Travel Films Week: ‘Easy Rider’: Searching for a Free America That Doesn’t Exist

Easy Rider poster: “A man went looking for America. And couldn’t find it anywhere…”
“Although the masters make the rules / For the wise men and the fools / I got nothing, Ma, to live up to… For them that must obey authority / That they do not respect in any degree… My eyes collide head-on with stuffed graveyards.” – “It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding),” Bob Dylan

Written by Leigh Kolb

In 1967, the president of the Motion Picture Association of America told an audience that “we have to stop making movies about motorcycles, sex and drugs.”


Peter Fonda, who was in that audience, got an idea: “Suddenly, the lesson of the day came floating in… ‘No more movies about motorcycles, drugs and sex.’ And I went, ‘Boom! That’s it!’”
Wyatt (Peter Fonda), left, and Billy (Dennis Hopper) search for America.
Easy Rider, which, on the surface, revolves completely around motorcycles, drugs and sex, was released in 1969. Peter Fonda wrote the screenplay, along with Dennis Hopper and Terry Southern, and Hopper directed the film. 
Easy Rider encapsulates a series of moments in American history–the counterculture hippie movement, the New Left, the civil rights movement, the women’s movement, the sexual revolution–that, at their core, sought to challenge and dismantle the status quo of the “Establishment,” the capitalistic white-supremacist male-dominated patriarchy. 
While the film features gorgeous scenery, cool bikes, an amazing soundtrack and shows a multifaceted American landscape, it also reminds us that to eschew understood social norms can be deadly. 
Wyatt (“Captain America”) and Billy ride toward what they expect to be the American Dream.
The movie poster includes the caption, “A man went looking for America. And couldn’t find it anywhere…”
It is this reality–that the nebulous idea of “America” (freedom, possibility, liberty and adventure)–that permeates the film. This idealized America doesn’t exist, even among the beautiful natural landmarks and infrastructure. 
In the end, it’s not running drugs that gets the riders killed. It’s their propensity for moving against the current, for having long hair.
The themes of socially defined and limiting masculinity throughout Easy Rider go hand in hand with the theme of an elusive America. In fact, the idea that this idyllic America can be found is as entrenched in our mythology as the idea that gender performance is set and rigid. Both are myths that are central to our being as a society, and both are myths that are incredibly destructive.
Fonda’s character, Wyatt (called “Captain America”) wears a large American flag stitched across his leather jacket, with a flag on his helmet and bike. His hair is long, but he looks the part of an American hero. His foil, Dennis Hopper’s Billy, wears fringe on his leathers, wears a weathered cowboy hat and has flames painted on his bike. His hair is longer and disheveled, and he’s consistently irreverent and mouthy, while Wyatt is contemplative and reserved.
Their journey takes them across the Southwest and South. Their destination is New Orleans, and they want to make it in time for Mardi Gras. Mardi Gras itself represents tradition somewhat turned on its head. The roots of the holiday are firmly religious, but the celebrations typically include hiding one’s face, dressing without gender norms, and over the years, increasing substance use. Their goal was to make it there–a celebration representative of both being free and out of control before lent begins, which is all about control.

On the way, they stop at a ranch for a tire fix and dinner. Wyatt is clearly taken by the “simple” life of the rancher and his wife and children. The rancher notes, after learning that Wyatt and Billy are from Los Angeles, that he set out to go there long ago, but “you know how it is,” he says, indicating that he got married and had children instead. His “settled” life isn’t maligned, but is shown as a respectable choice. Wyatt tells the rancher he should be “proud” that he can live off the land. They eat together and are connected by this communal act.

Wyatt and Billy pick up a hitchhiker, and he takes them to his commune. This is a largely feminine space–the women are leaders and nurturers, and have sexual agency. While they are attempting to create an idyllic society, it’s clear that they have substandard soil and questionable farming expertise. Wyatt is optimistic about their future (while Billy thinks they don’t have a chance). The two swim with two women, and they are nude and playful. Male nudity is more present in this baptismal scene than female, and it’s clear that they are having fun. The women are not objects in this film–they are supporting characters, but they are individuals. Throughout, the female characters’ names are more prominent than the men’s, which indicates their individuality.

The women in Easy Rider are nurturers, caretakers, mothers and lovers. Two of the soundtrack’s most prominent songs–“It’s Alright, Ma (I’m Only Bleeding)” and “Born to Be Wild”–address women. While we often think that a story like this is made possible by the male privilege of being able to be safely alone on the road, it’s clear that that notion is supposed to be challenged.

When Wyatt and Billy arrive in a small town, they are arrested and thrown in jail for riding along in a parade. While their stops so far have been welcoming and seem to embrace diversity, this all changes as they enter the “civilization” of a small town. George (Jack Nicholson) is in jail with them, as he was drunk the night before. George is a southern lawyer who has worked for the ACLU, and immediately jokes with Wyatt and Billy about how they look like outsiders. He notes that the townspeople here took “rusty razor blades to long hair.” He also says he imagines they can get out of jail easily if they haven’t killed anybody–“at least nobody white.”

George has an influential father in town (the sheriff promises to not tell his father he was so drunk), and it’s clear that he has a strong desire to be an activist and effect change, but he’s stuck in between his father’s footsteps and alcoholism, feeling like he can’t move forward because people are so backward. He is another model of American masculinity, not quite fully counterculture, but enough to feel excluded. In jail, he says to Wyatt and Billy, “We’re all in the same cage here.” For these three, that cage is a white patriarchy that has strict social norms that they do not adhere to.

George goes along with Wyatt and Billy (wearing a football helmet–his mother thought he should save it to give to his son someday, even though she hadn’t wanted him to play football, showing mixed messages of what it means to be a man) toward Mardi Gras. He says that he’s tried to go there “six or seven times,” but never makes it across the state line. He shows them a card for a brothel in New Orleans and jokes about the women there. He’s enough of a good-old-boy to see women as objects. To Wyatt and Billy, George represents the Establishment in a congenial way. He’s not threatening to them, but he has short hair and privilege; he fits the mold–to an extent–of what a man should be. His inability to fully function without binge drinking shows how damaging those expectations can be.

Wyatt, George and Billy get out of jail free–but not quite.
When the three stop at a diner, a booth full of teenage girls respond excitedly to the three men, but a booth of men react with homophobic, sexist and racist slurs against them. They mock their long hair and call them “Yankee queers.” These men operate under the guise of protecting white southern womanhood, which played a large part in racist violence–including lynchings–throughout modern history. When the girls follow the men out to their bikes and want a ride, the trio knows that to take them would be a sure death sentence.

Wyatt, Billy and now George by association are otherized because they don’t look or behave like “real” men should. The three are attacked that night at their campsite, and George is killed. This violence would surely be justified by the entrenched idea that the townspeople were protecting their women, or even protecting the order of their town by eliminating those who don’t fit.

A local says, “I guess we’d put him in the women’s cell, don’t you reckon?”
Before he’s killed, George talks to the other two about freedom. George says that Wyatt and Billy scare them because they represent freedom. When Billy argues that freedom is what it’s all about (“it” being their lives, and America), George responds:
“But talkin’ about it and bein’ it, that’s two different things. I mean, it’s real hard to be free when you are bought and sold in the marketplace. Of course, don’t ever tell anybody that they’re not free, ’cause then they’re gonna get real busy killin’ and maimin’ to prove to you that they are. Oh, yeah, they’re gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it’s gonna scare ’em.”

They don’t run from fear, though, they get “dangerous.” Resistance to civil rights, to women’s rights, to questioning gender norms–this resistance is typically violent, and is bred by fear of disrupting the social order (that is, the white-supremacist patriarchal order).

Wyatt and Billy make it to New Orleans, and go to the House of Blue Lights (the brothel that George had been excited about). There is heavy religious imagery in this scene–the Latin “Kyrie Eleison” (“Lord have mercy”) as a soundtrack and images of Madonna and child, the Virgin Mary and Jesus Christ are everywhere.

While Billy is awkward yet eager with Karen, a prostitute, Wyatt seems uncomfortable and disinterested in the woman he’s “chosen” (her name is Mary–of course).

The four wander into the streets, where Mardi Gras is in full force. Out in the crowded streets, Wyatt kisses Mary and lifts her up, finally feeling comfortable and free.

The four split LSD in the cemetery. 

The four take LSD, and the iconic scene at the St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 gets under way. The sounds of construction are a backdrop to children reciting Catholic prayers as the four characters strip, have sex, weep and trip their way around the cemetery. This is America. Wyatt cries and begs atop a statue of the Virgin Mary (Hopper had directed him to act like he was speaking to his mother, who committed suicide when he was a child). A film critic calls this scene a “eulogy” to the 60s, the end of the hope and optimism that drove liberation and counterculture movements. The trip is chaotic and disappointing.

Wyatt weeps in anger over his mother.

Wyatt and Billy camp out, and Billy is ecstatic about their journey. “We’re rich man, we’re rich.” Wyatt responds, “We blew it,” without the same pride and excitement for their future. “You go for the big money and then you’re free,” Billy says, encapsulating the American Dream. “Goodnight man,” Wyatt says, rolling over so the large American flag on the back of his jacket is prominent. 

They continue riding across America, through its towns and countryside, with shipyards, industry, bridges, factories and the automobile as reminders of the American landscape.

Billy’s defiance and his death.


Two locals drive by, wanting to “scare the hell” out of Billy. Billy flips them off, and the man asks him why he doesn’t get a haircut. He then shoots him point-blank. Wyatt turns around and promises to go for help as he drapes his flag jacket over Billy. The America that Wyatt has been searching for is lost. As he rides away, the same truck turns around and shoots at him, and his bike erupts in flames.

The camera slowly pans out, so that the speck of fire becomes less and less prominent in the beautiful countryside.

The murder of Wyatt and Billy at the end of the film is senseless, and based in the fear that George described and also the killers’ desire to prove and establish power and dominance. This death is symbolically a death of a hope in an America that is truly free and worth finding. The disappointing freedom of Mardi Gras has made way for the rigid control of lent. 

In the almost half a century since Easy Rider was released, it’s chilling how much of the rhetoric and violence against non-conformity and social progress still exists. This dream of an America that Wyatt so desperately wanted to find–a place of freedom and equality where you could live as you desired and “do your own thing in your own time”–went up in flames, just like his flag-emblazoned bike.



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

Conspicuous Consumption and ‘The Great Gatsby’: Missing the Point in Style

The Great Gatsby (2013)
Written by Leigh Kolb
Critic Kathryn Schulz, in “Why I Despise The Great Gatsby,” bemoans the acclaim that the novel receives in literary circles. She says, “It is the only book I have read so often despite failing—in the face of real effort and sincere ­intentions—to derive almost any pleasure at all from the experience… I find Gatsby aesthetically overrated, psychologically vacant, and morally complacent…”
Well, yes.
Isn’t that the point? 
Had Schulz replaced The Great Gatsby with “The American Dream” (rags-to-riches wealth and power and the reward of lavish lifestyles and romantic fulfillment), then she would have been spot on, and would have captured the exact message that The Great Gatsby has conveyed to generation after generation, ceaselessly beating us against the current… sorry.
I was looking forward to Baz Luhrmann’s much-anticipated adaptation of The Great Gatsby, because I love his Romeo + Juliet so much it hurts. He got it so right, so I figured he could get this right too, especially with Leonardo DiCaprio on board.
Cheers, indeed.
He kind of got it. The first half of the film is lavish and screams “Baz Luhrmann.” It was exactly what I wanted. Jay-Z’s “100$ Bill” captured the 1920s “Jazz Age” aesthetic of white people co-opting black music. The driving hip hop in the first few scenes exemplified the “hip-hop fascination with money, power, violence and sex,” that soundtrack executive producer Jay-Z saw in Jay Gatsby. 
But something changes. It seems as if Luhrmann wanted too badly to include most of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s text, and his own style was lost in that translation. I wanted the film to be jarring and fast, or painfully slow, with experimental music and filmography throughout. During the second half of the film, the soundtrack became more traditional and subdued. Luhrmann seemed to flirt with style—the typed letters at the end of the film (that I’d like to forget), the slow-motion shot of Tom hitting Myrtle—but there was something lacking in consistency. 
That said, Luhrmann does let us focus—even temporarily—on some poignant themes of the novel. Tom’s destructive masculinity (his trophy room and his racism expose his character) go unpunished in his patriarchal society. Daisy’s vapidity highlights the expectations of a beautiful, wealthy woman, when her hopes for her daughter are that “she’ll be a fool—that’s the best thing a girl can be in this world, a beautiful little fool.” Daisy herself attempts to live that role, and she escapes punishment because of who she is. Tom and Daisy’s privilege shields and protects them. Their “old money,” in contrast to Gatsby’s “new money,” shows the impenetrable American truth that you might be detestable, but you call the shots when you have money and connections. Gatsby’s desperate drive for that green light—to be loved—can be bought only momentarily.
The fact that The Great Gatsby Still Gets Flappers Wrong” didn’t bother me, really (although Hix’s article is incredibly informative). Having an independent, empowered woman in The Great Gatsby would seem as false as the magical typewriter. No one in The Great Gatsby is supposed to be a character we want to identify with or aspire to be. The men are problematic, and so are the women.
Nick, Gatsby, Daisy and Tom at one of Gatsby’s parties.
Luhrmann’s characters are often more sympathetic than the novel’s, but the core of who they are and what they represent is stable.
Jordan Baker’s role was minimized, but she was still a foil to Daisy’s carelessness.
I would like to deny the storytelling technique that Luhrmann employs with Nick Carraway, but I cannot. I don’t think I would have minded if he’d framed the story as Nick writing a memoir; maybe I even would have forgiven the floating type if it had been consistent (but probably not). However, the fact that Nick begins telling the story to his therapist, who then encourages him to write it down, seems ridiculous. Nick seems just self-aware and self-involved enough to know he has a good story—he wouldn’t have needed someone to persuade him to write it down.
Tobey Maguire’s Nick has a doughy personality. He’s not too likable, but we don’t actively dislike him. Maybe we roll our eyes at him sometimes. He’s true to the novel, that’s for sure.
DiCaprio’s Gatsby is mysterious, beautiful, reserved and is able to elicit sympathy from the audience.
Why yes, you can buy this headpiece from Tiffany’s.
Carey Mulligan’s Daisy is not quite as off-putting as she is in the novel, which seemed to be Luhrmann’s goal. He didn’t completely deny the existence of the emptiness and disappointment the novel conveys, but he clearly wanted us to be swept up in the fashions and romanced by the gorgeous settings and people (and shirts!). 
That (along with the inconsistent style) was my biggest problem with the film—it wasn’t depressing enough. Perhaps it was the lack of Gatsby’s father showing Nick little Jimmy’s meticulous plans, or the lack of a funeral scene, or maybe it was the floaty letters typing out Nick’s thoughts—I didn’t feel the empty weight of the futility of the American Dream, and the bitter disappointment of a life spent wanting more.
Luhrmann gets caught up in the “romance.”
I know Luhrmann can do it—he did it with Romeo + Juliet, with its era-bending dialogue and music, stylized filmography and heart-wrenching ending—but I think he got too caught up with the romance of Gatsby’s lifestyle (just like Nick did). 
And that’s the great reverse dramatic irony of stories like Gatsby—yes, maybe audiences get on some level that Jay Gatsby’s story isn’t meant to be aspirational. But they relish it in anyway. Donald Trump’s hotel is offering the Trump Hotel “Great Gatsby” Package (for $14,999 you can live like an ill-fated socialite?); Brooks Brothers has “The Great Gatsby” collection. Gatsby is like Don Draper; their true legacy—disappointment, emptiness and the tragic nature of a re-imagined life that isn’t a dream come true—is packaged in fashion and good looks. That life looks exciting, we think. I want hosiery like Daisy’s, and parties like Gatsby’s. Conspicuous consumption is idolized. 
But that’s not the point.
The American Dream is disappointing. Wealth is disappointing. Idealized romance is disappointing.
And then you die. And no one cares.
All of this is meaningless.
Luhrmann’s film and the marketing ploys surrounding it don’t seem to quite get at that. While I was let down, I suppose I’m not surprised. We live in a society obsessed with wealth, status and pulling oneself up from one’s bootstraps. To topple all of that over into an ash heap would be problematic for both the core of American mythology and for Hollywood.

Because if we focus on the tragedy of Jay Gatsby’s aspirations and the injustice of Tom and Daisy’s escape, then we would have to face the fact that the party is really over. But we can’t, and we don’t, so we go on, endlessly dazzled and distracted by shiny things (which women are especially interested in, evidently).

And perhaps that’s what Nick’s final words mean—we keep trying to go back, over and over, to this belief that the green light is obtainable, and it will make us happy. However, that light was not real in 1922, and it’s not real now. It’s just in 3D.


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

‘Oblivion:’ A Response to Ignatiy Vishnevetsky’s Review on RogerEbert.com

Oblivion (2013)
Jack Harper (Tom Cruise) stands on the landing pad to his home.
This is a guest post written by Gabrielle Gopie-Tree. 
I’m not a Tom Cruise fan and I usually don’t watch his films, but I quite like Oblivion. To be fair, I am partial to post-apocalyptic productions but often the action is overdone and the plot underdeveloped; this is certainly not the case with Oblivion, which is a film about monoculture. Monoculture lacks the essential elements for life: diversity, complexity, and struggle. 
Ignatiy Vishnevetsky sees it differently. While he offers a humorous critique of patriarchy and a welcome, albeit limited, view of misogyny from his perspective as a White male of eastern origins, his superficial review of Oblivion ignores the soulful theme of the film: self-recovery. This idea is central to every aspect of the movie and is quite an unusual perspective in a Hollywood film, particularly in a genre that is typically focused on stereotypical masculinity. While discussion of sex-inequality in film is an encouraging development, there are serious flaws in this element of Vishnevetsky’s criticism. Here is my point of view from my perspective as a Black female of western origins. 
Vishnevetsky starts with a spirited description of the colour (white) and shape of Jack’s ship, the docking station, and the interior of the central command’s arrival chamber as all being symbolic of female genitalia which he views as encapsulating a violent sexism. I disagree. Instead I see the distilled and contrived soul-lessness of these elements as juxtaposition against the reality of Jack’s former life; a life that keeps calling to Jack in the shape of his attachment to a very green getaway spot on Earth and romantic memories of a woman in pre-apocalyptic New York City. Jack projects an air of perpetual disorientation as his longing for a satisfying existence contrasts with his daily life. 
Jack works with Vica (Andrea Riseborough) character to ensure the logistical resource extraction process on a devastated Earth in the year 2077. Vica and Jack are colleagues as well as lovers. They both represent a futuristic version of the patriarchal family: Jack goes out to work each day returning to prepared meals and perfunctory intimacy. Vica is the classic Stepford Wife in both appearance and behaviour: her sheer plasticity and vacuity are her essence. Jack is depicted as having a ‘ruggedly capable masculinity:’ he fixes, fights, and fucks. Despite the mental manipulation of his masters, Jack has a heart. We see this via his expressions of service to others: his successful fight to save a lone dog as well as the woman who turns out to be his wife, Julia (Olga Kurylenko), from death by drone, and his communication of loyalty to the human resistance who awaken him from his alien-induced programming. These are traits typically associated with the feminine, making this a rather feminist/womanist element of Jack’s character and the film itself. 
Jack struggles with Drone 166 to get the machine to stand up.
While Vishnevetsky compliments the storytelling method used in Oblivion, he simultaneously lambastes the film as being “derivative” of “several science-fiction movies at once.” I see this critique as plausible in light of the theme of the film itself – self-recovery. However, it seems that while Vishnevetsky is comfortable advancing some semblance of a gender critique, he is much less comfortable discussing the racial element of Oblivion, although he does mention the colour of the pseudo-feminine monoculture that amuses him so greatly as “white.” For example, who could miss the racial dynamics in the fact that there is (as far as I can tell) only one non-white man, Beech (Morgan Freeman), and one non-white woman, Julia–or, that Beech has a similar wake-up talk with Jack as did Morpheus (Laurence Fishbourne) with Neo (Keanu Reeves) in The Matrix. Vishnevetsky’s failure to talk race brings the sincerity of his limited discussion of gender into question. 
Morgan Freeman as Beech, the resistance leader who helps Jack recover his identity.
Furthermore, Vishnevetsky’s claim that: Oblivion is about a “lowly technician sending unmanned drones to hunt and kill a demonized, alien Other — until it forgets that it ever was” is overly simplistic. He ignores the element of struggle in the film which is necessary for life and Oblivion is most certainly about the life/death struggle; from the start of the film with Jack and Vica’s life-parody to the story’s culmination in Jack and Julia’s life-reality on a lush green patch of earth, complete with offspring. 
Julia (Olga Kurylenko) and Jack recall a pre-apocalypse moment.
While Vishnevetsky sees Oblivion as “a wannabe mindbender that raises questions about its lead character’s identity — except that the lead character is too sketchy to make these questions compelling,” I see it as an exploration of a man’s struggle to recover himself from monoculture programming which in itself requires interactions with others for one’s self-development to occur. Curiously, Vishnevetsky condemns Jack using the archetype of the self-sufficient masculinised rugged individual but mislabels it as “creation myth.” Thereafter, he bemoans what he sees as none of the many women in the film being “able to do anything without Harper’s help.” This is a very strange critique and smacks of a highly neoliberal notion of sameness as the benchmark for sex-equality. Also, it does not hold up in light of the fact that Vica administers both the home and the office each day while Jack fulfills his duties outside on the ground and she engages in almost all communications with Sally (Melissa Leo) at central control, including the authority to terminate her working relationship with Jack by simply saying they are no longer an “effective team.” Additionally, toward the end of the film Jack and Julia collaborate to challenge the authority of the alien masters including Julia’s decision to undergo cryosleep as the best option for facilitating Jack’s assault on the alien’s central command. 
Do not be fooled by Vishnevetsky’s use of terms such as “uterus,” “vulva,” “mother figure,” “creation myth,” and “misogyny” which suggest a feminist critique of Oblivion that just is not there.

Gabrielle Gopie-Tree has a background in law, politics, psychology and spirituality. She is a nomadic social theorist trying to be the change she wants to see in the world; a believer in the lessons of the guide Qadhafi; and valiantly trying to allow the universe to unfold as it should.

Choose Your Own Sexist Adventure: Victim Blaming, Domestic Violence, and the Glorification of the Nice Guy™ in ‘Mud’

Matthew McConaughey all over the movie poster for Mud
Written by Stephanie Rogers, who spoils the entire movie. 
I wanted to see Mud because it looked like an interesting film about the cult of masculinity. It is, in fact, a film about masculinity and father-son relationships, but it goes out of its way to avoid offering an actual critique of masculinity. If anything, Mud celebrates the masculine by demonizing the feminine. The women in this film carry the sole responsibility of ruining every dude character’s life, and Mud screams through a megaphone its Women Are Awful message from the first scene all the way to “Help Me, Rhonda” playing over the closing credits. And I thought Side Effects was bad.
I hated that I had to hate Mud; the young boy who plays Ellis (Tye Sheridan) and his best friend Neckbone (Jacob Lofland) blew my mind, and Matthew McConaughey as Mud gave his best performance since Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (ha). Reese Witherspoon somehow even managed to garner sympathy for a second with her ten minutes on screen, a serious feat given the fact that the character she plays (Juniper) gets blamed by everyone for Mud’s predicament as a fugitive in hiding. Ellis’s parents, too, particularly Sarah Paulson (as Mary Lee) of recent American Horror Story: Asylum fame, gave moving performances, and I especially liked Michael Shannon’s three brief scenes as Galen—not because anything other than sexism and man-childness occur—but because he always commands the screen (see Take Shelter and Revolutionary Road). The actors, specifically the two young boys, save this film from entirely shitting all over itself.
Jacob Lofland (Neckbone) and Tye Sheridan (Ellis) in Mud
Matthew McConaughey plays Mud, the title character, and I keep reading everywhere that Mud is a retelling of Huck Finn, so okay. Two 14-year-old boys, Ellis and Neckbone (best. name. ever.), live in a poor yet quaint and lovely town on the Mississippi River. In conventional boys-as-adventurous-explorers fashion, they sneak their small boat off to an island down the river where they find an abandoned boat stuck in a tree. After climbing up there and sifting through a treasure trove of Penthouse magazines (because that’s necessary) and finding a bag of canned beans, they realize someone lives on the boat. Mud! The rest of the film shows men bonding with one another by objectifying women, beating up men to defend the honor of women, and blaming women both for the abuse inflicted upon them by men and for the problems they “cause” for the men around them. It’s a real win-win for the ladies of Mud.
Ellis goes to find Mud on the island

There is not a woman in this movie who doesn’t betray her man, cheat on him, use him, steal his home, rob him of his authenticity, make him move to a boring condo complex in the suburbs, or otherwise force him [out] of his natural and driving male essence … This thing might as well be a river fort with a giant “No Girlz Allowed” sign out front.

Hard to argue with that. Here’s why.
I guess I knew in pretty much the first scene (and in the first lines of dialogue), when Ellis told Neckbone he had a crush on a girl and Neckbone responded with, “She’s got nice titties,” that Mud might walk a fine line between either existing as a coming-of-age tale or offering up a sexist piece of shit under the guise of a coming-of-age tale. It’s a little bit of both.
The freakshow Ellis and Neckbone see when they first meet Mud
The neatly tied up plot goes like this: “Two teenage boys encounter a fugitive and form a pact to help him evade the bounty hunters on his trail and reunite him with his true love.”
Sounds romantic, right? See, I definitely teared up during its most manipulative moments, and I definitely came to care about the characters, and I definitely wanted to leave the theater feeling okay about that rather than feeling guilty for liking a movie that portrayed my gender (and even men), with such simplicity and disrespect. I psychically begged Mud to reverse all its misogyny in the end, to somehow invalidate the sexist ideology it spent nearly two hours enforcing, so that I could write about its complexity and nuance and be all, “Wow, what a smart deconstruction of Southern masculinity!” No dice.
Instead, I get to write about typical Hollywood gender-trope drivel, except it exists in a fucking semi-indie film, and, according to me—a genius—indie films ain’t supposed to rely on Hollywood gender-trope drivel anymore. Let’s begin.
Best Fucking Friends Ever
Every man in this movie tells a story about a woman who wronged him. Every. Single. One. The opening scene (juxtaposed with the “nice titties” comment and the Penthouse porn) shows Galen, Neckbone’s uncle and sole caretaker, getting reamed by his girlfriend. She bolts from his home, whips around to find the two boys sitting on the porch, and says something like, “You make sure you always treat girls like princesses!” We quickly learn that Galen tried something in bed that his girlfriend didn’t like, so when she throws a handful of gravel at him and yells, “I’m a princess!” Galen and the boys (and the audience) laugh at her “irrational” reaction and prudishness. Boys will be boys, honey.
Michael Shannon as Galen, aka Misogynist of the Year
Ellis and Neckbone then leave the house carrying Galen’s book on how to understand the opposite sex (because that’s necessary), and the film officially begins its Women Are Awful message with not even a hint of fucking subtlety or irony: welcome to prudes, princesses, titties, Mars/Venus, hysteria, virgin/whore nonsense, and porn, all within the first five minutes of screen time.
Not surprisingly, we learn that Mud finds himself stuck on an island and running from the law because of Juniper, a woman he fell in love with as a young teenager. The film pulls no punches in its insistence on blaming Juniper for Mud’s situation; she involved herself with an abusive man—a pattern for her—and since Mud lurves her so much, he obviously needed to murder the man responsible for beating her and causing her to miscarry. Juniper’s beating also destroyed her reproductive system (why not?), and that factors strongly into Mud’s decision to kill. The message here, and Mud all but says it, is that robbing a woman of her God-given responsibility to bare children is unforgivable and punishable by death.
I wish that were the only instance of blaming a woman’s reproductive capacity for another man’s misery, but, alas, Tom (a possible former CIA assassin, played creepily by Sam Shepard) can barely stand to interact with anyone ever since his wife and son died during childbirth. He raised Mud as his own son (only Ellis knows his biological father, played by Ray McKinnon), and sits on the river shooting his gun every now and then like a hater. Basically, women are misery-inducing killjoys who suck at performing their duties of procreation.
Sam Shepard waiting to … kill … something?
When women deign to momentarily stop holding hostage the broken hearts of men everywhere, they fall into the coveted category of Desired Object, going from active life ruiners to passive beauty queens.
Reese Witherspoon as Juniper with Smeared Mascara
We first meet Ellis’s girl crush (presumably the one with the nice titties) when Ellis sees an older boy put his hands all over her in the parking lot of the Piggly Wiggly. May Pearl (the next best character name after Neckbone and Mud) pushes away the sexual harasser, but do you think that stops Ellis from charging through the parking lot with reptilian stealth and jacking a high school senior in the jaw? No way. That would mean not employing the Damsel in Distress trope, and, in turn, allowing women to wield their own authority and agency. But Mud gives no fucks about women other than how they push the male-focused plot forward. As Megan Kearns notes in her review of Iron Man 3:

The problem with the Damsel in Distress trope is that it strips women of their power and insinuates that women need men to rescue or save them. And yet again it places the focus on men, reinforcing the notion that society revolves around men, not women.

That’s Mud in a nutshell, although many reviewers—and most people in the history of everywhere—still manage to confuse misogyny with Nice Guy™ acts of “chivalry.” 
The Piggly Wiggly: after-school hangout
Interestingly Upsettingly Predictably, the moment that moves Ellis away from rescuing May Pearl—after she rewards him with a kiss and tells him to call her, in typical Damsel in Distress trope fashion—relies on even more misogyny. The congregation of boys in the lot stops their commotion cold when Juniper suddenly appears—in all her blonde-haired glory and cut-off daisy dukes—and saunters into the Piggly Wiggly. The boys gape at her. The teenage girls squirm all jealous. And my brain jerks from all this Sexist Whiplash.
To rewind and parse: a boy street harasses a girl; another boy saves her from said harassment (Damsel in Distress); she publically rewards him for saving her; Juniper shows up as Desired Object; women become jealous of one another over male attention; and Ellis and Neckbone begin their inevitable lightweight stalking of Desired Object. In the span of three minutes.
Okay.
Juniper as Desired Object with Black Eye
It gets worse, though, way way worse. Later, Ellis and Neckbone find one of Mud’s bounty hunters, who was hired by the father of the man Mud murdered (hi, alliteration!), beating the crap out of Juniper in a motel room off the highway like, “Bitch, tell me where Mud’s hiding OR ELSE.” (Stalking women comes in handy sometimes, for both bounty hunters and young boys.) Naturally, the boys save our resident Damsel in Distress by bursting through the motel room door at just the right moment and pretending to sell a cooler full of fish (ha). The mob thug smacks Ellis down too, though, and that’s when the film finally turns into the Southern gothic crime thriller I’d been hoping for—but not before Juniper rewards Ellis with a kiss for saving her.
LIKE, ARE WE IN FUCKING SUPER MARIO BROTHERS?!?!?!
May Pearl smiles at her knight in shining armor
The abuse of women in Mud, which serves no purpose other than to normalize domestic violence for the viewer, is horrifying in its own right, but I ultimately found the Blame the Victim ideology the most disturbing aspect of Mud. Not only does the film voyeuristically depict the harassment and physical abuse of women at the hands of men with no critique or analysis, but it also shows the male characters verbally blaming women for the abuse inflicted upon them. Tom, who acts as a father figure to Mud, delivers a lengthy monologue to young Ellis all but calling Juniper a no-good whore for getting involved with so many abusive jerks and ruining Mud’s entire Nice Guy™ life. (You know, because Women Are Awful and consequently at fault for all the choices men make, including their choices to beat the shit out of women.)
Sarah Paulson as Mary Lee in Mud
The film’s message devolves even further to insinuate that—because Mud hasn’t been physically abusive toward Juniper and has even heroically punished the men who have been—he has both earned and deserves her love. And so, the audience can’t help but dislike Juniper when the boys catch her slutting it up at a bar with a billiards-playing bro instead of sailing off to Mexico with Nice Guy™ Mud in his fixed up former tree boat. A small part of me waited for the film to pause on Juniper’s face for a moment and toss up an UNGRATEFUL BITCH title card, just to make sure the audience got the point.
Juniper, aka UNGRATEFUL BITCH

The takeaway to the story seems to be that the only people you can count on in this world are your male friends and your father figure. At the end of the movie, after all hell breaks loose as Ellis and Neckbone’s entanglement with Mud gets crazy and deadly, we see each male character have a touching moment with his father figure. None of them are any good—Ellis’ father can’t make money, Mud’s adopted father is a deadly “assassin,” and Neck’s uncle treats women possibly the worst of any of them—but, heck, in a man’s world it’s the man who teaches you how to man like a man that man man man. And some of the man manning that men masculine you with is hatred of women. Ellis’ father … tells him at one point, “Women are tough. They set you up for some.” Eventually, when Ellis confronts Mud about how much girls suck, Mud replies, “If you find a girl half as good as you, you’ll be all set.” See, a woman can never be as good as a man.

Ellis and Mud talk about Being a Man probably
I can already hear the arguments. Mud exposes the hyper-masculinity present in Southern culture! The boys don’t know any better! That’s just how it is down there! Maybe. But, an intelligent film might consider taking that harmful social construct to task rather than rewarding the male characters for their sexist behavior. Mud presents misogyny as endearing for fuck’s sake, and art—in my opinion—possesses a responsibility to challenge those constructs because it also possesses the power to change them. The dudes in Mud experience no consequences for their bullshit; the film, in fact, revels in their Women Are Awful blues and invites the audience to participate. I’m less interested in whether the depiction of Southern masculinity is authentic. Why not make a statement about how that authentic Southern masculinity hurts women and men?
It never comes close to saying that. But it does manage to deliver a much more cynical message.
Ellis and Neckbone, rightly looking a little terrified of Mud
Halfway through the film, Galen says to Ellis, “This river brings a lot of trash down. You gotta know what’s worth keeping and what’s worth letting go.” Sure, he’s referring to literal trash (as he points to a newly repaired chandelier he found in the river), and he’s referring to Mud, a known fugitive (because he’s seen Ellis and Neckbone hanging out in the river with Mud), but—make no mistake—he’s also referring to women. The film never stops telling us that Women Are Awful, worthless, disposable.
In the end, Ellis’s dad comes to terms with his wife leaving him; Mud finally moves past Juniper; Ellis ogles a new girl (in slow motion!) after May Pearl breaks his heart in public; even Tom learns to leave the death of his wife behind. The men’s collective triumph becomes the fact that they finally learn to let go of The Trash in their lives and hold onto what’s most important—their relationships with other men. So while Mud is a coming-of-age tale in the traditional sense, and coming-of-age tales deliver all kinds of important messages for their young protagonists to absorb, the film mostly wants Ellis to learn that sometimes you just need to fucking drop a bitch.
How sweet.
How sweet, indeed

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Tyler Perry’s Rape Problem by Carolyn Edgar

Jessica Chastain, “Roles for Women Have Taken a Step Back” by Sasha Stone via Women and Hollywood

Think ‘The Walking Dead’ Has a Woman Problem? Here’s the Source by Simon Abrams via The Village Voice

Rick Ross, Don Draper, and the Fantasy World of Masculinity by Mychal Denzel Smith via Feministing

From ‘Californication’ To ‘Veep’ The TV Shows That Hired No Women Or Writers Of Color In 2011-2012 by Alyssa Rosenberg via ThinkProgress

Amy Pascal Asks Hollywood to Eliminate Gay Stereotypes from Films by Karensa Cadenas via Women and Hollywood 

In Which I Am Pretty Darn Sure that Most Gamers Are Fine with Female Protagonists by Becky Chambers via The Mary Sue  

‘Game of Thrones’ Is Back and the Prostitutes Rule the Roost by Alex Cranz via FemPop

Rick Ross Thinks Rape Is a Punchline by Jamilah Lemieux via Ebony Magazine

Girls on Film: Hollywood Will Try Anything for a Superhero Movie — Except a Female Director by Monika Bartyzel via The Week 

What Women Want on TV via HuffPost Live

The Wage Gap in the Video Game Industry by Susana Polo via The Mary Sue

Enough with Jon Hamm’s Penis Already! by Flavia Dzodan via Tiger Beatdown

‘Mad Men’ Season 6: It’s 1968 and You Know What That Means by Chris Lombardi via Women’s Voices for Change 

Esquire Editor: We Show ‘Ornamental’ Women in Same Way as Cars by Mark Sweney via The Guardian

Women Film Festivals: Do We Need Them? by Signe Baumane via Women and Hollywood 

It’s Bigger Than Adria Richards by Jamilah King via Colorlines

The ‘Not Buying It’ App: Challenging Sexist Media via IndieGogo 

Three TV Shows that Feature Great Older Women by Jennifer Keishi via Bitch Magazine Blog

What Would Fully-Clothed Female Superheroes Look Like? by Ryan Broderick via Buzzfeed

What’s Behind ‘Downton Abbey’s Huge Popularity? Great Female Characters by Megan Burbank via Bitch Magazine Blog

We Heart John Legend for Being a Fearless Feminist by Liza Baskin via Ms. Magazine Blog 

Half Of 2013’s National Magazine Award Finalists Are Women, For Real, So Let’s Meet Them by Riese via Autostraddle

Jurassic Park Taught Me It Was Okay To Be a Feminist by Alex Cranz via FemPop

What have you been reading or writing this week?? Share in the comments!

The Tragedy of Masculinity in ‘Romeo + Juliet’

Written by Leigh Kolb.
The opening scene of Baz Luhrmann’s William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet is an intense display of masculinity. While in the original text the Capulet and Montague men draw swords and taunt one another, Luhrmann’s rivals pull guns, rev car engines, smoke, shoot, and light fire to gasoline.
Luhrmann’s 1996 film takes Shakespeare’s text–he stays truer to the language than other modern adaptations–and places it in a decidedly modern world of gang violence, guns, and ecstasy.
It’s Baz Luhrmann. It’s over-the-top and gorgeous, and perfectly encapsulates the timeless themes of the tragic story. At 15, audiences see violent action, young love (lust) and parents who just don’t understand. Older audiences, however, see a tragedy borne out of patriarchy and a culture that expects and respects traditional masculine power.
Capulet and Montague, business moguls and patriarchal forces. Jesus looks on.
While Romeo’s Montague cousins are tied up fighting Capulets and taunting nuns, Romeo (Leonardo DiCaprio) is emoting on the beach over a recent breakup. His father references Romeo’s “tears augmenting the fresh morning dew,” and Romeo is seen smoking a cigarette, sweeping blond hair out of his eyes. Romeo doesn’t seem to be like his cousins, and even when they play pool together, he’s lamenting his lost love.
The feuding men.
When he meets Juliet (Claire Danes) at her family’s costume ball, they are equally smitten and she is forward with her feelings–“you kiss by the book,” she says, as they attempt to escape her meddling mother (who’s attempting to set her up with Paris, played for laughs by Paul Rudd). In discussions about marrying off Juliet, her father indicates to Paris that while mothers are made at her age, it usually doesn’t bode well for a good life. Her mother–who knows her less than her nurse–seems to want to push her into marriage because she had to marry young. Her bitterness and desire to push Juliet into an arranged marriage and young motherhood is portrayed as villainous.
Luhrmann’s take on the balcony scene isn’t for purists, but it’s great for feminists. Instead of Juliet being separated from him on her balcony, elevated literally and figuratively as Romeo struggles to hang on, Juliet walks down to the pool as Romeo waits for her, and the two deliver their lines in the pool–on equal footing, intertwined.
A nontraditional balcony scene places Romeo and Juliet closer together.
Juliet is continuously more mature than Romeo. While she falls for him as he does for her, she wants to know that he’s serious. Romeo stumbles, he’s clearly much more juvenile than Juliet is. They represent youth, yes, but also a departure from not only their fathers’ patriarchal social order and the gendered expectations placed upon them. Juliet’s world is protected and arranged for her; she’s expected to have a life like her mother’s (arranged and out of her control). Romeo’s effeminate nature goes against his father’s powerful corporate position and his cousins’ violent outbursts.
Romeo changes, however, when Tybalt (John Leguizamo) kills Mercutio (Harold Perrineau). Mercutio is frequently played flamboyantly–he doesn’t adhere to masculine norms and makes bawdy jokes at the expense of both Montagues and Capulets–and he represents a neutral party between the two families. Luhrmann’s Mercutio is played by a black man who convincingly cross-dresses for the costume party and attempts to bridge ground between the families. His death, then, is tragic to Romeo, but it’s also a sense of lost hope to the audience. Romeo gets behind the wheel of his car–he’s now part of this violent, masculine world–and chases after Tybalt. He maniacally shoots him as tears stream from his eyes.
When Romeo enters the violent, masculine sphere, the story changes completely and tragically.
He drops the gun, and the rain that has been approaching finally falls.
This crisis is what leads to the couple’s downfall–Romeo stepping into the patriarchal, violent world of senseless feuds pulls him away from the feminine that he’d so willingly embraced and embodied before.
As Juliet’s father drunkenly promises his daughter’s hand in marriage to Paris, he’s surrounded by guns and mounted hunting prizes on the wall behind him. As Romeo and Juliet sleep upstairs, she, too, is being pulled into the patriarchal order against her will.
When Juliet first refuses, her mother turns away from her and her father throws her to the ground, screaming, “I give you to my friend.” Juliet sobs, begging her mother to delay the marriage–but she refuses, and walks away.
Even those closest to her betray her desires–Father Laurence (Pete Postlethwaite) and her nurse (Miriam Margolyes) encourage her to marry Paris.
Juliet goes to Father Laurence and holds a gun first to her head, and then points it at Father Laurence to prove her determination to not marry Paris. Juliet takes control, even when all is working against her. Juliet refuses to bend to the will of the men (and world-weary women) around her.
Noteworthy in Luhrmann’s adaptation is his profuse use of religious symbolism, specifically Catholic iconography. This is another set of patriarchal rules they live under. The images in the film have meaning but not depth; they are as threatening as they might be comforting. Jesus looms over the city (he’s under repair when Tybalt lies dead in the fountain below him). Christianity is present in the city, in Juliet’s room and around Romeo and Juliet’s necks, but it doesn’t save them.
The modernization of key plot points–the certified letter that wasn’t delivered, the dealer that supplies Romeo with poison (fetched from the base of a Virgin Mary lamp), Captain Prince surveying the city in a helicopter–work remarkably well. And the soundtrack–oh, the soundtrack.
In the original text, there is a span of time between Romeo’s suicide and Juliet waking to see him lying dead. Luhrmann plays this scene much more dramatically–she wakes as he’s about to take the poison, and in his shock his hand bumps it into his mouth. They are both alive for a moment, and she kisses him while he’s dying. The lack of bystanders or spectators in this scene makes it more powerful–even a Shakespeare purist could attest to that fact.
The death scene is altered from the original text, and adds to the emotional impact.
Juliet shoots herself with no comment, and the camera pans up, looking at their dead bodies below while flashing back to moments of happiness.
Captain Prince screams “All are punished,” while their dead bodies are put into ambulances and the fathers look on bewildered.
In the original text, Friar Laurence gives a lengthy monologue, explaining all that had happened. Capulet and Montague shake hands and commit to peace.
In most Shakespearian tragedies, while there may be a pile of dead bodies at the end, there’s a sense of closure that things will be better in the future, or that the tragic tale will serve to teach others a lesson.
Not here.
There’s simply bewilderment, and the sense that the patriarchy, the violence, the incessant masculinity of Verona Beach has won, and everyone has lost because of it.
The story, then, isn’t about tragic young love. It’s about the tragedy of adhering to codes of behavior that are inherited and not freely chosen.
Luhrmann–by capturing a time and place that was at the same time specific and completely timeless–reminded a new generation of these messages that are as important and poignant today as they were in 1996, and as they were in 1595.
—–
 
Leigh Kolb is a composition, literature and journalism instructor at a community college in rural Missouri. 

Classic Literature Film Adaptations Week: Gendered Values and Women in Middle Earth

This is a guest post by Barrett Vann.

Several weeks ago, I was trawling the internet for reviews of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, when I came across this one, by Rhiannon at Feminist Fiction. In it, she says:

The film was … a retelling of one of the oldest, most classic, and so most male and white modern fantasy tales we have. And in that context, the film was actually quite an interesting achievement.

I’m not going to try to argue that The Hobbit was a feminist movie — with only one female character in the whole film, that feels a bit of a stretch. I’m not even going to claim that the film was perfectly executed, because I think it had many flaws. But I think it presented the all-male fantasy adventure in a somewhat new way, valuing strengths other than sheer might and blunt, obvious bravery.

… I’m not going to claim that these are “feminine” strengths. But I think they are traits that many other adventure movies would brush over, or present as weaknesses, a lack of proper, adventurous masculinity. The fact that the Hobbit focuses on these traits and integrates them into its adventure is admirable.

The fact that Rhiannon drew attention to this gave me pause, not because it’s not truequite the contraryor because I hadn’t noticed it myself, but because that is something so consistently true of Tolkien’s works that it would never have occurred to me to mention it. The value system in Tolkien’s Middle Earth consistently favours “softer” strengths, putting emphasis on gentleness, scholarliness, empathy, and patience as qualities that heroes possess. Indeed, it’s written into the very mythology of the legendarium. In The Silmarillion, one of the mighty of the gods of Middle Earth is Nienna, who “is acquainted with grief, and mourns for every wound that Arda has suffered in the marring of Melkor. … But she does not weep for herself; and those who hearken to her learn pity, and endurance in hope” (Tolkien, p. 19). Gandalf in his younger days is described as having learned pity and patience from her. This value placed upon empathy, of sorrow as a virtue, endurance of the spirit rather than the body, resonates throughout all of Tolkien’s works.

In The Lord of the Rings, whilst there is a war to be fought, and manly men like Aragorn and Éomer to fight it, the true heroes of the story are Frodo and Sama scholar and a gardener. In Fellowship, Frodo and Gandalf have this telling exchange in the Mines of Moria:

Frodo: It’s a pity Bilbo didn’t kill him when he had the chance!

Gandalf: Pity? It was pity that stayed Bilbo’s hand. Many that live deserve death, and some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends. My heart tells me that Gollum has some part to play yet, for good or evil before this is over. The pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many. [1]

Indeed, characters who embody more traditionally masculine values are more often the ones at moral fault, more apt to fall prey to the deceptions of evil or act rashly and in pride. To take things back to The Silmarillion once more, Fëanor, the Noldorin prince and gemsmith, is “the mightiest in all parts of body and mind: in valour, in endurance, in beauty, in understanding, in skill, in strength and subtlety alike: of all the Children of Ilúvatar” (Tolkien, p. 109). Fëanor is characterised by his might, but he is also rash, prideful, selfish, quick to wrath, and heedless of consequences. His actions result in horrific civil war and centuries of bloodshed and pain.

In The Lord of the Rings, a lesser example is Boromir, who is Captain of the Tower of Guard, and widely regarded as a great warrior among men; large and strong, doughty in battle, and fiercely patriotic. In The Two Towers and Return of the King, he is posthumously contrasted to his brother Faramir, who is the more gentle and scholarly of the two, and who, it is said, is “more Númenórean” than his brother. Boromir possesses many “masculine” virtues, but it is he who first of the Fellowship falls prey to the Ring, as it plays on both his fears for his city and his pride in his own skill. [2]

So, if we’re looking at traditionally gendered values and strengths, Tolkien’s works (and subsequently Jackson’s movies) often subvert them. Which is great! But what about the actual women of Middle Earth? Here, for those readers less geeky about Tolkien than I, I shall cease reference to The Silmarillion, and focus solely on The Lord of the Rings, and the differences between women in the books and the movies.

The Lord of the Rings books are not exactly overflowing with women; Galadriel, Éowyn, Arwen, Goldberry, Rosie Cotton, and a few bit players like Lobelia Sackville-Baggins, and Ioreth the Gondorian healer. The three most significant of these, and those who survive into the movies, are Galadriel, Arwen, and Éowyn. The first two have their roles expanded for the movies, sometimes with more success than others.

Galadriel is the character who stays closest to her book incarnation, and is, let’s make no bones, awesome. The Queen of Lothlorien, Galadriel is one of the oldest Elves in Middle Earth, and a powerful sorceress who bears one of the three Elf-rings. In the book, she appears only once, when the Fellowship stops in Lothlorien after losing Gandalf in Moria. She is a reader of thoughts, and speaks to the hearts and minds of each member of the Fellowship, testing their weaknesses. She also possesses the Mirror of Galadriel, in which can be seen “things that are, things that were, and some things that have not yet come to pass.” She invites Frodo and Sam to look into the Mirror, something which foreshadows events to come and helps to harden their resolve. She is tempted to take the Ring when Frodo offers it to her, envisioning a future in which “Instead of a Dark Lord you will set up a Queen. And I shall not be dark, but beautiful and terrible as the Morning and the Night! Fair as the Sea and the Sun and the Snow upon the Mountain! Dreadful as the Storm and the Lightning! Stronger than the foundations of the earth. All will love me and despair” (Tolkien, p. 356). The Ring tempts those of power, and as an immensely powerful woman, it is a hard test, but she overcomes it. She also gives gifts to the Fellowship, many of which are of immense use later, particularly the ones given to the Hobbits.

Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) is tempted by the Ring

It is of note, I think, that the Ring Galadriel bears is Nenya, the Ring of Adamant. Through her ring, she is characterised as a figure of strength.

The movie’s Galadriel is little changed, but her role is expanded. She provides the voiceover at the beginning of Fellowship, as one who was there and remembers the events of ages past, and in Two Towers, she and Elrond converse on the subject of the rising evil of Sauron and Saruman, and how best to subdue it. She also sends a host of warriors to the battle at Helm’s Deep. In Return of the King, Frodo imagines he sees her as he struggles through Cirith Ungol, and her reminder, “Even the smallest person can change the course of the future,” serves as a sort of tagline for the trilogy. She embodies strength, wisdom, and experience, and is seen frequently in a role of support for other, more obviously active characters.

“Will you look into the Mirror?”
It can be said without much argument, I think, that Galadriel is an excellent feminist character. Though she is married, it is she who is the leader of the galadhrim; she is powerful, compassionate, and wise, but she is not without flaws; temptation, and a certain withdrawal from the events of the world which Tolkien implies is the result of mistakes made when she was younger.

Arwen is a different case. Aragorn’s love, she is the daughter of Elrond, and in the books is more or less a nonentity. Frodo sees her at dinner in Rivendell, and she is described as fair and wise, dark-haired and grey-eyed, and she appears again, at the end of Return of the King, to marry Aragorn. Her only dialogue is a short exchange with Frodo in which she gives him a pendant to wear, to draw strength from when his experiences are too hard to bear. She is meant to be an echo of Luthien, the elf-maid in the First Age who married a mortal man; Luthien was an enchantress who, among other things, glamoured herself to look like a vampire, snuck into the fortress of Angband and put the Dark Lord Morgoth into an enchanted sleep so she could snatch a Silmaril from his very crown. However strong and fabulous Luthien was, though, all the resemblance we see in her descendant is that Arwen also loves a mortal man. Her entire character centres around Aragorn.

Now, Peter Jackson knew, at least, that if you’re going to have a love story, the other half of that love story has to show up more than once before she gets hitched. The way he goes about that, however, doesn’t always work.

In Fellowship, she takes the role of Glorfindel from the books, showing up to bring a wounded Frodo to Rivendell, outrunning Black Riders and summoning the flood of the River Bruinen to drown them after she crosses it. She’s competent, fearless, she even teases Aragorn at one point. Later on, the two of them share a romantic moment, reminiscing about the moment they met; Arwen assures him that she has faith in him, and pledges to forsake immortality for him. All that is fine.

Arwen (Liv Tyler) faces off against the Ringwraiths

In Two Towers, things start getting a little wobbly. With the introduction of Éowyn, a pseudo-love triangle is formed, and Aragorn spends a lot of time being woeful and having flashbacks about Arwen, in one of which he gives her back her Evenstar pendant, the symbol of her choice to become mortal for his sake. Unfortunately, this memory serves only to show Aragorn completely ignoring the agency of the woman he loves and adopting a paternalistic role in which he knows what’s best for her. Never mind the fact that they both knew this was always in the cards. The one element of this scene which might salvage it is the perfect chill of Liv Tyler’s delivery of the line, “It was a gift. Keep it.”

There are also scenes of Arwen and Elrond, in which Elrond takes on this same role, attempting to convince Arwen that there is nothing for her in Middle Earth, and that she would do best to stay with her family and depart to Valinor. Again, Arwen’s agency is undermined, and further, though she is a mature womanindeed, over two-thousand years oldshe is made childlike, as she trembles and weeps in her father’s arms.

In Return of the King, she is on her way to the Grey Havens until she has a vision of the child she might one day have with Aragorn, and rushes back to accuse Elrond of keeping his foreknowledge from her. It is then that the weakest element of the Arwen subplot commences; her mortality has (apparently) taken a very immediate form, and her fate somehow tied to that of the Ring. She is reduced to lying on cushions and weeping whilst Elrond rides to tell Aragorn that she is dying, and will die unless Aragorn wins this war for them. It’s utterly illogical, and worse, practically turns Arwen into a Sleeping Beauty figure.

Like a Victorian consumptive, Arwen dies prettily

All in all, the movies’ version of Arwen is a curious thing. She is shown to be competent, wise and compassionate and loving, but all that is largely undermined by extraneous plot points which strip her agency from her and serve to make her into merely a motivation for Aragorn. This is unfortunate, as she has the potential to be so much moresomeone old and wise, strong and brave enough to willingly accept her own death, when death is something so alien to her.

The third of these women, Éowyn, is one of my favourite characters in The Lord of the Rings, because she is a mass of contradictions. She is a young woman, only twenty-three, whose parents have died, whose uncle has sunk slowly into dotage, whose country is being encroached on by enemies; she is fragile, injured, deeply sorrowfulindeed suicidalbut she responds to this by being as strong as she possibly canand the way she knows to be strong is the way men are strong. She is trained as a warrior, but because she is a woman (more likely, because she is a royal woman), she is not allowed to fight. And so she rages, furious at herself for her uselessness, and at everyone else for making her so. The metaphors through which she is described are of ice and steelbeautiful, but cold, sharp, distant. When she rides to war, hers is “the face who rides seeking death, having no hope.” She is at once strong and deeply vulnerable.

Though the movies do at least allow her a few rare moments of happiness

In the books, she appears to develop an infatuation with Aragorn, but it is clearly grounded more in the fact that Aragorn is someone she wishes to emulate; he symbolises strength, and also the possibility of escape. She would follow him, but as a soldier follows his captain, not a girl pining for love. This is one respect in which the movies misstep. Miranda Otto’s Éowyn is much tearier, more delicate, where the Éowyn of the books is stubborn and dignified, and in introducing the love triangle element, her feelings for Aragorn are depicted as more genuinely romantic, and therefore she also becomes jealous of Arwen. There is, of course, nothing wrong with a woman having romantic feelings for someone she cannot have, but I feel that in this case, it rather misses the point.

Éowyn (Miranda Otto) weeps over the death of her cousin and the treachery of Wormtongue

In the books, Éowyn is left to rule at Edoras when Aragorn, Theoden, and his men ride off to war, and in a touch I appreciate, is actually nominated for the position by one of Theoden’s guards when Theoden is left in doubt over whom he ought to entrust with the role. ‘‘’I said not Éomer,’ answered Háma. ‘And he is not the last [of the House of Eorl]. There is Éowyn, daughter of Éomund … She is fearless and high-hearted. All love her. Let her be as lord to the Eorlingas, while we are gone’” (Tolkien, p. 512). Though she is young, she is known by her uncle’s men to be strong and intelligent enough to command, to be entrusted with defending the capital of their realm. Éowyn, however, does not take it as such, and chafes that she is not allowed to ride with the men.

Concerning war, there are a few points to make concerning the movies’ depiction thereof. Éowyn tells Aragorn, “The women of this country learned long ago; those without swords can still die upon them.” The implication here ought to be that there are other shieldmaidens of Rohan; perhaps not in the court, but in the smaller hamlets away from Edoras, that Éowyn is not an anomaly. However, the only other women of Rohan we see seem to be either old women or young children, fleeing from burning settlements or cowering in the caves at Helm’s Deep. I was disappointed that they only nominally normalised the idea of women fighters, rather than actually showing it.

Éowyn after the defeat of the Witch King

Éowyn’s best known moment, understandably, is her defeat of the Witch King; riding to the battle of the Pelennor Fields disguised as a man, she faces off with an immortal creature so terrifying he can fell men with a mere scream, beheads his draconian mount, and then, with the assistance of Merry the hobbit, kills him. My personal preference is for the book’s version of that scene, but that’s only because I have an unabashed fondness for Éowyn’s speech before she beheads his steed.

But no living man am I! You look upon a woman. Éowyn I am, Éomund’s daughter. You stand between me and my lord and kin. Begone, if you be not deathless! For living or dark undead, I will smite you, if you touch him. (Tolkien, p. 823)

The movie, perhaps understandably, shortens that to “I am no man!,” but the point remains. Éowyn is strong here not because she’s trying to be a man, but because she is a woman. It’s a triumphant moment.

Overall, I would say women in the movies actually come off rather worse than they do in the books, if only by a little. While scenes like Lothlorien and the Battle of the Pelennor fields are truly excellent, the writers seem to struggle in knowing how to depict women who aren’t strong or powerful in obvious ways, as shown in the unfortunate choices made regarding Arwen, and the way Éowyn shines less than she does in the books when she’s not cutting the heads off monsters. Considering the books, Tolkien’s world, although it is not a feminist one by any stretch, does to some extent restructure a gendered value system, and does contain dynamic and thoughtfully written female characters. If only there were more of them.

[1] This is the movie’s version of this dialogue, though a similar one occurs in the book.

[2] Note: I am not hating on Boromir! I feel I have to point this out, because people so often do, but he is actually one of my favourite characters. All those delicious flaws and a redemptive death; I’m a sucker.

———-

Barrett Vann has just graduated from the University of Minnesota with degrees in English and Linguistics. An unabashed geek, she’s into cosplay, literary analysis, high fantasy, and queer theory. Now that she’s left school, she hopes to find a real job so in a few years she can tackle grad school for playwrighting or screenwriting, and become one of those starving artist types.

‘Les Miserables’: The Feminism Behind the Barricades


Written by Leigh Kolb
Feminist ethics typically defines feminist philosophy as focusing on morality and relationships and not just traditionally masculine justice.
While Les Miserables features female characters who do exist largely to save men, this larger feminism vs. patriarchy dilemma is at work between the ideologies of Jean Valjean and Javert.
A Washington Post writer bemoaned how anti-feminist Les Mis truly is, with its stereotypical women who “exist not to drive the plot but to sacrifice for the men, the real stars of the show.” She refers to them as “bit players” in the musical, and notices that the women are all “abused” and “marginalized.” Yet as a feminist, she can’t help but love it.
While the female characters indeed do suffer to save men, there is much more at play in this film (an adaptation of the stage adaptation of Victor Hugo’s 19th century novel).
From the very beginning, we know that the hero’s journey belongs to Jean Valjean (Hugh Jackman), and that his path of self-realization will be the heart of the plot. After being “saved” by a compassionate priest, he vows to change himself (literally and figuratively, as his convict papers limited his employment possibilities). Eight years later, he has a new name and is mayor of a new town and a factory owner.
Fantine (Anne Hathaway) is a worker in a factory when she is introduced to the audience. The group of women–in sweatshop conditions–sing “At the End of the Day.” The lyrics showcase poverty, a lecherous foreman, hungry children and dismal working conditions. Fantine is fired for hiding that she has a child (the assumption is that she is immoral, which her co-workers pounce on). Valjean does not fight the foreman to keep her employed, and she is fired.

Fantine, in pink, works to support her child.

Fantine is the ultimate suffering mother, and Hathaway does a remarkable job at portraying her suffering when she chooses (out of necessity) to sell her hair, necklace, teeth and body. “I Dreamed a Dream” was incredible, especially considering the actors sang live during filming. Fantine’s plight is clearly the fault of awful men–the man who impregnated and then left her, the abusive foreman, the disgusting johns–she is a fighting victim, and she has the audience’s sympathies. 
When Valjean saves Fantine from Javert (Russell Crowe), who was arresting her because he believed her abusive customer over her, and takes her to the hospital, he realizes that he’d let this happen, albeit passively, and pledges to take care of her daughter.

Fantine’s transformation into a dying prostitute.

Valjean realizes that he hadn’t done what he should have in the first place, and makes up for it (this is really Valjean in a nutshell). Unlike the strict Javert, who lives rigidly within a patriarchal code of justice, Valjean’s morality grows and evolves, as he questions himself and the world around him.
The film introduces a new song, “Suddenly,” placed after Valjean rescues Cosette from the Thenardiers (Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter, in roles that seem made for them). As she sleeps, he expresses her transformative effect on him. Having a child gives him new hope and life. He sings, “Suddenly I see / What I could not see / Something suddenly / Has begun.” This stereotypically feminine maternal love for a child changes Valjean.

Cosette and Valjean save one another other.

Javert identifies Valjean by his brute strength, because that is all he can see in his fight for black and white justice. 
In “Stars,” Javert’s ode to order and righteousness, he subscribes to a religion that is authoritative and patriarchal. His views of justice contrast Valjean’s and are deeply rooted in traditional masculinity. Valjean’s religion is about grace, empathy and compassion, and his justice is not about man’s law, but about morality and care–typically feminine virtues.

Javert, after the revolt.

Many of us fell deeply in love with Les Mis as young girls and “tweens,” and the plights of Cosette dreaming about a castle on a cloud, or Eponine longing for someone in a different world who doesn’t love her back, tugged on our pubescent heartstrings. The music never ceases being beautiful, but as we get older, we understand the larger implications of Fantine’s suffering, Valjean’s existential crises and Javert’s clinging to justice without morality.
The class issues that drive the story are introduced with Valjean and Fantine, and come to a head with the revolt led by university students against the injustice of poverty. Eponine’s (Samantha Barks) unrequited love for Marius (Eddie Redmayne) is painful, but she is still a strong female character. She leads Marius to Cosette (Amanda Seyfried) and fights behind the barricades. The film shows her binding her breasts during “One Day More,” and when she pulls the rifle away from Marius so she is shot, the audience sees it up close. She’s sacrificial, obviously, but independent and strong, doing what she needs to do for her community, herself and Marius. Her plight symbolizes an oppressive system of social classes more than it does weak womanhood.

Eponine, a victim of poverty, terrible parents and unrequited love.

When Gavroche sings about “little people,” and is eventually killed, he also is a symbol of the evils of oppression. 
Cosette and Marius are equally smitten with one another (no games, no desperation). When Valjean learns about their love for one another, he’s in the midst of wanting to flee to get away from Javert. When he hears of the revolt, he goes, largely to protect Marius. He doesn’t know Marius, but he knows his daughter loves him, and that’s enough. He pleads with God to “bring him (Marius) home,” and protect him. When Marius is shot, Valjean saves him anonymously. He loves Cosette so much that he is willing to risk his life for a man who she loves, and he trusts her judgment. Women aren’t the only sacrificial figures here.
Valjean has the opportunity to kill Javert, but refuses. Javert commits suicide when he is faced with an inner conflict that he can’t resolve. Javert sings:
“Damned if I’ll live in the debt of a thief!
Damned if I’ll yield at the end of the chase.
I am the Law and the Law is not mocked
I’ll spit his pity right back in his face
There is nothing on earth that we share
It is either Valjean or Javert!”

This dualistic view of mankind’s nature and society loses–at its own hand. Valjean’s morality overcomes Javert’s strict code of justice. 

When Marius and Cosette reunite in “Every Day,” Valjean sings “She was never mine to keep / She is youthful / She is free.” This epiphany should lift up any feminist’s heart, because that’s a pretty refreshing thing to hear from someone, much less a 19th-century father.

Marius and Cosette.

After they are married, Cosette and Marius find Valjean (who has exiled himself again and is staying in a convent). Valjean gives Cosette a letter with his life story, and as he’s dying, he sees Fantine and the priest and goes toward them. 
The ending is a gorgeous reprise of “Do You Hear the People Sing,” as Valjean goes toward an enormous barricade and sees all those who have died. While there has been a great deal of loss throughout the film, this ending is uplifting. The message is that love has prevailed–platonic love, familial love and romantic love. 
The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy defines feminist ethics as questioning traditional ethics:
“…traditional ethics overrates culturally masculine traits like ‘independence, autonomy, intellect, will, wariness, hierarchy, domination, culture, transcendence, product, asceticism, war, and death,’ while it underrates culturally feminine traits like ‘interdependence, community, connection, sharing, emotion, body, trust, absence of hierarchy, nature, immanence, process, joy, peace, and life’ … it favors ‘male’ ways of moral reasoning that emphasize rules, rights, universality, and impartiality over ‘female’ ways of moral reasoning that emphasize relationships, responsibilities, particularity, and partiality (Alison Jagger, ‘Feminist Ethics’).”
Javert clearly embodies traditional, masculine traits and an obsession with rules. Valjean, on the other hand, grows into a sympathetic hero by developing a more feminine morality (putting a priority on connection, questioning hierarchy, working for peace and developing relationships). Valjean is our hero.
While Javert’s Christianity drives his actions (he sings “Mine is the way of the Lord” in “Stars”), Valjean’s stumbling toward Christianity is more authentic and is portrayed as preferable, with a focus on forgiveness, sacrifice and giving. As he’s dying, he sings along with the ghost of Fantine, “To love another person is to see the face of God.” This is the truth we’re supposed to walk away with–not the truth of laws and authority, but the truth of emotional vulnerability and mercy.
The women of Les Miserables suffer and sacrifice for men, and their plights certainly propel the men’s stories. Cosette, who is more one-dimensional than the other women, survives and thrives. She had the privilege of having a good parent and being in love, which again shows the importance of good relationships.
The only way, then, that Les Miserables could be anti-feminist is if Javert and his worldview had won. But he doesn’t; instead, the audience is supposed to celebrate what are often considered culturally feminine traits and morality. Les Miserables is critical of social injustice, poverty and oppression. And at the end of the day, that sounds like feminism.
The barricades are erected and are triumphant at the end of the film.

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

Gender and Food Week: ‘Cake Boss’: A Sweet Confection with Dark Filling

Guest post written by Lauren Kouffman, originally published at her blog Ex Ovum Omnia. Cross-posted with permission.
Fan favorite and global hit, Cake Boss, first aired on the TLC Channel on April 19, 2009, and has returned for five consecutive seasons, building to some of the highest ratings the network had ever seen. Syndicated episodes of the first four seasons are currently available on Netflix, and TLC’s homepage is saturated with clips highlighting new season drama. Clearly the network has found a hit in this off-beat show, following the daily life of a classically-trained Italian baker and his cohorts, in Hoboken, New Jersey. 
But just beneath a sweet premise of an Italian-American hero living out his American dream, is the nagging question of gender politics, and just how much “old-school” female subjugation is still the modus operandi, especially when mixing food and entertainment.
Catering mainly to an upwardly mobile female audience, familiar with a society-approved cultural narrative (i.e.: engagement, wedding, baby, family), TLC’s lineup of keystone programs including What Not To Wear, Say Yes To The Dress, A Baby Story, and 19 Kids and Counting, has helped create a name for itself, not only as The Learning Channel, but also — in my house, anyway — The Lady Channel. Based solely on TLC’s network profile then, we must assume that the intended audience demographic for any one of their programs is largely female, with ample leisure time for daytime or afternoon programming, and an interest in culturally dictated stereotypical “female” pursuits.

Cake Boss

On the other hand, along with newer programs such as Breaking Amish, Strange Sex, and Flip That House in rotation, which shift the focus away from the domestic and instead focus on either culturally deviant lifestyles or hands-on, “do-it-yourself-ism”, certain elements of Cake Boss’ structure seem to be reaching out towards a unique segment of otherwise non-initiated TLC viewers: namely, straight men. 

While Bartolo “Buddy” Valasco, Jr., and his posse of bakers based out of Carlo’s Bake Shop in Hoboken, have built a local reputation for churning out their old school Italian style of intricate cakes and pastries (a decidedly un-macho affair in itself), most episodes also include more modern and outrageous cakes in the style of Duff Goldman, network television’s other famous “bad boy” baker, presented in a more masculine, post-modern style. A far cry from hand-made roses and intricate lace details, these cakes are about as literal as you can get; In season one alone, we’ve seen a zombie cake with corn syrup “blood” oozing down the side, a firehouse cake with actual smoke puffing out of the “windows,” and a life-size blackjack table with spinning wheel, painstakingly painted to approximate mahogany wood and presented with some theatrical fanfare to a bunch of “wise guys,” as Godfather-esque music wound through the scene. 
In presenting his narrative, Buddy (along with his Cake Boss production team) takes great pains to keep the concepts of masculine and the feminine separate; the irony being that within the traditionally female realm of the kitchen, and especially in dealing with sweet and pretty baked goods, a man rules the roost… and it only fortifies his masculine identity meanwhile. 
Playing up his Italian heritage for maximum effect, we see Buddy expertly calming his four high-strung sisters and mother, dealing with difficult customers (often female), alternately reaming out and playing practical jokes on his male employees, and of course, exercising technical precision in creating stunning works of edible art.

Interestingly, though Carlo’s Bake Shop seems to employ a fleet of women as “cake decorators” (the distinction is clearly drawn here, in contrast to the male bakers), more screen time is paid to the colorful personalities of the few men that work there: Mauro the number two, Hothead Joe, Danny “The Mule”, and Cousin Frankie. Their characters have been fleshed out enough to act as Buddy’s consigliere, while the women are granted occasional group reaction shots. Moreover, all of the male bakers wear chef’s coats and white pants -even the delivery boy is dressed in all white — and none of the women are required to be in uniform. In Carlo’s Bake Shop, baking is a serious business, and the visual and social cues here reveal that women are neither taken seriously, nor considered a real asset to the business. 

Cake Boss
While Cake Boss itself falls more into the docu-drama category than most other food television programming, it is interesting to consider the implications of how food, and eating, are depicted throughout. Cakes and pastries are more than just everyday sweet treats, but are planned and purchased to mark special occasions, and meant to be shared among family and friends. Family is clearly at the heart of Buddy’s food and life philosophy, and he considers his customers and program viewers by extension, to be a part of that. Program viewers too, being treated to an intimate behind-the-scenes look into Carlo’s Bake Shop, are meant to feel like Buddy considers them a part of la familglia. 
Assuming most of us are lacking an authentic Italian grandmother at home to bake all of the traditional pastries from scratch, Carlo’s Bake Shop fills a nostalgic place in our hearts, where food, family, and deep emotions entwine. Media capitalizing on the relationship between food and feelings is nothing new; in fact, specifically because many of the thematic motifs presented in Cake Boss are less-than-politically-correct (i.e., the unspoken subjugation of women), watching them play out before us on television can be a healthy, even cathartic, way to indulge and explore our feelings on these subjects. As loyal viewers tune in for a half hour-long segment of bakery antics, they are treated to a free therapy session as well. 
More than just the boss, Buddy seems like Cake Dad… and of course father — especially The God Father- always knows best. Nearly every episode ends with the Valasco family smiling and laughing around a dinner table, with Buddy at the helm: a very Freudian image, indeed. 
While all the filming quirks and mafia references imply TLC Channel’s attempt to expand their viewership, it seems impossible to deny that the show’s success has already been secured, with a global viewership in over 160 countries, and most recently, product tie-ins with Cake Boss-inspired ready-to-sell cakes based on Buddy’s designs. A spin-off series called Next Great Baker has also seen some network success and continues to pick up traction, promising a $100,000 prize and a coveted internship at Carlo’s Bake Shop for the winner. Ironically though, the two first Next Great Baker winners have been women; although a cynic might question if any type-casting came into play in determining the winner (setting the stage for maximum drama), it will certainly be interesting to tune in for Cake Boss’ next season, as we witness a network-backed female baker navigate the male-dominated waters of Carlo’s Bake Shop.
———-
Lauren Kouffman is a first year MLA Gastronomy student at Boston University. Particularly interested in the intersection of media, technology and food, much of Lauren’s writing explores how food communities are built and maintained using new media tools. Lauren spends her free time collecting more cookbooks than she has space for, and searching for the perfect Old Fashioned.

Bitch Flicks’ Weekly Picks

Megan‘s Picks:
Why ‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Is the Best Film of the Year by Christopher Orr via The Atlantic
How Walt Disney’s Women Have Grown Up by Judith Welikala and Emily Dugan via The Independent
She Who Will Not Be Ignored by Melissa Silverstein via Women and Hollywood 

Queer Lead Sophia Swanson Makes MTV’s ‘Underemployed’ Worth Watching by Riese via Autostraddle

Bollywood Joins Public Outrage Against Brutal Gang-Rape in India by Nyay Bhushan via The Hollywood Reporter
BBC Outs Itself for Gay and Lesbian Stereotypes by Stuart Kemp via The Hollywood Reporter
5 Lessons for My Tween from Anne Hathaway by Joanne Bamberger via Babble
What have you been reading this week?? Tell us in the comments!

The Gender Situation in ‘Pulp Fiction’

Written by Leigh Kolb.To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Quentin Tarantino’s major directorial debut, Reservoir Dogs (1992) and Pulp Fiction (1994) were shown in theaters on Dec. 4 and 6, respectively, as special engagements.

While Reservoir Dogs solidified Tarantino’s spot in Hollywood, Pulp Fiction made him a star. It won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the Academy Award for Best Screenplay (it was nominated for Best Picture) and John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson and Uma Thurman were nominated for Academy Awards.
The film opens with a couple (Pumpkin/Ringo and Honey Bunny/Yolanda) eating at a diner. The two are discussing their next robbery attempt and realize robbing a restaurant would maximize their profits. The banter between the two shows that they are partners, and are in love.
As they enact their plan, they stand up with their guns. Pumpkin announces that this is a robbery, and Honey Bunny screams:

“Any of you fucking pricks move, and I’ll execute every motherfucking last one of ya!”

Honey Bunny/Yolanda, left, screams and threatens restaurant patrons as Pumpkin looks on.
The iconic sounds of “Miserlou,” by Dick Dale and His Del Tones begin, and the audience quickly realizes that unlike Reservoir Dogs, women will have a voice in Pulp Fiction.
Like Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction examines masculinity–glorifying and critiquing it. Instead of conversations about women, however, women have integral roles in each of the intertwining narratives.
Vincent Vega & Marcellus Wallace’s Wife
 
When Vincent and Jules discuss the meaning of a foot rub, they are speaking about intimacy and what it means to touch a woman’s feet. The rumor is that their boss, Marcellus Wallace, had a man pushed off a building for rubbing his wife’s feet. They’re exploring something beyond a foot rub (although Tarantino himself does love feet). On some level, they’re exploring male/female interactions and levels of intimacy.
Vincent tells Jules that Marcellus asked him to take his wife Mia out, and it’s clear that this woman invokes intimidation in men. Vincent goes to Lance’s house (his drug dealer) to purchase some heroin. He self-medicates before going to pick up Mia. She’s left a note on the door to come in, and she watched Vincent enter the house on security camera footage and speaks to him over an intercom. She is god-like in this scene (and while it fits the narrative, we know that Uma Thurman is also a god/muse to Tarantino).
Mia self-medicates with cocaine, and the scene at Jack Rabbit Slim’s makes the audience feel high. Mia chooses the restaurant and made the reservation (she is in control), and the two engage in friendly banter. She was an actress, and tells him about her failed television series, Fox Force Five. Vincent confronts her about the foot rub rumor, and she denies it, pointing out that a husband protecting his wife is “one thing,” but that was ridiculous. She says:

“Truth is, nobody knows why Marsellus threw Tony out of that fourth-story window except Marsellus and Tony. When you little scamps get together, you’re worse than a sewing circle.”

Here, the men are gossiping and being “silly,” which are most often the stereotyped flaws of female characters.
The two dance in a twist competition–upon her insistance–and win the trophy. The dance itself is one in which no one really leads; they are partners.
Mia and Vincent dance as equals.
Back at the Wallace mansion, Mia finds the baggie of heroin in Vincent’s coat pocket, mistakes it for cocaine, and snorts a long line, immediately overdosing. She’s a modern-day damsel in distress, whose distress is really a simple mistake.
Vincent rushes her to Lance’s house, and Lance yells, “You fucked her up, you fix her!” But we know this isn’t the case. Again, the assumption is that the man is at fault, and the woman is helpless, but that isn’t how they end up here. Everyone bumbles around the apartment, trying to figure out the adrenaline shot (at one point Lance is in a cluttered room looking for a medical book, and the board game “Chauvinist Pigs” is perched atop a pile). No one in this scene is truly heroic or capable, which makes it feel realistic. Vincent successfully injects the adrenaline into Mia’s heart, and Vincent takes her back home. They, and we, sober up fast.
The Gold Watch
 
The story of the gold watch, passed down to Butch from his great-grandfather, to his grandfather, to his father and then to him, is essentially a story about the decline in traditional American manhood. By the time the watch got to Butch’s father in the Vietnam War, he was a POW and had to “hide it in his ass” for years so he could pass it down to his son. The shift in American war culture/patriotism between WWII and Vietnam was stark. The “Greatest Generation” of American men in the second world war gave birth to boys who would serve in Vietnam, a war that utilized a draft and was met with protest and hostility. By the time Butch becomes an adult man, he is fighting, yes, but for money and not his country. His war is internal, and devoid of the heroism from a few generations ago. (This crisis of a lack of clearly defined masculinity is the cornerstone of Gen X novels/films such as Fight Club, which explores at length this generation of young men with no great war.)
Captain Koons presents a young Butch with his father’s watch.
Butch’s desperation to have that gold watch with him, even eventually risking his life to do so, is indicative of his desperation to hold on to this generationally diluted manhood.
Butch doesn’t throw the fight that he’d fixed with Marcellus, and instead wins and accidentally kills his opponent. In the getaway cab ride, the female cab driver asks him what it’s like to kill a man, because it’s a subject she’s “very interested” in. She seems more interested than he does, in fact.
Esmerelda lights Butch’s cigarette.
When he’s back at the hotel room with his girlfriend Fabienne, the two share intimate moments and comedic dialogue. Fabienne seems silly and child-like, but Butch is sweet and respectful to her (although he erupts when he realizes she’s forgotten the watch, he quickly apologizes and says he was to blame). As she’s lying on the bed wishing for a pot belly, she says:

“I don’t give a damn what men find attractive. It’s unfortunate what we find pleasing to the touch and pleasing to the eye is seldom the same.”

Fabienne and Butch.
She requests and receives “oral pleasure” from Butch, and in the hotel room scenes, the audience sees more of Butch’s body than Fabienne’s. Again, she seems naive and childish, but their relationship is equitable and for the most part, enjoyable to watch. Maybe Butch has a similar innocence, but it is well-guarded under his outward masculinity.
The next morning, when he flies into a rage about the watch, warfare and explosions blast on the television in their room, another reminder of the distance between Butch and that celebrated masculine pastime.
He goes off on a quest to retrieve the gold watch before they flee to Knoxville (since Marcellus will be trying to find him and kill him for not throwing the fight). He takes off in a Honda hatchback, and gets to his apartment. Vincent is already there, sent to kill him, but he’s on the toilet reading Modesty Blaise, who debuted as a female action hero in a comic strip, collection of stories/novel and films of the same name in the 1960s. (Tarantino is a Blaise fan, and certainly Kill Bill‘s The Bride shares many similarities with the female protagonist.)
Modesty Blaise, a 1960s crime series with a female protagonist.
Butch picks up Vincent’s gun and kills him as he steps out of the bathroom. When he escapes, he runs into Marcellus (women flock to the sides of Butch and Marcellus to help them), and the two end up in a depraved dungeon of a pawn shop with a racist owner. When Butch breaks free as Marcellus is being raped by security guard Zed, he can’t leave. He goes back down and kills the shop owner with a sword, and breaks Marcellus free (who then shoots Zed in the groin). There are obvious masculinity issues here, from the anal rape (my gosh what would Freud do with Butch’s narrative) to the phallic sword, Marcellus and Butch agree that they are even, and Butch will never utter a word about the rape.
Butch takes off on Zed’s motorcycle and arrives back to pick up Fabienne. Some kind of post-modern manhood has been achieved, and he’s free to go on–with the gold watch.
The Bonnie Situation
 
When Jules and Vincent are saddled with the problem of a dead man in their car, they turn to Jimmie and go to his house. He is adamant that they take care of their situation soon, because his wife Bonnie is about to come home. He says:

“Now don’t you fucking realize man that if Bonnie comes home and finds a dead body in her house, I’m gonna get divorced, all right. No marriage counselor, no trial separation. I’m gonna get fuckin’ divorced. Okay? And I don’t wanna get fuckin’ divorced. Now then, you know, I mean, I wanna help you but I don’t wanna lose my wife doin’ it, all right.”

This honest admission of a husband who doesn’t want to lose his wife is refreshing. She’s not a nag, she’s not a bitch, but she’s his wife and he wants to be married to her.
Marcellus calls Winston “The Wolf” Wolfe, who is the antithesis of Jimmie. The Wolf is partying with glamorous women at 9 a.m., clearly living like James Bond and speeds to Jimmie’s in a silver sports car. Jimmie is waiting for his wife to get home from work, brews fancy coffee and is hesitant to give The Wolf their best linens to clean up the mess. As a trade, The Wolf gives him a stack of bills to buy themselves a new bedroom set.
Jimmie’s “feminine” tendencies and The Wolf’s classic masculinity complement one another.
These two men–Jimmie and The Wolf–exist in opposite worlds and diametrically opposing masculinities. However, the two of them working together solves problems. This acceptance of and need for different shades of stereotypical masculinity and femininity reminds the audience that Tarantino is aware and critical of gender performance.
When they drop the cleaned-out car to Monster Joe’s Truck and Tow, Joe’s daughter Racquel comes to meet them. The Wolf says, “Someday, all this will be hers.” This is a nod to the next generation of gender roles–whether it be women running junk yards, crime rings or killing sprees, Tarantino’s women are not shut in dainty boxes.
Racquel, the heiress to Monster Joe’s Truck and Tow.
During the epilogue, we are again in the diner where Pumpkin and Honey Bunny/Yolanda are holding up the customers. Vincent and Jules are there (Vincent is in the bathroom during most of the scene), and Jules engages in a stand-off between the two while trying to talk Pumpkin out of doing what they’re doing. He allows them to collect the customers’ cash without hurting anyone. Yolanda becomes unhinged and pitiful in this scene, and a viewer may be dismayed at Tarantino’s decision to make the woman fall apart at this very moment, and that this shows her weakness. However, we must realize that many of the characters throughout the film have shown fallibility or been in positions of weakness (Vincent’s self-medication and debilitating nerves about Mia, Mia’s overdose, Marcellus’s sexual assault and Jimmie’s anxiety about his wife). This does not mean anything except that the characters are human.
Jules and Vincent have been scrubbed clean and left to look like “dorks,” somehow emasculated without their black suits.
Humans are not one-dimensional caricatures. They commit crimes, they overdose, they are racist, sexist and complex. As long as men and women alike are portrayed in all aspects of the human experience in a film and are reflections of reality (no matter how unpleasant that reality is), then authenticity can be achieved. Pulp Fiction, in all of its gore, turns a critical eye on masculinity and femininity and offers a more nuanced take on its male and female characters than films of similar genres. And as Tarantino’s later films went on to have female characters who take active and leading roles, The Wolf was right in pointing out that “all this” will someday be a woman’s, too.


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

Twenty Years Later: ‘Reservoir Dogs,’ Masculinity and Feminism

Written by Leigh Kolb.

Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs turned 20 this year, and was re-released in select theaters on Tuesday, Dec. 4.
In the introductory interviews that preceded the feature film, actor Eli Roth said that what was most powerful to him in Reservoir Dogs was that “Everybody had a voice.”
Discerning viewers may, at this point, remember that there are no women who have voices in the film. Women are talked about at length, but aren’t players in the film.
However, by analyzing these discussions about women and looking closer at the masculinity of the characters, one can certainly come to the conclusion that Tarantino has a nuanced view of gender and is a feminist filmmaker.
In the opening diner scene, the men are discussing the true meaning of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin.” Most of the men reflect upon their varying degrees of fandom for Madonna. Mr. Brown delivers a brutally vivid description about how he thinks the song is all about a big dick (“dick, dick, dick, dick, dick…”) and making a woman who has had a lot of sex feel like she’s having sex for the first time again. While the language is crass, there’s no clear judgment of the woman in question, or applause for the well-endowed man. It’s just a song analysis.
The diner conversations illuminate misunderstanding of and respect or disrespect for women.
At the very least, the topic Tarantino chooses to open his film with is intriguing. Their understanding, or misunderstanding, of women shows up again a few minutes later, when Eddie brings up K-Billy’s Super Songs of the 70s, and the fact that he’d never realized that in “The Nights the Lights Went Out in Georgia,” the female narrator is the one who kills Andy. Again, they analyze and comment on song lyrics that are sung by women and center around a woman. They are–on some level–interested in understanding women.
The tipping scene at the diner is integral in showing the audience how we are supposed to feel about certain characters. When Mr. Pink adamantly refuses to tip, and goes on a tirade against tipping, Mr. White says:

“These people bust their ass. This is a hard job… Waitressing is the number-one occupation for female non-college graduates in this country. It’s the one job basically any woman can get and make a living on. The reason is because of their tips.”

“Fuck all that,” Mr. Pink says, later adding that “This non-college bullshit, I got two words for that: Learn to fuckin’ type.”
A few minutes into the film, we think that Mr. Pink is an asshole and Mr. White is compassionate. And we’re right. The characters have been shaped during this exposition by their thoughts about women. The less they respect and understand women, the less we are supposed to respect them.
Mr. Orange gets shot when he attempts to carjack a woman (“Who’d have fuckin’ thought that?” he cries, while bleeding in the back of Mr. White’s car) and she shoots him. He then kills her. His instinct is to think the woman in the vehicle is helpless and would be easily overtaken, but he was wrong.
There are various scenes during flashbacks that further explore issues of women and femininity. Mr. White tells Joe that he and his former partner, Alabama, split up due to tensions of pushing “that woman-man thing to far,” but he also adds that she was a really good thief. Mr. Orange (an undercover cop mentored by a black man) concocts a story in which a woman is his drug dealer. Mr. Pink whines about the feminine moniker assigned to him (“It sounds like Mr. Pussy”). Mr. Blonde and Eddie wrestle and spar, showcasing their over-hyped masculinity and their different stations (Mr. Blonde having just been released from prison, and Eddie being the coddled son of Joe, the boss). Mr. Pink’s simplistic views on black women and white women leads Eddie to delve into a story about a cocktail waitress who glued her abusive husband’s penis to his stomach.
The women in Reservoir Dogs exist almost completely off screen, but they wield power in their stories (and literally in their actions, in the case of the woman who shoots Mr. Orange).
Originally, Tarantino had a female police officer briefly appear in the film (this scene is on a special edition DVD extras disc). The absence of female characters doesn’t make the film anti-feminist, though (in fact, considering Tarantino’s treatment of most of his police officers, a female cop may not have done much for the feminist argument).
Reservoir Dogs is not just a violent film about a diamond heist-gone-bad. And while its discussion of women helps the audience to navigate the characters, what makes this film truly feminist is its deconstruction of masculinity.
Analyses have focused on the homoerotic nature of Mr. Orange and Mr. White’s relationship, and of  the demonstration of “new queer cinema” theories present in the film. On its surface, this is a film entirely dedicated to white heterosexual masculinity–from the sharp black suits, to the guns, to the violence, to the racism–but that masculinity is largely a show.
Mr. Orange and Mr. White, however, both embody the most stereotypically feminine traits of their colleagues. Mr. White is the nurturer, and Mr. Orange the child, pleading for Mr. White to “hold” him and take care of him. They both share vulnerability, their names and are physically close and intimate. They cry together.
Mr. White comforts and nurtures Mr. Orange. He is heroic because of this.
In one of the final scenes where Joe, Eddie and Mr. White are in a triangular stand-off. This shot in itself provides interesting commentary on traditional masculinity and the threat that deviations prove to be to those in charge. Eddie is protecting his “Daddy,” Joe is protecting his patriarchal business and Mr. White is protecting Mr. Orange. Mr. White (“Mr. Fucking Compassion,” Eddie calls him) is the most empathetic and kind, and he wins that battle.
From left, Eddie, Joe, Mr. White and Mr. Orange.
And while no one wins in the end, Mr. Orange and Mr. White come the closest. They survive the longest (if we agree that Mr. Pink is shot as he escapes), and if the audience sees anyone in this film as heroic, it is them. As the cops are coming into the warehouse, Mr. Orange tells Mr. White that he is an undercover cop, and Mr. White is clearly devastated, and pained when he goes to kill Mr. Orange (which his professional code dictates that he must).
The peripheral value of women and the value of the feminine provide a strong, feminist subtext to Reservoir Dogs.
Before the Dec. 4 screening, there were the aforementioned interviews, and there were also previews hand-picked from Tarantino’s collection: Mean Streets; Mother, Jugs & Speed and The Duellists. Harvey Keitel (Mr. White) is in all of these films.
When Tarantino and his friend and producer, Lawrence Bender, were starting the process of making Reservoir Dogs, they were asked who their top choice would be if anyone in the world would be in the film. They answered with “Keitel,” although they realized that would never happen. Bender’s acting coach knew that his wife, Lily Parker, worked with Keitel at the Actor’s Studio, so they gave her a script. Parker loved it, so she gave it to Keitel, and he was on board.
Between Parker’s power and the incredible contributions of Tarantino’s long-time editor, Sally Menke (she worked with him until her death in 2010), one could go so far as to say that Reservoir Dogs as we know it exists because of women.
In any case, feminists should not shy away from Tarantino’s work (even if we can’t sufficiently answer whether or not Tarantino is a feminist–which I believe he is); instead, we should note the power of the women in his films (as Bitch Flicks has in the past), the power of the women who are not in his films, the power of the women who make his films happen and the power of deconstructing and commenting on American masculinity.


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