Romance – Page 15 – Bitch Flicks

Indie Spirit John Cassavetes Award Nominee Review: Bellflower

Bellflower (2011)

This is a guest post from Deirdre Crimmins.

On the surface Bellflower seems very much like a film made by men, for men. Staring director Evan Glodell, and shot on homemade cameras, the film begins by following Woodrow (Glodell) and his buddy Aiden as they build flame throwers from scratch to outfit their imaginary post-apocalyptic gang “Mother Medusa.” But while watching the film, the stereotypical “dude” exterior quickly wilts away and you are left watching an original, intimate portrayal of a love gone wrong; a love gone, horrifically, violently, and very engagingly wrong. The film ultimately defies gender constraints by showing complex characters that are developed much more than in a typical Hollywood film.

While the film starts by focusing its attention on Woodrow and Aiden’s weapon building, it is not actually about that. The film is actually about Woodrow and Milly. Woodrow first meets Milly at a local bar, where they are both casually hanging with their friends. When the bar introduces a cricket eating competition, both Woodrow and Milly flirt their way up on stage, chomp on those disgusting bugs, and end up in each other’s hearts. The next night they go on their first official date, which they spontaneously turn into a road trip from southern California to a Texas greasy spoon for barbeque. They seem like the perfect match. Both are young, impulsive, pretty hipsters, who are witty, sarcastic, and they enjoy completely launching themselves into the depths of an instant relationship with no reservations.

Milly and Woodrow

The problem comes when these two love birds attempt to settle down and turn their whirlwind romance into a stable, domestic relationship. Milly prophetically warns Woodrow that she is often the one who hurts the other person when in a relationship, but through his rose-colored glasses Woodrow doesn’t believe her. Woodrow becomes smothering, and Milly’s knee jerk reaction is cheating on him, and, ultimately choosing her previous free-spirited lifestyle over Woodrow’s stifling affection. After their heated break-up, an accident leaves Woodrow in the hospital with plenty of time to recover and wallow in his self-pity.

Here is where the ingenuity of Bellflower really begins to take shape. While a different film might follow Woodrow’s plotting to get back at Milly or, more optimistically, try to win her back, these scenarios do not happen here. Woodrow tries to pour himself back in to his work (after all, that car with built-in flamethrowers isn’t going to assemble itself), and even tries to date a friend, Courtney, who has been throwing herself at him. But none of it works, and he cannot get over Milly. He seems to snap suddenly, and wants revenge. Milly is ready for him, and after his attack, she engages with him in an ever-escalating sequence of vengeance. Both Milly and Woodward become monsters: they are unpredictable, and are hell-bent on permanently damaging each other. The film takes a decided turn from romance, to horror, along with buckets of blood, and bodies piling up.

A turn from romance to horror.

This sharp turn in tone is what makes Bellflower memorable. It is impulsive, and does not follow the typical conventions of narrative cinema. However, what makes the film successful in this execution is the extensive character development.

All of the characters in the film are complete, flawed, and at times vulnerable. We get a rare insight into the heart-to-hearts between Aiden and Woodrow. We also can see the internal conflict in Milly as she is torn between being tied down to a man she clearly loves, and the love of her independent life. Both the women and the men are portrayed as actual people, and not single-dimensional caricatures.

Additionally, the treatment of both women and men in respect to their gender portrayals is like a breath of fresh air. Though Aiden and Woodrow spend their time doing typically masculine activities in their workshop, they are doing it because they are unnaturally obsessed with Mad Max, and not because they are acting the part of manly men. And while in their shop, they are usually talking about the machines themselves, and occasionally Milly. As a woman in the audience who thinks flamethrowers are pretty bad-ass too, I am not alienated, or made to feel voyeuristic for peering into their world, because Glodell is not creating any reason for me to think that women would be unwelcome here. If you share their love for post-apocalyptic armament, then you are at home here too.

Milly herself is most decidedly a feminine woman, but the flaws in her character are just single elements that make up the larger web of her personality. When you know very little about a character aside from their flaws (think an evil Disney queen), it is easy for the audience to boil their negative aspects down to their demographics, rather than them as individuals. (For example, the evil queen in Snow White essentially communicates that all older women are evil and will punish people for being younger and more feminine than they are. That read of the queen’s character seems one dimensional, because the character of the queen is in fact one dimensional.) But when the audience is presented with multifaceted character, as Milly is presented, it is impossible to boil her down to an archetype. Milly is a woman scorned, but she is so much more than that. She is a fun loving free spirit, and a cricket eater, and a road trip enthusiast, too. If Hollywood made more of an effort to make these complex characters available for actresses, we would all benefit.

The one caveat to the glowing review of Bellflower’s equitable gender representation is the character of Courtney. She clings to Woodrow, is obviously jealous of Milly, and it is ultimately this obsession that leads to her demise. Courtney is one of the minor characters in the film, and I can only hope that were she given more screen time, she would have been additionally fleshed out and her character would have been more nuanced. Glodell has shown how well he can construct a character, but he needs to work on making even his minor characters avoid stereotypical gender pitfalls.

By showing the complexity of emotions, and human interaction, Glodell takes what could have been a simple revenge flick and makes it a film that sticks with you for some time.

Deirdre Crimmins lives in Boston with her husband and two black cats. She wrote her Master’s thesis on George Romero and works too much.

Oscar Best Picture Nominee: ‘Midnight in Paris’ and Its Woman Problem

Marion Cotillard and Owen Wilson in ‘Midnight in Paris’

I’ve never understood why people adore Woody Allen and lavish him with accolades. I’ve never liked his films. Nope, not even the adored Annie Hall, aside from the FABulous fashions donned by Diane Keaton. I know, I know…I’ve braced myself for the verbal lashings that will undoubtedly ensue. Besides his creepy penchant for dating and then marrying his daughter, I loathe the way Allen generally depicts women in his films. Yes, his movies make some interesting gender commentaries and contain phenomenal female actors (Diane Keaton, Meryl Streep, Patricia Clarkson, Penelope Cruz). But it irritates me that the myriad interesting and intelligent female characters in his movies seem to be punished for their strength or continually fall for the neurotic chump’s ~~charm~~ bullshit.

In Allen’s latest Oscar-nominated endeavor, Midnight in Paris, Gil Pender (Owen Wilson) is a successful Hollywood screenwriter struggling to write his first novel. He visits Paris with his constantly complaining fiancé Inez (Rachel McAdams), as he yearns to live amongst his literary idols in the Roaring Twenties. Gil discovers that at midnight, he is able to transport to 1920s Paris and hobnob with writers, musicians and painters. A love letter to Paris and artists, Midnight in Paris explores the dichotomy between illusions of nostalgia and pragmatically embracing the present.

Allen has a knack for evoking the visceral beauty of a city: NYC in Annie Hall and Manhattan, Barcelona in Vicky Cristina Barcelona, Paris in Midnight in Paris. With lush cinematography, Allen capturesthe seductive allure and breathtaking romance of Paris. He also infuses the film with myriad authors and artists from the 1920s, a bibliophile’s dream. These delightful distractions almost made me forget (almost) that while an okay film, it’s certainly not a great one.

Now, I didn’t hate Midnight in Paris like my kick-ass colleague Stephanie. But I totally understand why she did because it royally pissed me off too. The portrayal of women in this film is fucking problematic.

Kathy Bates is fantastic as writer and art collector Gertrude Stein. Yet she’s highly underutilized, striving to make the most of her small role. Incredibly influential, we witness Stein’s Parisian salon which attracted talented writers, like Ernest Hemingway and Ezra Pound, whom she advised and mentored. After reviewing his manuscript, Gertrude bestows Gil with her wisdom: “We all fear death and question our place in the word. The artist’s job is not to succumb to despair but to find an antidote for the emptiness of existence.” Aside from Gertrude, none of the female characters are either truly likeable, interesting or complex individuals.

Audacious Zelda Fitzgerald (Alison Pill, who tries her best to imbue her with charm), F. Scott Fitzgerald (Tom Hiddleston)’s wife and a writer in her own right, diminishes her artistic talent by saying, “…and I realize I’ll never write a great lyric and my talent really lies in drinking.”

An “art groupie” muse, Adriana (Marion Cotillard) designs couture fashion and becomes the object of Gil’s affection, despite his fiancé. When Gertrude reads the first line of Gil’s book aloud, Adriana praises it saying she’s “hooked” and later calls his musings on the “City of Light” poetic. Enamored with her, they begin to spend their evenings talking and walking around Paris. Cotillard is a divine actor. But her character is beige and boring. Although I must admit I’m glad Adriana ultimately chooses her own path.

In addition to seeking Stein’s advice on his book, Gil turns to another woman, an art museum guide (Carla Bruni), for advice on being in love with two women at the same time. Oh, and he also flirts with 25-year-old Gabrielle (Léa Seydoux) (cause you know, that’s what middle-aged dudes do) who sells old records from the Jazz Age and shares his love of Paris in the rain.

Owen Wilson and Rachel McAdams in ‘Midnight in Paris’

But the worst female depiction – yeah, if you’ve seen the film, you know who I’m talking about – was Inez (Rachel McAdams). Inez complains about Paris’ charming bistros, getting wet in the rain, living outside the U.S. and Gil not purchasing $20,000 chairs. She undermines Gil’s talent in front of him to her friends saying, “He’s not sure he can write a novel.” Inez criticizes everything Gil says and does all while gushing over her crush, academic Paul (Michael Sheen), going so far as to shush Gil when he speaks in order to hear Paul’s pretentious diatribes. When Gil talks about Inez to others, he highlights her beauty (of course) and adds that she possesses a “sharp sense of humor.” Watching their relationship, it’s painfully obvious that there’s absolutely nothing keeping them together as the only thing they share is a mutual like of Indian food.

Now, I don’t automatically have a problem with a villainous or unlikeable female character, especially since there are so many female roles in the film. In fact, I often lament how unlike men, women are not allowed to play unlikeable or unsympathetic characters. But I have a huge problem with the “nag” role. The cliché of women as “nags” permeates pop culture.

I also have a huge problem that the seemingly sole reason Inez was made so horribly despicable was to “allow” Gil to cheat on his fiancé. The audience would sympathize with Gil for kissing another woman, buying her trinkets, baring his soul to her and planning to sleep with her even though he was engaged because his fiancé was such a shrew. Oh that’s right, I forgot! It’s okay to cheat on someone as long as they’re an asshole.

Allen told Rachel McAdams that she should play this role as she should “want to play some bitchy parts” as they’re more interesting. Maybe. But not this part. I didn’t find her character interesting at all. Yes, McAdams tries her best with the material she’s given. But the character is one-dimensional and annoying, lacking any depth or complexity.

Midnight in Paris, like pretty much all of Allen’s films, lacks diversity. They’re a sea of white with no people of color anywhere in sight. Oh I take that back. There’s a black woman in a car that Gil gets in on his “way” to the 1920s, one shot of Josephine Baker (Sonia Rolland) dancing that lasts all of 30 seconds and a few black people watching her dance.

Along with race, sexual identities are also omitted. The film contains three famous lesbians: Gertrude Stein, Stein’s life partner Alice B. Toklas (Thérèse Bourou-Rubinsztein) and writer Djuna Barnes (Emmanuelle Uzan). Of all three, Gil only alludes to Djuna’s sexuality when he says she led when they danced together. So lesbianism is almost completely erased, paving the way for good ole’ heteronormativity.

The only overt gender commentary occurs when Ernest Hemingway (Corey Stoll) says, “Pablo Picasso thinks women are only to sleep with or to paint,” but he believes “a woman is equal to a man in courage.” Which is interesting since Allen is a person who in his personal life doesn’t always believe equality in relationships is desirable: “Sometimes equality in a relationship is great, sometimes inequality makes it work.” (???) Yeah, this explains a lot. He also has a penchant for younger women, in his movies and in reality, because younger women are more innocent, “before they get spoiled by the world.” Gag.

This attitude that older women are less desirable as romantic partners seems to echo throughout the film, particularly in its ending. Don’t stay with the older (relatively speaking) jaded woman. Get with the young, innocent girl! While numerous women abound, everything in the film revolves around Gil, a stand-in for Woody Allen. Women are merely a buffet to be sampled – if one doesn’t work out, oh well, try another!

I’ll admit; the book lover in me was almost seduced. It felt like a light-hearted, whimsical, bibliophile remake of Purple Rose of Cairo. Instead of film characters leaping off-screen, novelists from the past reside in alongside the present. But there is no way in hell this should ever be nominated for a Best Picture or Director Oscar. It’s nothing more than an esthetically pleasing diversion.

I swear people nominated Midnight in Paris for so many awards because Hollywood is lazy. Rather than nominating ground-breaking, intelligent films like Pariah, The Whistleblower or Young Adult, this gets nominated because Allen is a famous, old, white male director. Good job, Hollywood. Way to keep perpetuating the dude machine.

The film suffers from a major woman problem. The women in the film are just as intelligent and talented as their male contemporaries. Gil turns to women for advice and guidance. Yet Allen reduces almost all of them to love interests and arm candy, nothing more than satellites to a dude.

Indie Spirit Best Feature Nominee: Beginners

Beginners (2010)

This is a guest post from Megan Ryland.

(Does contain minor, vague spoilers)

Beginners introduces us to Oliver (Ewan McGregor), who is struggling to cope with the life and death of his father, while also attempting to fall in love. Told in memories that collide with the present day, the narrative moves forward and backward in time to reveal who and what has shaped Oliver’s life.

After Oliver’s mother dies, his 75-year-old father Hal (Christopher Plummer) reveals that he is gay and proceeds to embrace an identity that he has been forced to conceal. Unfortunately, four years later Hal is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Oliver cares for his father until Hal’s death, after which Oliver can only mourn and care for his father’s dog, Arthur, who shares his grief. Three months after the funeral, Oliver meets Anna (Mélanie Laurent), a beautiful French actress. Despite their shared tendency to push others away, they enter a complicated relationship and try to determine if either one of them knows how to make it work.

The movie is written and directed by Mike Mills, who reportedly based the movie on his experiences with his own father. While dealing with heavy topics, the overall tone and trajectory of the movie is arguably optimistic. The narrative is at times whimsical or quirky, but it maintains a strong connection to real emotion that I found compelling. Ewan McGregor is fantastic as the centerpiece of this intelligent romantic comedy, but the entire cast sells the story. Mélanie Laurent, Christopher Plummer and Mary Page Keller create a rich world as supporting characters with their own stories.

From where I stand, Beginners is yet another movie about men and their lives, but I have a hard time faulting it for that. If it were not another drop in the enormous bucket of Stories About Men, I could find little to complain about. I would actually like to go over what I felt Beginners got right about its characterization of women and men.

First, I appreciated the fact that men took on caretaking as a main feature in the film. Oliver spends months trying to care for his father, and then months trying to grieve his passing, and that emotional journey is not often documented in popular media. We also see men gathered around a sick friend’s bed and men as hospice workers, all without special comment or congratulations. In the movie, nurturing and care are not determined to be the domain of women. In fact, women appeared in a wide variety of positions that aren’t necessarily limited by stereotypical expectations. There are women clients, artists, upper management, friends, doctors, and nurses. Essentially, women are a normal presence within the world created by the film and they display a variety of characteristics. That’s refreshing to see in a movie focused on a man’s story.

Mélanie Laurent as Anna

For example, Beginners could have put Anna (Mélanie Laurent) in the role of the girlfriend-as-therapist, but her position in the story is not dependent on her ability to be the caretaker for Oliver. In my opinion, Anna’s sympathy and understanding does not transform her into a tool to cope with Oliver’s grief over his father. She escapes being the empty vessel for Oliver’s emotions to pour into, thank goodness! She has her own issues to sort out and their interactions move far beyond simply dealing with Hal’s death. In fact, in coping with her own issues, Anna is not morally required by the narrative to be a caretaker for her depressed father either. She’s arguably not forced to lean on men to define her character’s role or trajectory, despite playing the romantic lead.

The relationship between Anna and Oliver was of great interest to me. Anna is rather unique in the depiction of her sexuality and sensuality. Although both Oliver and Anna pursue the relationship at different moments, Anna is initially often the sexual ‘aggressor’ with no feigned coy expressions. She is not ashamed when she invites a stranger to her hotel room, or when they do introductions the following morning. Importantly, this behaviour is not set up by the film to be seen as deviant or ‘troubled.’ The audience isn’t expected to see anything wrong with her establishing a relationship in this manner. Although the lack of judgment or slut shaming could be attributed to the relatively mature age of both Anna and Oliver, I still appreciate the normalization of Anna taking the lead in her own sexual and emotional satisfaction.

Arguably, Anna is also beautiful and sexy without being objectified by the camera. Shots linger on her face, not her bust, waist or behind. Maybe my standards are horribly low from watching mainstream television and movies, but this treatment impressed me. Even her brief, partial nudity is natural and the director avoids allowing the audience to leer at her as she changes clothes. For as much time as the couple spends in the bedroom, I am hard pressed to describe Anna’s figure in any detail. The relationship between Oliver and Anna is depicted as involving a great deal of sex, but her character is never simplified to her value in bed. In my opinion, her defining characteristics are her playfulness, her caring insight and her struggle with keeping people in her life – not her sexuality or hotness rating.

Although it could have easily been a Garden State for grown ups, Beginners refuses easy answers or simple characters. It also deftly avoids the pitfall of the Manic Pixy Dream Girl, as Anna is legitimately flawed, not just quirky (as seen in Elizabethtown and Garden State). Anna doesn’t know how to make the relationship work anymore than Oliver does. Their only saving grace is in trying at all. Unlike the typical Manic Pixy Dream Girl, Anna does not guide Oliver on an adventure where he finds himself; they are both in an adventure of a relationship, while Oliver is separately dealing with his grief. It’s not her responsibility to open his eyes to the beauty of life.

Mary Page Keller as Georgia

Oliver’s mother, Georgia, is the other woman in his life. Georgia is a striking figure who we see only in distant memories and who is played beautifully by Mary Page Keller. In a very limited number of scenes, Georgia leaves a lasting impression. For example, when Oliver remembers his father briefly kissing his mother before going to work, Georgia’s expression as Hal leaves her is profoundly moving. Oliver’s father is entirely absent in these memories, even when he kisses Georgia. The audience understands in that moment what their entire relationship was like, and what Oliver watched on a daily basis. Every time the kissing goodbye clip repeated, I was glued to Keller’s face. In barely a few minutes on screen, the nuance and complexity that we see from Georgia (Keller) is astounding. She married a gay man knowing he was gay, and yet hungers for the kind of emotion, connection and attention that she needs. He will never deliver it, but she never leaves him; they are together until her death. Even from her brief screen time, the audience understands Georgia as a complexly motivated character who adds depth to the story.

Fortunately, Georgia is not entirely defined by the roles of wife and mother, despite only being shown in the memories of her son. She is a woman who gave up a great deal and who existed outside the lives of her son and husband. For example, Georgia is described as having “handed in her Jewish badge” when Hal married her. While she is not as present as other characters, I believe that she is given dignity and complexity. She is not a Maternal Figure placeholder and she is not used as the scapegoat for Oliver’s intimacy issues, but she is not perfect either. Keller delivers an utterly human performance of a woman who wants to give happiness to her son, while barely maintaining the façade of happiness in her own life. This is a story that has been lived by many women in many ways.

Christopher Plummer as Hal

I would be remiss if I didn’t also discuss Hal. Christopher Plummer has been collecting Best Supporting Actor awards for the role (as of this writing, Wikipedia lists 5 received), and in my humble opinion, they are definitely earned. Plummer plays a loving and optimistic gay senior, which departs from typical depictions of young, promiscuous gay men in the media. Although not an entirely radical character, Hal is certainly a fresh representation of sexuality for two demographics, one often considered ‘non-sexual’ (seniors) and other considered ‘hyper sexual’ (gay men). Hal is often joyful, even while dying, and doesn’t express shame or regret for the compromises he has made. He does not simplify his life for his son or the audience, and he does not apologize for it. Both Oliver and the viewer are left to determine what it means to live and achieve happiness as Hal has. Again, Beginners provides complex characterization and depth of feeling.

What I really love about Beginners is that everyone is trying to find love and happiness, and everyone is having a hard go of it. Men, women, everyone is imperfect and trying so hard. The sincere efforts and genuine flaws make this a story about three-dimensional women and men who aren’t reduced to stereotypes or roles. No one attempts to save someone else (everyone is too busy with saving themselves) and the story doesn’t even become about Oliver using someone else to save himself. The only hope for finding happiness is trying to do it despite everything else.

Megan Ryland is currently completing her BA, focusing on politics, women and gender. She writes about feminism, body image, and media analysis on her blog, http://beautyvsbeast.wordpress.com. Starting in March 2012, she will also be helping to release the Hello City! Culture Cast, a Vancouver-based podcast that reviews movies, theatre, concerts and more.

‘Fire’: Part One of Deepa Mehta’s ‘Elements Trilogy’

Fire (1996)

Fire is the first film in Deepa Mehta’s Elements Trilogy (Earth and Water follow). Made in 1996, it focuses on a middle-class family in present-day (funny how I still think of the 1990s as “present day,” despite the global changes of the past fifteen years) India.

The film centers around two married couples–Ashok (Kulbhushan Kharbanda) and his wife Radha (Shabana Azmi), and Ashok’s brother Jatin (Javed Jaffrey) and his wife Sita (Nandita Das)–who run a carryout restaurant and video store, and who share a home with the brothers’ mother, Biji (Kushal Rekhi), and their employee, Mundu (Ranjit Chowdhry). Jatin and Sita are newlyweds, but we quickly learn that Jatin loves another woman (Julie, a Chinese-Indian woman who has perfected an American accent and dreams of returning to Hong Kong), and married a “traditional Indian woman” out of pressure from his brother and mother.

The film offers the womens’ perspectives on the conflicts between desire and duty, and between tradition and the realities of a modern India.

As with almost any film centering on family drama and dynamics, we see the tensions simmering beneath the surface as the film focuses on the two women and their lack of fulfillment from their marriages. Mehta, in the DVD’s Director’s Notes for Fire, states,

I wanted to make a film about contemporary, middle-class India, with all its vulnerabilities, foibles and the incredible extremely dramatic battle that is waged daily between the forces of tradition and the desire for an independent, individual voice.

More than 350 million Indians belong to the burgeoning middle-class and lead lives not unlike the Kapur family in Fire. They might not experience exactly the same angst or choices as these particular characters, but the confusions they share are very similar–the ambiguity surrounding sexuality and its manifestation and the incredible weight of figures (especially female ones) from ancient scriptures which define Indian women as pious, dutiful, self-sacrificing, while Indian popular cinema, a.k.a. “Bollywood”, portrays women as sex objects (Mundu’s fantasy).

To capture all this on celluloid was, to a large part, the reason I wanted to do Fire. Even though Fire is very particular in its time and space and setting, I wanted its emotional content to be universal.

Sita learns very early in her marriage that her husband is in love with Julie–he doesn’t hide the relationship from her–and she seeks solace and comfort from Radha. Radha hasn’t been intimate with her husband in 13 years; when Ashok learned she was unable to conceive, he sublimated his desires (and began channeling a good bit of their income) into religious study with his swami. The friendship between Sita and Radha soon evolves into a sexual relationship, and when the women are found out by their family, they must decide whether to obey tradition or follow their hearts.

Radha and Sita

The film explores what traditional marriage has done to alienate these women–particularly Radha–from their own desires. The desire for intimacy and sex, sure, but also the desire to live their lives for themselves, rather than for their husbands. My reading of the film is certainly from a Western perspective, however, and you could argue that the film is about discovering desire (rather than reconnecting to it after a period of alienation), since the traditional, conservative Hindu/Indian culture didn’t allow much–if any–space for individual desire for women. Sita embodies changes in the society, as she comes from a traditional family, but is more critical of the traditional rituals and more in touch with her body and her desires. (When we first meet her, for example, she playfully tries on her new husband’s pants and dances around their bedroom, unashamed of her body.) Sita is also the one who initiates a physical relationship with Radha.

Depicting a lesbian relationship on film fifteen years ago proved hugely controversial, and Fire was immediately banned in Pakistan, and soon after pulled from Indian cinemas for religious insensitivity. Although the film twice passed the Indian censor board–they requested no editing, and no scenes removed–violent protests caused movie houses to stop showing the film. In “Burning Love,” Gary Morris writes,

The reaction of some male members of the audience was so violent that the police had to be called. “I’m going to shoot you, madam!” was one response. According to Mehta, the men who objected couldn’t articulate the word “lesbian” — “this is not in our Indian culture!” was as much as they could bring themselves to say.

It isn’t only the tangible pleasures of a lesbian relationship that created such heated reactions, though that’s certainly the most obvious reason. This beautifully shot, well-acted film is a powerful, sometimes hypnotic critique of the rigid norms of a patriarchal, post-colonial society that keeps both sexes down.

The controversy surrounding the film may have superseded the film itself–which is beautifully shot, heartbreaking, and even darkly comedic at times. Fire contains so many elements that I love in film: strong female characters, an exploration of complex issues that is never oversimplified and that never leads to individuals being labeled good or evil (although they certainly behave in good and/or evil ways), and immersion into a culture that isn’t entirely familiar to me. Speaking to a Western audience, Mehta has stated that one of her goals in filmmaking is to “demystify India,” its culture and its traditions. Fire complicates our understanding of a traditional patriarchal culture, and throws into sharp relief the ways these traditions impact women in particular.

Again, here’s Mehta on Fire:

We women, especially Indian women, constantly have to go through a metaphorical test of purity in order to be validated as human beings, not unlike Sita’s trial by fire.

I’ve seen most of the women in my family go through this, in one form or another. Do we, as women, have choices? And, if we make choices, what is the price we pay for them?

***

There is a ton of information online about Fire. Here are some selected articles for further reading:

Guest Writer Wednesday: Why Watch Romantic Comedies?

some romantic comedies

This guest post by Lady T previously appeared at her blog The Funny Feminist.

A few weeks ago, I announced my intention to tackle 52 romantic comedies over the course of one year. 2012 is the Year of the Romantic Comedy at my blog, and it shall henceforth be dubbed “The Rom-Com Project.” The Rom-Com Project is a completely serious endeavor, a social experiment, and in no way a cynical ploy to get a book deal by writing about a year of doing something. In my post where I first announced the project, I explained my reasons for focusing on the romantic comedy:

I also think that looking at romantic comedies is a worthwhile feminist project. I want to look at how men and women are represented in these films. I want to look at the way romantic expectations are presented in our popular culture. I want to look at issues of consent. I want to look at the way the comedy genre affects the romance genre and vice-versa.

Readers responded well to this post and left me more suggestions than I needed, to the point where I have to decide whether to narrow down the list to 52, or expand the project to “100 Rom-Coms in a Year.”

But why focus on romantic comedies (one might ask)? Why not focus on comedies that happen to feature women?

Well, just for a lark, I looked at the Wikipedia entry on “comedy film” and took note of the different sub-genres listed under the comedy banner, as well as the examples that were mentioned for each genre.

For the fish-out-of-water genre, the entry lists six examples. 0 of 6 of these examples have female protagonists.

For the parody or spoof film genre, the entry lists three examples. 0 of 3 of these examples have female protagonists.

For the anarchic comedy film genre, the entry lists two examples. 0 of 2 of these examples have female protagonists.

For the black comedy film genre, the entry lists fourteen examples. 1 of these 14 examples (Heathers) has a female protagonist without a male co-protagonist, and fewer than half have a female co-protagonist.

I think you can all start to see the pattern here, but let me continue just to belabor the point.

Gross-out films. 4 examples, 0 female protagonists.

Action comedy films. 9 examples, 0 female protagonists.

Comedy horror films. 9 examples, 1 female protagonist (in Scary Movie).

Fantasy comedy films. 6 examples, 2 female co-protagonists (The Princess Bride, Being John Malkovich), 0 female protagonists without male co-protagonists.

Black comedy films. 3 examples, 0 female protagonists.

Sci-fi comedy films. 8 examples, 0 female protagonists.

Military comedy films. 9 examples, 1 female protagonist (Private Benjamin).

Stoner films. 4 examples, 0 female protagonists.

Some might argue with me on particular examples, but it’s obvious that dominant characters in comedy films are overwhelmingly male. (I also understand that Wikipedia is not an entirely accurate source of information, but the examples that are used to represent these different genres explains a lot about our cultural attitudes.)

But what about the romantic comedy?

If you look at the entry on romantic comedies, you see many more films that have female protagonists, or at least female co-protagonists. Especially significant is the list of top-grossing romantic comedies. 22 films are listed. More than half of them have female co-protagonists, some have one female protagonist, and one has (gasp!) more than one female protagonist (Sex and the City).

The romantic comedy genre gets a lot of flak. It’s considered a genre that’s more “shallow” than drama, but not funny enough to be a “real” comedy. Is it any coincidence that the romantic comedy is one of the few film genres, and possibly the only film genre, that regularly features women?

To me, the romantic comedy genre is an example of the struggles women face both as entertainers and as consumers of entertainment.

Love stories are dismissed as “girl stuff” (as though something aimed at women is automatically less than something aimed at men). A male-centric romantic comedy like Knocked Up is something with “mass appeal” when a female-centric romantic comedy like My Best Friend’s Wedding is “girl stuff.” Judd Apatow makes the same type of movie over and over again and gets praised despite the striking similarity in many of his films (down to style, story, and casting), but reviewers of What’s Your Number? can’t resist comparing the movie unfavorably to Bridesmaids, even though “a female protagonist” is almost the only thing those two movies have in common.

It’s a double-edged sword. Romantic comedies are looked upon with scorn, as fluffy and unimportant compared to dramatic films, but also not “edgy” or irreverent enough to be “real” comedies. But if a woman wants to watch a movie that is both a) funny and b) featuring a female main character, she doesn’t have many options available to her.

Sexism is deeply ingrained in our culture. Just look at my last paragraph. I typed the last sentence of that paragraph saying that “if a woman wants to watch a movie…with a female main character…” Then I looked back and realized that I, who tries to make a point of combating stereotypes and gender essentialism, automatically assumed that ONLY women would ever want to watch a movie with a female protagonist. That a man wouldn’t seek out or enjoy a movie with a female protagonist. That a man wouldn’t think a movie with a female protagonist was funny.

I have several problems with the romantic comedy genre. I dislike that women are almost always presented as people who are obsessed with fashion and shopping and shoes. (Not that there’s anything wrong with being obsessed with fashion and shopping and shoes – I would buy Zooey Deschanel’s entire wardrobe if I had the means. I’m only pointing out that we don’t see many female protagonists in rom-coms who are not obsessed with fashion and shopping and shoes, and I would like to see a wider variety of characters.) I dislike that funny women are usually “pretty women in high heels who adorably fall down.” I dislike that women in romantic comedies are almost always teachers and cupcake bakers or art gallery owners or trying to make it in the publishing industry. (Again, not that there’s anything wrong with those careers – I just want more variety.) Or, alternately, these women are high-powered career types whose journeys revolve around letting free-spirited men teach them how to loosen up. (For more of these romantic comedy cliches, read Mindy Kaling’s Flick Chicks, and then pick up Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? And Other Concerns. I just finished reading it, and it’s hilarious.)

And yet, despite all of these cliches and stereotypes in romantic comedy films, I still want to spend a year analyzing the genre. I think it’s a worthwhile project because I want to examine our culture’s expectations about men and women and gender and sex and romance, and how romantic comedies play into (or don’t play into) rape culture. I am looking forward to this project.

But I’m not going to a lie. I’m a little annoyed and bitter that, if I wanted to spend a year writing about black comedies starring women, or parodies starring women, or any other comedy genre starring women, I would probably not to be able to come up with a list of 52 movies for any of those genres unless I reviewed a slew of obscure films that most readers wouldn’t recognize.

Final note: Whenever a woman (or a person of color, or disabled person, or gay person, or a person belonging to any marginalized group) writes a piece criticizing the lack of representation in media, it’s only a matter of time before a troll makes a comment along the lines of, “Well, if you think there should be more movies starring [this group], why don’t you write one yourself?” To that, I say, “All in due time. Alllll in due time.” I’m not writing about my super awesome women-centric movie ideas here just yet because I don’t want anyone to steal them. *shifts eyes, holds screenplay closer to chest*

—-

Lady T writes about feminism, comedy, media, and literature at the blog The Funny Feminist. Her essay “My Mom, the Reader” has also been featured at SMITH Magazine. A graduate of Hofstra University, she writes fiction about vampires, superhero girlfriends, and feisty princesses, and hopes to one day get paid for it. She contributed a review of Easy A to Bitch Flicks.

Guest Writer Wednesday: Rom-Coms Don’t Suck

This cross-post from Amanda Krauss previously appeared at Risatrix.

Romantic comedies have existed for literally thousands of years; the same historical genre, comoedia, is also responsible for today’s sitcoms.

But romantic comedies, especially, have suffered a great deal in the last few decades. These supposed “chick” flicks (male-authored for millennia, and still mostly male-created) get ridiculously low scores on MetaCritic and Rotten Tomatoes. Meanwhile, most “guy” comedies (e.g. an Apatow joint) or action flicks get decent scores, seemingly without even trying.

This is pure and simple sexism. You sure as hell can’t defend action flicks on aesthetic grounds. And any reviewer who accuses a rom-com of being predictable should have their license revoked — of course it’s predictable. So was that action flick, by the way. Oh, didn’t you see it coming that the hero dude was going to save the world? I did.

Unless you’re watching Memento, you just have to accept that most genres are predictable. It’s about execution, not form, but with screwball comedies and rom-coms there’s a general critical consensus that it’s OK to bash them for being exactly what they are (i.e. a set genre with predictable rules). That really pisses me off. Okay, Mr./Mrs. Critic, maybe you’d rather go see a revival of Metropolis at your local arthouse. But right now you’re being paid to review this movie, so don’t be a whiny beyotch about it.

And “guy” comedies (e.g. Knocked Up, Superbad, I Love You, Man) are exactly the same, predictable genre. I’ll even grant you that they’re technically funnier, mostly because the quantity and transgressiveness of the jokes is greater. There’s a complicated set of reasons for this, involving gender, comedy, and socialization. But suffice to say that gendering rom-coms as “chick” entertainment is a relatively recent phenomena and that we’re all socialized to think women are less funny, so I’d really appreciate it if critics would take a little step back when they did their sexist stuff.

Anyway. The generic point of comoedia is integration, no matter how many jokes are made in the middle. That’s why they’re predictable, and that’s, in fact, why they’re comedies.

So can we please stop all the whining about it?

Amanda Krauss is a former professor and current writer/speaker/humor theorist. From 2005-2010 she taught courses on gender, culture, and the history of comedy at Vanderbilt University, and in 2010 was invited to present a course entitled “Humor, Ancient to Modern” at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute. While she is focusing on her current blog (Worst Professor Ever, which satirically chronicles issues of education and lifelong learning) some of her theoretical archives can be found at risatrix.com.

(95) Minutes of Pure Torture: 500 Days of Summer, Take 2

Perhaps my expectations were too high, or perhaps my eternal lust for an intelligent romantic comedy (think Juno) got the better of me. We all loved Joseph Gordon-Levitt in 10 Things I Hate About You, and Zooey Deschanel was one of the reasons Almost Famous was such an awesome movie. The commercials telling us that (500) Days of Summer was not “a love story” made us interested—we went to see these two beloved actors fall in love.

It starts out boy meets girl—but the irritating voice of the narrator tells us that it is not a story about a boy meeting a girl. This is supposed to be hip and ironic.

Zooey Deschanel, as Summer Finn, is an enigma, or that’s what the filmmakers want us to think. She tells Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) in an awkward office-endorsed drunken karaoke night (I want to work there!) that she doesn’t want to be “anyone’s anything” and that commitment is far off in her future. She is then told that she is a “guy” by the goofy best friend. Alas, it is impossible for a woman to want anything less than a diamond engagement ring and a June wedding at the Plaza (you’ve got us pegged, boys!). After a random, highly erotic copy room make out session (again, I want to work there!), she tells Tom she isn’t looking for anything serious. With his nauseating puppy-dog look, Tom agrees, saying he’ll keep it casual. The next sequences go back and forth between their miserable days with each other and their occasional mediocre ones, which Tom thinks are the best and most meaningful days of his life.

He follows her around like an obedient dog and spends most of his time analyzing why she didn’t smile when he held up a certain record and how she didn’t listen to his mix CD (8th grade anyone?). He loves everything about her, alternately hates everything about her, goes to his pre-pubescent sister for advice and survives off Twinkies, whiskey and orange juice for approximately twenty days straight after their breakup. Though he works at a greeting card company, he owns a spacious apartment in Los Angeles and was training to be an architect but gave it up for mysterious reasons, though he lovingly sketches some buildings on her arm in one scene, babbling about light capacity. I’m not sure if this means anything; in fact it never actually becomes clear what his interest in architecture means. The movie prefers to center around his self-absorbed dealings with a female who does not seem particularly interested in him and his repeated attempts at stalking her.

Summer, though she detests relationships, continually flirts with Tom, thereby stringing him along for the entirety of the movie. The only interesting things about Summer are her fabulous vintage dresses (kudos to costume design) and huge blue eyes. Of the things we’re supposed to think are cool about her: she likes Ringo Starr, The Smiths, and she has read The Picture of Dorian Grey. That’s about it. She is a secretary, has no visible ambitions, was called “Anal Girl” in college (because she was neat) and has of course, a gorgeous apartment. One night she admits she had a dream about flying and tells Tom: “I’ve never told anyone that before.” Yawn.

This movie was said to be refreshing by many critics, but really no parts of it are invigorating, and little of it resembles real life. The dialogue is halting, and an awkward undercurrent plays throughout the entire movie, punctuated by my uneasy giggles to lessen my extreme discomfort. No sparks fly between the main characters—there is none of the chemistry that occurs in an actual relationship. That might be because neither character has much depth. Sure, they have some slapdash pseudo-idiosyncrasies, but they boil down to two hipster stereotypes.

The supposed draw of this movie is that it is about an independent woman who does not want to be tied down in a relationship. However, in the end, Summer gets married to someone else. When Tom questions her about this, she explains it away by the fact that she just knew this other guy was The One. So everything she said about not wanting commitment didn’t mean anything; it just boiled down to the fact that she didn’t really like Tom all that much.

Wow. I wasted $10 and an hour and a half, and it is now confirmed to all male audience members that all women really do want commitment.

Deborah Nadler is a freelance writer and feminist finishing up her degree in Comparative Literature from Smith College, after which she hopes to become a physician. Despite her father’s claim that “doctors don’t write books,” she has aspirations to become a published novelist.

Best Picture Nominee Review Series: Slumdog Millionaire

Best Picture nominee Slumdog Millionaire

This is a guest post from Tatiana Christian.

Set in modern day India, Slumdog Millionaire is heralded as a classic fairy-tale, rags to riches sort of story. Jamal (played by Dev Patel), a 20-year-old resident of Mumbai, is a contestant on the ever-popular Who Wants to be a Millionaire with Prem Kumar (played by Anil Kapoor) as his host. The film starts off with Jamal being tortured by police officers, demanding to know if he cheated during the game. As a “slum dog,” Jamal grew up impoverished and uneducated – so how could he possibly know the answer to a question such as “Which statesman is on the 100 dollar bill?”

The context of the film is that of abject poverty; a group of Indian boys are playing cricket in what looks like an abandoned airstrip before being chased away by police. As Jamal and his brother Salim (played by Madhur Mittal) race through the slums, we get an eagle-eye view of the poverty in which they live. Between the dirt roads, homes made of metal and stone are clustered together. The movie doesn’t hold back from the specific reality of our main characters.

As the young children race through the alleys, we get shots of the garbage floating atop the water. There’s a scene of a young man wading through the river, throwing trash into a large plastic bag. The lack of general infrastructure is depicted in two scenes where Salim charges people to use an outhouse and where many women are shown washing clothes in a common area.

The concept of poverty is incredibly important when we examine Latika’s (played by Freida Pinto) role in the movie. In India, women hold a lower place compared to men, even to the point of increased gendercide [in the event that a woman discovers she’s pregnant with a girl]. This preference for the male experience is captured throughout the film.

We first see Latika when Jamal watches his mother bludgeoned to death by anti-Muslim Hindus. The boys are chased through the city, and we get a quick glimpse of a girl standing between two buildings. She’s motionless despite the chaos around her, and only begins to run when beckoned by Jamal. As they race to find help, with the uninterested police playing cards, Latika waits on the other side of the road. Like before, she only runs once Jamal summons her.

Latika continues to be a rather passive and almost mute character as she follows our main characters around. The boys have found shelter in a gigantic crate, and it’s pouring while Latika stands in the rain, shivering. Jamal and Salim bicker over whether or not to let her in – and much like before – Latika is given permission to act as she crawls into the crate, soaking wet.

The disempowerment of poor women in India is also reflected in this film. According to Rashimi Bhat, “Women and girls have less access to food, education and health care than men and boys. Hence, they may face poverty more severely than men.” This concept is seen when the children are discovered by Maman (played by Ankur Vikal), a man who rounds up children and forces them to act as beggars. Maman asks the children to sing for him, and those who can are blinded because they earn more money that way.

At the risk of having his brother blinded, Salim – who was momentarily granted a second-in-command-type position – tells Jamal to run. Latika joins them as they escape and eventually they find themselves trying to catch a moving train. Both Jamal and Salim have boarded, but Latika is still trying to keep up. When she finally grabs onto Salim’s hand – he pulls away, leaving her to Maman and his men.

Salim isn’t atypical in his hatred for women – or at least Latika – as he is living in a country where every twelve seconds a baby girl is aborted. We also see his dislike for females when he is bossing the other children around, and he grabs a sleeping baby from the arms of another female child. He carries the wailing infant to Latika, telling her to hold it because it’ll fetch double. At first, Latika refuses, but when Salim threatens to drop the female infant, Latika gives in.

The fate of Latika versus Salim and Jamal is pronounced throughout the rest of the film. As a young, impoverished, and presumably uneducated orphan Latika doesn’t have very many options. The rest of the film is dedicated to the exploits of the brothers who board a train going anywhere – stealing food, getting kicked off, and then boarding again. They wind up at the Taj Mahal where Jamal is strangely mistaken for a tour guide, which allows him and his brother to start a racket of stealing foreigner’s shoes.

Meanwhile, the fate of Latika can only be guessed at until Jamal resumes his desperate search to discover she’s become a child prostitute. When the boys go to search for her, this is probably the only time in the movie where we see an abundance of women. In the film, their purpose is to only serve the men, and we see glimpses of Latika dancing for an older man. Jamal and Salim burst in to save her, only to have Maman waltz in. Latika is, once again, portrayed as being powerless as she simply watches as the men argue over her fate. She doesn’t protest or otherwise attempt to run away. SPOILER: Once Salim kills Maman, they escape to an abandoned hotel. (end spoiler).

Once at the hotel, Jamal and Latika discuss destiny, which has “bonded” them and is what compelled him to search for her. There is a scene where Latika is taking a shower, and she comes out to get a towel from Jamal. She asks if Salim is still there, who contorts his face with disgust then promptly leaves the hotel room to visit Javed (played by Mahesh Manjrekar), the nemesis of Maman. It’s presumed that he has sold Latika’s virginity to him because he comes back to the hotel, and kicks Jamal out with a gun pointed at his head.

In this scene, Latika comes out and tells Jamal to go – perhaps to save him – and heads back into the room with Salim. This is the last time that Jamal sees Latika for several years.

Bhat says that women in India have: “Lesser means – assets, skills, employment options, education, legal resources, financial resources – to overcome poverty than men, and are more economically insecure and vulnerable in times of crisis.” After this incident, we see Jamal working in a call center, serving tea to the employees while Salim has settled for a life of crime working for Javed. Jamal lies his way into Javed’s mansion when he sees Latika standing on a balcony, and when he enters the house, she’s excited to see him but then emotionally retreats.

Jamal notices a bruised eye, and tries to convince her to leave with him.

“And live off of what?” Latika asks.

“Love.” Jamal replies.

This exchange is paramount to understanding Latika’s role in life (that of which we see in the movie). Latika has been forced to live with or abide by the rules of men who were more financially powerful, while also lacking any skills to live on her own. In this sense, she settles for an abusive, coerced relationship because she doesn’t know how to survive. Jamal, who doesn’t really understand what it means to struggle as a woman, suggests something impractical. It highlights his ignorance of her situation, his male privilege.

But, he tells her that he’ll wait for her at the train station everyday at 5pm. Surprisingly, she shows up, and for a few moments they’re reunited until Salim and his thugs come to re-kidnap her. It’s very telling to me that in the first (and only) time that Latika has fought for what she wanted, it’s immediately thwarted and ends with a kidnapper cutting her on her face. The extreme violence that Latika experiences when trying to exert her independence is overwhelming.

After this, Latika is taken to a safe house while Jamal is on his final question for Who Wants To Be A Millionaire. While Javed and his thugs are busy with dancing girls, Salim gives Latika his cell phone and the keys to his car, as a way to atone for his past wrongdoings. This is incredibly important because while Latika experiences freedom, it’s through the assistance of a man (and one who sold her). But it’s also important to note that she’s not escaping to be free, she’s escaping to go into the arms of yet another man.

Tatiana Christian is a 20-something blogger who loves to blog around race, gender, media, and how personal experiences allow her to explore issues regarding social justice. I love to spend time on Twitter following and participating in conversations that help expand my understanding of the world.

Best Picture Nominee Review Series: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

This is a guest post from Jesseca Cornelson.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button occupies a curious space in my imagination. I asked to review it because I have long wanted to view the film—it’s been pretty high on my Netflix streaming queue for more than a year—and yet, every time I sit down to watch something on Netflix, I pass it over. Even though TCCOBB was one of those must-see movies when it came out in December 2008, and as much as it seemed a neat little imaginative tale in reviews and commercials, I just found it really hard to get terribly excited about anything Brad Pitt is in. I’m not an anti-Brad Pitt snob, it’s just that I get enough Brad Pitt coverage in my favorite gossip blogs that I really don’t feel like seeing him any more than I have to.

Once I settled into the movie, however, I was able to enjoy it like the popcorn fare that it is—pleasant, but not terribly complex and with little nutritional value. My very first impression of the film was that it is one of those movies whose story is designed simply to make the viewer cry, and for me, it succeeded quite effectively in that regard. I’m a sucker for stories shaped like sadness. My second impression was to wonder why on earth I was being made to cry about the tragic love story of two imaginary white people against the back drop of Hurricane Katrina, which was a very real and epic tragedy for the city this story is set in (as well as for areas well outside New Orleans). To this second point I will return shortly.

But first, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, based on a short story of the same name by F. Scott Fitzgerald, bears a family resemblance to another film adaption of a literary source, Forrest Gump, so I wasn’t terribly surprised to find out that screenwriter Eric Roth penned both films. In each film, we follow a quirky white boy in the south from his childhood through his adventures in adolescence and early adulthood and on into maturity. Covering such a large time span, the plots are largely episodic in nature but the feeling of an overarching structure is achieved through the protagonist’s varied and lifelong relationship with a woman he’s known since childhood. Both Benjamin’s Daisy and Forrest’s Jenny are remarkable, I think, only for their beauty and their rare understanding and appreciation of their respective misfit men. Both films also present what I think of as problematically unproblematic racial relationships. I don’t necessarily believe that every film, much less those that are comedic or fantastical in nature, needs to radically explore gender and racial relationships and stereotypes, but I suppose I don’t believe that we’re sufficiently post-racial to be able to gloss over historical struggles without such glossing over itself feeling like a distraction. And I think that’s part of what renders both TCCOBB and Forrest Gump ultimately conservative films.

Before I take on what I think is Benjamin Button’s most interesting relationship—that with Queenie, the African-American woman who adopts him, I want to talk about the film’s magical realism. While TCCOBB is clearly grounded in familiar historical periods and places—1918 New Orleans, Russia pre-World War II, a Pacific marine battle (if I recall correctly), not to mention the frame story set in a 2005 New Orleans on the brink of Hurricane Katrina—the world Benjamin Button lives in is also one of magic and wonder. In the frame story, Daisy’s daughter reads to her mother from Benjamin’s diary as Daisy prepares to die. The narrative in Benjamin’s diary is further framed by the story of Mr. Gateau’s backwards running clock, built out of Mr. Gateau’s desire for his son who died in World War I to return to him. Presumably, this backwards running clock had some kind of magical influence over Benjamin, who was born the size of a baby but with the features and ailments of an old man and, as anyone who is remotely familiar with the film’s concept knows, appears to grow younger as he in fact gets older. [I have to admit that I totally thought Benjamin was going to end up as a man-sized baby at the end, an idea I got from reading too much Dlisted where Michael K would go on and on about Cate Blanchett as an old lady having sex with Brad Pitt as a old man baby. Oh, Dlisted, I can’t believe I believed you! Also, try as I might, I cannot find the posts where Michael K says this, so maybe I imagined the whole thing.]

Other than these very important magical elements, the universe of TCCOBB is relatively realistic, save for its gliding over of both the women’s movement and the Civil Rights Movement. What are we to make of this? The way I see it, since TCCOBB works hard to incorporate historic events like World Wars I & II and Hurricane Katrina, (1) the filmmakers don’t think that race and gender figure very largely in 20th century and early 21st century American history; (2) they imagine that in the same magical world where a baby can be born with the features and ailments of an old man, issues of gender and race are magically non-issues; or (3) since this is Benjamin Button’s story, he just doesn’t give a crap about race and gender. Choice three is definitely the least plausible. Benjamin Button is one very nice guy who definitely gives a crap! (Maybe the point is “Here is a really nice white guy!”) He loves his black momma Queenie (as portrayed by Taraji P. Henson)! He loves Cate Blanchett’s Daisy, even when she’s an unlovable prick. I sympathize with filmmakers and writers of all kinds, for that matter, who want to tell stories set in the historic south about something other than race. Must every story set in the historic south be about race? No, certainly, I don’t think so. But when race comes up—as it most definitely does here since Benjamin is adopted by an African-American woman—it seems strangely unrealistic to neglect the complexity of historic race relationships.

Maybe the question I should be asking is what purpose does Queenie’s blackness serve? Does her blackness make her more accepting of Benjamin when even his own father abandoned him and others were repulsed by him? Does it make the film feel integrated and inclusive while still focusing mostly on white experience? Perhaps it’s better to ask what possibilities might Queenie’s blackness have presented in this magical version of historic New Orleans. If historical gender and racial issues are going to be ignored, I think it’s an exciting possibility to think of how they might have been re-imagined altogether. That’s one of the great possibilities of speculative fiction: it allows us an opportunity to imagine how else we might be—both in utopic and dystopic senses. But even as TCCOBB neglects historical oppression, it also fails to present an imaginative alternative, and that feels like a missed opportunity.

Essentially, Queenie, as a black woman, is limited in her employment as a servant to whites. And even though she fully accepts Benjamin as her son and Benjamin does seem to love and appreciate her, he seems to fail to see how the world treats her differently and, as he grows up, he surrounds himself with white people, almost forgetting about Queenie altogether. Ultimately, the stereotype of the nurturing black woman as a loving caretaker of whites is not greatly challenged or expanded upon. African Americans are presented largely as servants. And they are truly only “supporting” characters for the white characters. Benjamin doesn’t seem to see African-American women as potential lovers or mates—only as mother figures, or rather as his mother, since the only African-American woman presented in any kind of depth is Queenie. Most strikingly, he doesn’t use his inherited wealth to get Queenie her own place or otherwise take care of her, and the last time we see Queenie, she serves Benjamin and Cate cake before retiring to bed. My heart broke for Queenie that Benjamin didn’t see to her retirement in the same way that he looked after Daisy. Is TCCOBB saying that a black woman’s motherly love is expected for free but the romantic affections of a white woman are worth money? Certainly, I think the film suggests that while black women may make good enough mothers for white boys, those boys will grow up only to desire white women. Or perhaps the film simply suggests that black women are perfectly acceptable as caretakers, but they aren’t sexually desirable like white women are. If that last sentence seems far-fetched, think about how the black women who are seen as sex symbols in our culture have or affect features often associated with whiteness. At very least, it seems that the role of lover is elevated above that of mother.

This could have been a more radical movie—and not just one in which a white character has a revelation about what it’s like to know and love black people but one whose very imaginings might show how our racial conceptions and constructions might be otherwise. Instead, we get the opposite: race relations are sanitized of all conflict, while the segregation of family and romantic relations is upheld, with the sole exception of Queenie and Benjamin.

Queenie’s preposterous explanation that Benjamin is her sister’s son “only he came out white”—possibly the film’s most hilarious moment—suggests a missed opportunity. What if in this imagined world black women commonly had white babies and vice versa? Even in our own world, racial designations aren’t as clear cut as we often assume them to be. (See “Black and White Twins”; “Parents Give Birth to Ebony and Ivory Twins”; “Black Parents . . . White Baby”; and “My Affirmative Action Fail”.) What if TCCOBB totally upended everything we think we know about race and women’s roles in the south of the past? Wouldn’t that be interesting?

Moreover, it’s one thing to neglect race and gender issues of the past, but what about in the frame story of the present? All of the nurses and caretakers in Daisy’s hospital are also black women. Daisy is kept company by her daughter, Caroline, and a black woman the same age as Caroline, who eventually leaves to check on her son and never returns to the movie. WTF? Why is she there? Is she Caroline’s girlfriend? A good friend? If we’re not going to see her again, why is she there in the first place? Okay, I looked up the script. For what it’s worth, it specifies that she’s “a young Black Woman, a ‘caregiver,’” though nurses in scrubs are also present and Dorothy dresses in civilian clothes and spends most of her screen time thumbing through a magazine. I so wish that Dorothy had been Caroline’s girlfriend or wife.

And what of Hurricane Katrina? In the end, all we see is water rising in a basement, flooding the old train station clock. There’s nothing about what happened in the hospitals, in the Ninth Ward, in the attics, in the streets, in the Superdome. I don’t even know what to say about that. That the preposterously tragic love of two imaginary white people trumps and erases all the suffering of real, mostly black people? Even through my great big ole sappy tears as Daisy dies, that just doesn’t feel right to me.

Finally, I am reminded that part of my reluctance to watch The Curious Case of Benjamin Button lies with its format as a film. Over the past decade, I’ve grown to prefer serial dramas to just about everything—film, books, whatever (though I’ve recently become consumed with popular fantasy and horror novels). HBO led the way and remains at the top of the serious television game. Deadwood and The Sopranos developed true ensemble casts with richly developed morally-complicated characters shaped by their social, historic, and economic milieux, with deft dialogue that could be emotionally moving or belly-shaking hilarious. The mere invocation of Hurricane Katrina makes it impossible for me not to compare the long but ultimately light fare of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, which aside from its technical and artistic wizardry is ultimately forgettable, with the robust, lifelike, brilliant work of art that is Treme. Where TCCOBB uses its historical setting like a painted backdrop to affect historic depth without actually engaging history, Treme is a masterpiece of the fictionalized drama of the everyday real life of one of America’s great cities. Where women and African Americans are given roles in TCCOBB that support white stars, every character in Treme’s diverse cast is treated as the star of his or her own life, and they are richly complicated people whose lives are never defined solely by their relationship to white main characters. So that’s my loopy recommendation about The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: you’re better off watching Treme.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button was nominated for thirteen Academy Awards in 2009. It won three Oscars for art direction, makeup, and visual effects. It was nominated for cinematography, costume design, directing, film editing, original score, sound mixing, best picture, best actor in a leading role, best actress in a supporting role, and best adapted screenplay.

Jesseca Cornelson, who has finally finished her damn PhD already, is an assistant professor of English at Alabama State University. Every now and again, she updates her blog, Difficult History, where she writes about all manner of crap. She previously reviewed An Education for Bitch Flicks‘ 2010 Best Picture Nominee Review Series.

Best Picture Nominee Review Series: The Reader

This is a guest post from Megan Kearns.

When we read books or watch movies, we often do so to feel inspired, educate ourselves or escape our daily lives. We frequently look for stories filled with passion, love, sacrifice, revenge, wit and camaraderie. We don’t usually examine how shame gnaws away at us, unraveling our lives. I had a hard time writing this review for The Reader, which shines a light on shame. The film intrigued me with its compelling acting and moral complexities. But it remains a difficult terrain to navigate. Confronting the sins of the past, the film begs the question: can you ever forgive someone you love for committing horrific crimes? And can you ever forgive yourself for loving them?

Threaded with secrecy and guilt, The Reader weaves a tale that tackles the nebulous boundaries of morality and justice. Based on the best-selling book by Bernard Schlink, it features two of my all-time favorite actors as two tormented souls forever haunted by their past. With a quiet intensity, Kate Winslet gives a subtle Oscar-winning performance as Hanna Schmitz, a brusque yet sensuous woman. A complicated and unsympathetic character, Winslet imbues her not with empathy but with a tinge of humanity. Ralph Fiennes effortlessly plays the relentlessly wounded Michael Berg, full of longing and regret, never able to let anyone into his life or his heart but Hanna. The film unfolds as Michael, the tale’s moral compass, remembers his life in flashbacks as a sensitive love-struck young boy (played perfectly with a charming innocence by David Kross) who gets involved in a steamy and tumultuous affair with an older woman until she abruptly disappears. Initially tormented by her absence, Michael moves on with his life, until Hanna unexpectedly emerges 8 years later, on trial for war crimes.

In 1958 Germany, 15-year-old Michael meets 36-year-old Hanna, a train conductor, when she helps him home after finding him sick in the street. Drawn to each other, the two eventually enter a sexual relationship. They fall into a routine pattern of sex, bathing and books. Hanna requests Michael read aloud to her; the words of Tolstoy, Homer, D.H. Lawrence and Chekov leap to life. The reading becomes an emotional aphrodisiac and a means of connection.

As if shedding layers of clothing, the film attempts to unveil the layers of Hanna’s life. Yet it always feels diaphanous, never fully within one’s grasp. She shrouds herself in secrecy. Michael and ultimately we as the audience are never meant to completely see Hanna. She’s often harsh, only showing vulnerability when she sobs in Michael’s arms as he reads to her a heartbreaking tale or when a village choir’s music brings her tears of joy. Through art, Hanna is able to express her emotions, connecting with her sensitivity and humanity. But as quickly as she enters Michael’s life, she evaporates. A tragic story laced with sexual awakening and emotional enlightenment, the film reveals that we may never really know the people we love.

When Michael sees Hanna again, she’s a defendant on trial for her actions as a former SS guard. I found it interesting that the film shows the trial of 6 former SS guards, all of whom were women. As the case unfolds, Michael realizes Hanna’s secret shame she’s been so desperate to hide. SPOILER -> She can’t read. As Germany had the highest rate of literacy in Europe, it’s unusual that Hanna would have been illiterate. And some have been quick to criticize the book and film for insinuating that a person would be more ashamed of illiteracy than perpetrating human rights atrocities. <- END SPOILER While reading is a crucial component of the plot, the movie isn’t really about reading or the saving grace of literature; rather it’s used as a metaphor for “moral illiteracy.” Illiteracy analogizes feigned ignorance, for those who claimed they didn’t know what was truly happening in the concentration camps despite the existence of over 10,000 camps and the notoriety of the Nazi massacres.

So much has been written and filmed about the Holocaust. But rarely have tales been told from the perspective of those who have committed unspeakable crimes or the people who loved them. Yet The Reader never condones, empathizes or excuses Hanna’s behavior. Whenever I see a film about the Holocaust, I’m reminded of the saying “never again,” that we can never let this happen again. But genocide didn’t end after WWII; numerous genocides continued to be waged (Cambodian, Rwandan, Palestinian, Kurdish, Croatian) and are still happening today. The film and book it’s adapted from serve as an allegory for how the subsequent generation dealt with the shame of the Holocaust and atrocities their parents’ and grandparents’ generations committed. And Hanna is the character symbolizing the people who committed those unspeakable acts.

So often, we see a man playing the villainous role of a Nazi so it’s interesting to me that a woman embodies that role instead. Yet, I can’t shake the unease I feel with the portrayal. Hanna has no children, no family and never marries. This may not have been the intended consequence, yet it comes off as a cautionary tale. Hanna appears to possess no maternal instinct; rather than protect, she seduces a sweet and naïve boy, alternately treating him tenderly as a passionate lover or with curt callousness. She stands trial for war crimes as a former SS guard, participating in the deaths of hundreds of women and girls. I can’t shake the feeling that if she had been scripted to bear a child or to have lost a child, she wouldn’t have behaved this way. Are single, childless women more cruel and apathetic? No, of course not. Yet Hollywood continually seems to reinforce the notion that women without children are cold and calculating.

Gender role reversals weave throughout The Reader. In the beginning, Hanna helps Michael when he’s sick. By the end of the film, the roles have switched and Michael aids Hanna. It’s interesting watching a movie with an affair between an adult woman and a teenage boy. While I certainly don’t condone it, and it made me feel squeamish rather than erotic (as many reviews described their relationship), I couldn’t help but feel relieved that it wasn’t a 15-year-old girl in this situation as we so often see men with much younger women. In the book, Hanna becomes physically abusive in one scene when she’s overcome with rage whips Michael with a belt. While she’s softened slightly for the film, I still can’t shake my apprehension that there’s an element of sexual predator.

The film slightly expands the roles of the other female characters in the book, which relies heavily on Michael’s internal monologues and narratives. By removing voiceovers, the movie does a fantastic job showing us rather than telling us the story. We see other women in the film including Lena Olin in a dual-role as holocaust survivors, Michael’s mother and sisters, a female law student (added to the film) and Michael’s daughter Julia. Yet most, save for Olin, speak minimal or no lines and none of them have any personalities to speak of.

The only woman existing in Michael’s world is Hanna, whom he uses as a scale in which to weigh all his other relationships with women. Hanna never lets Michael into her world, everything is on her terms. Yet we the audience rarely see the story from Hanna’s perspective. Occasionally we watch Hanna’s face; her terrified expression when she learns she’s going to be promoted, lest anyone discover her secret or her joy when she first unwraps Michael’s packages of recorded books, which she comes to rely on later in life. Literature is also used in the film “as a powerful means of communication, and at other times as a substitute for communication.” Michael eventually uses reading to communicate with Hanna while she uses reading as a way to deal with her emotions and grapple with her past. But even the sole female protagonist, who serves as Michael’s sun, moon and stars, still has her thoughts and views removed. SPOILER -> In the book, Hanna eventually reads books by Holocaust survivors like Elie Wiesel. <- END SPOILER She can’t muffle the sounds of the dead, they continue to haunt her. But the film adaptation erases this crucial point. The only part that even comes close to addressing Hanna’s perspective on her past actions is when she declares:

“It doesn’t matter what I feel. It doesn’t matter what I think. The dead are still dead.”

A tragic yet powerful film that raises so many crucial questions about collective action and individual choice. It’s interesting to me that so much buzz surrounded Winslet’s Oscar-winning performance. Don’t get me wrong, she was sublime in it. But while she gives a commanding yet nuanced performance, the movie often treats women as cursory. Hanna merely serves as a vehicle to express the capacity for human cruelty and apathy, to look away and ignore the brutality happening in society. Even the film’s message isn’t really about Hanna or women in general for that matter. The women merely exist as satellites, all orbiting around Michael. Just like so many other films, it still boils down to a story revolving around a man; his feelings, his perspective and his world.

Megan Kearns is a blogger, freelance writer and activist. A feminist vegan, Megan blogs at The Opinioness of the World, where she writes about gender in pop culture, sexism in the media, reproductive justice and living vegan. Her work has also appeared at Arts & Opinion, Italianieuropei, Open Letters Monthly, and A Safe World for Women. She earned her B.A. in Anthropology and Sociology and a Graduate Certificate in Women and Politics and Public Policy. Megan lives in Boston, MA with her diva cat and more books than she will probably ever read in her lifetime. She contributed reviews of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Something Borrowed, !Women Art Revolution, and The Kids Are All Right (for our 2011 Best Picture Nominee Review Series). She was the first writer featured as a Monthly Guest Contributor.

Best Picture Nominee Review Series: Juno

This review by Amber Leab originally appeared at Bitch Flicks in October 2008.

Juno(2007)

It took me a long time to see the film Juno. I was thrilled when Diablo Cody won the Oscar for Best Screenplay, but at the same time suspicious about her little movie being so lauded. To win an Oscar, the film must be saying the “right” things to the “right” people, a dynamic that rarely favors progressive thinking (see the movie Crash as a recent example). In other words, when too many people love a movie, there’s probably something wrong.

Aside from critical praise and popularity, the topic of teen pregnancy is rarely done without a hefty dose of morality. While we are in a peculiar cultural gray area on the subject—consider the cover of OK Magazine, featuring smiling teen mom Jamie Lynn Spears, or the Republican VP nominee’s pregnant teenage daughter—there seems to be an anti-choice undercurrent running through pregnancy plots, not to mention the culture at large.

The expectations I had going in were also based on reading commentary about the ultra-hip dialogue and soundtrack of the film. While certainly not negative in themselves, coupled with a controversial topic, these features could be enough to couch a conservative, anti-woman message in a hip, fresh film.

It turns out, however, that after an initial adjustment period to the dialogue (and a question about whether the film is set in the early ‘90s), Juno turns out to be planted in a feminist worldview, and is a film that teenagers, especially, ought to see. It was thoroughly enjoyable, funny and touching. I liked it so much that I watched it again, but when I started to write about it, what I liked about the movie became all the more confusing. I loved the music, although Juno MacGuff is way hipper than I was (or am), and I saw a representation that reminded me of myself at that age. I saw a paternal relationship that I never had and a familial openness that I’ve also never had. I saw characters who I wanted as my childhood friends and family.

And while in Juno we have a strong, unconventional female character—and a lead character, at that—the film itself was very, very safe. And I worry whether that’s a good thing. It’s certainly understandable for a first film. A Hollywood outsider would have a much more difficult time making an overtly progressive movie about teen pregnancy, but if she plays the politics safe, and if her own personality is enough of a draw, she just might make it.

I was worried when Juno visited the dumpy abortion clinic and met her pro-life classmate protesting in the parking lot, and I was worried by the very dumpiness of the clinic. I was struck by the notion that a clinic like that would look and feel much more sterile—even in the lobby, as far as Juno went. The thought of fingernails sent her running out of the building. A detail like “fingernails” made the abortion too real for Juno, a teenager, I suppose. Is this a good or bad thing? I don’t know.

Juno, in a rather nonchalant way, seeks permission of the baby’s father, her good friend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera), for the abortion. Or, rather, she seeks his opinion; she seems to want him to resist her plans. But his lack of resistance causes her to make the following decisions on her own. This straddles the line somewhat. She wants to be told what to do, and rather than seeking out someone smarter and more experienced than she is, she asks the boy whose approval she’s still seeking.

Juno wants her baby to have the perfect family; one unlike her own, which her mother abandoned. Her family now consists of her father, her stepmother Bren (Allison Janney), and her half-sister Liberty Bell. Juno doesn’t have a bad deal going. Her folks are markedly working class (they’re both members of the labor class, a group that doesn’t see much Hollywood recognition; he’s an HVAC repairman, she’s a nail technician). Yet Juno imagines a perfect life to consist of two loving parents and a McMansion.Why would she seek out people of this particular class? Is this a case of Juno’s lack of class awareness or the film’s?

The film’s real progressive moment comes when Juno realizes that her idea of perfection isn’t perfect. She realizes that a father who doesn’t want to be there would be as bad as a mother who hadn’t wanted to be there. She sees that a father isn’t a necessity–or perhaps simply that two parents aren’t a necessity. Yet what does this all add up to mean? There’s certainly a moment of female solidarity (and this isn’t the only one, certainly, in the film), and a difficult decision that she makes independently. But, as with other conclusions I’ve made, I’m left with the question of “So what?”

The film does love all of its characters, which is a refreshing change for a high school flick. Juno’s best friend, Leah, is a cheerleader who exhibits some flaky, teenage qualities (her crush on the chubby, bearded, middle-aged math teacher takes a cliché and gives it a twist), but the film loves her nonetheless. Vanessa Loring (Jennifer Garner) is an obsessional, middle-class mommy blogger type, but we see that she would be a good mother, and the film cares for her. We even have sympathy for Mark (Jason Bateman) who, through his relationship with Juno, realizes that he and his wife no longer want the same thing (if they ever did). There are cringe-worthy moments with Mark and Juno, but none that damn him completely. It’s a rare film that gives us no bad guys, which is a large part of its charm.

It’s easy to want to live in a world like this, where a pregnant sixteen-year-old seems to get by pretty well, with her parents’ support and a relationship with her baby’s adoptive family. She has a sweet teenage love affair and doesn’t seem to struggle much. While teen angst is the stuff of Hollywood cliché, things just seemed too easy for Juno. I wish my teenage years could’ve been a bit more like Juno’s. Hell, I wish my life now could be.

The final question remains, though, about whether we should criticize a movie like Juno. Representations of role models for American girls tend to inhabit the poles; either young girls are encouraged to be the beautiful bimbo or the chaste Christian. This film has a strong personality (that masquerades as strong values—even an ethic) without being preachy or moralistic. That can’t inherently be a bad thing. Yet I find myself asking for more, wanting more–something that steps outside of the realm of safety. Perhaps Juno isn’t the film to give me more.

In all, I fear Juno suffers from the same postmodern condition afflicting so many films today. It strives for a non-message in order not to offend anyone, thus allowing anti-choice advocates to cheer the film as loudly as pro-choice feminists. There’s a problem here. If a film that almost universally passes as hip and progressive is so murky in its values and allegiance that we’re not really sure what to think of it, how can a truly hip and progressive film make it today?

Best Picture Nominee Review Series: Atonement

This is a guest post from Marcia Herring.

I’d like to start this review with a confession: Atonement is the second book in my long history of reading that has made me so angry, so upset, that I literally threw it across the room.

My anger was directed at the narrator, Briony Tallis, who I had no idea was pulling the strings of the story I had grown so engrossed in, the story that, had I stepped back for one moment, I would have realized was being shaped and tugged by an even larger narrator.

First published in 2001 by Ian McEwan (author of one of my favorite gender-questioning novels The Cement Garden), Atonement was adapted to film by Joe Wright in 2007 (he’d previously directed Pride & Prejudice and has since directed Hanna). I’d heard of the novel sort of peripherally, “Oh, everyone’s reading it! You’ve got to!” and as consequence, avoided it until forced to indulge for a class and found myself (cliché alert) unable to put it down.

Both as an Academy Award-nominated (and winning, for soundtrack) film and as a book adaptation, Joe Wright’s Atonement succeeds. The film is a gorgeous and gritty, if frustrating, portrait of childhood, of war, of love, of lies and the lies one tells to correct them.

The first section of the film and novel set up the plot. The wealthy Tallis family has temporary custody of their lesser-off red-headed cousins, the Quinceys, and young Briony (Saoirse Ronan) is determined to lead them all in a play to celebrate her older brother Leon’s homecoming. Mother Tallis is sick in bed, and older sister Cecilia (Keira Knightley) is awkward around the son of the Tallis’s lawn worker, Robbie (James McAvoy) and excited to hear that her brother is coming home, despite news that he’s bringing along a friend, cocky Paul Marshall.

Briony lives in a world saturated with innocence. She still writes fairy tales, slaying imaginary dragons in the tall grass. The politics of childhood become confused with budding sexuality–something that Briony witnesses in cousin Lola, and becomes obsessed and terrified with an encounter she witnesses between Cecilia and Robbie. This desire for her own sexual awakening and simultaneously not being ready for it leads to Briony witnessing and misunderstanding the encounter at the fountain, the stark near-nudity of her sister, the tableau of Robbie standing by, the broken vase.

In direct contrast to this innocence comes Paul Marshall, introduced as a dapper gentleman who intends to make money off of the war with his Army Amo chocolate bar factory. He descends upon the safe haven of the nursery where Lola is meant to be watching over her twin brothers. “You have to bite it,” he says, handing her a bar of chocolate, his face stony.

The sexuality, too, of Robbie has another angle. His attempts at a polite apology devolve quickly into crude sexual expression. Robbie is faced with the sheer absurdity and irrationality of expressing sexual attraction to one who is of a higher class. Paul Marshall experiences the opposite problem, his power over Lola used to his advantage as he inflicts first rough treatment and then a rape in the woods. That power keeps Lola from seeing the truth, that she has been mistreated, brutally; Paul Marshall keeps Lola at his side, and she eventually marries him.

Mistaken perception continues as the plot device for the first section of the film, as Briony intercepts a note from Robbie to Cecilia–the word “cunt” startling her into dangerous assumption–and interprets a hasty sexual encounter between them as rape. She tells Lola that she has read “the worst word you could possibly imagine,” the idea of desiring or expressing desire after such a secret and surely filthy part is appalling to Briony, more appalling perhaps than accepting innocence or guilt, more appalling than recognizing shades of gray. As cousin Lola is, nigh simultaneously to the romantic scene, being raped by Paul Marshall, the twins go missing and Robbie tracks them down. Because of his absence and because of her surety that Robbie’s crude note was that of a “sex maniac,” Briony accuses Robbie of Lola’s rape. Surely his wildly expressed sexual appetite is equal to and capable of no less than rape. There must be a villain, there is in all of Briony’s fairy tales, and that villain appears to be Robbie.

What follows is Rob and Briony’s means of atoning for their crimes. Rob, unable to fight the accusation against the wealthy and certain young Tallis, is sentenced to prison and then to fight in WWI. Briony, realizing years later that there were cracks in what she witnessed, that there are, perhaps, alternate truths, becomes a nurse in an attempt to undo some of the wrong she has inflicted upon Cecilia and Robbie.

On the issue of alternate truths, it is nearly impossible to discuss Atonement without discussing its construction, and therefore, its twist ending. Atonement is a movie directed by a man, adapted from a book by a man, about and concerning a woman and her version of the story of her sister and a man they both knew. To say there are layers of subterfuge to consider is an understatement.

A story is being crafted, an attempt to fill in the blanks. An attempt to create rational cause and effect as happens in all stories when we are young. An attempt to understand what must be truly random and unpredictable. Motive must be established.

But of course, things don’t follow a logical order. The wrong person is blamed for a tragedy while another gets off scot-free. War happens and the best and worst of us are lost, caught in causes we might not respect ourselves. Illness, a car crash, a lightning strike. Do we blame Briony, then, for trying to set order in her confusing world? Do we blame her for attempting to set things right that she helped to set wrong? I remember upon first completing the novel, my rage was so complete, so strong. I hated Briony for what she had done, for creating ugly and beautiful lies to cover up the truth, for believing that life was as simple as “Yes. I saw him with my own eyes.” I hated Briony for the very reasons that I love reading and watching films: writers and directors create lies for us, and we indulge in them. Fiction is called such for a reason–it isn’t real.

And as much as we would like to believe Briony’s version of events, as much as we sit, dutiful audience members and readers, we know simultaneously that life is not that simple. It is not as simple as letting oneself fall into a pond and be saved by the handsome hero. Romantic notions of rescue and war come with real danger–something which the film explores with gusto. Countless romantic tales, such as the sort that Briony is enamored with, feature a hero away at war, returning to his true love. But that is simply that: a story and one we buy into with such eagerness that it is easy for Briony, for McEwan, for Wright to pull the wool over our eyes. We want to believe that Robbie lives, that he and Cecilia are reunited, that Briony somehow makes peace with what she has done. At the end of the film, older Briony states in an interview that she could no longer find any use for honesty or reality, but where do the lies actually come in to play? As moviegoers, we anticipate a story. We know that story is not real. So what makes Briony’s betrayal any different?

The soundtrack, interlaced with the sounds of a typewriter, never lets us completely forget that this is a story that is being crafted. It is no mistake that the first shot of the movie is Briony typing away at her play, “The Trials of Arabella,” taking her work very seriously. Briony expresses the difficulty of writing: that a play depends on other people.

The difference between play and story, as Briony postulates, are similar to the difference between novel and film. McEwan spends pages describing the intricacies of the vase, complete and then broken, whereas in a film, the vase is simply there. A long camera shot transports the viewer from room to room; instead of the turn of pages, the soundtrack interacts with the actions on screen instead of, for example, a rowdy neighbor or interrupting child pulling attention from the work.

While it is, in a way, refreshing to give the narrative over so completely to a woman in what is most certainly not a “chick flick,” and while Cecilia appears to be a strong, fierce woman in charge of her own sexuality, and while Briony, if not the most trustworthy of narrators, is more than skilled enough to do the job of telling this story, both of their stories center around Robbie. Even small conversations between Briony and Cecilia, Briony and Lola, Briony and a young nurse at training devolve quickly into a discussion of Leon, or Robbie, or marriage.

Briony’s obsession with atonement, with losing herself in the quest to right the wrongs she has committed is decidedly un-feminist. Though this is, essentially, Briony’s story, her story is consumed with the stories of others, so much so that she undergoes an erasure of self to ensure the happiness of her protagonists. Briony has been stuck for her whole life revising and rewriting her story, trapped in her youth (her hair-style remains the same), only able to present the truth upon her death, and even then her tidied up version of the truth.

Any deconstruction of the traditional romantic narrative does have the potential to be feminist, however in this case, because the story is filtered not only through Briony Tallis’s obsession with that very narrative but through a male author and director, the deconstruction is seen as a loss of something good. A loss of cherished innocence, of childlike femininity.

There is no denying the technical mastery of Atonement. Simply look at the long shot as Robbie arrives at Dunkirk, despair and small hope surrounding him and swooning around him as the camera floats through soldiers waiting. Look at small consistent hints of cracks in the narrative, look at changes in perspective looped together by setting and soundtrack. Atonement is a master work of fiction and of film, but feminism is not something I believe it can claim.

Marcia Herring is a rollergirl receptionist from Southeast Missouri. She is still working on her graduate degree, but swears to have it done someday. She spends most of her time watching television and movies and wishes she could listen to music and read while doing so without going insane. She previously contributed an analysis of Degrassi, Teens, and Rape Apologism and a review of X-Men First Class.