishes ‘Labyrinth’ from the Hero’s Journey tropes it so closely follows? Its protagonist. Sarah is the hero of the story. She doesn’t need to be saved because she’s the rescuer, and she carries the plot forward with her resourcefulness, tenacity, and self-actualization. …She navigates a tricky tightrope between fantasy and reality, dreams and goals, past and future, and discovers the kind of woman she wants to be.

This guest post written by Kelcie Mattson appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s. | Spoilers ahead.

Adolescence is tough, no matter who you are. Your emotions, perspectives, and body are changing, and the prospect of entering the complex, confusing world of adulthood can seem frightening. It’s especially hard for teenage girls. Life is capable of hideous cruelty: society has pre-set expectations it demands women meet, and there will always be those who attempt to control and oppress female agency. But there’s also freedom — the freedom to choose your own path, to explore, to express, and to discover who you are and the power within you.

Those are the major themes behind Jim Henson’s 1986 film Labyrinth. Although it wasn’t popular at the time of its theatrical release, over the past thirty years it’s become a deeply loved cult favorite for its coming-of-age themes, vivacious imagination, and David Bowie’s amazingly outrageous clothes. (Oh, dear David.) But beneath the puffy ball gowns and sparkly technicolor makeup lies a palpably feminist treatise.

On the surface Sarah Williams (Jennifer Connelly)’s story is about her maturation into an adult, but bound inherently to that is the development, and realization, of her personal agency. When we first meet her she’s a clever, imaginative girl who prefers the company of books, stuffed animals, and made-up fantasy lands over the mundane demands of suburban life. To this end Sarah is also an embodiment of the stereotypical characteristics unfairly assigned to teenage girls — immature, petulant, and selfish. She throws a temper tantrum when tasked with babysitting her younger brother Toby so her parents can, gasp, enjoy an evening out by themselves. Why should she be forced to look after a crying baby when she’d much rather dress up in a flowing white gown and play pretend? Sarah’s defense mechanism against her growing responsibilities is to cast herself into a skewed fantasy where she’s an innocent victim terrorized by evil parents.

It’s immature, yes, but so very relatable. Sarah feels isolated, confused, and jealous of her brother, and fueling the core of those frustrations is the desperate desire to do what she wants. “Life isn’t fair,” she cries when things don’t go her way, as I’ll bet most of us have. She’s a normal adolescent girl yearning for the independence to make her own choices. And that first choice happens to be asking the trickster Goblin King from her play to take Toby away.

Enter David Bowie’s Jareth in a shower of glitter, who offers Sarah a decision of his own design. If she solves the mysteries of his labyrinth within a thirteen-hour window, he’ll return Toby to her. If not, Jareth keeps custody of the baby in his goblin kingdom. It’s Sarah’s choice whether or not to rescue her helpless brother.

This is where Labyrinth dovetails nicely into several synonymous identities. It’s a fairy tale homage with modern-day values; it matches beat-for-beat the plot structure of the typical Hero’s Journey; and it’s a tale of internal strength that’s unabashedly, specifically feminine in nature.

As a fairy tale, admittedly it’s nothing too new. It follows in the footsteps of its predecessors (The Brothers Grimm, The Neverending Story, Where the Wild Things Are, The Wizard of Oz) by imparting life lessons through symbolism — the magical alternate reality is a safe place where our conflicted protagonist can decipher the fundamental difficulties of growing up. As a Hero’s Journey it’s nothing revolutionary, either: the “character embarks on a quest, encounters personal trials to stimulate his/her growth, hits their lowest point before rising up stronger” template has become such a commonplace backbone for popular media you can find it almost anywhere you look. Even Sarah reconciling herself to the obligations of adulthood is a commonly explored arc, from 1977’s Star Wars to 2014’s Boyhood.

So what distinguishes Labyrinth from the Hero’s Journey tropes it so closely follows? Its protagonist. Sarah is the hero of the story. She doesn’t need to be saved because she’s the rescuer, and she carries the plot forward with her resourcefulness, tenacity, and self-actualization.

At first glance it’s easy to write her off as a passive character seemingly helpless to Jareth’s erratic whims and elaborate traps. But although Sarah reacts to the obstacles Jareth throws into her path, she actively resists his narrative, twisting the conflicts around to suit her needs until Jareth becomes the one reacting to her. When he tries to disempower her by casting her in the role of a lost princess needing his protection from a horde of masked strangers, Sarah rejects his fantasy by literally breaking it with her fists. She’s not tempted by the pretty trinkets he offers nor quelled into submission by his magnetism; she’s steadfastly resolute in her goal. Of course she gains quirky Muppet allies along the way, but as she tells her newfound friends, “I have to face him alone. It’s the way it’s done.” And, and — she doesn’t win through brute physical strength, but through an emotional, mental acknowledgment of her own power.

Before the labyrinth, the idea of personal power was all fantasy. A book to read, lines to recite. Sarah has to endure practical life experiences, albeit in a fantastical setting, to recognize the full extent of her capability and then apply that knowledge in order to survive in a treacherous, unpredictable world. A man’s world.

“You have no power over me,” she declares to Jareth’s face; thematically, to outside forces at large. Once she claims ownership of herself, she triumphs in her dual goals: rescuing Toby, and finding happiness. A girl declaring what she wants without shame brings down an empire.

When you look closely, even the movie itself emerges from the decision Sarah makes to sacrifice her brother. She regrets her wish immediately, but that doesn’t change the fact she serves as the action’s primary catalyst. That’s rare, in the 1980s and today. Sarah alone directs her destiny by challenging the labyrinth’s infinite parade of decisions, even as she accepts that not all choices are simple, clean, or fair, and all of them have consequences that can’t be neatly resolved.

In that sense Sarah’s Hero’s Journey isn’t treated any differently by the script than if she were a boy — except for the fact her gender identity informs the film’s proceedings. The execution isn’t perfect: her emotional outbursts are treated as juvenile things to leave behind, and her faults (jealously, selfishness) are ones that tend to be assigned only to girls. But Labyrinth’s dramatic tension is centered entirely in a young woman’s mind as she navigates a tricky tightrope between fantasy and reality, dreams and goals, past and future, and discovers the kind of woman she wants to be. Compassionate, quick-witted, and iron-willed, willing to trust others and open to evolution of thought, while also prone to pre-judgment, naivety, and her fear of the unknown — all of which she overcomes. This makes Sarah not a weak token effort at inclusivity but a character who boasts a full, varied emotional life. She’s not there to service a guy’s development, to just be his victim or his love interest.

Which brings us to that pesky Goblin King. My adoration of Bowie aside, my interest in Jareth is in what he represents to Sarah — a deliberately disturbing mix of childishness and sexuality. Arrogant and assured, he first infantilizes Sarah by offering her gifts to win her submission. When charm fails, he tries intimidation, using his age, power, and authority to order her “back to her room” to “play with her toys.” When Sarah’s ingenuity continues to surpass his expectations, he flat-out presents himself as a distraction. Their dynamic becomes (perhaps always was) a choreographed seduction instead of the normal villain-hero relationship. Jareth’s threats read more like flirtations, especially in tandem with Bowie’s preening, charismatic performance and those, err… very tight pants. That blend makes him both a domineering father figure trying to restrict her autonomy and a potential lover.

Sex is mysterious, dark, and completely adult. Playing with lipstick in the bedroom mirror might be the first step of Sarah’s path toward romance (“I’d like it if you had a date,” her stepmother laments, “you should have dates at your age” — somehow I doubt she meant David Bowie), but Jareth personifies the seductive allure of the unknown, that elusive discovery of more. This is a movie with farting rocks and puppet dance parties, though, so the undertones remain subtle. But intentionally or not, Jareth’s both the embodiment of the patriarchy and the loss of Sarah’s innocence — a man dictating to a woman what he deems is the best thing for her, while also introducing an initiation into the sexual world as reward for her coming to heel. Those threats are very real, very relevant ones.

In a normal fairy tale, Sarah’s happy ending would be to marry him. Jareth fits the love interest archetype: rich, powerful, and regal, with control issues to boot. As tempting as his proposal can be from a certain perspective (I do swoon a bit), it’s a tangible power imbalance and unsettling in a way that borders on emotional abuse — of which Sarah is instinctively, if not implicitly, aware. She may have matured in her understanding of how the world works, but her white clothes signify she sees herself as the innocent in a sea of cruel lasciviousness. So despite the reciprocation and recognition of her desire, she knows she isn’t ready for that major step. That could be interpreted as a reinforcement of the damaging notion that a “good” woman must be chaste. But although Sarah rejects Jareth’s advances (and, impressively, his piercing male gaze; the camera never objectifies her), he still functions as the spark to her burgeoning sexual awakening. She’s curious and aware, but it has to happen on her terms at the right time.

For all his, “Fear me, love me, do as I say, and I will be your slave,” declarations (cool story, bro, but she’s sixteen), in the end Jareth’s just a privileged, lonely, petty man. He doesn’t get the happy ending he wants. Sad Goblin King is sad.

Of the things Sarah discovers along her labyrinth adventure, above all she learns the power of choice. She chooses between bravely confronting the uncomfortable uncertainties of real life or surrendering her free will to a fantasy. She chooses who she wants to be — a healthy balance somewhere between no longer a child but not yet a grown woman. One of my favorite things about Labyrinth’s message is Sarah doesn’t entirely dismiss her material possessions, but rather finds space for creativity and wonder alongside everything else. She can face her nebulous future with clarity, solid in her convictions and rooted in the understanding of her personhood.

Labyrinth teaches us that women have power. We can say what we want no matter the overwhelming pressures otherwise. We can shape a path for our lives and choose what’s right for us at the right time. We alone determine our self-worth; our stories matter.

We just have to remember the words.

Kelcie Mattson is a multimedia editor by morning, aspiring critic by afternoon, and tea aficionado 24/7. She’s been a fangirl since birth, thanks to reruns of Star Trek and Buffy. In her spare time she does the blogging thing on feminism, genre films, minority representation, comics, and all things cinephile-y at her website. You can follow her on Twitter at @kelciemattson, where she’s usually overanalyzing HGTV’s camerawork and sharing too many cat pictures.

10 of the Best Feminist Comedies of the 1980s

10 feminist comedies from the 1980s that focus on women and their careers, friendships, families, relationships, and journeys of self-discovery. Also, a look at how well these films do (or don’t) pass the Bechdel Test.

This guest post written by Jessica Quiroli appears as part of our theme week on Ladies of the 1980s.

9 to 5

If I may, this is the greatest women’s comedy of all-time. So perfect on every level, it’s hard to know where to begin; but how about with the three main characters? These are women on the verge: Judy, a woman in the middle of a painful divorce, is a bundle of raw nerves and professional inexperience. Rosalee is boss Franklin Hart’s secretary, experiencing his sexual harassment on a regular basis that she dutifully smiles through, while also putting a firm foot down. She’s also misjudged by women in the office about her relationship with Hart. Her story shows a side of women in the workplace that was too often kept secret, when women couldn’t freely report their superiors’ behavior without risking unemployment. And then there’s Violet, the woman who trained Mr. Hart, and is now his “right hand.” She’s so in control, so sharp, that it only makes sense that she’s who accidentally sends them into a madcap adventure of unintentional crime. Played by Jane Fonda, Dolly Parton, and Lilly Tomlin, this wild ride is a classic in any era, but a rare, feminist gem of the 80’s.

Bechdel Test Check: Of course! It’s a comedy about working women, workplace sexual harassment, fair pay, and a good old crime caper they alone must solve. First, they discuss matters of business, lamenting Mr. Hart’s horrible sexism and incompetence; then they band together to get out of hot water. They talk survival in the first half, then literal survival, and avoiding prison, in the second half. These women have a lot more to discuss than romance.

Private Benjamin

One of the best, if just for the ending alone. Goldie Hawn stars in this unique story about a young woman, Judy Benjamin, who seeks a challenge to her otherwise nice life by joining the U.S. Army. She quickly realizes the reality of that decision, but forges ahead. Judy rises to the challenge, bonds with the other women, and eventually has to decide what life she’d rather live. The other awesome thing about this movie: Hawn co-produced it with Nancy Meyers, who also wrote the screenplay.

Bechdel Test Check: Many conversations with the awesome Eileen Brennan, who plays Captain Doreen Lewis, including on arrival, when Judy explains she’s looking for the Army with “the condos.”

Desperately Seeking Susan

A buddy comedy without the buddies meeting until the very end. Susan, (pitch-perfect Madonna), is the exciting, perhaps dangerous woman leading an unapologetically carefree life. Rosanna Arquette’s Roberta is a woman married to a man she’s dissatisfied with, living a life she’s uninspired by. Reading about Susan’s life via a personal ads chain sparks Roberta’s imagination and she begins to follow Susan. All the action revolves around them; the men in their lives are the baffled bystanders. The women create the action, tension, and fun. Ultimately, we get two (!) heroines who’ve succeeded in the world by pursuing individual happiness they’ve refused to sacrifice.

Bechdel Test Check: Susan and friend Crystal discuss the working life. Crystal has a great monologue about feeling disrespected and being “legally blind.” Susan and Roberta’s sister-in-law Leslie chat, with Roberta’s husband Gary in the mix, about Roberta’s diary and how little they really know about her.

Fast Times at Ridgemont High

Stacy Hamilton isn’t waiting for the boys to find her. The high school girl Stacy, played by Jennifer Jason Leigh, embarks on a sexual awakening of her own design. She’s unsure, of course, but that doesn’t stop her. Stacy’s on a personal mission to achieve a rite of passage, a high school senior who’s sexually curious. She seeks advice from her experienced friend Linda (Phoebe Cates), hoping for tips and confidence. This movie’s viewed as a sex comedy for teenagers, but the subject matter’s depth, and how it’s portrayed, gives the film an emotional center with a genuinely sensitive, sometimes sad element. Yes, Jeff Spicolli, famously played by Sean Penn, is likely the most memorable character in most people’s minds (even IMDB lists him as the top billed-star). Stacy, however, is the heart and soul of the story. Her character is one we don’t see often enough: a teenage girl, discovering sex, sexual politics, and her own resolve to grow up and treat herself better.

Bechdel Test Check: There’s really nothing. If she’s talking to another girl, it’s about sex with boys.

Working Girl

Tess McGill’s devotion to her career is motivated by her desire to prove her self-worth, to no one else but herself, then to the corporate world. She has ideas, and plenty of intelligence and creativity to realize them. But her boss, Katherine (played by Sigourney Weaver) isn’t interested in helping her climb the ladder. The premise of a woman not wanting to help another woman is unfortunate, but realistically speaks to an earlier time in corporate America when it was even harder for women to succeed. Tess is fair, energetic, ambitious, and sexy. She doesn’t sacrifice anything to be loved, accepted, and successful. It’s inspiring and so fun to watch her emerge.

Bechdel Test Check: Tess and best friend Cyn, played by Joan Cusack with the most Brooklyn accent you’ve ever heard this side of a Joe Pesci movie, discuss Katherine’s absence and business meetings. Also, toward the end, Tess calls her friends and colleagues to make a huge professional announcement.

Baby Boom

J.C. Wyatt’s clocked countless hours, challenging the male-dominated corporate world so relentlessly, she’s nicknamed “The Tiger Lady.” She’s close to being made partner when baby Elizabeth comes along, after a cousin leaves her to J.C. for reasons that baffle her. Her colleagues and boss begin treating her differently. And the man she’s in a relationship with (played by everyone’s favorite, Harold Ramis) politely opts out. J.C. eventually takes her baby and business sense to Vermont and due to a dose of cabin fever, she creates a lucrative baby food company called “Country Baby.” The natural baby food achieves national success and her old company comes crawling back to her. J.C. also meets a veterinarian played sweetly and seductively by Sam Shepard, who respects her as she is, loves her, and loves her child. The story isn’t run-of-the-mill, but women everywhere can relate to juggling all the plates.

Bechdel Test Check: Really only one and it involves discussion about Elizabeth, just not a man. When Elizabeth is handed over to her by the woman from the adoption agency, Diane Keaton hilariously stumbles from impatient, to confused, to stunned, becoming completely unhinged by the circumstances.

Broadcast News

This powerful comedy/drama about a female news reporter, starring Holly Hunter, is perfectly imperfect. The story, the characters, the choices, and the ending are raw reality, rather than the gift-wrapped stories Hollywood, and audiences, love. Of course we love them! But we also love the messy, relatable truth. Jane’s a highly-respected news-producer, handling the egos of news-men Albert Brooks and William Hurt, who compete professionally, and for her affections.

Bechdel Test: Joan Cusack again! Very, very briefly, Jane and Blair exchange words about a segment that needs editing. Cue the most famous scene in the movie.

Heartburn

There’s no way to omit a woman’s story that’s both legendary in literary and journalistic circles, and one relatable to many women. While many of us are merely observers of what it was like for female professionals in the 80’s (and 90’s) who were trying to balance family and career, writer Nora Ephron lived through all the societal stages. But this is a very personal story, with some really raw ugly stuff that you can easily judge, but are better off staying out of the way of, as Rachel Samstatt’s (played by freaking perfect Meryl Streep) friends and colleagues learn. Food writer Rachel has such intense doubt on the day of her wedding to Mark Foreman (played also horribly perfect by Jack Nicholson) that her friends and family, and finally Mark, have to convince her to marry him. There’s a lot to laugh at, and a lot to boil the blood, as we watch Rachel figure out who she is and what she needs to be happy.

Bechdel Test Check: One absolutely killer scene. Rachel returns to New York, after leaving Mark, and she runs into an old friend named Judith (played by Doctor Marsha from ‘Sleepless in Seattle’!). Rather than tell Judith about her husband’s affair, Rachel lies and says that her mother died. Judith tells her that she’s learned that the death of one’s mother can actually be “a blessing.” There are worse things, Judith tells Rachel. “I know, Judith. I know.”

Beaches

This is a love story between two lifelong friends. There’s no replacing the relationship, as C.C. Bloom (Bette Midler) tries explaining to husband John, played by the underrated John Heard. That might be because the friendship began when she and Hillary Whitney (Barbara Hershey) meet in early adolescence, before boys, before adult life pulls them in many directions. They’re each other’s foundation, the one thing that they can count on. Hershey plays Hillary so understated in the light of Midler’s raw, over-the-top performance, that when she falls apart, her meltdowns resonate. When they finally meet again as adults, Hillary flips a switch for a minute, announcing she’s “Free at last!,” prompting C.C. to recoil, uncertain about a person she knows to her core, but is getting to know in a whole new way. This ranks high in all-time great female friendship movies, because, mostly, they aren’t competing for a man’s attention. They’re most hopeful to receive each other’s love and acceptance.

Bechdel Test Check: Their first meeting is as young girls, but we sure need more of those girlhood stories. C.C introduces herself, as if in Technicolor, to the refined Hillary. A lot is revealed quickly about what these girls know, want, and need. Hillary hangs her head sadly, and in hardened monotone, explains that her mother died when she was a little girl. C.C. proudly announces she’s a singer, disappointed that Hillary hasn’t heard of her. C.C. also smokes, calls her mother by her first name, and attempts to calm her mother’s emotions. Hillary talks about her aunt and her concerns that she’s getting into trouble. In a sense, they’re already business women trying to meet their families’ expectations. They harbor too much responsibility, and they talk like the old friends they’ll become. In a later, pivotal confrontation they argue about envying each other.

Terms of Endearment

Essentially about two women obsessed with each other, Aurora Greenway and her daughter Emma spend their lives loving, fearing and fighting each other. Men are in their orbit, flying as close as they can, never fully understanding or appreciating them. The mother and daughter (played by Shirley MacLaine and Debra Winger) love one another in an indescribable way, and determine their purpose and happiness. They take what they can and they own it, unapologetically. When Emma begins her affair with Sam (John Lithgow) she proceeds simply and fearlessly. When Aurora talks about sex and stringing men along, or becoming a grandmother (more accurately yells like she’s been wounded), she’s confronting uniquely female experiences. Full disclosure, Emma Greenway Horton is my all-time favorite female fictional character. Created in the Larry McMurtry lab, she’s first introduced in early books as a background character. This story, in case you don’t know, ends badly. But, until then, you’ll be laughing a lot.

Bechdel Test Check: Emma’s best friend Patsy takes her to lunch with her sophisticated New York friends. After lunch, Patsy admits she told them about Emma’s illness and they argue. Later, Patsy tells Emma why their friendship is so meaningful to her.

Jessica Quiroli is a minor league baseball writer for Baseball Prospectus and the creator of Heels on the Field: A MiLB Blog. She’s also written extensively about domestic violence in baseball. She’s a DV survivor. You can follow her on Twitter @heelsonthefield.