Tag: Leigh Kolb

‘The Girls on Film’ Project Challenges Viewers’ Expectations

Here at Bitch Flicks, we discuss at length the under-representation (and often problematic representation) of women in media. In 2011, 11 percent of protagonists in the top 100 domestic grossing films were female (down from 16 percent in 2002). In contrast, women make up more than 50 percent of the population in the United States.
Toronto filmmakers Ashleigh Harrington and Jeff Hammond’s “The Girls on Film” project was inspired by an acting class the two took together. In an interview, Harrington says that their instructor would sometimes give male parts to female acting students as an acting exercise, and they decided they wanted to do something with that concept. Hammond adds that their goal is “entertainment” and to “stir up some questions” about gender in film. 
Ashleigh Harrington and Jeff Hammond, the duo behind “The Girls on Film”
They note that it seems natural to act in and watch these ultra-masculine scenes with women playing the men’s roles (although Hammond says that while it works with women playing men’s roles, when men play feminine characters often the result is “comedy”). Of course, this reinforces the notion that female characters are often marginalized, and the masculine–the lead–is what we aspire to be.
Harrington, left, as Tyler Durden and Cat McCormick as the narrator in Fight Club
So far, the two have produced scenes from Fight Club, The Town, No Country for Old Men, Star Trek, Twilight and Drive. The Fight Club (no, not Jane Austen Fight Club) and Drive scenes are particularly powerful in the fact that they aren’t spectacularly jarring. Instead, they seem organic, like women belong in those roles.
Laura Miyata as Anton Chigurh in No Country for Old Men
In a piece at The Guardian, Mathilda Gregory favorably reviews the project and analyzes what it is that we as audiences want and need:

“‘The Girls on Film’ project also raises a more subtle point. Do we need more films about what is      typically seen as ‘female’, or do we just need to relax more about which roles women can play? What is most astonishing about these gender-switched scenes is how well they work. … I quickly forget I was watching anything other than a scene from a movie.”
The fact that we can forget we’re watching “anything other than a scene from a movie” would suggest that the answer to Gregory’s question is a resounding both. 
Comparisons of the originals and their remakes

Hammond speculates what it might be like if Hollywood remade classics like Back to the Future with a female lead. Perhaps instead of regurgitating remakes ad nauseum, that could be one way to refresh old stories. (Ridley Scott–who has provided audiences with noteworthy female leads–has already said that the Blade Runner sequel will have a female protagonist.) While the answer to our female protagonist woes certainly isn’t recycling men’s stories and casting women in historically masculine roles, “The Girls on Film” provides an interesting and meaningful perspective into what it would look like if we allowed and expected women to have leading, “powerful” roles.

The possibilities could be endless.

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

‘The Mindy Project’ : A Case for the Female Anti-Hero


‘The Mindy Project’ premiers Sept. 25 (the pilot is available on Hulu).
The anti-hero is in. While one could analyze at length what this says about our society, it’s clear that we are more smitten with the male anti-hero than the female one. There’s still a notion that our female protagonists–when we get them–need to be flawed, but not too much. We still want them to fit a mold of what we deem good.

Mindy Kaling’s new sitcom, The Mindy Project, gives us the rare fully flawed female anti-hero in a prime-time comedy. What’s striking in the pilot episode (Hulu is previewing the pilot before the show premiers on Fox on Sept. 25), is that Mindy’s character, Mindy Lahiri, an OB/GYN, isn’t particularly lovable. In fact, she’s kind of an asshole.

And it’s great.

Lahiri gets trashed and attempts to ruin her ex’s wedding. She loves romantic comedies in a completely shallow, selfish way. She makes inappropriate (even racist) jokes. Was I being seduced by the fact that M.I.A. was blasting in the background during the show’s climax? Why did all of this work so well for me?

Lahiri, at her ex’s wedding, drunkenly insults the couple (including jabs at his new wife’s ethnicity).


I realized that it felt good to see an unlikable female protagonist. It felt good to see a true female anti-hero. Of course, it’s clear that we are supposed to root for her, and can do so easily. Lahiri as a protagonist fits in more with Sterling Archer, Michael Scott, Larry David and Jeff Winger than she would with Leslie Knope and Liz Lemon. We accept men as lovable assholes, but for women it’s often a different story.

The expectations we have for female characters in entertainment rival the expectations we have for women in our culture. Be funny, but not crude. Be pretty, but not vain. Be confident, but not prideful. Be excellent at your career, but don’t sacrifice love and motherhood. Be sexy, but not sexual.

Our expectations for men are much simpler, and less impossible. In fact, the expectations could be characterized as “lack thereof” (this is problematic in its own way). Perhaps this is the reason why we embrace the male anti-hero (whether it’s a sitcom, hour-long drama, film or Ernest Hemingway novel). Audiences expect men to be crude, shallow and unpleasant on many levels. These low expectations open up countless opportunities for complex male characters.

“I’m sorry, disorderly conduct? Aren’t there rapists and murderers out there?”
Upon release from her arrest, Lahiri shows little remorse.


Don’t get me wrong, I love Knope and Lemon. Knope’s character–the entire show, really–is a shining example of feminism in practice. Lemon is flawed, but is also hyper-self-aware and apologetic for herself in many ways. Both of those characters want to be liked. Lahiri (a true model Millennial) doesn’t seem like someone who would apologize to anyone. She just wants it all.

I look forward to having a relationship with a female anti-hero like I have with so many male anti-heroes on TV. I look forward to laughing and/or cringing at some of the character’s words and actions. Lahiri is not what we’ve been taught is the ideal. She’s real, and says and does things that don’t “fit” the ideal mold. Of course it goes without saying that seeing a curvy woman of color in a leading role feels pretty amazing. 

We don’t need every female protagonist to be a true hero. We simply need more complex depictions of women–the good, the bad and the accurate. We shouldn’t expect our female protagonists to keep sweet any more than we should ourselves. 

A reviewer at The Atlantic Wire, in a disappointed review of the pilot, says of the show’s premise, “… I’m worried this particular setup might not be the one. Bawdy talk in an OB/GYN office followed by drunken antics in a mini dress is all well and good, I guess. But Kaling, to some of us at least, has always seemed a bit better.”What does this mean, exactly, besides A. the show is too feminine, and B. she should be “better” than bawdiness and drunkenness? That’s not the point and is the whole point, all at once.

Lahiri grew up in an era of idealized depictions of love and womanhood via Meg Ryan and Sandra Bullock rom-coms. She wants that happy ending, but doesn’t seem to want to change herself for it. She’s clearly excellent at her career. At the end of the day–and at the end of the episode–she just wants to get laid. So she does. 

She smiles toward the camera and we’re invited not to judge, and not to clutch our pearls and wish for a more perfect female character. We’re simply supposed to come along for the ride.



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

Summer Blockbusters Prove Women (Not Surprisingly) Enjoy Laughing and Gawking from Their Own Perspective

The Significance of Bridesmaids and Magic Mike in a Sea of Masculinity

Not this.


In Christopher Hitchens’s infamous essay, “Why Women Aren’t Funny,” he points to a Stanford study that rated men and women’s reactions to cartoons on a “funniness” scale. The study found many similarities between men and women’s responses, but also found some marked differences. The author of the original report said, “Women appeared to have less expectation of a reward, which in this case was the punch line of the cartoon… So when they got to the joke’s punch line, they were more pleased about it.”

When people–especially an entire group of people–have low expectations, and don’t expect “reward” from their entertainment, certainly this is the set-up of a self-fulfilling prophecy, leaving women pegged as unfunny, unable to get jokes, and generally un-stimulated by what the normal audience (men) is stimulated by. Hollywood has been working under that framework for too long, and women have learned to expect that men’s stories are the norm, and women’s stories are just for women.

However, two summer blockbusters–Bridesmaids in 2011 and Magic Mike in 2012–have proven that when women are rewarded, they are indeed pleased. 

While one can easily find wider representation in art house movie theaters, commercial, blockbuster films for the masses have long been entrenched in a sexist Hollywood boys’ club. While these commercial films had flaws, the audience support and huge profits should teach Hollywood a lesson about what women want.


Bridesmaids broke the mold of the R-rated comedy genre by being about women and from a woman’s point of view. While raunchy, raucous comedies about men and men’s stories have been dominating the big screen for years, a modern counterpart with a female protagonist was an anomaly until Bridesmaids. Judd Apatow, baron of bromance, asked Kristen Wiig for script ideas, and she and her writing partner Annie Mumolo created Bridesmaids, and Apatow produced it.

Bridesmaids featured a female protagonist and told a uniquely female story, while still attracting and entertaining male audiences.


Before the film was released, many were pushing going to see it on opening weekend as a “social responsibility,” as box-office activists knew that the numbers had to be there for studio executives to trust that a blockbuster from a woman’s point of view can work and be profitable. And it was. Bridesmaids went on to become Apatow’s highest-grossing film, and the top R-rated female comedy ever.

Within weeks, female comedy was said to have made a “comeback,” and there was already talk of a sequel. Certainly money talks, but audiences–men and women–genuinely found the film hilarious and engaging.

Kristen Wiig co-wrote the film.

Melissa Silverstein, in her piece “Why Bridesmaids Matters,” noted the high stakes of the film. In an interview after the film was a solid success, Silverstein said, when asked what the “promised land” might look like after Bridesmaids’ success, “We have been in the desert for so long that we don’t even know what the promised land looks like. Women have been so beaten down that they are happy with one success and are looking to build from there… If women could figure out how to band together and make more films a success, maybe the promised land will be in view sooner rather than later.”

Female audiences were desperate for this kind of a film. As the campaigns for opening-weekend attendance showed, the expectations weren’t even that high, but the fight for more female comedies lured audiences in. The fact that it was entertaining was a plus.

A little over a year later, (heterosexual) women flocked to their local theaters in droves to see what they hoped would be naked, grinding, gyrating men on the big screen. But wait–just as women aren’t supposed to be funny, they certainly aren’t supposed to flaunt sexual desire (and women aren’t visually stimulated, right?). Wrong again. Steven Soderbergh built it, and women came.

Magic Mike proved the female gaze is alive and well.


The marketing leading up to the film’s release didn’t always focus on drawing in women with butts and thrusts. Up until a few weeks before the release, the trailer was selling a familiar rom-com. Then came the international and red band trailers, which left the internet buzzing with anticipation for the film.

In its first weekend, the film made seven times its production budget, and women-dominated audiences crowded theaters. In what, anecdotally, is a perfect description of the audience, Dodai Stewart wrote at Jezebel that “they were positively giddy about seeing some naked dudes.”

The most common complaint by women about the film is that there was too much story. They wanted more stripping. What was that about what women want?

Many audience members were disappointed that there wasn’t more stripping.

Just as there was a collective outburst of laughter last summer, this summer brought audiences to a collective climax, proving to Hollywood that women aren’t just in the game to watch The Notebook or accompany their boyfriends to see Transformers. Women as audiences have agency and want women’s stories and men’s bodies just as much as men want men’s stories and women’s bodies. For too long, women have had to settle for what men want (or are presumed to want). 

In a recent conversation in The New York Times, critics A.O. Scott and Manohla Dargis bring up the success of the two films. Scott says to Dargis: 
“You note that Magic Mike owes much of its box office potency to its popularity with women. As you suggested in your review it’s a ‘woman’s picture’ in two potentially radical ways. It caters to the kind of visual pleasure — the delight in ogling beautiful bodies in motion — that film theorists have long associated with the male gaze. And it tells what would have been, in an earlier era, the story of a woman, a good-hearted, hard-working striver selling sex appeal, pursuing dreams and looking for true love in difficult circumstances. The stuff of classic melodrama but with a hard-bodied hero in place of the softhearted heroine… Last summer the power of the female audience — and also perhaps the renewed willingness of male moviegoers to seek out stories about women — was demonstrated by the success of Bridesmaids… But something feels different about this year, and it may just be that such movies feel less anomalous, less like out-riders in a male-dominated entertainment universe. The ground may have shifted a little.”

Dargis answers, “Only if there’s enough money… The successes are promising, but I am going to wait until the numbers improve before I celebrate.”

As Dargis notes, we must not celebrate too quickly. Are these films perfect specimens of feminist film? Of course not. Both are entirely heteronormative. Bridesmaids‘ gross-out scenes felt clunky and out of sync (Apatow “retooled” some of Wiig/Mumolo’s script in places), and it didn’t pass the Bechdel test with flying colors.  The first nudity the audience sees in Magic Mike are Olivia Munn’s breasts (this male blogger, giving straight men reasons to go see it, includes all of the female nudity and the fact that it’s told from a man’s perspective). Magic Mike is largely told from a male gaze (men created and filmed it); it’s simply that the female gaze pushed and forced itself into the room. It also relies on the tired story line that women just want to save or fix men.

But for now, the promised land looks a little closer. Perhaps the success of these films is a mirage in the desert, but we can hope that a new age of blockbuster films awaits us–one where women’s stories are told as simply stories, and women’s sexuality is celebrated. For too long, women have been cast aside as objects, as accessories. They are ready to be the subjects. If ticket sales mean anything, which we know they do, Hollywood should take note.

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Leigh Kolb is an instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. She teaches composition, literature, and journalism courses. While working on her MFA in creative nonfiction writing, Leigh was the editor of a small-town newspaper. In her academic and professional life, she’s always gravitated toward the history and literature of the oppressed, and wants to see their stories properly inserted into our cultural dialogue. She believes that critically analyzing popular media is an important step in opening those conversations. Leigh lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, cat and flock of chickens.

‘Yo Bitch’: The Complicated Feminism of Breaking Bad

The cast of Breaking Bad



Warning: Spoilers Ahead
Season five of Breaking Bad began with the unraveling of Gus Fring’s drug operation, which had served as a puppeteer for most of the cast during the preceding seasons. The second episode, “Madrigal,” is named for the German parent company of Fring’s Los Pollos Hermanos. While the business of fast food and methamphetamine is set firmly in a modern era–especially feeding off the addictions of desperate Americans–the term “madrigal” brings to mind centuries’ old songs, performed by multiple voices singing in harmony. We can expect Breaking Bad to be as artfully and tightly constructed as a traditional madrigal. This season, however, the voices won’t just be men’s. 
For the majority of Breaking Bad’s critically acclaimed run on AMC thus far, the female characters have mostly served as annoyances and scapegoats for the audience. The hatred for Skyler White, especially, is palpable and vicious. 
Her husband, Walt, the ultimate modern anti-hero, has had the audience in his corner from the moment he was diagnosed with cancer. It doesn’t matter how many young women he watches choke to death in their own vomit. It doesn’t matter how many children he tries to poison. Nobody on Facebook wants him dead.
In the last two episodes of season five, however, women have come to the forefront of making or breaking the plans of the great male trinity of Walt, Jesse, and Mike. The men in the series have done what they wanted (or felt they needed to do), and have been clawing for, and getting, power as they go. The women, however, have had to navigate the systems around them to go forward in their lives. Skyler frantically establishes control over her life, and Lydia (a Madrigal executive who was part of Fring’s team) eventually allows the trinity to continue making meth.
Lydia, one of Fring’s former associates, takes the reins in the new meth operation.
Skyler has clearly reached a breaking point in her new, seemingly settled life with her dangerous husband. She doesn’t want her children in the home in order to protect them. In episode four, she dutifully makes Walt a birthday dinner, and sits down to eat with him, Marie (who has received her share of “annoying wife” eye-rolls), and Hank. She is clearly detached and disoriented. Hank and Marie credit her infidelity–which Walt told them is at the root of all of their problems–with her despondence. She gets up and wanders towards the pool, slowly stepping in. She submerges herself, and when she doesn’t return to the surface, Walt saves her (although one might wonder if he would have without an audience). The image of a trapped, miserable wife drowning herself is nothing new–it’s the ultimate representation of suffocation. Because she certainly seems unstable, Hank and Marie agree to take the kids for the time being. She has won this battle.
Skyler attempts to drown, and succeeds in having her children removed from their home.
After floating in the watery depths with Skyler, the audience is jerked to an electric grid operated by Lydia. Two women, juxtaposing water and electricity, a deadly combination. 
In episode five, Lydia is the driving force behind the train heist that allows the men to procure the methylamine that is necessary for their product. Her power and knowledge from serving as an executive allows them to move their business forward. Lydia proves herself time and again (stemming from a desire to protect herself for her child), even though her nervous energy makes the audience clench. 
The series started with Walt’s crisis of masculinity, in terms of how he could “protect” his family from the cost of his chemotherapy and his paltry income. He was the wage-earner in the household, and had a son and a baby on the way. He began cooking meth to protect his family, and we loved him for it.
As Skyler has moved from a clueless wife, to an accomplice, to Walt’s antagonist, she has had the goal of protecting her family every step of the way. She orchestrated the money-laundering car wash, she has saved Walt, and she saved a former boss–and herself and Walt–from the IRS (for now, at least). And we hated her for it.
Skyler did everything in her power to keep the IRS away from her professional and personal business.
Lydia, who is willing to kill to keep herself and her history safe, is only working with the men in order to protect her child. When Mike had a gun to her head (after she’d put a hit out on him), she begged him to kill her and make sure her young daughter found her body so she wouldn’t think she’d abandoned her. Mike has a change of heart, or perhaps he simply realizes she’s the source of methylamine they need. Before she proves herself as helpful to their cause, Mike says, “I gave her a pass; this is what I get for being sexist.”She proves herself invaluable, in part by saving them from taking GPS-outfitted methylamine.
Lydia points out the GPS device to Jesse. The men suspect she planted it, but she ended up saving them.
These passing comments and the clear symbolism of female repression and underlying power make it clear that Breaking Bad isn’t simply a tour de force of masculinity. The negative reactions to the female characters reveal misogyny in the audience, not in the series. The fact that we are exhilarated by men plotting and killing, and are nervous or annoyed when the female characters attempt to navigate their lives tells us more about ourselves than the characters.
This season–the first half of the final season, which is set to air next summer–is poised to be decided by women. 
Walt’s hubris has completely removed him from being a loving father or anything but an abusive husband. His growing god complex probably can’t end well, and the audience is becoming more and more OK with that. Walt is a twenty-first century Macbeth.
Skyler, while beyond her breaking point, has gotten her way for now and the children are out of the house. The cards are in her hands more than Walt is comfortable with. She will keep risking herself for her children, and waiting. “For what?” Walt asks. “For the cancer to come back,” she says. 
Without Lydia, the men are without their “ocean” of methylamine. She–like the ocean–is a feminine life-giver, and is orchestrating her moves to protect her daughter (from “group homes” if she herself was sent to prison). She has control.
The imagery of Walt, Mike, and Jesse as a holy trinity is becoming clear. Jesse as a Christ-figure is more evident than ever, in his sacrificing his relationships and fighting passionately for nonviolence. And much like traditional religion, men are worshipped while women are in the trenches, cooking and cleaning–literally and figuratively. We celebrate the men, and push aside the women. It’s becoming evident that we’re not supposed to be doing that.
The “trinity”
At the beginning of the last episode, a young boy, riding alone in the desert, picks up a tarantula and gently puts it in a jar, screwing the lid tight. This clear symbol of entrapment echoes what Skyler says to Walt later in the episode: “I’m not your wife–I’m your hostage.” While her character has clearly broken bad and is now breaking down, she is still entrapped by her husband’s–and now her own–crimes. The tarantula must shed its old skin to grow, as must Skyler. 
That boy is killed at the end of the episode (as he’s witnessed the train heist), and one must wonder if his fate may represent Walt’s. The tarantula is still trapped after his captor is killed, just like Skyler, if her life is spared, will always be trapped by this life. Perhaps Walt, like Arachne, will be punished for his pride above all else. Or maybe Skyler, like Lady Macbeth, will keep unraveling out of fear and guilt, and that will lead to her downfall.  One could also draw a comparison between the young boy and Jesse, suffering while trying to keep captive the beasts of others’ actions.
The tarantella (tarantula), an Italian folk dance originated hundreds of years ago, is identified by “frenzied” dancing. The mythology suggests that the dance cured spider bites by allowing the dancer to sweat out the poison. It’s a safe expectation that audiences will be seeing much frenzied dancing as Breaking Bad culminates its five-season run, and only a few of those dancers will be left standing.
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Leigh Kolb is an instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. She teaches composition, literature, and journalism courses. While working on her MFA in creative nonfiction writing, Leigh was the editor of a small-town newspaper. In her academic and professional life, she’s always gravitated toward the history and literature of the oppressed, and wants to see their stories properly inserted into our cultural dialogue. She believes that critically analyzing popular media is an important step in opening those conversations. Leigh lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, cat and flock of chickens.

Welcome New Contributors!

You’ve probably noticed some wonderful new writers around here. They’ll each be writing weekly posts, so you’ll definitely want to check back here often to read their fabulous pieces. In case you missed any of their introductions last week, I’ve included excerpts below. Make sure to read their full bios to learn more about them–and then welcome them to the Bitch Flicks team!
Myrna Waldron: I am a lifelong film enthusiast, but my particular passion is animation. (I like live action television too, but I’m fairly picky) Since a young age I have obsessively consumed animation in all forms, whether they be slapstick cartoons like Looney Tunes or abstract experiments like Begone Dull Care. I am particularly interested in American animation (Chuck Jones is my hero), but I have some interest in Canadian (particularly the short films distributed by the National Film Board of Canada) and Japanese animation (mostly from the 90s) as well. It is a pet peeve of mine when people refer to animation as a genre rather than a medium, or, even worse, to assume that all animation is for children – so don’t do it! 😉 [click here to read more about Myrna]
Lady T: If I can describe my approach to feminism in one sentence, it would be this: “There’s always room for improvement.” Occasionally, I blog about media that really grates my cheese, but I’m more likely to criticize and analyze works of media that I really love and admire. I like the female characters on The Vampire Diaries, but I think the show’s portrayal of its black characters leaves a lot to be desired. I love the late, great George Carlin for many reasons, particularly his stand-up about abortion and grammar, but I don’t agree with his opinions on rape jokes. Most works of art that I love have some problematic aspects and I think it’s worthwhile and necessary to analyze our favorite things. [click here to read more about Lady T]
Robin Hitchcock: I’ve been a movie lover since I was a young teen, when my dad instituted “Movie Camp” in our house to fill in the gaps in my cultural heritage.  I’ve been a feminist since longer than I can remember.  I have a small amount of formal gender studies training in the form of a certificate in Women’s Studies from my alma mater the University of Pittsburgh (2006), but that department was so small they couldn’t even offer a minor in Women’s Studies, much less a major degree concentration.  I also have a J.D. from the University of Pittsburgh (2010), but I do not practice as a lawyer.  I am always trying to learn more and strengthen my feminist muscles.  I find it more or less impossible to see a movie and not want to write about it.  Even when I really hate a movie, I still tend to enjoy watching it, thinking about it, and writing about it. [click here to read more about Robin]
Erin Fenner: I love cult films, “bad movies” and directors who try their damndest to say something new in a different way. I love black and white, foreign and Cannes Film Festival. I get excited by trying-to-be-subtle symbolism and am a sucker for allegory. I value the filmmakers who push a feminist agenda, and even those who willingly ignore politics but still manage to convey a message that is keenly relevant. Not to say that I don’t like blockbusters and Oscar nodding. Explosions and played-out sensuality don’t titillate me, but I am fascinated by the process, the message and am obsessed with the mistakes. [To be clear, my notion of “liking” or “loving” something is often interchangeable with most people’s notion of “morbid fascination.”] [click here to read more about Erin]
Max Thornton: I am a third culture kid who grew up in the USA, Kenya, and Great Britain. I am a trans* queer person who gets angry a lot. I am a grad student in theology, which I define broadly as the processes by which people create meaning in their lives, and my especial interest is the interrelationship of politics, culture, and religion.

I love film, books, and sci-fi in any medium, and I have an especial passion for television. My favorite show of all time is Mystery Science Theater 3000; my favorite show currently airing is Community; the list of shows I love is ever expanding with series both new and new-to-me, but among my very favorites are Adventure Time, Archer, Arrested Development, Breaking Bad, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Farscape, Firefly, Freaks and Geeks, The League of Gentlemen, Parks and Recreation, Phineas and Ferb, Pushing Daisies, Spaced, The Thick Of It, Venture Bros, and Wonderfalls. [click here to read more about Max]
Rachel Redfern: While I grew up in California and still consider it home, I’ve moved around a bit since then; currently, I live in South Korea where I teach English and stuff myself with Kimchi and Toblerone bars and watch way too much TV. My tastes extend into the realm of the eclectic and some of my favorites are Arrested Development, Castle, pretty much anything by HBO but specifically True Blood and Game of Thrones (ditto for BBC), and loads of old shows, Star Trek, I Dream of Jeannie, Murder She Wrote, Northern Exposure, most of which are campy and nostalgic (who else loves the original Doctor Who?). [click here to read more about Rachel]
Leigh Kolb: It was only after graduating college and working in the real world (where one male boss actually told me women’s lib was a bad idea) that I realized feminism needed to be a part of my life. I opened my eyes and saw a world of gendered roles and expectations–from the media to the workplace–and I didn’t like it. I embraced the f-word.

My love for pop culture, analysis, argument and feminism created the person at this keyboard. I’ve learned to bring notebooks with me to the movies, keep one handy in the living room when we watch TV, and keep my eyes and ears open constantly to connect representations of gender roles in the media to our culture. [click here to read more about Leigh]

New ‘Bitch Flicks’ Regular Contributor: Leigh Kolb

As a teenager, I didn’t necessarily see a place for feminism in my life. Looking back, I realize that’s because I was surrounded by it. I went to Lilith Fairs. Tori Amos and Ani DiFranco were voices that inspired me and female protagonists like Angela Chase, Cher Horowitz, and Daria served as reminders that teenage girls were complex and had agency. Eddie Vedder even scrawled “Pro-Choice” on his arm on MTV. That was my mass media. Compared to what young women are offered now–well, the 90s seem like a veritable feminist utopia, don’t they?
It was only after graduating college and working in the real world (where one male boss actually told me women’s lib was a bad idea) that I realized feminism needed to be a part of my life. I opened my eyes and saw a world of gendered roles and expectations–from the media to the workplace–and I didn’t like it. I embraced the f-word.
My love for pop culture, analysis, argument and feminism created the person at this keyboard. I’ve learned to bring notebooks with me to the movies, keep one handy in the living room when we watch TV, and keep my eyes and ears open constantly to connect representations of gender roles in the media to our culture. 
I know that the 90s weren’t perfect. But something changed. Perhaps that something can best be illustrated by the toxic juxtaposition of sweeping social conservatism in government and Britney Spears in pop culture in the early 2000s. The gains from second-wave feminism have been chipped away with a sledgehammer for the last decade, all while sex–specifically packaged as scantily clad, passive young women–is selling more and more.   And it makes me furious. 
Turning a critical eye on our media can make us more aware (and frequently more furious) about what’s happening on a social and political level.
My media favorites include, on the small screen, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Parks and Recreation, Louie, Sons of Anarchy, 30 Rock and old episodes of Arrested Development, Twin Peaks, My So-Called Life and Beverly Hills, 90210. On the big screen, I generally love all things Ridley Scott, David Lynch, Baz Luhrmann, Quentin Tarantino, Catherine Breillat and Darren Aronofsky. My past work for Bitch Flicks includes reviews of Black Swan, Drive, Battlestar Galactica and Sons of Anarchy. 
I am excited to be writing for Bitch Flicks, and can’t wait to actively dig in to what we too often passively watch.
—
Leigh Kolb is an instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. She teaches composition, literature, and journalism courses. While working on her MFA in creative nonfiction writing, Leigh was the editor of a small-town newspaper. In her academic and professional life, she’s always gravitated toward the history and literature of the oppressed, and wants to see their stories properly inserted into our cultural dialogue. She believes that critically analyzing popular media is an important step in opening those conversations. Leigh lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, cat and flock of chickens.

Women in Science Fiction Week: Procreation at the End of Civilization: Reproductive Rights on ‘Battlestar Galactica’

The cast of Battlestar Galactica
This guest post written by Leigh Kolb originally appeared at Bitch Flicks on April 23, 2012. 
“All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again.”
The opening credits of each episode of Battlestar Galactica, which aired from 2004 – 2009, set the premise for the plot: “The Cylons were created by man. They evolved. They rebelled. There are many copies. And they have a plan.” During a few episodes later in the series, the plight for humans’ survival is highlighted with the announcement: “The human race. Far from home. Fighting for survival.” Most of the beginning credits also show the population tally, which dwindles after each battle. President Laura Roslin says at the beginning of their journey, “The human race is about to be wiped out. We have 50,000 people left and that’s it. Now, if we are even going to survive as a species, then we need to get the hell out of here and we need to start having babies.”
When a society is thrust into time of struggle and chaos and its existence is threatened, reproductive rights and bodily autonomy are among the first rights to be taken away by those in power. Battlestar Galactica shows us, as good science fiction does, the moral struggles we face now, and what they might look like in the future.
There are moral issues at stake throughout the entire series, including the erosion of prisoners’ and laborers’ rights so that others may live more comfortably. The same critical lens is cast on forced birth, forced abortion, eugenics and abortion restrictions.
Early in the second season, Kara “Starbuck” Thrace has returned to Cylon-occupied Caprica (home planet for the crew of Battlestar Galactica) to find her destiny and aid the resistance, a group of humans who have stayed behind to fight the Cylons. She is kidnapped and knocked out, and wakes up in a hospital bed. Her “doctor” (who later is revealed as a Cylon) tells her she was shot in the abdomen and they have removed the bullet. As she drifts in and out of consciousness, she becomes suspicious. The doctor has excuses for every inconsistency. He tells her they’d operated because they suspected she had a cyst on her ovary. He says, “You gotta keep that reproductive system in great shape… it’s your most valuable asset these days. Finding healthy childbearing women your age is a top priority for the resistance. You are a very precious commodity to us.”
Starbuck replies, “I am not a commodity. I’m a viper pilot.”
Leigh Kolb is an English and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri, and has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing. She lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, chickens, and garden, and makes a terrible dinner party guest because all she wants to talk about is feminism and reproductive rights.

Motherhood in Film and Television: Mothers of Anarchy: Power and Control in the Feminine Sphere

This is a guest review by Leigh Kolb.

The ancient idea that men and women inhabit different spheres based on their biological makeup is rooted deeply in Western culture. In the Nineteenth Century, however, when the Victorian era dictated behavior and the Industrial Revolution changed work, scientists and civilians defined and embraced this idea of True Womanhood. Men’s and women’s spheres were separate—his was public and political, hers was inside the home and maternal. This is certainly not an argument that has died, and one would be hard-pressed not to find the same rhetoric at houses of worship and houses of legislation today. Many representations of women in media reiterate this ideology.

Motherhood is firmly rooted in the feminine sphere—inside the womb to inside the nursery. In the critically acclaimed television drama Sons of Anarchy, the gendered spheres are clear and present. Sons of Anarchy is oftentimes dubbed “Hamlet on motorcycles” since the plot line bears a strong resemblance to Shakespeare’s Hamlet (which is an important note for feminist analysis, considering Shakespeare’s own subversive feminism). As in Hamlet, Sons of Anarchy’s audiences and critics often focus on the protagonist, the “ghost” of his father, his nefarious stepfather, and the men who surround him. The excitement of politics, public tension, violence, and man’s inner struggle always trumps the inner-workings of the home and child-rearing. The power is in the public sphere.

Gemma threatens Wendy. She makes it clear that no one will hurt her son or grandson.

The Mothers of Anarchy, on the surface, have no control. In reality, they have all of the control.

The matriarch “old lady” (the endearing term club members give to their partners) of the California motorcycle club is Gemma (Katey Sagal). She is the Gertrude-inspired character who has married one of the original members of the club, after her husband was killed. Her first husband helped found the Sons of Anarchy motorcycle club after Gemma became pregnant with their son and wanted to settle in Charming, where her parents were from. She may not ride, but her instincts and desires steered the club from its inception. The town’s police chief refers to Gemma as “leaving Charming when she was sixteen and showing up 10 years later with a baby and a biker gang.”

This original group, which spawned numerous Sons of Anarchy chapters after its founding, is referred to as Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club Redwood Originals (SAMCRO).
Tara and Gemma together saved baby Abel’s life, and Jax, his father, holds him.
In the pilot episode, there are explosions, murders, gun runs, back room decisions, and motorcycles tearing up the streets. Of course, one doesn’t need to analyze too much to see the clearly phallic representations of masculinity in motorcycles and firearms. It is also clear that the women in the episode are revolving around the hallmark of True Womanhood—motherhood.

Gemma’s son Jax (Charlie Hunnam) has a pregnant ex-wife, Wendy (Drea de Matteo). As Gemma is driving to check on her, Wendy is in the kitchen injecting herself with a syringe-full of meth. The camera pans out to a very pregnant Wendy with her hand on her belly, relaxed. This is a fallen mother. Gemma finds her in a pool of blood, curses at her, and rushes her to the hospital. At the hospital, Tara (Maggie Siff), a surgeon and Jax’s ex-girlfriend, is tending to Wendy and Abel, who was delivered via emergency c-section ten weeks premature. Immediately the audience is presented with the powerful mother and matriarch, the bad mother (and few things are worse in our society than a bad mother), and the professional mother, who is responsible for keeping Abel alive since his biological mother could not.

Gemma’s maternal instincts are fierce and stinging.
These three pivotal female characters revolve around a baby, and they are portrayed inside—literally and figuratively. The women are inside when introduced to the audience—Gemma is in her car, Wendy is in her kitchen, and Tara is in the hospital. When Gemma wields her knowledge of and power over the club to Clay, they are in the bedroom. The male characters are largely outside—riding their bikes, working on cars, and scoping out new property.

Toward the end of the episode, the men of Sons of Anarchy are engaged in club warfare, and commit brutally violent crimes (involving guns, explosives, and vehicles) as they navigate the changing waters of their club’s purpose and see their territory shifting to guns and drugs.

Tara and Jax have a son, Thomas, and they together raise him and Abel.
Spliced into this plotline are the scenes from the hospital. Gemma has slipped Wendy a syringe with an order to commit suicide (she puts the syringe in a Bible after they pray—religion and piety is also in the feminine sphere). Tara is operating on Abel, inside of him, and starts his heart after it stops.

The masculine sphere is powerful, aggressive, and largely superficial. The feminine sphere, while perceived as less important and less powerful, deals in matters much closer: giving life, manipulating life, and sustaining life. When Jax comes to the hospital to visit his son, he is beat up and bloodied from his duties outside. Tara tells him to clean himself up, and then he can see his son. Tara—who gave Abel his heartbeat, not Wendy—is in control. It’s simply a matter of time before she and Jax are in a relationship and she is clearly an old lady in training.

Gemma looks at an old photo of her and John, Jax’s father and the co-founder of SAMCRO.
While the pilot episode can be examined by itself through a feminist lens, the entire series follows its women with the same watchful eye. What may sound like one-dimensional stereotypes in simple plot descriptions are actually nuanced female characters and plot lines.

Possibly the most obvious mother archetype in Western culture is the Virgin Mary. Sons of Anarchy does a commendable job of avoiding the virgin-whore dichotomy so prevalent in matters of femininity and motherhood. Gemma is a sexual creature and desires sex (one episode even deals with her battling vaginal dryness after menopause), but that isn’t problematic. The show manages to avoid the all-too-often inferred Oedipal nature of Hamlet and Gertrude in the Shakespeare original, showing that a woman can be sexual, and be a mother, and that’s OK.

In season two, Gemma is brutally raped by enemies of the club to divide and destroy SAMCRO. She is lured into the enemy’s hands when a young woman stops her on the road and begs her to check on her baby, who’s not breathing. Lured by her maternal instincts, Gemma rushes out of her car and into the woman’s van where there’s just a baby doll, and she’s knocked unconscious and taken to a warehouse where she’s assaulted. The way that she deals with the assault—secretive and ashamed, yet helped by Tara medically and emotionally—is painful and realistic. Tara was a victim of domestic violence, and the two come together not as victims, but as allies and survivors. When Gemma finally tells her family about the rape, they come together and are more united, not divided. As she explains the assault to Clay and Jax at the family dining table, Patty Griffin’s “Mary” plays softly in the background, conjuring the image of that original suffering mother; however, she is not the pure and perfect image of virginity; she is real, damaged, and whole. This is the True Womanhood, not that of silence and submissiveness. In this depiction, it’s clear that Gemma gains and keeps control and is not the one being controlled.

In an excellent piece at Yes Means Yes, a feminist blogger notes that “The strong women characters are not terminators with breasts, they’re real humans with full inner lives and complicated problems. The plots often explore women’s lives in ways that mainstream shows overlook. And the show humanizes women, like sex workers, who are too often presented as one dimensional.” Indeed, even the porn stars are human in Sons of Anarchy—not just human, but capable of mothering, and mothering well.

SAMCRO becomes affiliated with a porn production company, and club member Opie’s girlfriend (and eventual second wife) is one of its stars. Lyla has a son, and is compassionate in her role as step-mother to Opie’s children. Lyla is a caring mother, and also serves as a catalyst for conversations surrounding the topics of abortion and birth control. For motherhood shouldn’t just be about mothering children, but also about making choices about what’s best for the entire family (which sometimes means not having more children).

In season three, Lyla becomes pregnant and does not want to be (her relationship with Opie is not solid, and pregnancy would end her career in the porn industry, and she wants to work a few more years). Tara offers to take her, and she also is pregnant and decides she wants to schedule an abortion. The entire scene is without judgment or negativity—it’s a clean clinic, and a simple procedure. Tara references having an abortion at six weeks in her previous abusive relationship and that it was “not a baby” at that point. Rarely is abortion presented as realistic in popular culture. Feministing says of the episode, “Most TV shows won’t even present abortion as a viable option and if they do, it’s usually stigmatized and quickly discarded in favor of adoption or keeping the unintended pregnancy.” Later, when Opie discovers Lyla had an abortion and is taking birth control pills even though getting pregnant is her only way “out” of porn, he is angry. But it’s clear that the audience isn’t supposed to be.

Tara ends up not having an abortion, but not because of a moral awakening. She is abducted and almost killed by SAMCRO enemies, and is able to escape by telling the abductors she’s pregnant. After the ordeal, she and Jax see the unharmed baby on an ultrasound, and reconcile. At first, Tara appears to be more submissive after being held captive and choosing to have the baby. As the series progresses, however, viewers see her coming to power in the club by her own choosing. She will mother SAMCRO sons—adopting Abel and giving birth to Thomas—and she will become the matriarch.

Tara is poised to take over Gemma’s position as matriarch.

As central as motherhood is to the various story arcs of Sons of Anarchy, one can’t help but notice that these strong female characters lack mother figures themselves. While Gemma had a mother growing up, she died from the family’s “fatal flaw” (a genetic heart condition). Tara’s mother died when she was young, and she inherited her father’s house and car. Father-son relationships are central to many of the storylines (certainly the relationship between Jax and his father’s letters, a.k.a. his “ghost,” and his relationship with his stepfather Clay; Opie’s relationship with his father, SAMCRO’s other founder; and Jax’s relationships with his young sons). In fiction, male protagonists are often driven by their relationships with their fathers—away from them or toward reconciliation. However, while audiences continue to see more female protagonists, those characters often have no mothers or are more influenced by their fathers or male mentors (The Killing and Homeland on television, for example, or Twilight and The Hunger Games in text and on film).

Of course this is not a new phenomenon. In Shakespeare’s works, “Fatherhood appears in full gamut, but motherhood, especially in the relationship of mother and daughter, is almost, though by no means quite, absent.” Hamlet’s Ophelia just had a father and brother to guide her (tragically), and no mother. Strong women are often portrayed as being on their own.

These reminders of the gendered spheres—men are in public, in politics, connected to their ancestors and to the world around them while women are inside, working in the home and raising another generation to fulfill these same gendered roles—continually romanticize the role of father and downplay the role of mother. So when modern women emerge on screen, even the most complex and nuanced characters such as those in Sons of Anarchy, there’s still the trouble of True Womanhood, at its core, not being rooted to power in connection. Instead, these women are lone wolves, seeking power where they can and how they can, because their mothers could not or chose not to—or perhaps because it’s simply not a narrative that’s at all woven into our culture.

In an interview, Sagal said of Gemma, ”At the core of her, she is a mother to all of these men. As tough and dark as she is – and she will slit your throat for the right reasons – she is big-hearted.” The undertone of this quote is that Gemma cooks big meals, cleans up, and protects her “men.” Tara also grows into the role, serving as an on-call doctor for the club, bringing men back to life who would have otherwise died or been arrested. They are biological mothers to their sons, and mothers to the Sons. While the spheres are in place, the reality of the series is that these mothers may be perceived as being without power behind closed doors while the boys are killing, being killed, and making business decisions, but the power the mothers yield is monumental. Gemma has orchestrated the club from its beginning, and the fourth season ends with Tara standing over Jax at the head of the SAMCRO table. The audience knows the mothers’ roles, but the men often seem oblivious. The same can be said for Shakespeare’s mothers (it’s widely believed that Gertrude had a part in King Hamlet’s death plot). The audience will have to wait, however, to see if Western culture ever gets it right and removes the spheres that give the perception that motherhood lacks the power and strength of a twin-cam Harley.

———-
Leigh Kolb is an English and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri, and has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing. She lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, chickens, and garden, and makes a terrible dinner party guest because all she wants to talk about is feminism and reproductive rights.

Reproduction & Abortion Week: Procreation at the End of Civilization: Reproductive Rights on ‘Battlestar Galactica’

The cast of Battlestar Galactica

This is a guest review by Leigh Kolb. 

“All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again.”

The opening credits of each episode of Battlestar Galactica, which aired from 2004 – 2009, set the premise for the plot: “The Cylons were created by man. They evolved. They rebelled. There are many copies. And they have a plan.” During a few episodes later in the series, the plight for humans’ survival is highlighted with the announcement: “The human race. Far from home. Fighting for survival.” Most of the beginning credits also show the population tally, which dwindles after each battle. President Laura Roslin says at the beginning of their journey, “The human race is about to be wiped out. We have 50,000 people left and that’s it. Now, if we are even going to survive as a species, then we need to get the hell out of here and we need to start having babies.”

When a society is thrust into time of struggle and chaos and its existence is threatened, reproductive rights and bodily autonomy are among the first rights to be taken away by those in power. Battlestar Galactica shows us, as good science fiction does, the moral struggles we face now, and what they might look like in the future.

There are moral issues at stake throughout the entire series, including the erosion of prisoners’ and laborers’ rights so that others may live more comfortably. The same critical lens is cast on forced birth, forced abortion, eugenics and abortion restrictions.

Early in the second season, Kara “Starbuck” Thrace has returned to Cylon-occupied Caprica (home planet for the crew of Battlestar Galactica) to find her destiny and aid the resistance, a group of humans who have stayed behind to fight the Cylons. She is kidnapped and knocked out, and wakes up in a hospital bed. Her “doctor” (who later is revealed as a Cylon) tells her she was shot in the abdomen and they have removed the bullet. As she drifts in and out of consciousness, she becomes suspicious. The doctor has excuses for every inconsistency. He tells her they’d operated because they suspected she had a cyst on her ovary. He says, “You gotta keep that reproductive system in great shape… it’s your most valuable asset these days. Finding healthy childbearing women your age is a top priority for the resistance. You are a very precious commodity to us.”

Starbuck replies, “I am not a commodity. I’m a viper pilot.”

Admiral William Adama, left, and President Laura Roslin

He persists, and finally says, “The human race is on the verge of extinction. Potential mothers are a lot more valuable right now than a whole squadron of viper pilots.” He keeps pushing her into more vulnerable territory by bringing up old scars that suggest she was abused, and perhaps that’s why she’s afraid to have children. This pushes Starbuck over the edge and she screams at him to get out.

Her reproduction has become a commodity; it takes precedence over anything that she might be as an individual. When she pushes back against these ideas, she’s made to feel shame and vulnerability, as if that will guilt her into wanting to procreate. This philosophy is consistent among anti-abortion groups—if women are perceived as too strong, independent and resistant to motherhood (as Starbuck certainly is), they simply need to be coerced into realizing the importance of that goal. It’s their responsibility to mother more than anything else.

When she wakes again, she has a new scar and the doctor tells her “We’re just about done with you, Starbuck.” He attempts to put her back under, but she has removed the IV—she’d never told him her handle was Starbuck. She stumbles out of the room—the hospital used to be a mental institution, which begs the audience to consider the implications of maternity and captivity—and overhears the doctor and a Cylon talking about her ovaries, suggesting that her eggs had been harvested or were about to be.

Eventually she kills the doctor, takes his keys and stumbles into a room full of drugged, barely conscious women with their knees up and machines and tubes coming out from under their hospital gowns. She recognizes a friend from the resistance, Sue-Shaun, and tries to start freeing her from the machinery. Instead, she begs Starbuck to kill the power. “It’ll kill you,” Starbuck says, but Sue-Shaun pleads, “I can’t live like this—they’re baby machines. Please. Please.” Starbuck takes a surgical instrument and smashes the power supply; sparks fly, and the women die.

Sharon, a Cylon who has joined ranks with the resistance after falling in love and becoming pregnant with Helo, another viper pilot, informs Starbuck that this was one of the Cylons’ Farms, where human women were taken and inseminated to attempt a human/Cylon breeding program, which hadn’t yet been successful. The Cylons had failed to reproduce naturally, so they were finding other means. Sharon says, “Procreation is one of God’s commandments—be fruitful.” Starbuck fires back that “raping women” is what they’re doing, and Sharon defensively counters that love was the missing component, since she and Helo have successfully become pregnant.

Sue-Shaun’s insistence that the power be shut off, thus killing every woman-turned-incubator, further shows the lengths that women will go to resist reproducing unwillingly. Sharon’s insistence that if love were in the equation, and if a Cylon and human were “set up,” like she and Helo were, that the forced reproduction would somehow be more palatable, shows the ideology that allows these atrocities to be committed—procreation above all. It’s what God wants.

Starbuck “rescues” Sue-Shaun from forced reproduction

All Starbuck wants to do at this juncture is get a raider ship and liberate every Farm—but she’s reminded this is not her destiny. The women, the audience sees, will have to wait. Because while procreation is so important to a threatened species that women’s bodily autonomy and choice can be set aside, righting those wrongs are not among the first priorities.

Later in season two, there is much turmoil surrounding the Sharon and Helo’s pregnancy. Back on Battlestar Galactica, Sharon is in a holding cell because she is a Cylon. President Laura Roslin, who is on her deathbed (she was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer before the attack), orders that Sharon’s baby be aborted after Dr. Cottle tells her that there are some genetic abnormalities showing up in the fetus. Dr. Gaius Baltar disagrees (for self-serving, political reasons). Roslin says, “Allowing this thing to be born could have frightening consequences for the security of this fleet—I believe the Cylon pregnancy must be terminated before it’s too late.”

As Admiral Adama and the men around her question her decision, she remembers something Caprica’s former president said to her and says, “The interesting thing about being president is that you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone” (most certainly a reference to the same quote attributed to President George W. Bush). She is in control, and will use that control over another woman’s body because, being half-Cylon, the fetus is “the other,” and represents the enemy.

As Adama tells Helo the abortion must take place, Helo asserts, “We’re talking about a child—a part of me. I guess it’s easier to kill when you call it a Cylon.”

Sharon reacts with anger and rage, screaming “Let them try and take my baby” to Helo before she starts banging her head bloody into the thick glass keeping her separated from the rest of the fleet. Armed guards come to get her and she uses her chair as a weapon, and they must hold her down and sedate her.

As Sharon is wheeled into the medical unit for the procedure, Baltar bursts into the room saying that the fetal bloodwork has a resistance to disease, and seems to kill cancer cells on contact. Instead of receiving an abortion, blood is drawn from Sharon’s fetus and injected into Roslin. Roslin seizes as Sharon gazes at her from her nearby bed—as Roslin comes to and instantly heals, she and Sharon make eye contact. Two women, utterly in control of one another’s futures.

The cancer is gone. The half-Cylon, half-human is safe.

Back in her holding cell, Sharon’s belly has grown larger, and she strokes her much-wanted future child lovingly. Roslin sees her, and has a pained look on her face.

Again, power, fear and desperation lead those who can to make decisions for other people, especially when those people are “the other.” Procreation is necessary and blessed, unless it’s not.

And just as Sue-Shaun was willing to die instead of mother without her consent, Sharon was willing to kill before losing the baby she wanted.

Later in the series, Sharon’s baby will be taken from her again and, while she has been told the baby is dead, given away to another couple to raise. Starbuck will be haunted by who she’s made to believe is her little girl from her egg harvest, and she’s thrust into a (false) motherhood and personal turmoil. The choices they did not get to make tear them from the life they desired.

Toward the end of season two, after the audience has been presented with the reproductive issues of attempted forced births and abortion, the question of choice in the face of societal turmoil is posed. A stowaway teenager has made it on to Galactica from her colony of Gemenon, where abortion is illegal. Cottle tells Adama that he performs abortions for women: “I do my work, she leaves, I don’t ask a lot of questions.” “You’re going to start,” says Adama, who has been contacted by the frantic parents of the missing young woman.

The young woman says, “It doesn’t matter what you say, I’m not going to change my mind,” and then begs them to not send her back, because she is afraid of her parents and the fundamentalist religious rules of her colony—she wants asylum on Galactica.

“Some might say,” says Cottle, “she was the victim of political persecution.”

Adama glares at him, and the doctor walks away.

As is so often the case in matters of reproductive decision-making, the doctor is pushed out of the picture because of politics.

The colonial representative from Gemenon, Sarah, comes to Roslin to plead for the young woman. She says that abortion “is an abomination in the eyes of the gods” and threatens to remove support for Roslin’s campaign unless the young woman is released back to Gemenon.

Roslin is strong in her convictions (at first) that abortion was legal in the Colonies, and it must be legal still. “I’ve fought for woman’s right to control her body my entire career,” she says, clearly struggling with the tension of political and seemingly practical ramifications of her orders.

As she makes these assertions, the white board with 49,584 written on it looms behind her. The population, Adama reminds her, is a consideration, and reminds her that she herself had said, “We’d better start having babies.”

Roslin researches demographics, and Baltar tells her that if humans continue on their present course, they would be extinct in 18 years.

The audience then hears Roslin’s voice at a press conference making a radio address, saying that while people have enjoyed the rights and freedoms they had before the attack, “One of those rights is in direct conflict with the survival of the species.” The pregnant teenager touches and looks down at her swollen abdomen as Roslin says, “We must repopulate the fleet.” She then announces that she’s making an executive order that “anyone seeking to interfere with the birth of a child—mother or medical professional—will be subject to criminal charges.”

Sharon reacts violently to the news that her fetus will be aborted without her consent

However, before the executive order is in place, Roslin is sure that the Gemonese teenager is granted an abortion and asylum.

When Sarah confronts Roslin with this information, she says “Word has it you’re not going to prosecute the Gemonese girl.” Exasperated, Roslin says, “She has a name, Sarah—I think she’s suffered enough… Take your victory and move on.”

Another press conference, another political power play by Baltar on Roslin, and we come full circle again—women’s reproductive rights reduced to a political wedge, to keep support, win voters, and attempt to repopulate the fleet. It’s not about the woman.

Nor is it in 2012 America, on Earth, far away from the notion of battleships and humanoid machines.

While America is still in the throes of economic decline, already in 2012 944 reproductive health and rights provisions have been introduced by legislatures, including many that restrict access to abortion and contraception. Much of the rhetoric used by anti-abortion and anti-contraception factions (like the monotheistic Cylons) includes the ideology that women should be mothers, should embrace motherhood and fulfill their purpose as a procreating species.

At the same time, the US has a legacy of eugenics and sterilization. Even as recently as 2011, a Louisiana lawmaker proposed legislation that would give incentives to poor women to be sterilized. He also has proposed a ban on all abortion—again showing that reproduction is beautiful and necessary—unless the state says otherwise. Modern society is also no stranger to forced adoptions.

The Cylons, throughout the series, demonstrate a monotheistic religion that has similar rhetoric to fundamentalist Christianity. On the other hand, the Colonies are polytheistic—seemingly more progressive and inclusive, having legalized abortion. President Roslin is clear in her personal struggle to make decisions that go against a lifetime of pro-choice activism. Eventually, though, the rhetoric all converges. Women must reproduce for the greater good. Their individual autonomy must be put aside for the fleet, for God/the gods, for politics and for others to live.

At the end of the opening credits of Battlestar Galactica, there is an intense teaser reel of what was coming up in the episode. We would always close or eyes, or look away from the screen, because we didn’t want to see what was coming. It’s easy to do that with every issue that science fiction and dystopian fiction bring before us—look away, because we don’t want to know what’s coming. In reality, these political and moral dilemmas are not taking place in some star system light years away; they are taking place here. They are taking place now.

———-

Leigh Kolb is an English and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri, and has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing. She lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, chickens, and garden, and makes a terrible dinner party guest because all she wants to talk about is feminism and reproductive rights.

‘Drive’ and the Need to Identify the Virgin or Whore in the Passenger Seat

This is a guest review by Leigh Kolb.
The 2011 film Drive opens by plunging the audience into an 80s-insipired neo-noir world, where the beats are hard, the car chases gripping, and the femme fatale seductively leads the real chase. Or at least it seems that simple.
The protagonist, simply named Driver (Ryan Gosling), may not appear to have clear motivations or desires throughout, but he is in control. He’s a stunt driver and auto mechanic by day, and an outlaw getaway driver at night. He seems to be content with this LA life he’s carved for himself.
Until he meets his neighbor, Irene (Carey Mulligan). The name Irene means peace—which could very well describe her disposition, but certainly not her role in Driver’s life. He first spots her carrying a laundry basket, then grocery shopping with her small son, and later helplessly looking under the hood of her stalled vehicle—the archetype of helpless femininity and quiet motherhood. She comes to the garage where he works for a repair and a ride home, and so begins their friendship/romance.
Carey Mulligan as “damsel in distress” Irene
Driver takes on an immediate fatherly role to Irene’s son, Benicio, and the three have idyllic car rides and moments by a river. They are on a journey, but a journey that doesn’t really go anywhere. Irene, always in the passenger seat, places her hand on Driver’s on the gear shift. We see Driver smile at Irene, and Benecio seems protected and comfortable, especially in the scene that Driver carries a sleeping Benecio home while Irene follows, carrying Driver’s bright white satin jacket emblazoned with a gold scorpion.
Irene makes a passing comment that Benecio’s father is in prison.
She fails to mention he’s her husband. And he’s about to come home.
That white jacket doesn’t stay clean for long.
What comes next is a tour de force of quick, graphic violence. (Or, as the New York Times rating more romantically describes it, “gruesomely violent chivalry”—he’s just valiantly protecting Irene, after all.)
The scorpion dances around its prey and its deadliness is swift and unsuspected. It also is a fiercely protective creature, and mothers keep their young nestled on their backs. Driver reminds a victim-to-be of the fable of the scorpion and the frog, in which the scorpion kills the frog (ultimately killing them both) simply because it’s his “nature.” The scorpion, upon first glance, reminds us of Driver. But who holds the “scorpion’s” fate—figuratively and literally—in her arms? Irene.
Of course, even as Driver is driving off with blood on his hands, no money, and no Irene, he calls her to tell her “Getting to be around you and Benicio was the best thing that ever happened to me.”
He has ensured their safety, while unraveling his own life. Unknowing, she stands silently, fingers to her lips.
A.O. Scott, in his New York Times review, says “Ms. Mulligan’s whispery diction and kewpie-doll features have a similarly disarming effect. Irene seems like much too nice a person to be mixed up in such nasty business. Not that she’s really mixed up in it. Her innocence is axiomatic and part of the reason the driver goes to such messianic lengths to protect her.”
In Rolling Stone, Peter Travers says, “Mulligan is glorious, inhabiting a role that is barely there and making it resonant and whole.”
The audience knows nothing about Irene, except that she met her husband when she was 17, she’s a waitress, and she’s pretty. How are we supposed to assume she’s “too nice to be mixed up in such nasty business”? How are we supposed to cling to her innocence and need for protection? How is a character who serves as a catalyst for almost the entire plot “barely there”?
Instead, the femme fatale role is squarely placed on the shoulders of Blanche. Travers writes, “Violence drives Drive. A heist gone bad involving a femme fatale (an incendiary cameo from Mad Men’s Christina Hendricks) puts blood on the walls.” This isn’t untrue—there is a heist gone wrong and it does get bloody, fast. But Blanche is an accomplice, not a seductive force that lures Driver in.
The classic definition of femme fatale is “an irresistibly attractive woman, especially one who leads men into difficult, dangerous, or disastrous situations…” Scott and Travers would certainly contend that Irene is too pretty and innocent to fit that mold—but someone needed to fit that mold, so Blanche it is.
Instead, Irene’s character is flattened into oblivion, “barely there,” as the reviewer states. Even though we know so little about her and her motivations, we are given clues. While she has an air of subservience (working as a waitress, fetching glasses of water and dinner for her male visitors), she is clearly in control at the beginning of the narrative. She goes to Driver’s work, she touches his hand, she withholds pertinent information about her personal life.
Ryan Gosling as Driver and Mulligan’s Irene–she holds his jacket (a symbol of his character) against the red and blue backdrop
Irene is also presented in a constant mural of red and blue—the bright, dark red of cherries and blood, lust and violence, and the Wedgewood blue of the Virgin Mary’s mantle, innocent and pure. The colors of her apartment and her shirts and dresses mirror this color scheme, challenging us to imagine her as a complex woman, one who could inhabit both worlds of innocence and experience.
In the garage scenes, we’re reminded of the fact that cars get designated feminine pronouns (because they are designed to be owned and shown off), and are tools to attract women. Driver’s car of choice, as Shannon (Bryan Cranston) says, is “plain Jane boring… There she is. Chevy Impala, most popular car in the state of California. No one will be looking at you.”
While Irene isn’t “plain Jane boring”—of course she’s quite beautiful—perhaps her nondescript nature and lack of flash is what kept audiences from noticing her important role.
In the animal kingdom, impalas are largely gender-segregated, except during mating seasons, when males will work so hard at competing for the females that they often get exhausted and will lose their territories; they are showy creatures, leaping and running from prey and for fun. The females isolate themselves with their calves. This speed and agility makes it clear why Chevy would use them as a namesake for a model of car, but we would be remiss at not drawing the similarities between the gender roles in the film.
At the end, no one has gained, only lost. Driver leaves with his bloody, dirt-stained jacket, and Irene silently puts down the phone. They are separate—her with her child and safety, and him with his masculinity and “chivalrous violence” having come out on top, but with no reward but the protection of someone he’d just met. His femme fatale, if we must label.
Christina Hendricks as “femme fatale” Blanche
And in the testosterone-fueled action genre, we must label our women. Even when it’s clear we’re supposed to challenge the virgin/whore dichotomy, even slightly, we cannot be trusted to. Irene and Blanche cannot be full, round characters—they must be caricatures to audiences and reviewers alike.
Much like the color imagery—from the aforementioned blues and reds to the hot pink Mistral font used on posters and in the opening credits—we can listen to the soundtrack to hear women setting the beat for the film, as stereotypically masculine as so many of the themes are. The opening sequence is set to Kavinsky’s “Nightcall,” an intense electro house track, which starts with a gravely male voice and soon switches over to a melodic female singer. The bulk of the singing on the sountrack is by women, and this should remind us that the women are tuning the strings that will make the music of the plot.
Over the climactic shooting at the pizza parlor, the haunting voice of Katyna Ranieri sings Riz Ortolani’s “Oh My Love.” Her voice soars, loudly and clearly over the bloody scene: “But this light / Is not for those men / Still lost in / An old black shadow / Won’t you help me to believe / That they will see / A day / A brighter day / When all the shadows / Will fade away.” She pleads for our protagonist, and she pleads for us, to look beyond the flat facades of what we expect, and to instead find the complexity of characters we think we know.
For the “kewpie-doll” can be the femme fatale, and the femme fatale can simply be an accomplice. Or perhaps the shadows of those labels can be lifted entirely, and we can be left with multidimensional female characters who are recognized for who they are.

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Leigh Kolb is an English and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri, and has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing. She lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, chickens, and garden, and makes a terrible dinner party guest because all she wants to talk about is feminism and reproductive rights.

Guest Writer Wednesday: Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan: Viewers’ and Critics’ Miss-steps in a Dance with a Female Protagonist

Black Swan (2010)

As Mila Kunis’s character descends upon Natalie Portman’s in the (dream) oral sex scene in Black Swan, a college-age young woman in the movie theater audibly whispers, “And this is why every guy in the theater is here.” 

Darren Aronofsky’s 2010 Black Swan is a film about repression, perfection, and letting go. 
It is a film about finding, torturing, losing, and gaining oneself through destruction, much like many postmodern films of the same genre (Fight Club, along with Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream and The Wrestler). 
But to too many in that theater and in theaters across the country, it is a sexy, crazy, girl movie about ballet. 
Even though most of the marketing of the film catered directly to the male gaze (focusing, of course, on that oral sex scene, which had nothing to do with sex in the context of the film), it is considered either a movie about a girl, or a movie for girls. Even in the sponsored post on Jezebel (which was heavily promoting the film through advertising), women were supposed to come see the film because of pretty ballet, and shocking scenes—psychological and sexual—all touted in a juvenile, sing-song manner: “Natalie violently masturbates face-down on a mattress under the gazes of two creepy stuffed bunnies. For real.” “Natalie makes out with Mila!” The advertisers seemed desperate to sell a different film to audiences. Females would surely flock to theaters to see ballet, so how could it be marketed toward men (and as seen here, women)? Frivolous lesbian sex. Because certainly men wouldn’t want to see a film about a ballerina (note that these marketing concerns certainly weren’t an issue for The Wrestler). 
The IMDB page describes Black Swan as “A thriller that zeros in on the relationship between a veteran ballet dancer and a rival.” 
But it’s not. Nina’s (Portman) rival, Lily (Kunis), has almost nothing to do with the central plot and theme of this film. However, the allure of feminine cattiness, jealousy, and competitiveness is much easier to digest than the idea that a film could focus on universal human conflicts with a female protagonist. 
Aronofksy’s 2008 film The Wrestler is described on IMDB as follows: “A faded professional wrestler must retire, but finds his quest for a new life outside the ring a dispiriting struggle. “ 
Personal conflict, inner-struggle, the gender-neutral “quest.” 
In an interview that touched upon gender issues in Black Swan, Aronofsky said, “… to me, if you paint a human character with real emotions and really empathize with them, it doesn’t matter if it’s a 50-something aging wrestler, or a 20-something ambitious dancer, they’re just people.” How unfortunate that we must hear that explanation from a director, instead of simply understanding it. 
Lest the blame of this feminine vs. universal (masculine) protagonist issue be placed solely upon the marketing and audience, the feminist lens must also be properly focused. In Debra Cash’s “Swanday Bloody Swanday: Darren Aronofsky’s Sadistic, Misogynistic New Film,” she refers to the film as a “textbook demonstration of what academics refer to as the male gaze… Aronofsky’s fable portrays female powerlessness on every level—youth, friendship, collegiality, retirement, motherhood.” And that in itself is misogynistic? Should we not portray powerlessness because we want to be powerful? Had Aronofsky been celebrating powerlessness, maybe that argument would hold true, but he certainly was not. Showing how destructive powerlessness is should be viewed as a feminist action. 
Many feminist film reviewers also lambasted the misogyny of the ballet’s artistic director, Thomas (played by Vincent Cassel), even though his character’s inherent sexism (referring to his principle dancer as his “Little Princess,” for example) is essential to the themes of repression and being able to break free from said repression. Jill Dolan, at The Feminist Spectator, says that “As her [Nina’s] relationship with Thomas gets more and more entwined, she begins to suffer from a kind of Stockholm Syndrome, idealizing and even identifying with Thomas and his mercurial cruelty.” This is begging the question that Nina is the victim–would we ever assume a grown man in a similar role was the victim? Perhaps we’d glance at the notion, but never give him the simple, passive role of “victim.” Relegating Nina to the role of the victim belittles and negates the larger focus of the film. 
While Thomas’s advice to Nina to touch herself is uncomfortable, it is effective, not purely sexist, in trying to force her to find her Black Swan. What better way to discuss this clearly feminist idea—the female orgasm and the difficulty to attain it due to outside and inside pressures—than in the context of the dichotomy of the White and Black Swans? When she finally does achieve orgasm during the aforementioned dream sequence, it’s clear she can do so only when she has lost herself enough, and lost herself to a point where she can blame someone else for her destruction, that she can let herself (and her Black Swan) free. 
While this literal and figurative climax also serves as the beginning of her perfection and destruction, we can see that the destructive nature of this epiphany relies on the fact that she has not achieved freedom by herself. Dolan presents this scene as if it is a lesbian sex scene, as does Cash. In doing so, these feminist commentators take away the importance of the scene by assuming it’s simply for the male gaze, when in fact it is all about Nina overcoming, or attempting to overcome, the passive social and sexual world that she inhabits, while still striving for perfection. 
This leaves the feminist viewer to wonder what makes a film feminist? Must sexism lose and the oppressed woman break free and live happily ever after? Instead, perhaps the truly feminist film is one that makes the female protagonist represent humanity, not just womanhood. Dolan ends her article with the line: “That’s a message that’s not good for the girls.” This further proves the idea that the message of success through self-destruction cannot be gender-neutral with a female protagonist. 
Aviva Dove-Viebahn, in her Ms. Magazine Blog review “Sex, Lies and Ballet,” acknowledges Aronofsky’s “fascination with the intense humanity and obsessive desires of his characters” in a refreshingly comprehensive review. Dove-Viebahn clearly sees what the others miss—that we as viewers are supposed to be questioning and compelled by Aronofksy’s narrative. 
In the Variety article “Stalking the perfect ending,” Mark Heyman (one of the writers of the film, along with John McLaughlin and Andres Heinz) said about the film’s end: “We wanted it to have some kind of emotional weight and significance and somehow be satisfying, even though it’s tragic… so that it felt like she had achieved something even as she had destroyed herself.” It seems that the writers and the director have a clear understanding of the purpose of the film, and the complicated, yet simple, themes. Why did so many audiences and critics miss the point? 
In Nassim Nicholas Taleb’s The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable, he explores probability and the human urge to predict in his Black Swan Theory (typically used to explain world and financial events). He derives the title of the book and theory with the story of the white swan in the “old world”—people had only ever seen white swans, so they assumed all swans were white. The sighting of a black swan was a complete surprise. He says, “It illustrates a severe limitation in our learning from observations or experiences and the fragility of our knowledge. One single observation can invalidate a general statement derived from millennia of confirmatory sightings of millions of white swans.” The male protagonist is the white swan—the millions of white swans. Aronofsky’s Black Swan—the female protagonist—has shocked the people in our “old” world. We don’t know what to do with it exactly, and are unclear of its purpose. 
Taleb goes on to describe the three attributes of the Black Swan: “it is an outlier, as it lies outside the realm of regular expectations,” “it carries an extreme impact,” and “in spite of its outlier status, human nature makes us concoct explanations for its occurrence after the fact, making it explainable and predictable.” The audiences who quickly categorize Black Swan as a movie for/about women, or the critics who lambast its misogyny, are unable to otherwise grapple with the outlier of a female protagonist who can show us ourselves—male and female. 
Unfortunately, we are still entrenched in a culture where men’s stories are universal stories of humanity, and women’s stories are women’s stories. Until we move past that, and realize that just as we don’t have to be aging professional wrestlers to understand the humanity and struggle of The Wrestler’s protagonist, nor do we have to be young female ballerinas to see Nina as a character that speaks to us in Black Swan, we will continue to be in gendered places in the movie theater, where male protagonists are the norm, and female protagonists are only noteworthy if they are being gone down on.

Leigh Kolb is an English and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri, and has an MFA in creative nonfiction writing. She lives on a small farm with her husband, dogs, chickens, and garden, and makes a terrible dinner party guest because all she wants to talk about is feminism and reproductive rights.