GWSS 3307: Feminist Film Studies, Fall 2008

The official definition of queer is odd or weird, but in pop culture/society it has been transferred to reference gays/lesbians. After watching this movie I think that the "queer" aspect is minute compared to other themes that were more prominent; such as monster, reversal of roles, and male castration. Catherine's actions in this movie were excessive, manipulative and unpredictable. Catherine is the type of woman who does whatever she wants, and whoever she wants. I think the lesbian plot was purely to show more depth to Catherine's character, I don't think there was any intention of having the lesbian be a "monster", rather the tendencies of Catherine were there to show how evil she was. As the director put it "being gay is not an issue…There is a dark layer to the movie, and I always felt the movie was about evil, but I never linked that feeling of evil with preference of sexuality." I can understand why people were frustrated with the monster being lesbian, but honestly watching the movie now that gay/lesbians are more accepted I did not find that story line offensive.

I was personally disappointed with the movie ending as patriarchal. The roles were being reversed throughout the entire film, with female domination. Nick kept feeling emasculated by being turned down by Catherine and Roxy. So he met up with Beth and exerted his dominance over her by nearly raping her. Catherine and Roxy's relationship was male castration to Nick, it demonstrated that the men were not necessary to the women. Catherine's character was so wild and free I just never expected her to succumb to a man. So I consider the ending as Catherine tricking Nick and she actually still plans on killing him.

Posted by conlo027 at 8:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

So after thinking about the definition of 'queer,' and looking up the dictionary definition, I think the word queer basically means going in a different direction. After watching Basic Instinct, I don't really think the intention of the director was to generalize any group of people as bad. I agree with his response when he said there was just a dark layer to the movie, he wasn't trying to demonize anyone in my opinion. The characters that were queer in the movie, if any label should apply, were strong and powerful, even if their characters seem mysterious, but isn't that the point of the movie? The fact that the movie was made in 1992, is probably a reason such strong protest was involved. The timing and the controversy of that movie was due to ground breaking ideas no one had projected into popular culture at that point. It scared people. If a movie of that caliber were to come out in this day in age, there wouldn't be to much said.

Posted by ande4840 at 1:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In terms of sexuality, I viewed queerness in Basic Instinct, as an addition to the excess of sexuality of Catherine’s character. It’s well known that many men are into girl on girl action, the film seems to simply utilize this enticement to further the extremeness of Catherine’s over powering sexiness. I didn’t view the queer aspect as depicting homosexuals as psychotic murderers. Catherine’s bisexuality adds to the abjectiveness of her character; by making her even more unpredictable and spontaneous, as if to say, “Watch out, who is she gonna fuck next!� Not only literally, but figuratively. There are themes not only from our specific readings for Basic Instinct, but also from an earlier reading on the sexual roles of domination and submission—Catherine is sexy to Nick because she can dominate him, if this film were to have continued with Catherine in a submissive traditional role, I doubt Nick would continue to be as overpowered by her sex, he is interested in being dominated. The overall queerness of the film, as in, “something queer is going on� is directly derived from film noir detective movies, the jarring music, sometimes chiaroscuro lighting, the paranoia and back stabbing (or in this case chest stabbing) are melodramatic devices that first came to cinema during 1940s film noir. These devices are used to build suspense and paranoia, making the film itself become abject.

Posted by sind0026 at 12:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My understanding of the term “queer� is when a person identifies their sexual orientation or gender identity in any way that does not follow heterosexual/heteronormative society, but this definition differs for everyone. Although Verhoeven states that “being gay is not an issue…never linked that feeling of evil with peference of sexuality� I believe that there are evident undertones from the heterosexual capitalist patriarchy that gives the film’s “queerness� a very negative connotation. Stone’s character was uncomfortably open in discussing her heterosexual sex life (with the first murder victim) and how she enjoyed sex just for the pleasure of it, though her female relationships in the film show a different side of her. When Roxy dies, she is visibly upset at having lost a love, when in comparison she showed absolutely no feeling when she was informed by Douglass that “the guy she was fucking� was dead. Stone’s strong protagonist female character was shown with this weakness, and Douglass worked quickly to conquer her and her “queerness.�

Celestino Deleyto states in “The Margins of Pleasure: Female Monstrosity andMale Paranoia in Basic Instinct� that “lesbianism is not so much a social reality presented by the film as one more feature of the male perception of the dangerous modern woman.� Therefore, the males feel expendable in the face of lesbianism. The final scene in the film shows Douglass’s victory over lesbianism. He and Stone can now “Fuck like minks, raise rugrats and live happily ever after.� The patriarchical dream! (268)

Posted by Mel at 11:57 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I would have to agree with the director of Basic Instinct, Paul Verheoven, this movie does have a very “dark layer�, but the film was not taking aim at different sexual preferences but more at the “Female Psychopath�, and the female fatale. Author Deborah Jermyn discusses, “The genre known as The Women From Hell. They are all women who appear in normal, domestic or relationship situations and at first appear well-adjusted. Only later is it understood that they are dangerously deranged. First comes the Mistress From Hell (Fatal Attraction), next the Nanny From Hell (The Hand That Rocks The Cradle)…and then the Lesbian From Hell (Basic Instinct).� Catherine, Roxy and Beth are the three characters that could be depicted as “queer� in the film. These three women do not make the film a queer film though because of the bigger picture behind their roles. Without their insignificant relationships it would be impossible to show the Female Fatale role that Catherine was playing.

Catherine was extremely powerful, especially over Nick, because every time he would see her with another woman it would make him want her to himself more and more. Nick also experiences male paranoia because he is interacting with an intelligent female which makes Nick feel inferior, giving Catherine even more power.

Posted by rasmu281 at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This movie uses the sexuality of women as a marketable resource to make money. Whether or not the director intentionally depicted women, specifically lesbians, or queers, negatively is irrelevant. Because he did. Queerness is portrayed through females that are presented to us as narcissistic, emotionless, and possessing excessive sexuality. Monsters, to use the term from class. Sharon Stone doesn't close her eyes when Michael Douglas and her kiss the first time, she seems unpredictable in her behavior, the camera zooms slowly on her and takes long, dramatic shots of her to increase her sense of mysticism. The music creates suspense when she is in the shot, and the endless presence of the male gaze depicts her as an object to be stared at and to be cautious of. Looking at queerness outside of Sharon Stone’s character, we see it only in times where people are partying and being excessively sexual.

This would suggest that queer people only dance and do drugs and have sex. I could see where this would upset the queer community. Of course, the end too, is upsetting because she has no other choice but to surrender to heterosexuality and abandon her queerness after her one lesbian lover is gone… I mean c’mon, really? After the entire movie she plays the men like chess pieces, she finally is overcome by this (not-very-attractive) man and runs back to him crying. Whatever strength and power she proved to us throughout the movie was made void by this heterosexual takeover at the end.

Posted by AJ at 11:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The whole movie is based on character development. Without this, there would be no mystery, suspense, and it would not have been very interesting. I think the use of homosexuality and bisexuality played a role in Basic Instinct to show more depth to the characters. I think it showed how Catherine (Sharon Stone) was a free bird, she was not conservative, she was a rule breaker, and overall full of surprises. In the beginning it was made very clear that Catherine was a very sexual person by how she openly spoke of sex. It was also very clear that she viewed sex as purely pleasure with no deep feelings involved. I think Catherine being a bisexual emphasizes her personality. She makes her own way through life not caring what others think. For example, when Catherine was brought in for questioning, she begins to light up a smoke and is then informed that the building is smoke-free. She calmly asks what they were going to do if she continued and pretty much called their bluff. She makes her own way through life and pushes all rules and people aside who interfere. Catherine is also a very sexy character. Women want to be her and men want to be with her. Catherine being a bisexual emphasizes her sexiness because most people find lesbians to be very arousing. I don’t think this movie portrayed bisexuals and homosexuals as being evil in any way.

Posted by flemi136 at 11:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Basic Instinct, I could understand how portrayel of queerness could be mistaken as evil. The women are shown as evil female monsters throughout the movie backing up the assumptions that women have this unpredictable fear. The women, especially Sharon Stone, are shown as so confident that they can get everyone and everything they want by manipulation. As the movie is filmed, there are many shots that are shown through the male gaze and the women actors are well aware of it. Like the scene where Stone is being interrogated by all the male detectives. Throughout the film male paranoia is evident in the male actors. The movie reflects this fear of excessive feminist power throughtout the movie in many scenes. For example, the sex scene with Beth when she is being bent over and the clothes are torn off in a manly "i have power" way.
As I watched Basic Instinct and looked behind the deeper meaning to the movie and the storyline, I saw not a strong, dominate female Shoron Stone monster but a sensitive woman that has feelings and hurts also. The scene after Roxy dies and Stone is sitting in the chair crying helps portray this softer side. She lets her walls down and communicates how much it hurts when everyone she loves ends up dying and then again when she goes back to her detective to appologize.
I think Beth is the woman that gives queerness a bad name. She had sex with this amazing woman in college and became obsessed. She ended up forming herself into a overwhelming, obsessive female monster that ended up being hte most powerful of all. She desired this partner so much she ended up killing those that would get close to Stone. Looking at this character alone, I can understand how the intrepretation of queerness is dark and evil.

Posted by hendr324 at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I don’t think that queerness played a huge role in this movie at all. I would have never really noticed their relationship was really more than “friends� if someone hadn’t brought up that it was controversial. I think the relationship was just used for more power for Sharon Stone’s character. The more her character was with the other woman the more Nick wanted her for himself. After watching the movie I agree with the director that the queerness was not portrayed as evil. The whole plot of the movie was based upon evil. On the other hand the girlfriend of Stone’s character could be looked at as evil. Every scene that she was in that I saw she was angry. Her anger stemmed from her jealousy of losing her partner to a man. In my opinion I don’t think that Stone’s character was really in “love� with her friend and or girlfriend. She was just another tool being used for her power. The more people that Stone’s character could control the more power she had. The whole femme fatale character is based upon power and control. Stone’s character started off with all the power and controlled every situation, but in the end ending up giving in to her temptation, which was Nick. I don’t think queerness was a huge issue in this movie at all it was just another layer to the plot.

Posted by jcareykc at 10:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

First, I don't think the director intended to create a negative image of lesbians. I think it was just a way to add mystery to the movie. We talked about different symbolic meanings in class, such as the ice-pick that resembles a phallus, but did the director intentionally create these symbols? However, I can understand how people have a problem with the "monster" in the film being a "lesbian monster."

I can't decide if it was good or not to see Nick question his masculinity throughout Basic Instinct. We saw him realistically behave sexually violent with Beth as a result of him losing his masculinity/ability to get whoever he wanted, which could be good for people to see, but Beth didn't seem to think she was raped following the event, which makes light of the situation.

I enjoyed seeing women's confidence on film. In a way, it showed that women can be just as dominant as men. However, it is significant that Catherine gave herself to Nick in the end, encouraging male domination. On the other hand, if Catherine was really bisexual, she would have the ability to love both men and women, and the director just happened to choose the man in this film. But if she were really a lesbian (because her "real love" was for women, then it doesn't work. The problem is that we don't know. Therefore, I don't think it's fair to criticize the film in such a harsh way. I don't think most movie-goers' opinions of lesbian/bisexual women changed after viewing this film.

Posted by bute0023 at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think I would believe the director Verhouven, that the premise of the movie goes far beyond sexual preference, and into just mental illness. Queer, as I understand it, is usually used by people who feel as if their sexual preference doesn't fit inside the context of normative heterosexuality. A person may be gay or lesbian, bi, trans-gender or sometimes just identify differently gender or sexuality wise. While the characters within this film may have been queer I felt it had little to do with the actual idea of queerness and was just a Hollywood attempt at further exoticizing the “dark� element of some hyper-sexualized interpretation of urban life...
In the same turn I agree with some of my classmates, that this story can be interpreted both ways. Perhaps it is this inclusion in this “seedy underbelly� created to scare the “straights�, that make this movie offensive or derogatory to the idea of queer.

The detective character played by Michael Douglas may then represent that patriarchal hegemony feeling no other choice but to oppress by possession this rouge element. His “castration anxiety� is a metaphor for the ways in which ideas are stigmatized and controlled by fear; of violence, social ridicule and suspicion. Beth becomes a suspect because she slept with a woman? This was not some moral weakness or sign of its degradation, its called college.
That and the empowerment of women by the rejection of the man, would only be interpreted so because the Currans character becomes so enraged by the concept. So I guess this movie is more about hegemonic patriarchal oppression then it is about gays, and his “fairy tale� ending when he finally gets the girl is justified by the hopes he'll get his... or maybe just a really bad ending to an otherwise unrealistic Hollywood movie.

Posted by spiek010 at 9:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I read the portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct as antihomosexual. Throughout the film the theme of women are monsters is illustrated but it is not just women who are depicted as the monsters but really it is the lesbians. Catherine is shown to be bisexual but it could be argued that she is truly a lesbian. She reserves her love for women, not men, which is shown in her only emotional scene when Roxy is killed. The conclusion of the movie is that Catherine is the murderer. But the ambiguity in the film from the start still clearly points to the murderer being one of the lesbian women either Catherine, Roxy, or Beth, the college lover, at the end. Because if it wasn’t Catherine it was undoubtably one of these other lesbians. The monster in the film is the femme fatale lesbian who does not have any remorse for any man she kills. This is shown throughout the movie when Catherine is shown to be expressionless when told about the murders. Roxy also is portrayed this way. In “Why the Woman Did It� the author mentions how the film also characterizes the women with the historical stereotype of lesbians being narcissistic. The women in the movie only care about themselves and believe themselves to be very powerful. This is shown by how the women use their sexuality to overpower the men. This is evident in the famous crotch shot scene. The movie also depicts the lesbians at animals and “autoerotic.� The gay club scene is filmed to show us these characteristics of homosexuality. I can understand why queer activists would be upset with this film. The lesbian is portrayed as the monster, the man hater, the unpredictable.

Posted by Faith Kolstad at 9:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The queerness in the movie Basic Instinct played a significant role in identifying the male paranoia Michael Douglas' character struggled with. When talking about how the movie portrayed queerness, I refer to the bisexuality seen in the film. In "The Margins of Pleasure: Female Monstrosity and Male Paranoia in Basic Instinct," Celestino Deleyto talks about the paranoia felt by men when they responds to a woman of intelligence. She goes on to say that Michael's character's paranoia is the cause rather than the effect of female monstrosity (Deleyto 2). Sharon Stone's character is the intelligent woman causing the internal struggle of male dominance that Michael's character experiences. Her bisexuality fueled the fire of the male paranoia. At times in the movie she blatantly chose a female sexual lover over him, making him feel secluded and powerless. When he does get involved with her sexually and her female lover, Roxy, confronts him, he portrays the male dominance when talking to her. As said in class, he infantizes her and basically taunts her about winning Sharon's sexual mojo. I think that Roxy's gender

gave him increased paranoia at first and then supplied a sweeter triumph when he did get to demonstrate his patriarchal power that was withheld for so long. The queerness of the movie was prominent and played a significant role in male paranoia.

Posted by jona0062 at 9:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After watching “Basic Instinct� I didn’t feel like queerness played much of a role in the film at all. The filmmaker used queerness as just another tool of the “unknown� to keep Nick on edge and jealous. This film was released in 1992 and there weren’t many mainstream films with queerness in them and it was simply used as a cheap ploy to sell tickets and stir up faux controversy. It was more or less a queer tease to play into a heterosexual shock fantasy for male, heterosexual spectators. I never felt that there was a link between evil and queer when watching the film. I agree with Celestino Deleyto writes she writes, “For all the controversy raised in the U.S. by gay and lesbian groups about the attitude towards lesbianism, the only same-sex relationship developed of any depth by the film is the one between the two men.� The lesbianism plays such a small role in the film that it’s barely worth analyzing. The film wasn't made with much care, evidenced by the ridiculous plot. I don't believe the director intended to make a homophobic film. He just created a silly, thriller with little depth.

Posted by Da provida at 9:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I was really unhappy about the portrayal of lesbians and bisexuals in this film. One thing that I did not like in particular was how Catherine just threw herself at Nick at the end. It was as if she thought, well the woman I was with is dead so I guess I 'll play the desperate lady now to this big strong man. Then I read this on www.imdb.com, "Problems reoccurred later when Eszterhas wanted to make more changes to appease the gay and lesbian communities. Verhoeven point blank refused to incorporate these changes". It seems that the director Paul Verhoeven just wanted to make a film that would bring in the money. Perhaps it isn't that he dislikes lesbians, but maybe the guy is just plain ignorant. That made me not feel so mad anymore but just sad for him. I feel that he portrayed Roxy as sort of crazy and desperate and Catherine as a bitch and a whore. Maybe if he had developed these characters a little more it would have helped his reputation. I thought the character that Michael Douglas played was absolutely disgusting. Are we supposed to identify with him or feel bad for him? He is a rapist, a murderer, and a chauvinistic pig. I left the film believing that he was the actual monster.

Posted by Tina Fey at 9:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The trouble I am having is that I can see both points. I definitely do not think that Paul Verhoevan set out to make a movie trying to portray queers in a negative light. I agree that it's a movie about "evil." It's about how to use other peoples motivations and desires and mold them to your own desires. It's about your best poker face. At the same time, there were bisexuals/lesbians in the film and they were the evil characters. Now we didn't see the whole movie so we might have missed some parts that show those characters doing positive things, but I find that unlikely. But I agree with the director when he says, "Being gay is not the issue..." because "Rocky's" (Hehe) character could have been a guy and I think the movie would have made it just fine. But the problem with that argument is - then why wasn't it a guy? That I have no clue how to answer and can only take stabs in the dark. However, because "Rocky" was a female, it benefits our class because we can talk about penis envy and other theories. We can talk about how Michael Douglas' character might be driven by fear because if two women are in a relationship they have conquered that penis envy. If women conquer penis envy, then men are rendered useless...

...and therefore lose all this power they have over women. This idea is very important in the scene where Douglas is standing the the bathroom naked when "Rocky" walks in.
I can sympathize the points of the director and the activists, but I am leaning toward the director a little more because I don't think he made this movie to attack queers.

Posted by leex2356 at 8:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Queerness in Basic Instinct is in fact wrapped up in some very obvious negative light. The movie "was about evil.." as the director claimed and he sees no issue with how queer is used. I however understand his tag-team alliance of evil and queer to be his sort of one two punch winning combo of the movie. In our society we are socialized to put queerness in a certain light, often negative, so it makes sense that the director himself didnt even notice the tactics he employed. It is because Sharon Stone is a seedy character with questionable morals that her bisexuality becomes employed negatively.

As discussed in class and the readings, Stone is the "abject" or the character that is outside of the "norm". This is simply a fact. So to then make her queer is to plainly suggest that queer is outside the norm or in connection with evil. I understand why queers would be offended by their representation in this film!

That all said, it is this queer writers opinion that to put queer outside the norm isn't all bad. I recognize is not helpful to the overall acceptance of queers in society, especially when it come to normalizing, but queer existing outside the norm is what I love about being queer! The norm is what I don't like about our society. It is important to look at the movie closer and notice that Stone's character while obviously outside of the "norm" could also be said to be above the "norm". Everyone in the movie was fascinated by this woman and it wasn't as if she was ignored or treated with discrimination. She was an evil character that was very well humanized. I sympathized with her by the end of the movie.

Posted by Revolutionary at 8:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

“Basic Instinct� portrays the queer community in a negative light not because the lesbian/bisexual women are murderers but because the heterosexual wins.

A predominant theme in this movie is male paranoia, man’s irrational fear that femininity is contagious, that he will one day become dispensable. Nick watches Catherine and Roxy dance and hold each other, and their passion infuriates him. He watches Catherine use her femininity/sexuality to get what she wants at the police station, and her power frightens him. She causes him to lose control over himself, leading to his drinking for the first time in months. In order to reassert his so-called masculinity, Nick takes Beth back to her apartment and practically rapes her.

A film showing queerness in a positive light would not allow him to get away with this. It would not end with a strong, independent woman like Catherine abandoning all of her plans and planning to live happily ever after with Nick. In the end, Nick’s fears are placated because the threatening women are gone, and he has Catherine all to himself. He ends up the dominant character because no one else survived after Catherine decided to kill him.

While the “queer� relationships start out as the strongest (Catherine is distraught to learn that Roxy has died; Nick and Gus are partners as well as great friends), only the heterosexual ones make it to the end. Had either the female lover or the male best friend survived, it might have been a more queer-friendly film.

Posted by Katie Green at 1:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I didn’t view the queerness in the film as a negative aspect. I still haven’t been able to view the entire film, but from what I saw it wasn’t something that stood out to me in a negative way. I viewed it as more of a way to put focus on male paranoia, Nick’s paranoia. I agree with Richard Schickel in a comment in the reading Why the Women Did It, “Catherine is certainly bisexual but it is just another aspect of her cultivated air of differentness, her love of high risk games and shock effects.� I don’t think that the fact that Catherine had a female lover was portrayed as a negative aspect of her character; instead, I read it as just another way to point out Nick’s insecurities and male paranoia.

Posted by Jolene Lewis at 12:15 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Although I was unable to watch the entire movie, from what we were shown in class I didn’t think Basic Instinct gave a very definite portrayal of queerness. It was unclear whether the relationship between Catherine and Roxy was an actual queer relationship in the traditional “relationship� sense, or whether it was simply another manifestation of male paranoia. On one hand, the portrayal of both women as so sexual that they’re “monstrous� suggests that maybe their romantic relationship is simply another way that they manipulate men. The scene where Nick is rejected from the bathroom stall is a great example of this- he isn’t needed for their sexual satisfaction, they have each other. In addition, when Catherine ultimately chooses Nick in the club scene, we could look at this as implying that she is actually “straight� but is so excessive in her sexuality that she is also interested in women.

On the other hand, we see real emotion between Catherine and Roxy, which is uncharacteristic of most of the relationships in the film. This obviously suggests that there is a real caring relationship present, not just one of pure sexual manipulation. Ultimately, I didn’t really get the feeling that the “monstrousness� of these women was directly tied to their queerness. Rather, I think it was definitely more related to their excessive and overt sexuality.

Posted by happyfeet at 11:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The queerness in Basic Instinct seemed to be something of sideshow in that it wasn’t the main point of interest, yet its presence was impossible not to notice and wonder about. Yet even though it didn't have center stage, its connection to the suspicious women in the film present it as subversive and dangerous. The fact that Queer activists protested the film doesn’t surprise me because this portrayal of queerness in the film seemed only negative. Three out of the four women characters in the film are painted as queer in some regard, and all three are suspected of or confirmed as being evil killers. Whether or not any of them seemed like they were supposed to truly be bi or lesbian would probably seem irrelevant to the activists because the bottom line is that these women who are all leading "deviant" lifestyles to one degree or another also engage in varying levels of homosexuality.

The article by Linda Hart has a great point in that Roxy and Hazel aren’t really necessary to keep the plot moving. Further she says that Roxy’s only purpose is to demonstrate Catherine’s bi-sexuality. This analysis seems reasonable to me, and thus I find it interesting (yet not surprising) that Paul Verhoeven denied any connection between his “dark layer� of evil and sexual persuasion. Perhaps he only intended for Catherine’s possible bi-sexuality to feed into the male paranoia that Nick was enmeshed in, which it did do quite well. However, I think it’s hard to separate out any of the elements that went into creating the spectacle of Catherine and to say that certain ones had nothing to do with her overall transgressive essence. Her character engaged in so many forms of "deviant" behavior, it seems to me that Verhoeven created a perfect storm for his "female monster" masterpiece and that he shoud've just owned up to it.

Posted by kafka at 11:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I do think that there is queerness in the movie, which is an obvious fact. I think that this movie although, may be precieved bad, actually stimulates that women do have control over men, despite white male hierarchy! Although, it does not really represent women in a great aspect, in such that she needs to use her sex appeal, and queerness to control the male, it still shows that males dont always have control. The monster completely has control over that male ( Catherine and Michael). A specific example is when you see Catherin go into her room to change and you see Michael looking at Catherine, the male gaze, I think that she knew that he could see her and she was using her "assets" to manipulate Nick and kind of gaining control over his "phallas". Throughout the clips that we saw Catherine and her "queerness" poses a power over Nick causing him to have male paranio! He is completely disctracted by her looks and she gains complete control over him, with that I do think it is a lot deeper then him losing control (castration complex) I think that Nick has a feer over homosexuality. With that I think thats where,

the negative portrayal of lesbians come into play. What is negative about is that its not about that fact that it is being shown but how a specific male (Nick) and others see it as a bad thing because they end up losing control over the "monster"! where as it should be ok in that Nick should just accept that she is a lesbian and does not stand a chance.

Posted by week0065 at 11:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct was completely inadequate. I totally sympathize with the queer community being offended by the portrayal of homosexuality in this film. From what we see of the relationship between Catherine Tramell and her female lovers (Beth and Roxy) we don’t doubt that she is a heterosexual but we see Nick (Michael Douglas) feeling jealous and inferior because of these relationships. Celestino Deleyto points out in her essay that “this perception [of male uncertainty of women] does not only associate, as in noir, female sexuality and criminality but, more specifically, turns all the women into nominal lesbians, even though all the frequent love scenes are heterosexual and Sharon Stone’s Catherine Tramell is perceived as intensely heterosexual.� This point seems to reinforce the idea that homosexuality is viewed (at least by the characters in the film) as sexual liberation and used to take power away from men by not needing them for sexual pleasure.

In reality, this serves as the greatest insult to the queer community. Not only is homosexuality minimized to a tool and used to manipulate power, it is completely devoid of real feeling. When we see Tramell and Roxy in the club, there is no feeling (only male gaze). It is only in one of the scenes not shown in class that we see that Catherine might actually have true feelings for Roxy when Catherine mourns Roxy’s death and even this could be simply a reaction to the loss of a close friend.

Posted by joh02629 at 10:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I believe the movie Basic Instinct portrays queerness as a way to enhance male paranoia. You have the “monster�, Catherine, who is rich, beautiful, manipulative, and obviously wanted by men. Catherine acts as if she doesn’t need men in her life, and plays them by being involved with another women, Roxy. This relationship with another women causes male paranoia throughout the film. An example of male paranoia would be when the guy sees Catherine and Roxy dancing at the club. He becomes fearful that he will be rendered dispensable and begs for Catherine’s attention. In the movie, Catherine always ends up back with the guy even though she is portrayed as queer. To me this could be because of the norm of femininity, and being with a man is more “accepted� in society.

However, this film shows that Catherine values her relationship with women. An example would be that when Roxy dies, is the only honest display of emotion we see from Catherine. However, she still goes with the norm and ends up with Nick in the end. This movie tries to portray women as being independent and not in need of a man; however, if you’re portrayed as queer in this film, you are a crazy killer. Therefore, I believe queerness is depicted in a fairly negative way based on the criteria for being queer in this film.

Posted by sulli396 at 10:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Queerness to me is any preference of sexuality other than being heterosexual. Considering this, the main character Catherine Tremell, played by Sharon Stone was a queer woman, being bisexual. I feel as if the queer theme used in the movie Basic Instinct was to add a layer of darkness, as the director Paul Verhoeven said. The queerness in the movie was to enhance the femme fatalness of Stone as a dangerous and knieving serial killer. The queer aspect may have also been placed as a subconscious message to the audience that queer is "weird" and "dangerous" so beware. But also, the queerness may have been used to entice not only the male protagonist but the audience as well. As Deleyto discusses Freud's analysis, he says that the drive towards forms of unpleasure is far greater than the ones for pleasure. So the queer aspect represents a form of unpleasure for many people, thus it is a driving point to view the film. This enhanced version of the femme fatale is the monster which entices us to view the film.

I also feel that Stone, being queer, represents a form of masculinity. She is associated with the ice pick, a phallic symbol as to represent her dominant role compared to Micheal Douglas. But as the movie progresses, especially towards the end, Stone gives up her queerness, masculine femme fetale role to lead a "normal" life with Douglas. I feel as if her leaving her role as queer and the femme fatale represents her being subjugated by the patriarchal system. The fact that she chose to lead a life with a man, she gave up her queer side and came to her "senses." She was finally playing the role that women should, is what I feel the film's final message was.

Posted by hadix001 at 9:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I agree with Paul Verhoeven, I did not see that being gay as a major issue within the film Basic Instinct. Although there were undertones, seeing as all Catharine’s close and emotionally intimate relationships were with women (Roxy, Hazel Dobkins) I did not see this as a criticism on queerness, or lesbianism. I felt that the film focused on man’s struggle with powerful women within a patriarchal society and dealt specifically with male paranoia. There is a constant power struggle that Nick has with Catharine which can be seen in all the scenes with her, during questioning, their sexual in-counters, etc. What makes Catharine so “scary� and “unpredictable�, making her the perfect femme fatal, is her taking control of patriarchy, taking control of the gaze. I think the scene that best demonstrates that is the infamous questioning scene, she quickly takes control and becomes in charge of the questioning. Her blatant sexuality scares Nick, as well as the other males in the film, it is unexpected. In The Margins of Pleasure Celestino Deleyto quotes E. Ann Kaplan who says, “The film noir expresses alienation, locates its cause squarely in the excess of female sexuality (‘natural’ consequences of women’s independence)…� Her sexuality is explored throughout the film and continuously taunts Nick. This explains the scene later when Nick rapes Beth to gain back his power that was taken from him by a woman.

One scene that I think demonstrates the rejection of what is expected of women under a patriarchal society is the last scene, when I believe that Catharine reaches for the ice pick specifically because what Nick says, which is that they’re now supposed to live happily ever after and have many kids (it a much more colorful way of course), this is exactly what is expected of women. It’s not until Catharine says she doesn’t want kids and he’s okay with that that she leaves the ice pick behind. In Rereading the Bitches from Hell Deborah Jermyn when talking about the femme fatale she states, “She stands for alienation and fragmentation, the inability of women to cope with the demands of the feminine role in a patriarchal society.� Catharine was someone who refused to act her “role�, that being traditional, quiet, timid women, but a strong independent women doing what she wanted when she wanted.

I think this movie was about rejecting patriarchy, and also how Catharine learned to play patriarchy and becoming in control of it. She does this with her sexuality, her unpredictably and her knowledge about others as well as the world.

Posted by lars2805 at 9:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Basic Instinct queerness plays a role in setting up the character of the femme fatal or “monster� in the opposite role of the main male character. The role of queerness was used more to make the bisexual character Catherine a threat to the heterosexual character Nick, as opposed to signifying that all lesbians/bisexuals, in general, are “monsters�. My interpretation of the term queer is a title or description of someone’s sexual orientation: gay, lesbian and/or bisexual. To me queer is a description of the sexuality of both Catherine and Roxy, and their public displays of affection.
In the beginning of the movie the audience starts viewing Catherine as the “bad� or “evil� character because of her ability to mess and toy with the minds of the detectives. As the movie progresses, Catherine’s sexuality, of being a lesbian/bisexual, also helps develop her character as being the “monster�. The character of Nick seems uncomfortable and threatened when Catherine expresses her sexuality (for example, when she is kissing Roxy).

Catherine is the monster because she is finding love, comfort and pleasure by being with another woman, which cuts out the need for a man (ie. Nick).

Posted by robes002 at 9:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In my opinion, the main actress wasn't even queer. I think she was just using that identity as a means to manipulate and conquer the lead male character. It made him feel uncomfortable and that was her way of playing games with him. In Basic Instinct, the portrayal of queerness was very odd. She was technically with another women, but yet attracted to men. Obviously, her partner wasn't on the same level as her. I think that the movie played up "queerness" more than necessary. The movie was about a murder mystery and manipulative woman. The movie could have existed without her female friend, and still give basically the same message.

Posted by conw0077 at 8:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When I watched this film I really didn't think much of the queerness in the film. I agree that there was a queer aspect to the film but that it was not viewed in a negative or positive way. Instead I viewed it as a jealous lover who added suspense to the film. However the fact that she was jealous and always viewed in a very sexual way might explain why there was such a backlash in the queer community over the film. The film also depicted queerness in a negative fashion by always showing them in a "party" scene. I think that by always showing the queer aspect in a purely sexual or party situation gives a negative image to the queer community. The constant party situations and sexual behaviors when the two are together leads to the poor image of the queer community. Also, as many individuals in class discussed, we did not feel that the queerness in the film was not prevelant enough to call this a queer film. I agree that the queerness was there but I do not think it validating calling the film queer.

Posted by bergm154 at 7:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I definitely agree with Deleyto that there is this them of patriarchal order and feminist backlash. I viewed the portrayal of “queer� characters as negative in Basic Instinct. When I use the word queer I guess I mean the theme or action of persons being attracted to the opposite sex in a sexual way. All of the queer characters in the film were promiscuous and had some kind of psychotic and violent behaviors. T hey also seem to have this kind of personality where they don’t care about anything or anyone. Catherine was the stereotype of a narcissistic lesbian (“Why Women Did it). This is pretty obvious when we think of Roxy, Catherine, Beth and the queer people at the night club. However, in the way Michael Douglas’ character exudes male paranoia we also see the homophobia present in the film. Michael Douglas is very threatened by Katherine’s sexuality and dominance, especially when he sees her with Roxy. He and his male colleagues all have the theme of male bonding, and we

see them in the bars drinking together after work. However, all the queer characters are at a dance club doing drugs and wearing promiscuous clothing (or lack thereof). Celestino Deleyto discusses the relationship between Gus and Nick and how Catherine is a threat to their relationship and male bonding; there is a “homosexual undercurrent� in Nick and Gus’ relationship (4). This repression of his homosexuality leads him to let out his anger and frustration on women.

Posted by Alias at 7:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct is confusing and unclear. Roxy and Catherine have an obvious relationship, but it is unclear if it is actually a queer relationship or if they are purposely making Nick and other men uncomfortable and feel useless. It is no secret that men are threatened by women's homosexuality, simply because then they are no longer needed or desired. The same is true and is portrayed in this film. The reading "The Margins of Pleasure" by Celestino Deleyto, describe this fear of heterosexual men no longer being needed by women and the paranoia that goes along with that fear. I found this film to be repulsive and crude. When this movie was released, the queer community held protests and were very upset because of the bashing of lesbianism and the suppression of the female desire. Personally, I think this film was about Nick winning, Nick wanting to be the powerful man and turning Catherine "straight" again. As the film ends, it appears he has succeeded but at the same time, when I define queer it doesn't mean you have to be homosexual. You can be bi-sexual or transgender or anything you want, it's also not complete homosexuality. Catherine could be one or many of the descriptions of queer and I think this movie was about getting rid of those different desires of hers, and focusing on Nick's. As long as his desires were met and she was heterosexual at the end of the day, the movie succeeded its purpose.

Posted by izzy at 5:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though I agree that the portrayal of lesbians and bisexuals could be viewed as “negative,� I don’t think that this was the purpose or theme of the film. The focus of the plot revolvs around what I would consider the two “main� characters (Nick and Catherine) and their heterosexual relationship…which was not portrayed as the positive alternative to homosexuality—quite the contrary in fact. Rather, I think that this surprising dysfunction deserves more attention. As Deborah Jermyn says in her article, this is a film about the “femme fatale� and the dangers that the female killer (which is strongly linked to feminism) represents to society. I feel Catherine’s identity, as a female, is a more critical role to address than her bisexuality (though this is by no means insignificant). While her “queerness� is one facet of her dangerous persona, it the literal female killer which threatens heterosexual male society most.

Posted by lenth006 at 3:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Basic Instinct is fascinating to me because of filmmaker Paul Verhoeven. Director of films like Robocop and Starship Troopers, Verhoeven has never been a man of subtlety. He uses gratuitous sex and violence as commentary. Of course, this is problematic, because at what point does satire, especially in such provocative areas, merely become a way of selling tickets?
On the topic of queerness, Verhoeven makes some interesting decisions. The film is obviously not meant to be a peephole into a realistic American setting. The film is drenched in excess and 60s-thriller paranoia. Catherine's bi-sexuality is employed as merely another way of turning the screws on detective-foil Nick. Because of this, I think reading too far into Verhoeven's subtext is akin to hiring a food critic to review a meal at Culver's. The association of Catherine and her bi-sexuality with all manner of things hedonistic, including alcohol abuse and cocaine use, could obviously raise concern and incite a reaction.

However, I'm not convinced the association was meant in an inflammatory way. Is it problematic? Of course. Does it seem like the film went out of it's way to associate queerness with evil? Not really. It comes off more as a plot device; another dramatic twist in a film built upon them.

Posted by thur0139 at 3:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the article Why The Woman Did It it talks about the queerness in the movie Basic Instinct "Avoiding the controversy about the film's homophobia, which instigated a massive protest based on the contention that the film portrayed lesbians and bisexuals as predatory murderers, Verhoeven sticks to a discussion of the film's formal conventions. At the same time, however, one cannot help but notice Verhoeven's verification of what became the game and lesbian activists' strategy for ruining the film's box-office appeal: "Catherine did it!" the ubiquitous signs that marked the demonstrators' protests were intended to ruin the element of suspense that is the hallmark of the detective narrative." After reading this article and watching the movie I still don't know if I see Paul Verhoeven trying to cast being gay as negative concept. Never once was I thinking while watching the movie that because Catherine was gay meant she was a murder. I can see how Queer activists might of thought that the film portrayed lesbians and bisexuals as predatory murderers. But I do agree with the article when it says that the over reaction was to get attention.

Posted by breme071 at 2:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There is queerness in Basic Instinct, however most viewers would only notice the obvious “queerness� in the bisexuality between Roxy and Catherine. Moreover, there is queerness in the plot of the story and the way the characters develop. I agree with Deleyto, “lesbianism is not so much a social reality presented by the film as one more feature of the male perception of the dangerous modern woman�. The lesbianism is just another twist to the plot. I think the real queerness in this film is Nick’s character and the castration process he goes through. Nick constantly feels his manhood and masculinity threatened by Catherine’s beautiful, confident, tempting, sexual and complex character. She poses a threat to Nick because he can’t figure her out. She frustrates him to the point where it drives him to start drinking again and then he commits violent acts (car chases and nearly raping Beth). The queerness and dark layer to the film is the threat of castration and the control women can have over men.

Posted by savor004 at 2:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct was a negative one. Kathryn and Roxy were portrayed as heartless, cold and diabolical. Three of the four primary female characters in Basic Instinct are killers. Their characters together, establish that “women� can be suddenly and inexplicably violent. Basic Instinct is surely a homophobia film in the sense that it renders visible the systemic homophobia of masculine heterosexual desire (Why The Woman Did It pg 134). I felt that this film had no plot and was merely constructed as a soft core porn for men to fulfill their sexual fantasies. The character Roxy was either fondling or kissing Kathryn or interacting with Nick as an evil “monster.� There is one particular scene where Kathryn and Roxy are at a night club. Roxy goes into the men’s restroom and straddles Kathryn while she is doing cocaine in a bathroom stall. The two then go out onto the dance floor and slowly and sensually, dance, kiss and caress one another.

Nick is watching the entire time with his male “gaze� he then begins to provocatively dance with Kathryn while Roxy dances off in the distance with her “evil lesbian gaze.� Another scene that portrays Roxy as an “evil lesbian “ is after Nick and Kathryn finish having sex. Roxy confronts Nick in the bathroom, as the camera pans up Roxy is the in background with an evil look on her face and tells Nick to “Leave Kathryn alone.�

Posted by thoughts at 2:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the article, " Why the Woman did it", the author write, " Basic Instinct is surely a homophobic film in the sense that it renders visible the systematic homophobia of masculine desire." To many people the portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct is seen through the theme of bisexuality, (between Catherine and the other main female characters). To me the theme of queerness in the film is dominated by male paranoia and the homophobia of masculine imagery. Through out the whole film we see things through Nick's eyes. We see the anger in his eyes when he is at the club and he sees Catherine and Roxy dancing together. At this point you see the need of control inside of him. He needs to "turn her" to be interested in him, to want him. Later we see this again when Nick kills Beth, he shout, " still like girls Beth?" Nick had such a fear of not being needed by these queer woman, he put it before his investigation. By doing this with the lead male character one may get the idea that being a queer woman is worst than being a murderer. I understand the word queer to be in reference to the sexual preference of a person (gay, lesbian, bisexual), that is a choice, a choice that can not be controlled by others. However in this film the theme is all about control and in the end we see Nick prevail as

Catherine "accedes to the order of heterosexuality" as we see the last shot is of Catherine falling into his arms.

Posted by woul0006 at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Let me first say that I do not in any way think was director Paul Verhoeven trying to make a statement in against the gay and lesbian community. I just think he knows America's obsession with sex and he knows that it sells. So to sex it up a bit by adding a lesbian and a bisexual character to the normal old-fashioned thriller, he was just trying give people what he thought they wanted. Something sexy and different. He said that he just felt that the movie was about evil and not the preference of sexuality. The problem though is not his film. If he had those things to say about it, he really was trying to take a stand and let everyone know what he was trying to do when he made this picture. The problem is that with film, any film can be read different way. To me that is the best part about film. Two people can watch the film and both can come out with two exact opposite meanings of what they thought the movie was about. Also in queer studies, when watching a movie they try to find another meaning for the film. In this case, queer activists read this film a certain way and did not appreciate it at all. After reading the two articles and watching the film I do agree with certain things that the queer activists and writers saw. I just cannot agree with them being mad and picketing the film because ever since movies have been around every race, gender and sexuality has either been the good or bad guy/girl, so when I read about how they got upset, for me it felt like somebody just wanted some attention.

The two themes that the movie presented were the femme fatale/monster complex and the male paranoia. Reading the articles and going over the term before watching the movie really helped my understanding of the femme fatale. Catherine represents exactly what the femme fatale is. She is a very beautiful and extremely sexual. Nick did anything that he could just to be with her and when he didn't get her we saw the consequences (rape or not). Catherine knows the powers and capabilities that she owns. She knows that she has Nick by the balls and she just teases and entices him even more, which is an example of the monster complex. The other theme that was presented was the male paranoia. This idea was talked about in great detail in Deleyto's article. For what Deleyto wrote about that subject, I agreed with most of it. Male paranoia is the irrational fear of homosexuality. Being less of a "man" is another part of the paranoia. When Nick is denied by Catherine you can see his unhappiness. He is upset because as a man, he cannot get what he wants and that knocks his ego down a peg or two. When this happens to Nick we wonder if this makes him upset because he really wants her or because getting denied is forcing him to take a look at his other desire, Gus. We see throughout the film that these two have a very close relationship. As Deleyto points out, Gus constantly tries to remind his friend that she is guilty and that he is letting his attraction for her spoil his professial detachment. He treats her like a rival. It is never said that either are gay or that they have any type of relationship. Watching this film I could not see that being said or even that idea coming out and for that reason I can see how this film, as Deleyto said, could be looked at as a fear or repression of male homosexuality. I have a feeling that when Verhoeven was making this film he never thought that his little sex thriller would ever have quite the impact on our culture like it did.

Posted by keilh004 at 10:52 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While watching the movie, Basic Instinct, the only way I saw portrayal of queerness was between the women, mainly Catherine and Roxy. I can see why people are upset because it does set a stereotype for lesbians, but I also agree with the director when he makes the point that there is a dark layer to the movie, and how he always felt the movie was about evil. The reason I think people felt this stereotype was because Catherine is playing the perfect femme fatale or “monster" role in this movie. She was the main person of investigation for a brutal murder of a wealthy, beautiful, seductive and wealthy former singer who is brilliant at playing with the minds of both men and women. I think Celestino Deleytos makes perfect sense when saying “the central "monstrous" female protagonist and the gender and sexual relationships constructed around this figure in one of the most popular films of the genre, Basic Instinct, my hypothesis is that the representation of female monstrosity is the product of a paranoia related to gender relationships in Contemporary society.�

The way they film this movie is probably offensive to a lot of people as well. Whenever the female figure is on set, they are continuously focusing on the women’s “best� features; zooming in to the waist or chest, or doing a lot of slow motion shot, starting from the legs up. Now looking at the other side, most of the movie was based on psychoanalytical concepts of “male paranoia� that we discussed in class. Nick is scared that he wouldn’t be able to fulfill Catherine’s need and ends up essentially rapping Beth to try and get his satisfactions met. I can understand both sides the of story and all the controversy, because in the end of the movie your left with a lot of unanswered events that make people assume a lot of things.

Posted by bues0040 at 7:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In evaluating what makes Basic Instinct queer, first we have to define what makes any film queer. Perhaps it is simply the prescence of "queer-ness" (that is, a gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered character). However, that would make any silly film aimed at teenage boys that makes fun of homosexuals a "queer film", which is frankly ridiculous. In order for a film to have a queer element, it should have a portrayal of a GLBT character(s) that is not simply ment to mock. In that way, then, Basic Instinct can be seen as a film with queer elements.
The portrayal of lesbians in the film, however, is inherently false, since it is based on psychoanalytical concepts of male paranoia that we discussed in class. The fear of the detective that he is not necessary to make Catherine sexually fulfilled can be seen quite clearly by both the audience and Catherine (and she manages to play with that fear by being very sexually open with her girlfriend in front of him). There is also a certain element of "female paranoia" in a way that is at play in the film. In Jermyn's "Rereading the Bitches from Hell", she evaluates the ways the "female monster"

characters are also directly tied in with the "good wife" mentality of the more subservant female characters. In this way, Basic Instinct wishes to portray being a lesbian as completely opposing to being anything remotely positive. By constructing "lesbian" or "queer" with the Other, the director is making a definitive statment on where being queer registers in comparison with "normal" heterosexual behavior.

Posted by seitz057 at 1:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After watching Basic Instinct, I noticed an underlying theme of misogyny throughout the film. Women were portrayed as monsters who are not to be trusted. They are threatening and if you get involved with them they will seduce you and then leave you; trick you, use you, destroy you, and kill you. If you’re not careful, they will ruin your friendships, cause you to lose your job, and make you question your sexuality. I can certainly see why queer activists were upset by the production of this film, but I’m wondering if feminists and those fighting for women’s rights had the same reaction. The director states that this movie is about evil, and I’m not sure that evilness is strictly of queers, but more so of women in general. Deleyto brings up the point that all the principal women in this film are violent killers. Not only are these women psychopathic murderers, but even worse, they are lesbians. This film seems to endorse and favor male sexuality, and anything that deviates from that is seen as “queer� and dangerous. Sedgwick is quoted in Deleyto’s article as saying: “the intense homophobia that characterizes most homosocial formations in our society are products of the same system that oppress women.� I couldn’t agree more with this statement. In Basic Instinct, this combination of femaleness and homosexuality equals a monster.

Posted by herma216 at 12:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While I didn't find myself particularly struck by the representations of queerness in "Basic Instinct", I can certainly see how queer activists would heavily criticize the film. At the same time, I am also struck by how insincere the film is in every respect. To me, the film others both male and female characters, rendering both genders so bizarrely unrelatable that it is impossible to take the film seriously at all.

During class, Elakshi made the argument that it was only during her queer relationships that Catherine, the cold and emotionless woman, appears to emote or to show signs of humanity. It is true that Catherine seems genuinely sad over the loss of Roxy, and that the events of the film make it clear that Roxy's relationship with Catherine is what 'marks' her and ultimately causes her death. Perhaps it is because we just watched chunks of the film, but I never really got the impression that any relationship in that film had any emotion behind it. Catherine sheds her queerness for heterosexual involvement easily; she notes that the man who was killed in the beginning of the film was someone she was involved with on a more long-term basis, obstensibly while she was involved with Roxy. This leads the viewer to believe that she was most likely using Roxy as she was all the others. Perhaps I'd have more of a strong feeling about the way queerness was used in the film if i saw the whole thing uninterrupted and unadulterated.

While I am certainly not condoning the way queerness is portrayed in the film, I suspect that a lot of the backlash came from the film being one of the few mainstream engagements of queerness in popular culture in the early '90s. From the perspective of the modern viewer, about 15 years later, the film is problematic because of its depictions of all people, not limited to a gender or sexuality. It is so completely fabricated, sensationalized, and disconnected from reality, it can't even be taken seriously.

Posted by allison at 1:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The movie Basic Instinct builds up a complex theory of how society has cultivated the image of the violent woman as a lesbian. This movie portrays queerness when looking at women. The camera is constantly framing, zooming, looking up and down and capturing the female body. In many parts of the movie Catherine would talk and the camera would be zoomed in at her face then Nicks face to see his expression. In Basic Instinct there is a clear example of a femme fatale or “monster� played by Sharon Stone. She is attractive, over sexual and likes to play with men and women’s minds. Gay rights activists strongly criticized the film and its depiction of homosexual relationships, especially the portrayal of lesbian and bisexual women as psychopathic serial killers. I can see why the queer community can be outraged because of the relationship between Catherine and other women. It is offensive for Catherine to be unfaithful to her female partners, giving lesbians a bad representation. Deleyto explains how lesbians in films are seen as dangerous modern women from a male characters perspective. Catherine enjoys the fact that Nick gains male paranoia when realizing that Catherine is bisexual. You can tell that Nick feels angry and surprised when Catherine and Roxy are kissing in the club. His sexually masculinity is getting taken away by a woman. According to Jermyn men feel that when women are with other women that they are conquering patriarchy. This leads Nick to practically raping Beth to feel dominant and wanted.

Posted by lemme021 at 7:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Basic Instinct my interpretation of the portrayal of queerness differs from situation to situation. I understand why the gay community and feminist circles of 1992 were upset with this film; there is ambiguous and stereotypical coding of characters based on gender, sexual orientation, and profession. The women are not represented very well in this film. They all are murders and/or “crazy� (Beth, Catherine, Roxy, and Hazel). Roxy is portrayed as the worst stereotypical lesbian: a jealous, murdering woman who ends up dead. And while not a huge contributing factor to the movie, the stereotypical remarks made about psychologists may also "add fuel to the fire".

Those that advocate for Basic Instinct’s homophobic undercurrents may also bring up the point, as Deleyto did, that all threats to the male – female relationship must be terminated. The compatibility between Nick and Gus is undeniable; however, Gus poses a threat to Nick’s alpha – male character’s heterosexuality. This is why, as Deleyto explains, Gus must die. From this, one can extrapolate that this is one of the reasons why Beth and Roxy’s characters are also killed; as both were lovers of Catherine and thus interfered with the subliminal advocacy of heterosexuality.

However one can also argue that Roxy’s character was killed because her relationship with Catherine induced male – paranoia in Nick. As discussed in class Nick is irrationally afraid of being rendered into homosexuality from the attraction between Catherine and Roxy; thus Roxy must die.

I thought Basic Instinct was trashy and cheesy. While Catherine may be dominating, cool, and suave- her feminist appeal is ultimately ruined by her surrender to patriarchy.

Posted by Eleanor Roosevelt at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Though there are multiple ways to read the portrayal of queerness in Basic Instinct (BI) and much nuance to be considered- a blog of 250 words or less allows the space for one argument. I ascribe to Hart's argument that we can read Catherine as a lesbian (her argument p. 129 as my foundation) and also Deleyto's argument about the spectrum from homosocial to homosexual that is explored in the relationship between Gus and Nick, which also inserts the threat women pose to the male bond (her argument p. 9 as foundation). Drawing on the arguments posed by both Jermyn and Deleyto about BI's relationship to gender roles in contemporary society, I see queerness presented as embodying both the threat and destabilization of the heterosexual patriarchal order.

A consideration of the two central characters are portrayed provides insight into the representation of queerness. If we understand Catherine as a psychopath we could understand the film as locating her ambivilance about heterosexual domestication as exemplified by her lesbianism (i.e. total rejection of patriarchal order). Nick is showed as a heterosexual man in crisis and thus somewhat of a 'monster' (recovering addict, responsible for innocent lives lost, rape of his partner) If we accept deleyto's argument about the surplus of heterosexuality as perhaps hiding homosexual desire – the crisis Nick faces to fulfill his gender role and endless aggression can be seen in part as a result of his queerness.

In the end, with the first fade out ending in the affirmation of heterosexual love triumphing queerness, the choice to fade back in and show the ice pick can be read as the ultimate affirmation that adherence to heterosexual patriarchal order is not possible. As Nick's choice of Catherine's leads (perhaps) to his partner (read that both ways) Gus's death and his own demise. Catherine's adherence to heterosexuality it thwarted by the implication that she intends to kill Nick.

Posted by Sofia at 12:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

NICK
You mean getting inside you isn't
going to get me any deeper into
your character.

She looks a him. A beat. She smiles slowly.

CATHERINE
Not unless you confuse my character
with my body parts.

Queer could be described as radically opposed not only to heteronormativity, but to homonormatitivity as well. It is used as a verb and a noun, not simply a stable identity category. It attempts to blur boundaries between sexuality, gender, and other, typically rigidly defined, identity characteristics. "Queer revels in its otherness, difference, and distance from mainstream society (gay or straight), even as it recognises that this distance is always incomplete" (Brown, 2006: 2685).

I think the question conflates certain things. On the one hand, articles were referring to gay and lesbian activists; it does not necessarily mean that they are queer in the above described terms. I think attempts to fight potentially harmful representations and communicate the message to the mainstream society that 'we are not like that' for some queer activists would represent certain kind of conservatism (as in gays in military, marriage, good consumer citizenship etc). On the other hand, I think we can locate certain kind of queerness in the film, especially in representations of gender as fluid, unstable, contradictory and performative. I would argue that representations of ‘lesbianism’ in the film are least queer - it looks more as a typical soft-porn male fantasy than transggressive sexuality. I think the film does a good a job in portraying hetero-male anxieties and ‘homophobia of the masculine imaginary’ (Hart: 125)in the context of female power and changing social relationships, but its conservative ending instead of challenging the norm, reassures the possibility of a return to heteropatriarchy.

Posted by Arnoldas at 8:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Throughout this movie there are many different representations of queerness. The first and most obvious representation through characters is between Catherine and Roxy, the next that is a bit more subdued-as explained by Deleyto-is the relationship between Nick and Gus. Queer is also shown in the themes of this movie. Catherine is a women that doesn't fit into the normal "feminine" role. She is very off putting to Nick, in the fact that she is a take control, confident, sexual woman. The effect this has on Nick is to make up for the masculinity he feels in being siphoned off of him. He engages in very masculine, even violent, actions (nearly raping Beth, going with Gus and shooting Beth).

Catherine being thought of as the "monster" I think comes from her queerness. Aside from the fact that she is a murderer (which isn't really portrayed until the end) she really doesn't fit the part of monster from the definitions discussed in class; evil, horrifying, grotesque. This title really seems to derive from the fact that she is an unpredictable and nontraditional woman. Although Nick throughout the film showed many more overtly violent and aggressive acts. Catherine's queerness, her promiscuity and abjectness, seems to over power Nick's tendency for violence and anger. It seems that the movie is implying her characteristics are less desirable and dangerous than Nick's.

Posted by luco0005 at 5:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think that queerness in Basic Instinct is represented mostly in terms of male fear that the repercussions female bonding eliminates male power and therefore make him effeminate which implies his own homosexuality. I understand queer as simply non heterosexual and therefore deemed abject by the mainstream culture (as in the Deleyto essay). As Jermyn explains, the relationships between Catherine and Roxy, and Catherine and Hazel represent Nick's own fear of femininity because with the notion of "divide and conquer", or the fear of female bonding, is the idea that strong relationships among women allow them to reject male systems of domination and overcome patriarchy. Also Nicks experiences of the female relationships in the movie represents itself when, feeling emasculated, he half-rapes (I don't know I saw it more as just rape, but I will allow for other interpretations) Beth to try and assert his masculinity and deny Catherine's dominance over him and therefore his own feared homosexuality. I agree with the "Why the Woman Did it" reading of Basic Instinct in that the bisexual and

lesbian references in the film seem mostly to be superficial and simply used to illustrate the overall homophobia in relation to gay males. However, I can understand where protesters were coming from because if you looked at the film only in regard to women and their relationships it would not be hard to come to the general conclusion that they are being negatively depicted, and that this negativity extends to specifically to the lesbian tendencies of their sexuality.

Posted by CrazyOldMaurice at 2:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Much of the harsh criticism of the portrayal of the bisexual relationship in the film, "Basic Instinct" stems from the notion that the film's protagonist, Catherine Tramell, is the constant object of attention and speculation. This is because she thoroughly portrays the idea of the femme fatale/ "monster;" an idea that Celestino Deleyto dissects in the article, "The Margins of Pleasure: Female Monstrosity and Male Paranoia in Basic Instinct." This "monster" is the object of intrigue and horror as Catherine, an attractive, wealthy white female author embodies both a hypersexual woman, often threatening male dominance with her ferocity in this area, as well as potential cold-blooded killer. The fact that Catherine clearly has a constant homosexual relationship with a despite the men the men that she uses for sex and throws away (or kills), is the subject of outrage in the queer community. However, I find that the weakness in this argument lies in the fact that this relationship is the only weakness to love that the apparent “monster� has. When Catherine’s lover, Roxy, is killed, the audience sees Catherine cry—her first display of weakness or emotion. I think that while the relationship between Catherine and Roxy is eroticized to the point of potential offense to the queer community, it also shows the only real link between love and the monster—letting the audience infer that Catherine’s relationship with Roxy was her emotional Achilles heel. However, the fact that these women had to be either hyper-masculine, hyper-sexual, or crazy killers in order to have this sort of relationship is also offensive, but allows much of the male audience (that may have an affinity for Catherine) to quiet their “male paranoia� of being sexually threatened by a woman in “real life.�

Posted by J Kriegs at 11:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

There are lots of ways in which queerness is portrayed throughout Basic Instinct. I agree with Deleyto, in that the lesbians of this film are perceived as “dangerous modern women� in the eyes of the male characters. An example of this queerness is when Nick first discovers that Catherine has a female lover. The male paranoia can also be associated with this scene. While the two females hug and kiss Nick becomes instantly shocked and uncomfortable. His facial expression becomes blank, along with his body language looking nervous and confused as he makes his way out of the room. As viewers, we can see that Nick feels threatened because a woman has taken his place, sexually. There is also a queerness in emphasizing the female body in this film. The camera is constantly framing, zooming, or panning on female body parts. For example, when Catherine gets out of the car and it is raining, the camera focuses on her long-bare-legs as it slowly creeps up her figure.

I could list a hundred examples of shots like this, but my point is, we don’t see nearly as much of this when it comes to the male character. I find this all suspicious (or queer) because its not necessary. The film would still get the same silly plot across, even if the technical aspects didn’t focus on the female figure.

Posted by kerli006 at 10:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Jane Campion's film The Piano is, in my opinion, a feminist film. I believe that it is a feminist film because, although Ada is still objectified by the men in the film, she is a dominant character in which her actions pulls the story forward. The audience can see her personality and her struggles because of how her gaze is incorporated into the film. The audience can see what she sees and therefore feel how she feels. She is not just an object in the film that is acted upon. I still notice that the male gaze is at work in the film though. Only one of Ann Kaplan's three male gazes is obvious in the film. This is the gaze of the male characters of the film. It is very obvious when you see Baine's looking at Ada. I think Campion incorporated this male gaze to show how women are objectified. I think it was very intentional but only to show how Ada was viewed by the men. I suppose that I do not believe that the male gaze is at work throughout the entire film unconsciously through the camera because it was filmed by Campion, a woman.
Afew scenes in the movie show how Campion may be responding to patriarchy. One of these scenes is when Ada goes to her husband's bed and objectifies him by touching his body but not allowing him to touch her back. This shows how it feels to be objectified. You see how her husband feels awkward and helpless which leaves him angry. Although the film cleary shows the presents and reality of

patriarchy. This is shown when her husband cuts off Ada's finger to show her that he is dominant.
Another reason I thought that this was a feminist film is because of how Ada cannot speak but the audience can hear her clearly. It is obvious that she has a voice. She expresses herself through her piano. Campion, in my opinion, is saying that women may be forced to be silent in thier actions and words but their thoughts and feelings can not be overpowered. It surprises me that Campion has stated that The Piano is not a feminist film because she gives more power to Ada than any other character in that it is her character that moves the story forward.

I really enjoyed watching this film.

Posted by Faith Kolstad at 12:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Framing is the technique of centering the attention on what the director wants the audience to focus on. The subject can be framed by other objects or how the film is shot. Framing can convey meaning to the object being framed and direct the audience's attention to where the director is going with the film.

Posted by Faith Kolstad at 10:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the film The Piano I noticed a distinct motive to convey a typical patriarchal system; however I do not see this film as feminist for this same reason. Ada metaphorically and literally has no voice of her own. She is unable to make her own decisions from the beginning when her father promises her to a man in New Zealand. Throughout the film she is expected to fulfill the physical and emotional desires of the men around her. I think that Campion very effectively shows this through her filming techniques, nude shots and objectification of Ada through framing, as well as the script very blatantly stating the men’s desires and never Ada’s. The fact that Campion is not a feminist filmmaker is only surprising because Ada dominates the film; she is weak and fragile but seemingly overcomes this on her own by the end of the film. Her will chooses life, she escapes the island of gloom, and the audience has been rooting for her the entire film. Mulvey’s article “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema� also supports a feminist film theory for the piano. Mulvey states, “The magic of Hollywood style at its best arose, not exclusively, but in one

important aspect, from its skilled and satisfying manipulation of visual pleasure. Unchallenged, mainstream film coded the erotic into the language of the dominant patriarchal order�(2). In Campion’s movie, she shows clips of male nudity as well as male framing which defy the stereotypical male sex scene, which has been known to exclusively objectify women. With that said, Jane Campion states that she is not a feminist filmmaker, and I believe the artist knows their work better than the viewer; I do not see the film as feminist.

Posted by marsh410 at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In my opinion, Campion's gender does affect my reading of the film as potentially feminist and I do think she made specific choices to create this film in a way that responds to patriarchy. Because she is a woman, I thought she would make certain decisions about how to portray the main female character, but she made the exact opposite decisions as I had expected. For instance, I would never expect a woman filmmaker to show both the woman and the man nude. It doesn't surprise me that she isn't a feminist filmmaker. She directed a movie about a woman cheating a man. That doesn't happen too often in films. I do not think that the Piano is a feminist film. Ada would have been more powerful in the film. Instead, she was portrayed as weak and vulnerable. She wasn't able to talk on her own. She needed to find a man to motivate her to want to talk. That's not the message a feminist film is supposed to portray.

Posted by conw0077 at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Piano is an interesting film in that it can be interpreted many different ways. The fact that some people think it is a feminist film, when even the director, Champion, announces she is not a feminist filmmaker, forces us to look at the complexity of the film. I do not think The Piano is a feminist film. I do not think that the fact that the director was a female makes much of a difference.
Looking at the main character, Ada, we can understand that she doesn’t speak. This can be interpreted in two ways: her silence as strength, or her silence as being weak. I admire how she can communicate without words, but she uses her piano as her voice. This creates problems, because the piano is an object that is left behind, traded for sexual pleasures, and then destroyed. What does that say about Ada’s voice? I have learned from bell hooks that to determine the importance of a character in a film,

you can analyze how often they are seen on screen, how often they are heard, and how, in general, do they move the story forward. Ada is not heard, she seems to follow around other characters, by choice or not, but she is seen very often. There is no denying the male gaze that is so prominent in this film. Anytime Ada is near Stewart or Baines she is being looked at like a piece of meat. How would you explain the strong usage of the male gaze as a feminist tool in this film? The love, and the gaze, between Ada and her daughter, Flora, initially had me questioning if it was indeed a feminist film. Ada shows affection for only Flora, chooses to sleep with her separate from her husband, and acts free, lively and open when she is with her. This is, of course, until Flora disobeys her mother and listens to her new father instead. Upon exposure to extreme violence towards her mother, Flora seems to experience no “lasting trauma� as hooks describes it. Curious of course, because Flora and her mother have a long time bond and trust, while Stewart has only been in the picture for a short while. This, to me, is reinforcing patriarchy. My last observation is also reinforcing patriarchy. Even after Ada is manipulated by Baines and objectified by means of trading parts of the piano, for parts of her body (different parts he wants to see, to touch, etc.) Ada “falls in love� with him! I was disappointed to see this happen, because to me, it’s an obvious reenactment of Kaplan’s theory of “…desire is to be desired.�
The fact that Ada was an untraditional mother, an artist, and chose to be involved with someone other than her husband, could be looked at as empowering. But I cannot ignore the exercise of power and the objectifying gaze by, if not one of the men, then the other, to call this a truly feminist film.

Posted by AJ at 12:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

On a superficial analysis of The Piano one might assume it is a film that further encourages the furtherance of patriarchy and male dominance; ending with a happy nuclear family at the end. When considering the awards the film received it is hard to blame the filmmakers for choosing a Hollywood ending. Regardless of the director, Jane Campion’s, outward statements that she is not a feminist filmmaker, I can’t seem to grasp The Piano as any other sort of film. The Piano tells a story of a colonial woman, it gives a horrifyingly accurate portrayal of a woman’s place within her society, her only ability to control her environment is her ability to control men through sex. Ada is the protagonist, she is the character moving the story forward, though the men in the film make logistical decisions about property, marriage, and where Ada will be living, it is Ada’s reactions to these patriarchal decisions that construct the story of the film. Historically she would have had no legal ability to change the decisions made for her, at that point in time women were basically treated as commodities. Throughout our readings there seems to be this notion that a feminist film has to be a film that outwardly in your face puts women in a powerful, or reversed role, I disagree with that. I believe it can be more sub terrestrial than that. I think a film such as The Piano can be considered a feminist film simply because it outwardly in your face shows how fucked up society has allowed women to be treated! I don’t think the film is in anyway accepting of societal wrongs against women, this to me, makes it feminist, it gives a portrayal of a woman as a commodity and it is by no means masked. In plenty of other films about women in arranged marriages, the woman “falls in love� with the man she’s arranged with, in The Piano Ada is a rebel in her time. Ada controlled her environment with the means she had available, and she did seemingly fall in love with Baines, so who cares if they go off and get married and blah blah—it’s Hollywood!

Posted by sind0026 at 11:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Piano has many unique aspects-camera angels, male nudity, and sexuality-presented in the film. This all is influenced in my mind by the fact that Jane Campion is female. I perceive specific parts of The Piano in the context of this fact. Ada giving sexual favors to Baines would have impacted me very differently, much more negatively, if the director had been male. Although, these scenes were very upsetting, they were somewhat easier to watch knowing that these scenes were filmed with the full implication of what this would mean to female viewers. I tend to think (although probably incorrectly) that women understand the pain of sexual abuse more strongly than men.

Overall, I don’t feel that this film was feminist. Although there are certainly are parts that have feminist aspects. I see this most in the male nudity compared to the female nudity. This is too unusual for a film for it not to have been a conscious choice. This is where I feel she is making a statement about patriarchy. Rather than the female body being showcased it is the male’s.

I also see a response to patriarchy in that this film is more about Ada and her growth. Although the men have some influence on her life, the real changes that occur are explicitly between her and her piano. This is also highlighted in the fact that in the only times she narrates it is mostly just about her relationship with her piano.

Posted by luco0005 at 11:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I would like to view the two main male characters of The Piano through a feminist lens. It seems that Campion is honest with her portrayal of Stewart. He is a character we are allowed to hate. He literally owns Ada. She is an object to him. As the audience, we grow to hate him more when he refuses to let Ada take her piano, which she believes to be her very essence. I believe Campion made those choices in order to show patriarchy at work. Where she goes wrong, however, (at least in a feminist light) is with the character of Baines. Just like Stewart, he displays patriarchy in the way he uses Ada for sexual favors in return for her piano. Yet Campion romanticizes his character. We can't hate him because our protagonist has fallen in love with him. Campion defines Ada's sexuality through the gaze of Baines, illustrating Kaplan's ideas. Ada wasn't sexually awakened until Baines desired her, and once she realized this, she craved it, and went back for more. The fact that Campion is a woman doesn't mean she has to make feminist films. As a filmmaker she is allowed to express her creativity and make whatever kind of film she wants. I'm just glad she didn't identify herself as a feminist filmmaker, because her celebration and heroification of Baines was anything but.

Posted by allora at 11:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In Jane Campion's film, "The Piano," the protagonist, Ada is portrayed as the object of the male gaze for the vast majority of the film. This can be seen in the way that Ada is sold as daughter property to wife property, and then proceeds to be constantly inundated with men, (both her husband and lover) who are obsessed with her almost solely as an object of physical affection. Throughout the film, we can see that Ada's true voice or soul is in her piano, and she is therefore almost a prisoner of it. Therefore, whoever owns the piano for the majority of the movie, owns Ada. The fact that she is her piano's property--which is symbolic of her own voice-- allows her to retain some sense of agency. She continually claims the piano as her own, despite the men who sell it over her head. In this way, we can view this film as a feminist film through Ada's retaining of her voice, personal amnesty, and affection through the choices she makes with the piano as her instrument. However, in the way that she is "owned" through her husband watching her and lusting after her even as she chooses to lay with another man, and in the way that she is forced to prostitute herself to Baines, (the man she eventually chooses to love) for her voice is very antifeminist. However, the fact that the female director builds an ethos for Ada and demonizes her husband for trying to possess her is a very feminist perspective. Kaplan notes in her article that feminists have complained that this "gaze" is male because women are subjected to framing and fragmenting of their bodies to portray them in a purely erotic light. This is done in the Piano, but in a way that is critical of eroticizing women. Overall, despite the critique of the male gaze that is so blatant throughout the film, I do not consider it to be wholly feminist. This is because the feminist perspective derives from an array of issues that are not limited to women. The way that the island native people are portrayed as less "civilized" and prone to rash and savage nature was extremely racist and was not a part of the feminist agenda. The only not heteronormative character in the film was also one of these island natives and the only judgement of him comes from Mary who says, "balls were wasted on you." This is meant to be comical, but ends up, in my opinion, being detrimental to the homosexual community, and therefore the feminist cause.

Posted by J Kriegs at 11:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was expecting to see a great feminist film, but after The Piano was over, I hoped that it wasn't a feminist film. The only part of the film that struck me as being feminist was the shot of Baines' back side.

Right at the start of the film, Ada is sent away to be with a husband of whom she had never met and had no choice over. She (as I believe is mentioned in the article) doesn't speak, which seems to be just another symbol of weakness on the female part.

Both Baines and Ada's husband are aggressive with Ada throughout the film. Ada "loves" Baines, but Ada is viewed in a very sexual way. For example, Baines tells her to lift her skirt. She does, with Baines underneath the piano eyeing her and touching her leg. Similarly, Baines says "take off your dress. I want to see your arms." This wouldn't have to be a sexual comment except for the fact that we know Baines has a thing for Ada. Baines also convinces Ada to "lay" in bed with him.

Ada's husband pushes Ada around and eventually chops Ada's fingers off after she cheated on him with Baines. Clearly, male dominance is being portrayed here. Ada never wanted to be with him in the first place, but she has no choice in the matter. When she does make a choice, she is violated/dominated. In the end, she is forced to leave again. Her life is so terrible that she comes close to committing suicide in the end, once again showing that she was dominated.

Also, we see the male gaze throughout the film. There are many instances where fragments of Ada are shown- her arms, her neck, her skirt, her face, etc.

Posted by bute0023 at 11:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Jane Campion's direction of the movie the piano was very interesting to me. I personally didn't see this film as being any kind of feminist statement to patriarchy, female direction or not! Let it be known that not all females are feminists (Sarah Palin)! There is system of domination at work in the film and it is indeed male domination. Ada in the film is working under a masculine discourse of power. She is treated like a sex object/toy by this man whom she doesn't know and at first thinks he is an ass for being so nasty (rightfully so) and always staring at her in a sexual way. She then later sees the "error of her ways" and falls for this guy?! What the? This is just what Kaplan was referring to with a dominant-submissive structure, where men rule and women work with the limited autonomy they do have. I can clearly see that Campion is not a feminist. No doubt the character of Ada was well written and I can see where you might find the feminist spin,..but,...."sugar please!" The full feminist spin would be about another 360 degrees!

Posted by Revolutionary at 11:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

All through watching the film 'The Piano', I was extremely uneasy. Hunter's monologue at the beginning is eerie, and when a film begins with a voiceover prologue, you know that it must end with an epilogue. The tone that the voiceover set for the film put me on edge, and so I only enjoyed it for its cinematic contributions. I also could have gone on and lived a normal, happy without seeing Harvey Keitel's full frontal nudity.
I believe that Campion made specific choices to create a film that shows the heterosexual patriarchy every chance she got. In the film, Ada represents the perfect woman; beautiful and silent. However, her sassy attitude and strong will get in the way of the men's ideal (Stewart's and Baines') and so they act accordingly to put her in her place. Stewart, eventually follows her into the woods and chases her down just to grope her and was only stopped because Ada's daughter Flora was in the

vicinity. Ada then undresses him in his sleep just to look at him, and when he wakes up she does not allow him to touch her. In this case, the gaze is reversed. However, Ada is an object of the gaze from the tribespeople, the white women, Stewart, and Baines.
The fact that Campion did not affect my reading of the film as potentially feminist because throughout the entire film, Ada is the victim and has power exerted over her at every turn. To me, this means that the film is not feminist. Although she can be strong, the men triumph over her, rendering this film not feminist. First she is sold by her father into marriage in New Zealand, then she is traded by Stewart to Baines for piano lessons, and is eventually traded completely to Baines for marriage. Although it seems to be her own choice to be with Baines, it is actually Stewart's choice. Stewart cuts off Ada's right index finger, with an axe, because she won't tell him that she doesn't love Baines...did Steward forget the fact that she was unable to speak? The fact that Ada even desired to be with Baines after the sexual exploitation and demeaning acts he put her through just boggles my mind. These choices by Campion also show that she is demonstrating patriarchy. I also did not read the film as feminist because the men always triumphed over Ada and Flora, and their choices weren't their own. Also, the fact that Campion explicitly states that she is "not a feminist filmmaker" cements the point to me. If she says she isn't, she isn't. Taking all of this into consideration, 'The Piano' is not a feminist film.
The male gaze is also seen at every turn in the film, from the moment that the Maori's and Stewart see Ada and Flora on the beach, to Ada beginning "piano lessons" with the despicable Baines. Also, Kaplan's ideas on "the desire to be desired" fits in well with Ada and Baines' relationship, and I believe that this is the reason why Ada wants to be with him. He acted on his desires, while Stewart "waited for her to come around." Ada wanted so much to be desired after being sold by her father, etcetera, that Baines showed her the most animal of desires and she fell for it.

Posted by Mel at 10:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As I sat watching The Piano, I could not escape the feelings of repulsion throughout the entire movie. The first time this feeling became apparent was when Ada's new husband refused to take the piano to their home, making clear his power over her. To make matters worse, this happened in the first five minutes of meeting each other. I was also repulsed by Baines and the degrading situation he put Ada in, proving his power over her over and over again. Campion's gender did not affect my reading of the film as potentially feminist because I did not get a feminist perspective from it. I agree that Campion made specific choices about patriarchy in this film with the constant power struggle between Ada and the men in the film. The males always proved more powerful, reinforcing patriarchy. Even when Ada did get her piano back, it was only because she subjected herself for Baines' sexual pleasure; him being the higher power yet again. To say the least, I disagree with Campion's portrayal of women in her film. It does not surprise me that Campion is not a feminist filmmaker because I did not think the movie was

feminist at all. Hooks made a great point in her article, she stated that the movie..."advances the sexist assumption that women will give up artistic talent to find true love (Hooks)." This was the most discouraging part of the movie. It was truely painful to watch Ada continually accept Baines' perverted requests in order to get her piano back. I blame Ada for accepting his offer, but more so I blame Baines for being the power-thirsty, patriarchal male that knew she would do anything for her piano. I was absolutely appalled that she ended up falling for him! This was a shocking sign of weakness and manipulation shown from the main female character. To me, Ada represented a vulnerable female under the power of manipulative patriarchy, a significant issue in society today.

Posted by jona0062 at 8:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I do not view The Piano as a feminist film. The fact that Campion is a woman does not affect my view, nor does it surprise me that she stated that she is “not a feminist filmmaker.� I have come to this conclusion since I can think of many more examples from the film that would suggest it is not feminist over it being feminist. First of all, Ada is mute and is not able to voice her opinions. She is unable to communicate to the man she ultimately falls in love with, Baines, since he is illiterate and she has no voice. She can only really communicate using her body, which she basically sells to him to get her piano back. This would not support a very feminist view. Although she proves to be a fairly strong woman in many respects, she still gives in to the men in the film. She wants more than anything to bring her piano up to her new home when she arrives in New Zealand, but she ends up giving in to her husband’s command and leaving it on the beach. Also, when she shows anger and her strength in the film, the other women and her husband worry that she might have a mental problem.

This film supports Kaplan’s ideas in her piece “Is the Gaze Male?� Through her sessions with Baines, she falls in love with her. She feels pleasure in being desired by Baines and goes back to him even after he gives her the piano back. Kaplan explains this idea stating “women have learned to associate their sexuality with domination by the male gaze, a position involving a degree of masochism in finding their objectification erotic� (135). She also says of a woman that “her desire is to be desired� (126).
There are many more examples that could support both sides of the argument as to whether The Piano is a feminist film. However, I did not view it as feminist and would have to agree with bell hook’s statement that it “celebrates and eroticizes male domination.�

Posted by Jolene Lewis at 12:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The fact that Jane Campion is a woman, might lead me to believe that this could potentially be a feminist film. Upon seeing it however, I don't buy it and I am not surprised that Campion denies being a “feminist filmmaker.� I say this because, Ada, our heiroine of sorts is portrayed as a victim of men at just about every turn. As an object to be possessed by men, she is traded three times in the film. She is sexually exploited by Baines, but supposedly falls in love with him as a result. For this she is attacked and mutilated by Stewart. And in the end she appears contented to be with Baines, but this “happy ending� for Ada doesn’t actually seem that happy.

Her “choice� to be with Baines wasn’t her own, it was Stewart’s. Also, it seems to me that her choosing to be in love with Baines was born out of being desired by him. As Ada becomes aware of his desire for her, she is drawn in and ultimately seems to align with E. Ann Kaplan’s theory in that her “desire is to be desired.� This seems the case because after Stewart surprises her on her way to Baines’ and has chased and groped at her as she retreats, she ultimately ends up undressing Stewart to gaze at him, not allowing her to touch him, yet knowing that he desires her. In the end it seems that Ada hasn’t truly made any decisions for herself, and has just been reacting to being objectified by the men around her. And as bell hooks summed it up, “patriarchal order is restored� in the end as the audience is sold the image of her and Baines kissing romantically in their new life together. Patriarchy, yes; feminist film, no.

Posted by kafka at 10:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I remember seeing this film when I was younger and it was new. The only thing I really remembered (before re seeing it) was the nudity (I never really wanted to see Harvey Keitel's ass) and how much I hated Anna Paquin. The former may have changed but Paquin is still like a knife in my brain. Not so much her acting as I now realize but her part in the antagonism of this film. In re watching it I couldn't help but shudder. From the perspective of a feminist, or at least a self realized female, this movie was to me intensely disturbing. The overlying tone of voyeurism, throughout, of a woman who is as someone said before the perfect one; both beautiful and silent. The use of coercion in sexuality, and the feeling that everyone (except maybe the indigenious people) were left completely dysfunctional by the sexual and social repression of post Victorian values.
Perhaps this movie was feminist in the way that it shows the extremity of patriarchal violence and need for control, as an antithesis to the idea of feminism

I felt like the male gaze was almost palpable in this movie, whenever either Baines or Stewart were present, Ada was ogled like some alien creature, an object to be dissected, contained and above all possessed. Ada could almost be considered 'feminist', in a time of such sexual repression she was to put it bluntly a little bit of a freak. Unwed mother, artist, adulteress and from some perspectives, whore. She was unafraid and therefore caused discomfort and maybe fear in those around her unwilling to disagree with the societal rule of gender role, and I think that perhaps would make her feminist. Flora on the other hand played so deeply into the patriarchy she even ratted out her mother, causing her to be mutilated and almost commit suicide, then, as bell hooks pointed out, was left with no long lasting trauma, playing and singing in the final scenes. Kaplan's idea of the repression/denial of motherhood is exemplified here, that the daughter has loyalties more to the�father� she has barely known and initially denies, then to the only parent she has had her whole life, and only after a few weeks. I know she is a kid but I think this was definitely an allusion to patriarchal domination and attempted subjugation of all things feminine.

Posted by spiek010 at 10:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I believe “The Piano� was a feminist film and it surprises me that she explicitly states that she is not a feminist filmmaker. A certain tone is set in one of its first sequences. When a crew of sailors unloads Ada's belongings in the surf. Mother and daughter, dazed from the journey and the rude landing, appear vulnerable. The seamen, on the other hand, are crude and careless. They clearly have no appreciation of the significance of the piano. When asked if there is anything further she needs or wants, Ada replies that she has had enough of the stinking ship and they can all go to hell. After this response you know to whom this film is addressed and to who it is not.
I believe Campion's main character, Ada, is labeled as kind of crazy by virtue of her refusal to conform to what society considers being the feminine ideal. In The Piano, Ada has refused to speak and Campion never tells us why. The Piano also presents someone who has, presumably of her own accord, come half way around the world to marry a new husband. And yet she refuses to make the slightest effort

to ingratiate herself with him. The fact that she got away with acting like this and ends up with the man she wants in the end, shows a sense of feminine power.
This film portrayed a variety of different gazes. You have male female, female male, and even gazing of objects, such as the piano. Since the film didn’t focus merely on males gazing at females it helps to prove that this was a more feminist film.
I agree that Campion made specific choices to create this film in a way that responds to patriarchy. She did this right from the beginning when we find out that Ada is forced to movie and marry Stewart. Patriarchy is also displayed when Ada’s piano is given away to Baines and she sells her body to Baines in order to get her piano back. The fact that women during this time were unable to choose their own partner or have control over their belongings shows that there exists a system of society or government in which men hold the power and women are largely excluded from it.

Posted by sulli396 at 9:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Piano does not stand out as a feminist film to me. This is mainly due to the fact that Ada and Flora are seen more as property than individuals. I believe that as a director Jane Campion focused more on the piano and Ada and how they travel through this journey together, than she does on relationships between the men and women in the story (a possible result of the movie having a female director).
In The Piano, there are many examples of male gaze: from man to woman, from woman to man, and from human to object (the piano). As I learned from this week’s readings, male gaze is not just a man looking at a woman, and the film The Piano male gaze is used to objectify the women in the film. The piano is gazed upon by all of the characters in the movie; it is seen as only an object which will only speak when told to. The gaze is then seen from Baines towards Ada and from husband towards Ada. In both cases Ada is seen as an object for men to control which is seen as a mirroring of the gaze upon the piano. The oppression of women is also supported by the time setting being in the colonial era; it is a time in history when women had few if any rights at all.

Posted by robes002 at 9:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I had never seen his film before and my first reaction was surprise and confused. No I don't think because of the director Campion's gender the film was potentially feminist. I'm also not shocked that Campion has explicitly stated that she is "not a feminist filmmaker because nothing stood out to be feminist. Just because she is a women doesn't mean it has to be feminist. In the reading by Ann Kaplan she talks about male gaze "Assigned the place of object she is the recipient of male desire, the passive recipient of his gaze. If she is to have sexual pleasure, it can only be constructed around her objectification; it cannot be a pleasure that comes from desire for the other that is, her desire is to be desired." In The movie Piano we see this when Ada goes back to be with Baines because she figures out she desires him too. Ada is being desired by Baines and at first Ada does not desire Baines desire.

Posted by breme071 at 9:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

That Jane Campion is “not a feminist filmmaker� came of absolutely no surprise to me, nor does her being a woman affect my opinion of this movie. Some argue that “The Piano� is a feminist film because of the way it portrays men. While I will give Campion credit for providing audiences with a greater amount of male nudity than female, she doesn’t take it far enough. One of Kaplan’s main points in “Is the Gaze Male?� is the difference between the male and female gazes. As she points out, “men do not simply look; their gaze carries with it the power of action of possession.� Women, on the other hand, “return a gaze, but cannot act on it.�

Campion illustrates this point quite nicely. While both the male and female characters have their share of gazes, these gazes unequal. When Ada stares at Baines, she is looking straight at him, and he appears unperturbed. On the other hand, when we see Baines looking at Ada, he is frequently looking at her from behind or at an angle.

Very rarely does he stare at her from the front, giving his gaze a much more voyeuristic feeling than hers does. In addition, when he gazes at her, she appears uncomfortable – at least for the first half of the film. His gaze has power; hers does not.

Other examples are when Flora and Stewart each spy on Ada and Baines. When Flora watches them through the keyhole, she does so because she wants to know what’s keeping her mother and why no one’s playing the piano. When Stewart watches them through the floorboards, he does so because he is turned on by what he sees and wants to keep watching. Flora’s gaze is curious; Stewart’s is voyeuristic, and his is the more powerful one.

Posted by Katie Green at 9:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I was not very impressed by Jane Campion’s work in The Piano. And I am not sure how it won so many awards. The only actor that kept me wanting to watch was Flora she added life to what I thought was a lifeless film. Campion’s gender does not affect my reading of the film as being potentially feminist. It does not surprise me that Campion has stated that she is “NOT a feminist filmmaker.� I was very confused and a little frustrated when I found out that the director of the film was a woman. I thought there are few female directors in the movie making industry and she makes this garbage. Granted just because she is a woman doesn’t mean that she has to make feminists films, but I just expected more.

I do not feel that The Piano is a feminist film and I do feel that Campion does subscribe to the patriarchal order and she does so time and time again with the constant male gaze, voyeurism, and scopophilism. Ada functions only as an object of desire for Stewart as well as Baines. Stewart even discovers Ada having sex with Baines and instead of saying one word, he gazes between the wooden boards of Baines home in a very voyeuristic/scopophilic manner. In Kaplan’s article, Is the Gaze Male? Kaplan gives a perfect example of the scopophilic instinct “The male pleasure in his own sexual organ transferred to the pleasure in watching other people having sex.� Stewart watching Ada and Baines.

Posted by thoughts at 8:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I found that The Piano was different than other movies made by men, because of the way men were portrayed in the film visually. However, I don’t think that actual story content of the film was extremely pro-woman or feminist. I agree with Saco when she discusses how the film isn’t feminist because Ada ia mute, and because of this she is “subject to the whims of the male characters� (4). Before watching the film I was aware that the director, Campion, was a female and this did make me look more closely at the choices in the way that the characters were portrayed and filmed. I don’t think that the film really responds to patriarchy other than the change of the gaze. The film was not intentionally filmed in a way that was for men to get pleasure in watching the characters. Kaplan discusses how Hollywood cinema is “constructed according to the unconscious patriarchy…� (120), but I don’t think that Campion filmed in this way.

There were many nontraditional shots of men. Kapan also discusses how women are the objects of sexual desire, but clearly, in The Piano, the men were sexually objectified. We see many close-ups of naked body parts, and the men are framed in doorways. However, there were times in the movie when Ada was framed and there were many zoom-ins on her face and the back of her neck. Throughout the movie the viewer was seeing Ada from another character’s gaze. We see voyeurism in the ways that Baines watches her play the piano and when Stewart watches the two of them having sex (hooks, 3). Kaplan also discusses the fact that women’s fantasies “have the dominance submission pattern� (127), and this was seen when she had sex with Baines. Perhaps this film could be seen as a feminist film in the sense that both men and women were objectified and subject to the gaze.

Posted by Alias at 8:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When I started watching The Piano my initial reaction to it was not good. The quietness of Ada and the somewhat darkness of the film made me question it. But, as the movie went along I started to lose myself in it and I felt like I was there on that island with Ada and Flora. I started off feeling sorry for Ada and Flora that they had to live in this strange place with strange people. Her husband seemed to be the “good guy� in the film, while the other man seemed to be the “bad guy� but as the film continued I found out that was far from the truth. When Ada first arrived on the island I felt sorry for her because she didn’t have any control of anything around her, but that changed as the film went on. She does end up losing a finger, which is vital to her piano playing and her happiness but she ends up with love and happiness at the end of the film. A new life, with her daughter and a man she loves and a man that loves her. I believe that The Piano could be considered a feminist film. Campion is trying to show the role of a woman put into a situation where she has no control and Ada basically uses her gender and body for getting what she wants. Even though Ada can’t or won’t speak she still manages to communicate through her piano and her body. It shows that non-verbal communication can be stronger than verbal. Even though there wasn’t a tremendous amount of dialogue in the film, the gaze was used instead. The gaze took the part of dialogue in this film.

Posted by jcareykc at 8:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I loved Ana Paquin in this movie and she definitely deserved the Best Supporting Actress Oscar. I think Campion's gender should not be considered when you consider the work as feminist or not. I think that she attempted to counter patriarchy with her work. Some examples of her attempt were the gaze being feminine at certain points of the film ie. when she Ada is caressing Stewart's bottom, when she gazes at "her" piano or her behavior/attitude towards her husband. However overall I would not consider this film feminist, and I am not surprised that Campion does not consider herself a feminist filmmaker because "the film arguably also reproduces some rather traditional mainstream conventions for depicting women in film.

For example, according to feminist theorists, 'woman' in mainstream cinema seldom has a voice of her own (metaphorically speaking), in the sense that female characters are typically depicted as saying and doing what 'men' would have them say and do. In the film, this metaphorical convention is reproduced quite literally: Ada is a mute." (Mulvey) Furthermore, Ada's primary way of expressing her feelings is through her piano, which she has no control over the possession of by the male characters. Stewart sold the piano to Baines for land, and Baines blackmails Ada promising to return the piano one black key at a time in exchange for sexual favors. Another crucial moment in the film is when Ada, Baines and Flora are leaving the island on the boat. When Ada puts her foot in the rope it is the first time she is making any choice for herself, and she chooses to live. That scene represented Ada's rebirth. The Piano is a great film worthy of the awards it won.

Posted by conlo027 at 7:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Feminism is a complicated animal. On the one hand, there are probably very few in the Western world who would disagree with the concept that women are equal to men. On the other, there are equally few who would admit to being a feminist, even though they agree with many things that feminists stand for (this is probably due to the backlash to second wave feminism that was discussed in the lecture). This is how I saw Jane Campion and The Piano. Although she stated that she is not a "feminist filmmaker" it seems pretty clear that she is trying to lend The Piano a feminist viewpoint. Such statements as Ada being a mute (representing a woman's lack of a voice in her society), being essentially "sold off" to a man she does not know and her final sexual liberation all seem to critique not only Ada's society but our own. However, as bell hooks noted quite well, there are some serious flaws with a feminist vision of the film. The intense domestic abuse may be trying to make a statement, but that does not make it any more acceptable. If Campion is using the film to "respond to patriarchy", such scenes are not very effective to that end.

Throughout the entire movie Ada is an object, and not a liberated woman (even in the final scenes, where she is supposed to be free, she still is in the typical patriarchal family structure of man-woman-child and relies on her husband to make her a new finger and provide her happiness). It seems pretty clear that just because a filmmaker is a woman, the films she creates are not immediately feminist, even if she claims that they are.

Posted by seitz057 at 7:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My overall feeling during and after The Piano was one of conflictedness. In certain parts, it screamed patriarchy in a way that practically made me cringe. ("Lift your skirt. Higher." Blegh!) In other parts, there was a definite feeling of rebellion against typical gender roles. Ada's stubbornness and coldness toward her husband were definitely uncharacteristic of mainstream depictions of this relationship. It's something I've been turning over in my mind over the days since we watched the film. Particularly when you consider Campion's intent, I think despite breaking down some conventions, the film is overall unfeminist. I am swayed in this direction due to the positioning of Ada throughout the film. This was shown in both the visual representations as well as her theoretical positioning in the story. As mentioned in class, Ada was constantly being framed by the camera, whether in a mirror, doorframe, or bonnet. More theoretically, Ada's position in the story itself was one of "to-be-figured-out-ness."

First her husband was trying to figure her out in terms of intimacy. Later, in terms of how to keep her faithful. Throughout the film I was struck by how she was this puzzle for her husband to solve. One scene where this concept dawned on me was towards the end, as Stewart stood at the window, watching Ada walking outside. Although this positioning in the story wasn't objectification in the traditional sense, Ada was still very much turned into "something" to be stared at and demystified.

Posted by happyfeet at 6:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I thought "The Piano" was very well put together. I do perceive this film as mostly feminist. The males in the movie are highly dominating in the things they do and ways they act toward Ada. Ada and her daughter are frequently protrayed as weak women who try to obey the higher superior male. I though it was interesting how the affair with Bianes and Ada occured. At first it was Ada's undying love for her piano that drove her to obey Baines' sexual demands. He had power over her and she did mostly as she was told. I enjoyed watching how it the powere slowly transitioned over into Ada's hands. Once Bianes let her go and gave her the piano back, Ada then had the power of what she was to do. The film portrayed many feminist and patriarchial points, but the one that stood out most was Ada's final choice to end or keep her life. It wasn't the actual decision that mattered of what happened it was Ada's freedom to control her own individual self. The piano gave her that freedom, to feel contempt and free. She spoke through her piano and her daughter's interaction with the piano and Ada made a greater impact on how happiness was seen through Ada. When the piano was thrown over the boat, Ada had to make that one last choice to move on happily with her life. And freedom was her choice and that, to me, was the best choice of all.

Posted by hendr324 at 5:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This film was really hard for me to determine if it was feminist or not. There were certainly aspects of the film that made it feminist like the scenes where Ada was framed like in the mirror she often looked at or the opening scene with her fingers covering her face. However, women were not the only characters that were framed. Mr. Banes and even the piano are also framed or gazed upon in the film. I do not think though that Jane Campion being a woman had anything to do with the nature of the film being considered feminist or not for several reasons. One is that the film depicts a woman struggling get a solid foundation back after the death of her first husband rather than a woman who is defining herself based on the men she is surrounded by. Another is that this type of film where a woman, or man, is struggling to redifine themself is also produced by male directors. I do believe that Campion made choices in the film to reflect patriarcy by having the male characters dominating over the female characters, but Ada does not define herself by the man she was with but rather by the piano. This is why I do not think of the film as feminist. Also, I am really not surprised, by this film, that Campion says she is "not a feminist filmmaker". Based on this film only I do not see enough evidence to call her a feminist filmmaker for several reasons. One is that yes there is patriarchy in the film but there are also male characters that treat the women as equals and with as much respect as their male counterparts. Another is that not only is it the male characters who treat Ada as an object but so do many of the women who think she is just "dumb". Overall as a whole I believe that this film may come off as feminist simple because of how Ada is treated as an object in the film with no say in how she leads her life.

Posted by bergm154 at 5:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think that her work displays many aspects of the "gaze" that are not done by just man, but by woman, child and even those who look at objects in sort of a "gaze"! I think that because the the director was a women it was a lot easier for her to portray a film that can be concidered feminist. I think that because the gender of the director was a woman does affect my idea of the film being feminist because what women would want to make a women about women being subjective to men and scrutiny!? I think that she uses many cases of voyeurism and fetishism to appeal to the male audiences, like the sex scene. It does affect my initial thoughts that Campion stated that she is not a feminist film maker because there were many scenes where males were dominated and the "gaze" was constantly on display. Yes, I do think that The Piano is a feminist film. Some examples is how "Ada" is constantly being framed, whether its by a door frame or her someone looking at her through cracks, etc. Also, where the dominant males come into play, whethere its her father literally shipping her off to be married to another man,

or her husband cutting off her fingure for "Ada" doing what was right in her heart! Although that a women did write this movie does not exempt the fact that this could be or potentially could be a feminist film. It made a lot of money with many awards/oscars why should Campion care?

Posted by week0065 at 5:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I found that the film inspired a lot of conflicting emotions in me, both at it's conclusion and when mulling over the blog question. On the one hand, "The Piano" does many things that I believe can be read as feminist. The two most interesting and developed characters in the film are female, Ada and her daughter, and they are the character's the audience is positioned to relate with. Featuring two females in such prominent roles is rare for a Hollywood film. Additionally, patriarchy and male-domination is not shown as a particularly appealing idea. The audience is constantly positioned to empathize with Ada and her actions while the male characters (think ax-wielding Jurassic Park-guy) are little more than two-dimensional stereotypes.
However, the film's ultimate resolution is anti-feminist in many ways. Ada falls for Baines, despite his character's rigid adherence to patriarchal stereotypes. He turns Ada into an object, using his power as a means of gaining sexual gratification.

That Ada ultimately falls in love with him, despite their lack of development, not only betrays her character but the pro-feminist ideals the film had purported until that point. As such, "The Piano" is a frustrating film, challenging in many important ways and yet frustratingly simple and archaic in others.

Posted by thur0139 at 4:51 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think this movie posseses a lot of feminist ideas and attitudes, and definitely makes statements about women's oppression. However, I'm not sure it could be coined a true feminist film. It addresses many gender roles and expectations during this time period. Women were expected to be submissive and agreeable, and to create a peaceful household for their husbands and children. In some ways, Ada's character was the perfect woman: beautiful, talented and silent. Her piano was her voice and her outlet of expression, and eventually men robbed her of that as well. In this way, I do think that Campion was making a statement against patriarchy. Ada was forced into an arranged marriage, bargained her sexuality for her piano, and severely punished for expressing free will and desire. But in the end, Ada fell in love with the man who tried to buy her. I found it interesting that as Ada, Flora and Banes were leaving New Zealand, she was still unhappy enough to attempt suicide. In any other movie this would have been the typical happy ending: little family riding away into the sunset. Ada is still dissatisfied even after she has the "love of her life." Maybe Campion is commenting on the role of women in society today...While things have improved, we're still not where we'd like to be.

Posted by herma216 at 4:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This film could definitely go either way as being feminist or not. I don't think it was but I don't think it was patriarchial either. I know the director was a woman but this film was not simply viewed from the standpoint of a woman but it was also not just viewed from the male gaze either. I think the director is somewhat lying to herself when she says she is not a feminist film maker simply because this film does somewhat defy patriarchy. When she leaves her husband for another man, that is her being a strong woman and standing up for herself instead of just bowing down to his demands. This film was violent and kind of hard to watch. It made me cringe and it made me happy at the same time. The director did an excellent job at changing the gaze from male to female and somewhere in between. The peeping of the husband and the daughter at her sexcapades was one reason the gaze is not completely male, also there are so many moments of Ada and her daughter gazing at each other and at the piano that I don't think the gaze was directed at just one gender. It was a film to make you think and I believe the director succeeded.

Posted by izzy at 3:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

While viewing the film, "The Piano" my thoughts kept moving back and forth on whether it was feminist or not. Initially, knowing that the director was female affected me to read the film as feminist but as the film progressed I found myself with the complete opposite feeling. Yes, in the film we experience "gazes" from both the male characters and Ada but what really made me believe the film was not feminist was the element of the female voice in the film. In the Saco reading it says the feminist theory is that women rarely have a voice of there own. In this film Ada is mute therefore her voice shines through the piano and right off the bat the piano (her voice) is controlled by men. Alisdain tells Ada she can not bring the piano with her to her new home and later in the film when the piano is brought back into her life Baines uses it as a tool to get sexual control of her. Besides that she has to earn the piano back key by key from Baines showing that he is the owner and she is in a way his slave. In the end we see that she gets to be with the man she wants and the piano, but only because another man (Alisdain) made the choice for her. She never gets the chance to be free and have the voice she wants. It does not surprise me at all that Campion stated that she is not a feminist

film maker. While there are some elements that could make the film appear feminist, I believe over all Ada is dominated and seen as an object of desire by the men in the film.

Posted by woul0006 at 2:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When people watch a film, they already assume certain aspects of the characters or plot due to past experiences, media, and popular culture. They can also make predictions based on these assumptions. Mulvey says that the audience subconsciously identifies with the subject of the film. People take a passive role while watching films and let the main characters do all the thinking for them. They agree with that character and don’t actually watch the film critically. bell hooks says we need to be an “enlightened witness� when watching a film. We need to consider who made the film, the motive behind creating such a film, or shooting a specific scene in a specific way (ie framing & gazing), and what meaning the director was actually trying to convey. hooks says that we need to deconstruct the ideologies and mythologies of popular culture and clear our mind to critically analyze a film.

However, in order to change our way of thinking permanently and affect others, we need to be exposed to enough critiques over time to make critical thinking our only way of thinking. Hooks also says that in order to change society, we need to install the changes in “mass literacy�. These things will help change our society. Watching bell hooks’ film “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� and reading Kaplan has taught me to think critically about the actual directing and casting of a film and not just the plot. Kaplan asks us to question the “relationship between images on film and the context for their production� and “the meanings of women that are produced on film and how they relate to the meanings/images about them produced elsewhere ie socially, politically, and culturally�. Doing this will help and audience to think critically and look at the film from a different point of view besides the main character.

Posted by savor004 at 2:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I would not classify The Piano as a feminist film. My initial reasoning was that Campion was trying to be true to the setting of the film - a colonial patriarchal time and culture - however, when I reread bell hooks' article, I was struck by a question she asks:

Since this is not a documentary film that needs to remain faithful to the ethos of its historical setting, why is it that Campion does not resolve Ada's conflicts by providing us with an imaginary landscape where a woman can express passionate artistic commitment and fulfillment in a passionate relationship?

Posted by Natalie at 1:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Even though Campion explicitly stated that she is “not a feminist filmmaker�, she made specific choices in her directing of The Piano which could make the film be either or. If you look closely at the gazes in the film, the most significant gazes are female, and done by Ada to a male—Ada watching Baines undress while playing the piano, Ada caressing her husband’s bare back. These scenes go against mainstream cinema and depict a male as an object of desire. However, by the end of the movie, all hopes for a feminist film are overpowered by an ending of male dominance, patriarchy, and a woman making sacrifices for love.

According to hooks, ‘women in mainstream cinema seldom have a voice of their own’. Since Ada has lost her voice due to a broken heart already, her only form of communication is her piano. She has already been silenced by a man, and at the end of the movie, she is once again silenced. She gives up her piano because it has been tainted. She gives up her passion and hobby for a man. A feminist film would not end with a woman having to give up an important part of her life for a man. A woman should be able tohave room for both in her life—love and passion.

Posted by savor004 at 1:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Before watching the film I read the bell hooks article where I concluded that this was not going to be a feminist film. I went to www.imdb.com to see what the general population had to say about the film. The comments ranged from "epic love story" to "desperate and romantic". I had no idea what I was about to see. After watching the film I feel that this movie is drastically anti-woman. There is so many layers of violence towards women in this movie. We begin with Ada being essentially sold to Stewart. She is then sexually abused by Baines, something which we are supposed to find arousing. Baines then calls Ada a whore and gives her the piano back because he suddenly feels badly about his actions and then -bam- she's in love and the audience swoons. Then she is physically abused by Stewart who decides in the end to "give" her to Baines. And they all live happily ever after. This is the furthest thing from a feminist film. I think bell hooks was right when she wrote of Campion, "her work betrays feminist visions of female actualization, celebrates and eroticizes male domination". Campion stating that she is not a feminist filmmaker makes perfect sense to me. It's unfortunate that a women with obvious talent is wasting her time demeaning her own gender.

Posted by Tina Fey at 1:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When watching The Piano, I thought there was more focus on the Piano than anything else. There was indeed gaze directed at Ada, but not as much as the Piano. I think Jane Campion (director), was trying to show the importance of the Piano, rather than a male or female and their relationship, but the relationship between the Piano and Ada. I did however think it was interesting to see a film that did have just as much female gaze as it did male gaze. I believe there was just as much gaze on Baines and Alister, as there was on Ada. This may be attributed to the fact that the director is female, but I can't say for certain. The film is already set in a time when women had few rights if any, and that is clearly seen in this piece, but Ada, as well as her daughter Flora, were both blunt in their own ways. This makes me see the female characters as strong, not without rights. In these respects, I think the film has many feminist ties to it, which I can only assume were intentional on Campion's part. I think the film can e seen as feminist, if you take into consideration that Ada and Flora prevail after in times.

Posted by ande4840 at 1:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After watching the film the Piano as well as reading essays associated for this piece, I will have to disagree with the notion that this film could potentially be feminist. Or, the film may be directed such that it makes obvious (white) patriarchal ideals in our society by showing things such as the male gaze, voyeurism, subjugation of women, etc. It seems that the filmmaker wanted to expose the white patriarchal system and how women play a role in this system. Seeing as Campion is not a feminist film maker, I am surprised that this film could be seen as feminist; just because a woman has made a film with issues regarding womens' role in society, it does not make the film feminist. I feel that audiences primarily viewed this film as a love story rather than one showing the struggles of a 19th century woman and so in that sense, it was hard to critically view the film as a feminist one. One thing I feel that makes this film non feminist is due to the gaze used at various times in the movie. I would consider this gaze male.

Various examples include, the gaze used by Stewart when he first looks at a picture of Ada when going down to the beach, or when Baines looks at Ada at the beach or when she's playing the piano. Even when Ada uses the gaze, the gaze seems primarily male, such as when she's looking at Baines during their piano lessons or when she's looking at Stewart during when she's in the bedroom with him. But what is a feminine gaze? I feel as if it is only a version of the male gaze where the viewer is female rather than male. So can a film really be "feminist" if the gaze is only but a version of the male gaze directed towards men rather than women? I feel as if Ada was just another typical female character in a movie directed to show typical white patriarchal values rather than a progressive woman trying to break off stereotypes of the average woman.

Posted by hadix001 at 12:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I don’t believe that director Jane Campion’s gender had any sway on the way I viewed the film or its themes. As I watched The Piano I found myself focusing more on the ways that it showed an – as bell hooks put it – “uncritical portrayal of sexism and misogyny� than on the gender of the writer. I disagree with the way hooks spoke of the film for several reasons, mostly because she claims the film doesn’t look critically at sexism and misogyny. I think The Piano takes a very critical look at the male dominated colonial era and considers many of the ways that women were oppressed. In the film, Ada is no more than a commodity; her autonomy is taken from her when she is married to Stewart and further removed when she is given by her husband to Baines. Campion further demonstrates female oppression by literally taking away the voice of the main character Ada. Another way we see this sexism and misogyny is through the affair of Ada with Baines. Again we see the male in the power position; Ada is literally helpless because her piano – the only vehicle for self expression – is in the hands of the men of the film. As an observer of the film, I couldn’t help but notice the ever present oppression of Ada and in this way I think Campion truly gives us a critical view of what it was like for women of the colonial era (and even beyond).

Posted by joh02629 at 10:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

This film was defiantly an emotional rollercoaster. Campion proved to the audience that the “gaze� can be from a male, female and a piano standpoint. The “male gaze� exists when her husband looks at a picture of her before they meet, Baines watching her play the piano through the lace and the husband watching her and Baines through the wood work. Ada also watches Baine framed through the doorway, the piano on the beach and peaking through her fingers right at the beginning. Knowing that the director was a woman I watched the movie carefully for feminist critiquing but did not see much. I only noticed that Ada was looked at by the men as the “female object� of the gaze, as Mulvey would call her, the “object of desire�. Although, this film does respond to patriarchy quite obviously because Ada’s life was controlled by men. I agree with Mulvey’s thought in the Diana Saco’s reading how Ada is mute for a reason. In typical Hollywood blockbusters woman have a voice and are able to make their own decisions but Ada’s expression is through her piano. She is controlled by the men; she does what they tell her to because she cannot help it. All together I learned that “the gaze� can happen from any person or object. This film had examples of a feminist film but not as a whole. She and her daughter were not free to make their own decisions but they were not slaves to them or anything.

Posted by lemme021 at 8:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Writer/director Jane Campion's film “The Piano� is one of the most churning intensity and emotional film I have watched in a very long time. The story of a mute woman's rebellion lifestyle, who has willed herself not to speak, and with her strong-willed young daughter right by her side is a wonderful way to prove that not only does the ‘male gaze exist but also a ‘female gaze exists as well. Like stated by Diana Saco in her article The Piano and 'the Female Gaze', “The 'female gaze' can be viewed, broadly, as a way of understanding what possibilities exist not just for a feminine (or feminist) 'way of looking', but also for a feminine/feminist way of talking and being, The Piano clearly raises some interesting questions in this vain.� I strongly agree with this statement because with having the main character Ada a mute we watch through her ‘gaze’ throughout the entire movie; how she framed her husband and Baines through doors and windows. And the scene on the bed when we watch through Ada’s eyes as she rubs her hands on her husbands back in silence.

You have to watch though her perspective to even understand what she's feeling. And i personally don't think i felt this way because the writer/director was a women. When I watch movies it never is a concern if a women or male wrote the movies because what I get out of the movie doesn’t really matter what the sex of the writer is. With all this said, just because I think that there is a ‘female gaze’ doesn’t mean I think this is a feminist film because like Kaplan stated in her articles, people look for “Fully autonomous independent women“ in feminist films and I think the role of women in this film lack independence and really have no voice in this film, obviously because the main character is mute. So I am not surprised at the fact that Campion has explicitly stated that she is “not a feminist filmmaker.�

Posted by bues0040 at 5:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As someone who enjoys to watch movies, I thought it was a good movie. I can't say it completely meets all my likings for a movie, but I can't argue that it wasn't a beautiful movie. However, I don't find this movie to push many feminist ideas even though the main character and director are females. I'm glad the blog question asks, "Does [Campion's] gender affect your readings of the film as potentially feminist," and comes out and tells us that, "...Campion has explicitly stated that she is,"not a feminist film maker."" Of course knowing that we're watching a movie directed by a female in a feminist studies class affects my viewing the movie, but as I was watching the movie, I couldn't find a strong feminist under current to the movie. Even before I looked at the blog question I wondered to myself, "Is this really a feminist film?" thinking that being in a feminist class makes all movies we watch feminist and also watching a movie directed by a female making it an even greater chance the film is feminist. Of course anything can be perceived feminist if looked at from a certain angle, but the way I saw the film was not feminist from the way we have learned feminism in movies thus far in this class.

The female character, although she was the main character, didn't really have that much of a voice in the movie. As we stated in the class discussion that voice is literal and figurative. Throughout the movie it were the men that were making the decisions. Although we do experience Ada's gaze, it is at a piano while the male gaze is still directed toward the female body. I also think a real feminist movie would promote that all females are equally beautiful. In this movie, Ada is obviously very skinny with beautiful hair and beautiful skin. I think a feminist film might have a female body that doesn't meet popular cultures standard as a sexy female, but still shoots that less than standard body in a beautiful light. So again, beautiful film, but I feel it is not a feminist film. Thank you!

Posted by leex2356 at 5:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Jane Campion’s The Piano is not a feminist film. I will even go as far to say that it’s actually anti-feminist. Ada is an extremely passive character with no voice, both literally and figuratively. She does little to advance the narrative. The majority of her decisions are highly affected by the men in her life. I am not quite sure what would meet the criteria of a feminist film, but I doubt a film about a mute protagonist who gives into a man who used her for sexual gratification would qualify. Baines is an awful person, despite what the film wants the spectator to think. Through the language of film, The Piano assumes the viewer to initially despise Baines but eventually fall for him, like Ada. I agree with bell hooks when she writes in “Misogyny, Gangsta Rap and The Piano� that “‘positive’ surrender is encouraged by the ‘romantic’ portrayal of sexism and misogyny.� Campion’s direction manipulates the audiences into thinking, “Hey, I guess Baines is a good guy after all.�

The non-diegetic, uplifting string score we first hear when Ada makes the trip to see Baines signals that Ada has fallen for him despite how he used her. I think Campion puts her own attitudes of romanticized sexual harassment into both the script and the direction of the film. Her gender doesn’t affect my readings of the film as potentially feminist. I don’t think it would be fair to assume that because Campion is a woman, she has a duty to make her film feminist. I believe that Campion attempted to create this film in a way that responds to patriarchy in the elementary sense that the men in the film are terrible people. I think the anti-patriarchal message is blurred due to Ada’s weakness and love towards Baines. It doesn’t surprise me that Campion says that she is not a feminist filmmaker because if she was, she’d have a lot to own up to.

Posted by Da provida at 4:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Avant-Garde is a french term that means advance guard. It is typically used as an adjective to describe art that pushes the boundaries of the cultural norm and what is acceptable in our society. Avant-Garde can be fashion, theater, music, film, dance, or anything else that can be expressed as sort-of over the top/out there in essence. Because avant-garde is new and experimental, it can sometimes appear as complicated, dark, and very hard to read.

Posted by savor004 at 3:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Jane Campion has made a movie that is both entertaining and depressing at the same time. The directing/writing, acting and cinematography create an unforgettable movie. What Campion does for me is prove that the "gaze" is not only done or owned by the male gender an issue that I am sure Laura Mulvey would have a strong opinion on. The idea of the gaze according to Mulvey is completely the males gaze only. While there are plenty of examples of the "male gaze" in the film, it is the "female gaze" (which Diana Saco article explores) given by Ana that was more effective and intense than any other gaze in the film. Is this because the director was a woman? Maybe. Did her gender affect the way I looked at the film? No. There are things you can speculate on like how certain things were shot or how the story was told, but never during the film did something pop up in my head that made me think about how I could tell a female directed this film. Campion has made a great film and to me to judge her and the film on the guidelines that we have to keep in mind that she is a female is not only unfair to the film but extremely unfair to Campion.

Branching off of that I can completely understand why Campion explicitly stated that she is "not a feminist filmmaker". Let me make this clear, there would be nothing wrong if she would have said that she was, but by saying that she is not, herself and all of her films will be judged by people with a much more fair and open mind. I say that because I just feel if she said that she was a feminist filmmaker she would only be unfortunately judged on how well she did in comparison to her film and her beliefs. Instead I believe Campion wants to throw the idea of gender out the window and so she can just be judged on how good of a "filmmaker" she is. Now for me to decide if "The Piano" is a feminist film, that is much tougher. While we are given an incredibly strong and intelligent female character in Ada (he daughter is a very strong and intelligent as well; because of her mother no doubt), we are given scenes of torture and sexual assualt against woman. In that light it is hard for me to declare this a feminist film. When researching this film and looking at reviews, I think the best description of this film came from my all-time favorite film critic Roger Ebert. Ebert said, "It is a story of shyness, repression and loneliness; of a woman who will not speak and a man who cannot listen". That last line leave a sinking feeling in my stomach because I have suspicion that is something that could be said for many situations in the world. My question to whoever reads this is if Ana could speak, would her husband or Baine listen? In my opinion, during that period it wouldn't have mattered much either way.

Posted by keilh004 at 2:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In her movie, The Piano, director Jane Campion raises the crucial question: who’s gaze is the audience viewing the action through? I believe there are arguments in favor of both the typical “male gaze� and a new feministic “female gaze.� As Ann Kaplan sites in her essay, “Is the Gaze Male?� voyeurism and fetishism are both concepts of the male gaze; in the film, there are examples of both. Voyeurism shows up quite literally, when Ada’s husband watches her making love with Baines through the hole in the wall. Fetishism is also present once Ada enters into her “deal� with Baines to get her piano returned. Baines frequently focuses on one specific body part of hers: the neck, the shoulder, and the calf. In these instances, the film would appear to have that of the male gaze—especially in conjunction with the fact that it displays a woman who is literally unable to “speak� for herself nor take charge of her own life.

However, it is crucial to take into account that the director is a woman. In this light, what would be gross stereotypical factors now become criticisms of social roles within the mass film industry. After all, many aspects of the film are quite symbolical. Ada’s decision to refuse speech and instead to express herself through the piano is one example. In a world where her voice-vocal or not-is not heard because she is a woman, she has found a way to force people to listen. As the other women in the film express, her music “creeps inside you� whether one wants it to or not. Finally, one must also take into account that Jane Campion states that she is “not a feminist filmmaker.� I judge that this, coupled with the evidence for both a male or female gaze, leaves the decision up to the audience—a refreshing opportunity to discover and interpret meaning without it being dictated!

Posted by lenth006 at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The film Piano represents a very specific cite for contestations of modern feminist philosophy. In her article “Misogyny, gangster rap and the Piano� bell provides one such reading of this film as anti-female as it eroticizes sexual harassment, portrays the voiceless woman, and tells the story of colonized land, bodies, and peoples -in the case the Maori people (which hooks perhaps problematically categorizes as being represented as “docile happy darkies without a care in the world�). The Piano, though perhaps not the strongest feminist film, is certainly a challenging piece that forces us to grapple the complexity of human contact, sexuality, and desire.

Given the historical context the film is structured within it certainly has messages about the realities of patriarchy and colonialism. Women are portrayed within this context. Women lived within this context. hooks argues “violence against land, natives, and women in this film, unlike that of gansta rap, is portrayed uncritically, as though it is “natural�'. I think the film does not reinforce these structures as “natural�, rather any story about colonialism or patriarchy set in that time period might have told the story of subjugation (and would be responsible to show the effects of subjection)- this one being no different. Though I don't believe simply by the presence of a female director we are in the realm of feminist film, I also don't believe telling the story of sexual-harassment/violence that ends in love in inherently misogynic, if the effects of the violence and harassment are also explored.

Posted by Sofia at 8:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

“The Piano� is not a feminist film in my eyes. Overall, the plot was interesting and kept my attention, but the patriarchal mode of thinking was blatantly obvious. Even though the director was female, the women of this film are greatly suppressed. Granted, one must keep in mind the time in history that this story takes place. Ada is passed around like an object (the piano) from her father-to her new husband-to Baines. This continuous cycle throughout the film shows Ada and Flora as always being “owned� by a male character. The male gaze is also present in almost every scene with Ada and husband/Baines. We see this gaze in the very beginning of the film, when the viewers are first introduced to the husband. He is starring at the daguerreotype of his future wife, Ada. The silver image becomes a mirror when angled slightly, and this acts as a tool to capture the refection of husband’s face. His control over Ada is obvious from the very beginning. Kaplan in her article, “Is the Gaze Male?“, discusses the question of Can the male gaze be female?

I noticed in this film that there is a female gaze, literally, but it is always derived from the male’s power. For example, when Ada gazes at her piano, the audience knows she is thinking about Baines. Even though the gaze is coming from Ada, the gaze is a result of the seduction from Baines.

Posted by kerli006 at 5:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

First off, this is a little longer than intended, and I do apologize to Jessica and Elakshi. However, I feel incredibly strongly about this film, and had a few points I felt I needed to make.

After viewing Jane Campion’s film The Piano in class, I was rather horrified at the prospect that this could ever be interpreted as a feminist film – much less a pro-female film by any measure. I vehemently disagree with the notion that Campion made this film to respond specifically to the patriarchy; instead, I feel that it supports some of the most basic institutions of women’s oppression while supplementing its troubling message with other various and sundry injustices sprinkled throughout the story.

Engaging many issues such as imperialism, disability, literacy and gender, Campion creates a narrative that evokes a Victoriana that aligns itself closely with the accepted canonical view of Western history. To me, there is nothing in the director’s presentation of these issues that suggests the redressing of these issues that many critics and viewers hailed the film for. The most disturbing part of the film for me was the dichotomy between disability and desire in the character of Ada. The audience is consistently reminded by other characters that Ada’s deafness constitutes “damaged goods�, and that it may be correlated to lesser mental abilities or a lack of sanity – all while managing to constitute the perfect Victorian woman: slight, silent, becoming and modest. Both her husband and Baines bring her into their respective homes as an ornament of beauty and pleasure – though Baines ultimately exploits her passion for playing her piano, effectively coercing her into a sexual and emotional relationship where she has no more agency than before.

Though some might argue that Baines is empowering Ada by offering her the choice to engage in a bargain - to refuse or deny the offer, an indulgence which her husband did not grant her - it is clear to the viewer that Ada has no choice. If she refuses, she loses her ‘voice’. Ada’s playing is rapturous, passionate – Baines has the pleasure of looking at her perform on the beach, and quickly realizes the exploitative possibilities; he brings Ada into his home under the guise of wanting lessons, only to first encourage her to perform for him, eventually leading to her sexual coercion and exploitation. Ultimately, Ada’s sexual and emotional desire, which itself was borne of sexual violence, leads to her own physical and psychological undoing: when her husband finds out of the affair with Baines, he mutilates Ada’s hand, gruffly commenting that he is “merely clipping her wing�. To me, this symbolism was crystal clear: a woman’s personal agency is restrained to what her male keepers, or the patriarchy, will allow - in this case, desire within the context of sexual violence. Furthermore, any attempt to express desire or willfulness will result in further violence. I found this film to be absolutely, completely, unbelievably maddening.
Calling back to the material we read by bell hooks, assuming that a film made by a woman could possibly be considered feminist by virtue of the director’s gender alone is a dangerous mistake. Assuming that Campion’s womanhood immediately guarantees that her work be considered as part of a different – much less better - plane of gendered representation is unequivocally wrong. hooks calls for us to be an enlightened witness; making such assumptions without considering the content and nature of the work itself is what continues to lead us down such dangerous roads of representation.

I promise to keep it a little more succinct next week. Again, my apologies.

Posted by allison at 2:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have come to the conclusion that The Piano was not a feminist film whatsoever. The whole film focused on the ownership of property, the property being Ada. Ada never really had control of where she was going, she was given away by her family in the beginning and then given away by Stewart in the end. It was also the men that truly owned the piano and the men who either allowed or did not allow Ada express herself through playing it. One could say that Campion did do a thorough job at showing what an extreme version of patriarchy may look like and how the voice of the women is lost within this type of patriarchy but still does not lead me to believe that this is a feminist film.

I found that the perspective of the gaze very interesting throughout this film, although the gaze is pointed towards the man I still found it to be a male gaze rather than Ada purposely gazing on the men. By this I mean that for most of the film I felt that even though the camera was gazing on the male body, it was an unwanted gaze, and that Ada for the most part was forced into doing it. An example of this is during one of the "lessons" when Baines undresses for Ada, the camera lingers over his body, but this is not a wanted gaze, Ada at this point of the film still disliked Baines and only put up with his attraction to be able to play the piano. Also during the scene where it is just Baines and the camera is gazing on his naked body, I still felt that the gaze was Baines on the piano, not the camera on Baines. I felt that it was his power he had over Ada sexually dominated the piano. Another scene that I still am unsure about is the scenes where Ada is with Stewart and she is caressing his body. I personally felt that she was only doing that because she knew that is what Stewart wanted and hoped that by doing that she may leave her and Baines alone. This is why she was always doing the caressing and did not want him to really touch her at all.

Over all I felt that this film just portrayed the various forms of power men can have over women, but not that this was a feminist film. The only decision that Ada really made her self was whether she was going to continue living. I felt that that is why she put her foot in the rope, just to have some choice that only she and she alone could make. Which I think is sad, that the only choice she really had was life or death.

Posted by lars2805 at 2:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In terms of feminist vibes I felt that it was more significant that the central character is a women that that Campion is woman. I don't think Campion (however hard she may have tried) or anyone for that matter, can escape from responding to "patriarchy". What I think is important is the way Campion attempts to follow a patriarcichal examlpe such as when she uses the "male gaze" described in Kaplan's article "Is the Gaze Male?" when Baines looks at Ada. Also when Baines caresses the piano naked I thought of fetishism Saco described in her article on The Piano. However, Campion does also focus on sexualizing the male body such as when Baines is fully naked in the doorway and when Ada is stroking Stewart's rear. I'm not surprised that Campion doesn't think of her work as feminist. Ada and Flora (while central to the plot) are physically subjugated by men, which may be a nice construction for historical fiction, but doesn't really give off an "empowerment of women" vibe.

The Piano is a feminist film though. I mean while the film does present a grim and extremely depressing scenario, it reflects the types of oppression (such as sexual subordination, dependence on men and lack of a voice) that women have had to and continue to struggle to overcome in some places. Ada's piano was actually never hers until the very end of the film. First her father bought it and allowed her to play it. So when Stewart and Baines seem to be the only one's to ever mess with her piano (and voice), they are actually just taking over where her father left off. Just because a director chooses for things to be as horribly oppressive as possible doesn't necessarily make it anti feminist.

Posted by CrazyOldMaurice at 3:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After watching The Piano, I have concluded that, it was not a feminist film. There are many examples throughout the movie in which I based my conclusion off of; however, the most significant example I found was the point and title of the film: the piano.
As Ada is mute, she cannot speak for herself. She uses her daughter as a sign language interpreter and she uses her piano as a way to express her feelings (this can be seen in multiple scenes, but mostly when she is with Baines). However, her daughter became influenced by men, this can be understood when Flora says that she’ll never call Alisdair her father, but starts to do so towards the end of the film. Thus Flora can, theoretically, be managed by men. That leaves Ada with her self-expression via her piano. But as Diana Saco states in her article “Feminist Film Criticism: The Piano and ‘The Female Gaze’�, even the piano “is subject to the whims of the male characters�. This can be understood as the piano is sold and then used as blackmail for sexual favors from Ada.

While the counter argument may contain something like “The Piano is a feminist film because Ada is feisty and aggressive�, it can be debated that while Ada is feisty and aggressive, she gives into the male dominance anyway. For example she tears linens downs and breaks things when Alisdair tells her to teach Baines how to play the piano (aggressive), but she goes and teaches Baines anyway.
The happy fairy tale ending also seems a bit patriarchal, as Hooks mentions in her article “Misogyny, gangsta rap, and The Piano�. Baines seems to have control over Ada, as he has made her a new finger (to which Ada will forever be indebted to him for); Flora seems to have no traumatic memories even though she witnessed her mother’s finger get axed off; and Ada is now the modest wife. These examples and others provided me with substantial evidence to support my conclusion that The Piano, even though written and directed by a woman, is not a feminist film.

Posted by Eleanor Roosevelt at 2:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

According to Saco, Ada in the film serves traditional role of woman without voice, literally. While the concept of “voice� is an important one in feminism, I think in some senses it downplays potentially “progressive� aspect of representing person who is speechless. Despite her being unable to speak she is quite assertive from the beginning and while not all her wishes materialize, she is not by any means simply a passive player. Her agency is also quite obvious in her ability to avoid, or at least, delay sexual contact with both male characters.
The commodification criticism is clearly an important one, but let’s not forget the context of the film – it’s a portrayal of mid-19th century colonial life of the Europeans.

We cannot understand fully the situation simply in terms of gender. We should try to understand how specific class location (Ada and her husband appears to be from the upper class background), as well as context of colonialism and rise of capitalism play part in the story. How commodification of women is related to capitalist commodification of essentially everything in life? Also, the Victorian times are often seen as paradigm of prudence and “morality� (which is rather myth than reality), it is still useful to look at this film in that context and realize that it is not a simple representation of obedience, powerlessness, and unchallenged male power. Even if the film could be analyzed as heterosexist, it still paints quite complex picture of human desire. To simply dismiss it (especially without contextualizing the time and identity of characters) as anti-feminist feels quite a stretch.
I found the “happy ending� to be the typical hollywoodish conservative closure. After exploring the complexity of desires throughout the film, it portrays tamed and stable feeling, very much contrary to what’s been evoked throughout the film.

Posted by Arnoldas at 8:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I really enjoy bell hooks' views on misogyny and gangsta rap. I think it is really nice to find such a strong feminist that is willing to put her views and perspectives in such a different perspective and not communicate it as, she quotes herself, "feminist trash."
I agree with her that the misogynist and sexist ways of behaving and thinking that are portrayed in a majority of the rap videos and lyrics are reflections of ways that people of today's society think, feel, and behave.
In bell hooks article, "Misogyny, Gangsta Rap, and The Piano," she talks about an interview she conducted about a year ago with the popular Rap artist, Ice Cube. When they got together they sat down and respectively shared views and opinions on politics, values, and self determination amongst the Black race. It was thought that is bell hooks, an extreme feminist, got together with Ice Cube, a tough rap artist, that they would tear each other's throats out with harsh, bitter comments. I liked how this plan backfired. It just goes to show, that a person cannot judge another on how they may view issues, what they may value, or how they may act simply based on what kind of a person they are perceived to be.

Posted by hendr324 at 4:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I found the Bell Hooks documentary to be very enlightening. While I've taken other feminist classes as well as film classes she brought some new ideas to light for me. I thought the most interesting point, something I hadn't really thought of before, was the journalist she brought up who wrote the review on Spike Lee. It made me realize that those who do not watch films critically, and maybe some that do, often rely on reviews to help them decide how they feel about films. Often these reviews reflect the opinions of "typical" society. I think it's crucial to not only watch films critically but to also watch them without the bias of another's opinion. After watching this documentary I hope to never read another film review again- unless it's written by a feminist! I was also intrigued by her response to the O.J. Simpson case. I find her refusal to give people only what they want and her fight against the main stream very inspiring. To say that the murder of Nichole Simpson came domestic violence was probably the most profound statement I've heard about that case. I feel that in every thing that Bell Hooks says she is really getting to the core of the issue and making us think about what things really mean instead of what society thinks they should mean.

Posted by Tina Fey at 4:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In her film, “Cultural Criticism and Transformation,� belle hooks critiques not only the way we view popular culture, but what this system fosters, and how we play an integral role in the permeation of racism, sexism, etc. through the seemingly passive activity of media consumption. In illustrating her ideas, she uses examples from popular media, in both written word and the silver screen and then juxtaposes what was happening in the film—both on the surface and analytically—to what the audience saw, remembers. She also compares this difference to portray broader problems by showing the ways in which the creators (editors, directors) become enslaved to a system driven by money-making, and the item up for auction is the identity of classically disenfranchised groups.
In Mulvey’s article, she talks about the visual pleasure that is often erotic, and often derived from “the look� which in our terms is also known as the “gaze.� The object is female and the “looker� of is male. The fact that women are the object of the possessive male gaze for the purpose of providing visual pleasure means that women lack agency, or the power and choice as to whether they want to be possessed in this way. This is somewhat like a caging of the female identity, which is similar to the “framing� we discussed in lecture. The female on screen is consistently framed and imprisoned in windows, mirrors, etc. They are essentially trapped in the male gaze, and not at their own volition.
hooks harps on this idea of visual pleasure at the detriment of women and the African American community in her discussion of mainstream rap music videos in which the images of women are “fragmented� in a way that shows the viewer that these women are nothing more than their aesthetically pleasing parts. These women also commonly have lighter skin, and straighter, lighter hair. hooks points out that women with darker complexions are rarely featured in these videos. This also sends the message to viewers that Caucasian features in women are more sexually attractive, and therefore more valuable, as their sole identity as sexual objects is established.
The film changed my thinking a bit because I usually do not consider myself a party to these images that are projected in the media. However, as a consumer, I have mindlessly consumed racist and degrading material while, as a social activist, I have sat idly by and allowed my role in the continuation of this disgraceful cycle to go unnoticed.

Posted by J Kriegs at 12:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks made me reaize that, when it comes to film-watching, I am completely oblivious.  I look back now and I can see all the racial profiling, gender discrimination, and stereotyping that took place in many of my favorite films. I will now watch movies with a more critical eye.  In the movie "Kids" it was greatly disturbing to see a girl get raped "gently".  Rape is never ok, and the fact that the director portrayed it as "gentle" thing makes me think he was trying to make it ok.  Also, I realize that race plays a big part in movie roles.  If the director doesn't cast people of all colors, shapes and sizes, he is seen as a racist or as fitting a steroetype.  The "bad guy" can't always be Black, but he can't always be White, Asian, Mexican, etc. either.  There are plenty of films that portray non-black criminals now days, so I'm not too concerned about films having a racist nature.

Posted by conw0077 at 11:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)

First of all, I like how bell hooks is never capitalized. I suspect that is done deliberately...
Anyways, the interview with bell hooks was incredibly enlightening. The term she uses, "White Supremacist,, Capitalist Patriarchy" sums up through which lens she believes one should analyze media. As consumers and target audiences, we often times take things at face value. We need to understand the deliberateness in which media is produced: by whom, for whom and why. Often times, media is produced to reinforce the White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy which is the reality of our mainstream society. First is to be aware of this, to be "enlightened witnesses," then we need to dismantle it by critical analyzing. White Supremacy is a current state of our society and media that seems outdated, but hooks reminds us it is not, through examples of how blackness is used as a resource deployed by white people for their advantage.

This concept is used in the film "Waiting to Exhale," which was produced by white people using the coolness of blackness as a marketable resource. A black person creating media cannot pass through without using white guidelines of what is right. (Spike Lee is critiqued much more harshly than others and not given credit for his achievements.)
Capitalism is a system where making as much money as possible is central to its values. We need to remember that media, the movie industry specifically for this discussion, is just that: an industry. Creating something that makes money. It takes part in the capitalist system and will use whatever ways possible to gain as much profits as possible. Hooks illustrates to us that Madonna clearly takes part in this system by jumping on whatever latest trend makes her the most money. Whether that be playing the innocent girl, a sexy helpless woman, or even playing a feminist.
And lastly, Patriarchy is a social construct positioning males at the top, in control and with the authority. In media, Patriarchy is reinforced by having males at the center of the plot, seen most on screen and speaking the most lines. Hooks points out that in the movie, "Kids," the girls are often seen but not heard.
These three terms put together give us an understanding of how we need to be analyzing movies, according to bell hooks.

Posted by AJ at 11:25 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hook uses this term in her film as a way of grouping all the "interlocking systems of domination." This allows movie watchers or music listeners to analyze issues of gender and racism, among other things under one term. Hook believes that racism is a term that "keeps white people at the center of the discussion" because it is a term that was developed by white people but can be directed in any way toward any group. On the other hand, she uses the term White Supremacy as a term to analyze racism that can "evoke a political world that we all frame ourselves in relationship to." It is interesting to look at films in this way because it doesn't just end with the two categories of white and other. It is almost like a spectrum that is easily noticed now that it has been brought to my attention. Even when it comes to black characters in movies or music videos the darker the skin of the character the more likely they are to play a delinquent or degrating role. In most cases it can be summed up as the lighter your skin is the better person you are and the darker your skin the worse you are.

The capatalist part of Hooks term "White Supremacist Capatalist Patriarchy" can be seen in the manipulated representation of females. Hook makes a good observation that after women went to work during WWII they were expected to return to the home when the war was over, this vision of women was made public through adds and propaganda. It is very similar to the rape, SM, and brutal sex seen in films now because that is the white male capatalist film society trying to regain control of women from their feminist ways and back into the home.

Posted by rasmu281 at 11:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks had a heck of a lot to say about watching films with a critical, feminist eye! Not only was she completely clear and concise in her analysis of the media and movies that were addressed but she let no injustice go without saying. The techniques she employed in bringing out the multiple "isms" (racism, sexism, chauvinism, etc.) were not so mechanistic to be easily described but more of an abstract, feminist lens through which she viewed not only films but the world. The terms capitalism and white supremacy were two terms she used in her discussion of the what she believed to be the root causes of the "isms" within the films. She is addressing the big picture issues by using these terms and not poking around at the "symptoms" of the larger problems that are taking place within our society. Capitalism is the driving force of our economy and to make the money one has to cater to the people in power,..hence white supremacy. In other words, in order to make money in the move industry one must work within the discourses already set up. Her quote " there isn't any money on the left" says it all.

Her film has really done nothing but feed my already raging fire. I have been aware that everything we are fed by any form of media is a means to keep the democratic patriots at work and "happy". As well as keeping the capitalist sate which we live in in proper order. Because of her film I have more tools to pull out the "isms" being employed.

Posted by Revolutionary at 11:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks' film teaches us how to watch films critically because she guides us through the steps she takes when analyzing films. She breaks it down into manageable pieces. For starters, she mentions that film-makers make conscious decisions to portray and/or exploit individuals in certain ways, whether we realize it or not (most people, I think, are not aware of how much thought goes in to the film-making process and the meanings behind every little part of films).

Hooks discusses the framing of men versus women, as well as the roles men are given versus the roles women are given. Women are typically portrayed as sex objects. Their main purpose in films is not to be strong, main characters, but to be somewhat in the background; almost like a filler. Even if women are the "main characters," Hooks mentions that in Kids (I believe) people remembered the names of the two star male characters in the film, but could not remember the names of the two star female characters. In class, we talked about the male gaze/watched the YouTube clip on it; we saw that women are often zoomed in on and looked at from a distance, portraying this idea that women are to be looked at from afar and are "hard to get."

Hooks also looks at violence; sexual and physical. Male dominance is a huge issue for Hooks. Movies and music videos show male dominance in nearly every script, some more obvious than others. How often do we see female dominance? If we do see it, the men are perceived as being whipped or non-masculine. Maybe their should be more equality displayed between men and women; although that probably wouldn't make for good flicks.

The one concept Hooks uses regularly throughout the film is White Supremacy. One specific example stands out to me; she mentioned that filmmakers can portray black people/black culture without even including black actors on screen. What does that tell us? It's hard for me, as a white person, to notice things like this because of the white privilege that I have.

Hooks' film has definitely influenced the ways in which I will watch films from now on. I am able to analyze the roles that characters are given in a way that I have never thought of before. I think this was a good way to start thinking about feminism in films as well.

Posted by bute0023 at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

After watching the Bell Hooks film "Cultural Criticism and Transformation" I felt like I hadn't notcied a lot of the ways filmmakers try to force their ideas and perspectives onto the viewer of the film. In the movie "Kids" I thought the rape scene was really disturbing because it was almost as if the director tried to make the rape ok because of the way the boy was saying nice things to the girl while it was happening, not that she could hear him anyway, and trying to make it look like he wasn't forcing himself on her, but he was. It is scary to think of a young boy watching this film and then think it is ok to do something like this because it was portrayed in a way that didn't look like rape, when in fact it was. I think that after watching this film in the future I will notice more the ways the filmmakers try to portray different kinds of people in the manner they believe is the right way, when really it is just their opinion on how that person should be. For example, in the film "Smoke" I thought it was interesting how the character of the black boy wasn't written specifically for a black character but the personality of the character caused the director to pick a black person because the director thought that is who would represent that character better. But why did a black person have to play that character? It wasn't necessary, it was just the way the director viewed the character, which then forced anyone who watched that film to view that character as black.

Posted by hall0778 at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

The first-wave feminism movement refers to the 19th and early 20th century feminist activities that were beginning to take place. This suffrage movement focused mainly on the inequalities that were being supported through the de jure process. It is hard to concentrate on the details of everyday unfairness that you have to deal with as a woman when the law doesn’t even see you as a full citizen. After gaining the right to vote in 1920 the women’s movement started to challenge the de facto inequalities. The first-wave feminist movement set the cornerstone for womens right.

Posted by hass0257 at 10:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks film Cultural Criticism and Transformation teaches us that you need to watch films as an enlightened witness. Being an enlightened witness means becoming critically vigilant about the world we live in. In the section Motivated Representation Bell Hooks talks about the movie Smoke. In the movie the theft is an African American boy yet the script never asks for an African American actor. Bell Hooks asks the director of the film Smoke why he chose to cast an African American boy and he couldn’t answer her. The director without knowing it reproduces certain kinds of racial stereotypes. We as the audience have to be conscious of racial, gender and other profiling in pop culture. Bell Hooks also mentions that film making isn’t about magical thinking, imagination or creativity, its about people consciously knowing what kinds of images make an impact. Which means they only pick an African American as the theft because they know it’ll make an impact. Key terms Hooks mentions are White Supremacy, Capitalist, and Patriarchy. They refer to an institutional structure, not individual beliefs. Bell Hooks said that if she just looks through the critical lenses of gender or race you’ll miss the bigger picture when looking at pop culture but if you use these key terms you will see the bigger picture. Bell Hooks’s film has made me think when I watch a film how is each person being portrayed and how each situation is being handled. One topic that she talked about that struck with me is when she is talking about the rape scene in the film Kids. The movie Kids said that there would be a brutal rape and to be advised when watching. Bell Hooks points out that if you were not able to see the rape and you were only able to hear what was happening you would think that it was just two people making love not a brutal rape. I would of never thought that before she pointed it out. I mean I know that was rape when watching the movie but that was because she told us before the scene was played. If someone were just shown that clip of the rape they wouldn’t know it was rape. This fact was an eye opener for me because of how this could be so differently perceived. Bell Hooks pointed out to us that no one wanted to talk about the feminist movement; there has been a great back last against feminist being played out in movies. Back around WW II when women bad to work in the factories mass media was used to get them back into the kitchen and now mass media is trying to get women out of feminist ways of thinking and back into patriarchy way of thinking. I never thought about this happening in pop culture and knowing this has really opened up my eyes.

Posted by breme071 at 9:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

I felt that the most moving part of this movie was bell hooks' title argument, on the idea of critical thinking and transformation. That the ability to view media and the the world in away that you become an “enlightened witness� and through this enlightenment can change their own lives more so than could monetary gain or social capital. Her theory of the White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy summed up the state of our society better than did the previous terminology of racism, sexism and classism. Our social structure has been set up in a way that reinforce stereotypes of violent hyper masculinity and over-sexualized femininity, that in turn reinforces the power structure mainly that which keeps old rich WASP men on top. She argues this through the discussion of both womens framing and objectification in film as well as showing us how media glorifies/celebrates male sexual violence and violence in general. Also in her talk of Spike Lee and Madonna she demonstrates how the system can work for and against pop culture icons. Madonna considered a feminist by graphically and publically displaying her sexuality and Spike Lee being reviewed as a failure, because his movies didn't make sense to white viewers...but ultimately just because he is black. Her talk definitely helped me to rethink film and to view it more critically by seeing these underlying concepts for what they are, namely a framework for societies structural of oppression of the Other.

Posted by spiek010 at 9:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks approaches the topic of popular culture with a voice that is not commonly heard within pop culture, the voice of an African American woman. Hooks presents the audience with the proposition of “thinking critically� when viewing the images and ideas that we as a society are spoon fed through cinema, television, and other media sources. Foremost she examines symbolisms of our white supremacist, capitalist patriarchy, asking viewers to become “Enlightened witnesses, and to be critically vigilant.� Hooks urges the audience to not just accept pop culture ideas and images, but to deconstruct and analyze them.

How are women and people of color most often displayed? Simply put, women equal subjugated sex objects, and minorities are generally generalized as stereotypes. As a viewer it is complicated to accept these ideas as projections of fiction, rather than examples of live truths. These exploitations of oppressed people further society’s negative attitudes and actions; imprinting visions of age old sexism and white supremacy. Hooks explores the condition to which the male P.O.V can objectify a female’s body instantly. Furthermore she examines the OJ Simpson trail, pulling forward the evidence of how white vs. black was used to cover up the real issue of domestic male violence. She continues to also explore the chronology of Madonna’s career; from a groundbreaking feminist artist, to an old woman who sold her body to capitalism.

As a beginning feminist filmmaker, I believe I have in many ways been doing my best to view films critically, and to write screenplays with strong female lead characters. However, Bell Hooks was able to present new ideas of “cover-ups.� Such as the OJ trial, what is behind the circus that’s not getting the attention it deserves? I am now thinking about discovering deeper points that are often obstructed by lavish distractions, or even masked by other societal issues. Also I have been reminded of the capitalist control over the images and ideas that are introduced to audiences daily.

Posted by sind0026 at 9:38 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I have read bell hooks' philosophy before and I must say its nice to finally be able to put a face to the name. I tend to agree with her ideas on cultural criticism. We must be conscious of the power that pop culture has in creating systems of oppression. I found the OJ trial part interesting, as I had never really thought about how race was used as a smokescreen for the patriarchy surrounding that ordeal. I loved the idea of "mock feminism" in films like Waiting to Exhale. Movies like that one show how important it is to be able to see through patriarchal rhetoric in order to become what hooks refers to as an "enlightened witness". I can't have a blog about hooks without mentioning "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy", since that seems to be one of her favorite phrases, but I think it emphasizes the need to focus on the interconnectivity of all parts of identity, not just race or gender. I can't help but wonder: would it be possible to include a word like hetero-sexist or homophobic to that long string of words?
hooks has really challenged me to think more critically about pop culture. I'll never watch a film the same way again.

Posted by allora at 8:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

bell hooks’ film “Cultural Criticism and Transformation teaches us to watch films critically by asking us to question the things that we take for granted about popular culture and blockbuster films. hooks wants us to consider who the movie is made by and for, where the funding comes from, what the filmmaker expects us to believe about themselves, and decode the underlying messages of sexism, racism, class, and heterosexism (to name a few) that support the authority of the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy (WSCP). She asks us to become “agents of change� and understand that film culture has a certain agenda to follow, and begs us to rethink our interpretation of rap music, cinema, and mass media by interpreting popular icons such as OJ Simpson, Madonna, the film Braveheart, Spike Lee, etc, by understanding how gender, race, privilege, and class play into popular culture.
hooks’ film has caused me to consider future film watching differently because I believe in her work which states that media and film reinforces the WSCP. Although I have not watched any films since we watched hooks in class,

I know that from now on I will take a more critical lens to the media that I do encounter. I had many eye-opening experiences during the film, and often said to myself “I never thought of it that way.� I realized that the culture that I grew up with has taught me to blindly accept the WSCP and not to question it or think anything else, and I will now reject it. Blatant displays of powerless and sexed up women (such as the bathing beauties with gratuitous breast, leg, and bottom shots that hooks often spoke about) have always made me uncomfortable and I wondered how cinema could get away with such displays of women, now I know it is due to the WSCP. Now I just have to decide which of her many, many books to read!

Posted by Mel at 8:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

One can see that Bell Hooks is an intellectual and a scholar that is devoted to critical consciousness and awarness of oneself and society. In her lecture she has focused on the interconnectivity of race, class, and gender and their ability o produce and perpetuate systems of opression and domination. She clearly emphasises that topics can not be dealt with sepereatly but have to be understood as being interconnected.
In her video on Cultural Criticism and Transformation, bell asks why we should study popular culture, and answers by arguing that we need to resist representations - not be free of them, but to be critically vigilant regarding them. Because popular culture has great power in our everyday lives, she suggests that the process of critiquing popular culture is the site of pedagogy and learning, and it is a way of strengthening our students' sense of agency.Early on in the movie she explains the importance of the freedom found from the mass based literacy movement. This show us that the first step to thinking critically is decolonizing our mind which then allows us to find our own voice. Through this process people can resist the reinscribed ideas of Race, class, and gender and move towards becoming an "enlightened witness".
Hooks showed the complex nature of being truly critical, and with that she has opened a path for starting an honest conversation on sensitive subjects. I loved when she talked about "American cultures obsession with transgression and change". While many believe that society has made great progress with the state of constant respect for the "other" by mantaining a system of "P.C" (political correct), it is because of this notion that we fail to start a genuine and honest dialouge about the real issues that are presented. Hooks explains this by stating that the "Postmodern theory, that is not seeking to simply appropriate the experience of "otherness" in order to enhance it's discourse or to be radically chic should not seperate the "politics of difference" from the politics of racism."
As a black, muslim, female immigrant I am aware that the cure for oppression is not going to come from the oppressor, it is with movies such as the Hooks lecture that I can find tools and strategies to overcome the fear of becoming a part of an institutional construct of the White Supremacist, Capitalist Patriarchy.

Posted by hass0257 at 7:49 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Posted by hass0257 at 7:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In the film “Cultural Criticism and Transformation,� bell hooks tells us to think critically. She wants us to become “enlightened witnesses� by being critically attentive to the world we live in. The media of popular culture is deeply visual and people with money and power can produce whatever images they want. hooks stresses the importance of questioning who produced and directed a film as part of examining its contents critically. Being a sociology major, I was particularly interested in much of her discussion about popular culture. It was interesting to me when she pointed out how Hollywood movies can suddenly make issues important. Her example was with the movie Braveheart, but there are many other examples. I was also very interested in her ideas about a sense of entitlement that some students feel as opposed to others. She said that when she taught at Yale, students had a sense of entitlement and more of a sense of imagination about the possibilities for their futures.

When she taught in Harlem, students did not have this imagination, although they had equal intelligence. I agree completely with this as it goes along with many sociological theories.
There is much more that I could go on about but overall I would have to say that hooks gave me some tools to think more critically about the films that I watch and question the messages that are being conveyed both subconsciously and consciously. This is a great intro film to prepare us for our film watching.

Posted by Jolene Lewis at 2:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Thinking critically about films is a relatively recent idea. Not until the 1960s did people truly sit down and start thinking about what exactly it was that the films they were watching were telling them. As bell hooks points out in her “Cultural Criticism and Transformation,� “popular culture is…where the learning is,� and pop culture is made up primarily of movies, music, and the celebrities of the decade.

In her 1975 article, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,� Laura Mulvey discusses scopophilia, the love of looking. She discusses how women are put on display in movies for men’s pleasure through the use of close-ups, slow motion shots, fragmentation of women’s bodies, and the a literal framing of women. She discusses how the male and female characters are viewed in the film

Hooks takes this idea and expands it, talking about how all of those movies that depict women as nothing more than male fantasies add on to each other to create a massive pop culture that teaches us that women are meant to be objectified. She teaches us that in order to view films critically we must be aware of the fact that every image we see has been created by someone. We must take the filmmakers into account whenever we watch a film. We must take the producers into consideration whenever we hear a piece of music. These images do not simply appear; they must be created. And if they are being created, we must think of why that is.

One of the best points hooks makes is when she points out how mass media were used after World War II to bring women out of the factories and into the home. Now those same media are being used to bring women out of feminism, as well as to reinforce racist stereotypes that decent members of society have been trying to fight.

Actually, that phrase in and of itself would irritate hooks because I use the word “racist.� Hooks dislikes that word because it “keeps white people at the center of the discussion.� She prefers the phrase “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy� because it brings together all of the main things wrong with media today. Rich, old, white men are the ones making most of the decisions when it comes to which films should be made, how to shoot a music video, who should be cast in them, etc. These mean assume, states hooks, that “we all share the common morality of the dollar,� which is to make as much money as you can regardless of what you have to do to earn it.

Hooks disagrees, and so do I. Having vast amounts of money doesn’t mean much when to get it you must help create a society where the person doesn’t matter, only the stereotype. I can’t speak for hooks, but I know I wouldn’t care if women were occasionally objectified in films or if black men were occasionally depicted as the bad guy. Money does matter to a lot of people, and in order to get money you must sell something, and sex and violence sells. In small amounts, mixed with other, healthier forms of entertainment, this would be fine. The problem is that the other side is never shown. Rarely will you see a movie where the man is the one being objectified or where the white man is the one robbing a black man. It’s when these images and ideas come to be expected, when people just assume that the black man is the bad guy and the woman is a slut, that we have the real problem.

Posted by Katie Green at 2:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In her lecture “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� bell hooks offered a host of strategies for viewing films critically. She wants the viewer to consider: Who made the film? Who is the money behind the film? Who is the intended consumer of the film? Who is the film about and how are the characters portrayed in the film? More often than not in today’s mainstream movie machine, the answers to these questions can be found within what she refers to as the “white supremacist, capitalist, patriarchy� (ws, c, p). As she pointed out, these are “interlocking systems of domination� that are all working in tandem to keep themselves in place. And she cautioned that simply looking at one aspect (race, gender, etc) on its own doesn’t give us any real insight because the representations offered via the mass media are always more complex. I think that falling into this trap is rather easy because often there is one issue that seems more prominent than others might seem.

Her critique of rap music illustrates this very well. At first glance the overt sexism might seem most prominent. However, she reminds us that the target consumers are usually white, suburban, teenage boys and that the men running the corporations which distribute the music are executives worshiping in the house of capitalism and that the usually black rappers are simply doing the same. Presto- together they all work to reinforce the system of “ws, c, p� and they do it quite well. She said “images mean something,� and truly what we see is no accident. hooks wants us to always be mindful that all we see on TV and in the movies has a filter that is controlled by people (the “ws, c, p�) in power who most often stand to gain financially from what is being shown.

It’s really interesting to me how easy it is to lose sight of all this when at the cinema. After listening to the lecture I was feeling a bit bad about how I quite often passively consume while I watch films. Then I realized while watching the movie “Cars� with my 2 ½ year old nephew that we are conditioned into the “ws, c, p� from very early in our lives. The main car in this movie is a boy (narrated by a white man) and the girl car does nothing to forward the plot, which is one of the topics treated in Laura Mulvey’s piece. Then I thought about other animated “kid� movies I’d seen ("Antz," "Shrek") and the same basically held true. I haven’t seen "Finding Nemo," "Bee Movie" or "Wall-E," but I’m pretty sure the main characters are boys. I guess it makes sense, that in order to perpetuate itself the “ws, c, p� would start on us young in order to successfully lull us into complacency. With all this in mind, I feel like it would be impossible not to see the agenda behind film images, but I know it’s not always obvious. So for future I plan to keep vigilant and mindful while viewing.
Thanks for listening.

Posted by kafka at 1:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I definitely got more out of the Bell Hooks video then I ever thought I would have. After you gave the class a short synopsis on what we were about to watch, I basically just expected a good little 20/20 type show talking about feminism in film and popular culture. Instead I got that and more. I was able to hear an incredibly smart and gifted woman voice her opinions on everything from gangster rap and Madonna to the OJ Simpson trial and thinking critically when watching films. Now while I didn't agree with everything she had to say, that doesn't mean I didn't enjoy or get anything out of the video because I did. I just watched the video again for the second time and I was able to get into and like it even more this time around. After watching it twice and being able to think about it for a bit I feel like I have a pretty strong grasp on what Hooks was trying to say.

Her main goal out of the lecture that she gave was to think critically when listening to music, watching television and especially films. She does not want us just to watch the movie. She wants us to look behind on the sets and the acting, and instead think about all of the thinking processes that went into creating what we the viewer is watching. She wants us to ask questions like why was this person cast? Who wrote this film and what is his/her background? Who produced this film? She believes that if we ask these questions then we can understand why we are seeing what we are viewing on the film and we are also getting to see what the makers of these are all about. Knowing who is making the film tick and creating the representations that you see on the screen gives you a better feel for why certain things are the way they are in the film. Not only that, but you will also be judging the film with a much more open and intelligent mind. By asking those questions I believe Hooks would say we are being enlightened witnesses. After watching the video I will definitely be adding another approach to my movie watching skills. As a Studies in Cinema and Media Culture major, a lot of these approaches to viewing film are some that I already use, but there were plenty of different ways that she talked about that I will be using. Thinking about who made the film is one thing I know for a fact I will be using when it comes to watching all movies especially with the ones in this course. After talking about the "male gaze" and Mulveys article it is going to be very interesting to see all of the different approaches to portraying women on film. Through close ups and framing (just to name a few) a serious film can use these techniques the wrong way and make a film look like every other Hollywood flick out there.

I did have a few minor disagreements with her but there is only one that I thought I would mention because watching the video again I got the same feeling of almost complete disagreement as I did the first time. The majority of what Hooks said about Spike Lee was completely off-base. While I do see what she is saying when she talks about him being treated unfairly and not respected, I have to say that almost all of his movies have been positively reviewed and he is definitely one of the most celebrated filmmaker of the past 20 years. When it comes to making money Spike has and never will be about that so we can lay that issue to rest. But when she started mentioning the talk of Spike being considered a failure that is where I couldnt bite my tongue any longer. I out of all of the years i have been watching and studing movies like crazy have never heard anything EVER about Spike Lee being a failure. Beside that small section of the video, I really enjoyed Bell Hooks' lecture. She is a smart woman who knows what she is talking about. She realizes that popular culture is, good or bad, where the learning is at for our generation. Knowing that she gives us many useful tips out of getting the most of what we are given.

Posted by keilh004 at 1:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In bell hooks' short film “Cultural Criticism and Transformation�, she makes use of several different methods engage a number of critical feminist viewpoints, aiding her in the unpacking of several major cultural phenomenon. hooks encourages us to look and think critically about film, rap music, and other representations of gender, race, sexuality and class in mass media. hooks makes the argument that popular culture is at the crux of the transmission of cultural knowledge; according to her, this is where the learning and socialization of most people takes place. Referring to the nature of pop culture as 'intertextual', hooks illuminates the correlations between how we are expected to perform our sexuality and the violence that effectively keeps some groups subjugated in our societies.

The ultimate point of her argument is that popular film, music, and other institutions in our culture are the most basic units of teaching and learning and that the sustained representations – including misrepresentations and under-representations – create, transmit and maintain the aims of a white heterosexual capitalist patriarchy. Even in social movements that have had considerable success, such as feminism, the values transmitted by the dominant culture's popular media and entertainment seek to undermine those aims and damage these powerful movements that promote education, awareness and change. She argues that there is a great measure of allegiance to sexism and patriarchy and that because of the cultural construction of gender in societies such as ours, women allow other matters such as that of race to 'trump' women's issues. Cultural outlets such as film and rap music are, in the words of hooks, coding bodies to create an expectation of how desire and worth are determined and played out – all by maintaining a colonialist viewpoint well into the 21st century.

The main way hooks seeks to combat and critically assess these troubling representations of gender, race, sexuality, class, ethnicity, economic status et al is by being what she calls an 'enlightened witness'. To be an enlightened witness, hooks says, you become critically engaged with the material you are viewing. Another phrase she uses that particularly struck me is 'decolonization of the mind'. To decolonize the mind, you remove these clusters of thought that establish certain concepts to be infallible within our society – ones that promote the subjugation of women, minorities and many other groups. hooks connects the concept of decolonization and of being an enlightened witness to literacy, ostensibly arguing that empowerment comes from the ability to educate oneself to other viewpoints.

The point hooks made that was most striking to me was that we should not settle for poorly constructed narratives that masquerade as progressive or positive. Oftentimes, representations such as those in the film Kids, which hooks heavily references, are misinterpreted as progressive when really they are violent, damaging, or disrespectful in nature. This film by hooks is a challenge to refrain from passive viewing. By taking the initiative to actively engage with and challenge what is being forced upon us by popular culture, we, as the viewers, will be able to address the problems such representations present.

Posted by allison at 11:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In the film, " Cultural Criticism and Transformation" Hook's opened my eyes to a whole new level of critical thought in film. When the film first began I was surprised to see the reoccurring topic of race being brought up, as the class is Feminist Film Studies, not Race Film Studies. However I thought it was so powerful the way that Hook's showed that race and sex function together at the same level through the term White Supremacist. In film if we can look at the different ways that races are being used and represented and use that to open the door to a new understanding of how woman are portrayed in films. Hooks encourages us to take a deeper look into film. She was spot on when she said that no one wants to admit to consciously constructing stereotypes in film. Knowing this, we have to then take a closer look into these films, in order to get the TRUE message. After doing so you find yourself asking questions that will further your knowledge of the world around you. Film can be the road map that leads to changes in our world. By watching and critiquing film we can take away messages and lessons that would otherwise be ignored.

Posted by woul0006 at 11:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have little experience with viewing films critically, so I thought Bell Hooks’s interview to be very motivating. She stated that anyone is capable of thinking critically about film. Having an opinion and considering what you are viewing is important. By not responding to a film, intellectually, one is almost giving in to the Hollywood nonsense that is out of control in our society. Hooks emphasized that when critiquing or analyzing a film, one should recognize gender, race, social status etc…simultaneously. This opens the viewer‘s analysis to the whole picture, not just singling out one issue. For example, usually the issues of race and status go hand-in-hand in the movie world. Hooks expressed the power of film in pop culture. Pop culture plays a huge role in the way people learn and interpret society. It was stated that the media has control over our imaginations. That is an unsettling thought for me. Another strategy for analyzing film, was to pay attention to stereotypes.

The example Hooks used was the “thief image�. Most people know what a stereotype is, but sometimes I think we look past them, especially when it comes to film. For my future film viewing I will definitely be paying more attention to the roles and images of the female characters. In fact I have already begun to change my viewing habits, last night I was watching The Hulk, and was very attentive to the “male gaze� and the framing of the female character. One last important comment; Hooks made the statement that it is still possible to critique a film, and be impacted/ moved by the story. I think she was making the point that we don’t have to feel miserable about every film we watch, however, we should still be aware of the reoccurring issues in cinema, specifically pertaining to the female characters.

Posted by kerli006 at 11:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I found many of Bell Hook's assessments and appraisals both poignant and fascinating. Her discussion of American's reactions to Hollywood-ized historical portrayals (stories they were likely unfamiliar with), and the way they are not only not questioned but accepted was very interesting. She said something that I really responded to, and that was that "specific liberal, white men who are moneyed can produce whatever images they want to produce." Historical accuracy or accurate representations are not at the top of a film executive's list of priorities, and the cultural images we are inundated with , images carefully designed to manipulate, speak to this.
I also enjoyed her discussion about how media is being used, much as it was post-WW2, to get women back into a patriarchal way of thinking. Women are terribly represented in film, relegated to secondary character status, and the lack of strong, thinking roles for women in Hollywood speaks to this. Media is a touchstone of our society, yet corporations are run and decisions are made by rich, white men. When women are catered to, it is often in a deprecating way. "Chick-flicks" serve mostly to reinforce the ideas and assumptions of the patriarchy, whereby a woman can only achieve happiness and success by falling in love and marrying a man. These two-dimensional portrayals are not liberating or nuanced, instead catering to neolithic ideas of gender and status.

Posted by thur0139 at 10:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Posted by spiek010 at 10:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell Hooks attributed much of the sexism in films, to the people who are producing the films. In the reading by Laura Mulvey, Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, Mulvey touches on a theory of Freud's that said, scopophilia is part of ones sexuality, that gazing is natural. The relation between the two, is if men are producing most of the films seen though out the population, wouldn't it be natural for them to focus on what Freud pondered to be the basic human instinct of attraction? And because the majority of the producers are wealthy, white, and male, they keep producing one sided views of sexuality. Is it just a vicious cycle then? Then, I am curious to know if these male produced films are mostly created on fantasy, compared to the real thoughts, feelings, and actions of women?

Posted by ande4840 at 9:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

When we watched “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� in class, I was prepared for a film that highlighted the things that were wrong in popular culture and the things that need change. What I wasn’t prepared for was how well bell hooks was at articulating the things I have often only vaguely felt about these issues. Hooks’ film doesn’t simply make a few points about the flaws in today’s media culture; it challenges the audience to become more aware of the issues that pass in front of our eyes everyday on screen. She challenges us to become “enlightened witnesses� or people who not only see but also question and analyze what it is that we are taking in. Hooks’ point about “color coding� was really interesting because she spoke about the different levels of acceptance based on the lightness of skin, i.e. a woman of color with darker skin is less likely to play in a leading role. I found this especially interesting because when I look back to many of the films I have seen, there are very few exceptions to this rule.

I find it very interesting to think about the way that I view a film and then to think about how bell hooks might view the same film. The reason I find it interesting is that I imagine that hooks thinks about all parts of the film, not just what is being represented on screen. She takes into consideration the director, the cameraman, the crew, the producers, everything. Her analysis isn’t just about what message is being portrayed; it is also about how that message is coming to the audience. In this way, I admire her analytical prowess and seek to emulate it in my own critical analysis of films. I hope to take from this film a sense of skepticism about the messages in the films I watch in the future and become more of an “enlightened witness� as hooks would say.

Posted by joh02629 at 9:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Bell hook’s raised many points that have helped me to start viewing films critically. One point raised is to look not only at the actors and actresses and what story they are portraying but to look at the creators, the one’s who are behind the message that you are seeing. Her idea of being critical is all about being an active audience, compared to the passive audience. Bell hook’s mentions how the U.S is so deeply visual but often has a very one dimensional identity. One must actively look for stereotypes, who’s behind the production (usually white men), and be conscience of manipulations within the films, music, art, etc. She stresses the point that to have transformation, in the case of women as well as minorities becoming equal, one must be literate and be able to think critically. I agree with this statement completely. Without ever questioning what we see and who has the power behind the various creations we as a society will never advance forward and will continually have the same people in power. This in bell hook’s terms is an “enlightened witness�, one who is able to look at the bigger picture within a piece of art.

Posted by lars2805 at 7:28 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In her film, "Cultural Criticism and Transformation" bell hooks addresses and analyzes representations of different cultures, colors, and sexes in film and popular culture. This has been done before by many academics, however, hooks puts it in an entirely new perspective by naming the root of the issue: white supremacist capitalist patriarchy. By discussing the background and meaning of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy, hooks teaches us to try and find the bigger picture so that we may put things in perspective. This can mean asking questions like, who wrote and directed a certain film - was it a man or a woman? black or white? straight or gay?, or why do some rappers use extreme violence and sex in their music - who is their audience? The example of misogyny and violence in gansta rap is one that is constantly discussed. hooks explains in her essay, Sexism and Misogyny: Who Takes the Rap?, "The sexist, misogynist, patriarchal ways of thinking and behaving that are glorified in gangsta rap are a reflection of the prevailing values in our society, values created and sustained by white supremacist capitalist patriarchy." She makes an important point: that a "critique must always be contextualized." I think that this statement applies to films and pop culture as well as gangsta rap.

Posted by Natalie at 7:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

bell hooks has spent her career studying and teaching both women’s studies and cultural studies. In the documentary “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� she presents her own insight of the depiction of race, gender and social class in media outlets such as music and film. She also teaches her audience how to watch films and listen to music critically and to analyze what they observe while also realizing the affect which this media is creating in our world. In film today, movies such as Basic Instinct and Kids, girls and women are used more as objects to look at than as actual characters/people. Through techniques such as the male gaze, it is the director and/or writers who are responsible for doing this. Male gaze, when used as a guy looking at a woman, supports some societal beliefs of to-be-looked-at-ness in regards to women, supporting the idea that they are just objects to be looked at. This is also accomplished when the woman in the scene is being focused on in a way that makes her seem more attractive such as gradually scanning her body form the feet up or focusing only on specific body part such as her butt.

After hearing what bell hooks had to say in “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� I will start realizing the different techniques that are used in movies and what they convey to the audience. Besides the really obvious displays of the male gaze I never realized often and how inappropriately it was used in the movies that I watch. I also learned that a writer, who is responsible for a script, may have one idea of how a certain scene will turn out but it is the director who is responsible for what ultimately is put on the screen.

Posted by robes002 at 7:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I think that bell hook did a very well job in explaining feminism, and creating a better understanding of it for me. Personally I don't have much of a backround in feminist studies. I also come from a family backround which is very traditional with a male dominated culture. After watching the film and listening to bell hook explain that feminism is not just about women wanting to be a dominating figure like many male figures in our society today but rather being equals to their male counterparts. Furthermore I like how she adds that it is about equality not just at work but as well as in the home and all aspects of life. I think that after watching her film it will help me greatly in my understanding of the course and feminism in general.
However there were a few aspects of the film that I found to be bias or slightly of the subject for feminism. That is that there was a great deal of attention given to minority women. I feel that minorities, particularily female minorities, are not fairly represented, but their voices are just as important as anyone else who has something to be heard. I do not disagree with what she was saying but rather that she should have focused on more of the womens role, both in film and in daily life, and not so much on defining the female character as black or white.

Posted by bergm154 at 4:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Popular culture is all around us and it has shaped our views and our opinions or certain races, ages and genders. Bell hooks does an incredible job of giving us countless examples of how this is happening in our culture. She talks about how Darth Vader has the distinct "bad guy" voice and how countless movies show the bad guy with the dark appearance and the creepy voice. The voice we associate with the "bad guy" is the directors creation. The director decides how the characters sound, look, their age and sometimes their gender. Most of those things are not written into a script they are the directors interpretation of how the story is supposed to be. We should be watching films with this type of mindset but the majority of people see the story that is presented to them. They see a black character as the thief or the white middle-aged woman as the victim. I personally don't look at the white supremacy in films unless there is blatant racism in the film. I just see the characters as they are but since watching bell describe the many aspects of popular culture that i have never looked at, it makes me open my eyes and I think the next time I watch a new film or even a film i have seen countless times, I will look at it differently.

She also talked about how our culture is moving in the opposite direction of the recent feminist movements. With women being portrayed as sexual objects instead of powerful independent beings, our culture is moving back towards a patriarchial society. Women fought for almost 100 years to be seen and treated as equals and just as they were slightly gaining ground, popular culture and the directors and script writers behind movies and music have proved the power of our media. Media can be used in many ways and with the sexualization of women in recent films, there isn't much room for feminism even when Lora Croft is killing men left and right, but doing so with her perfectly groomed hair and her push-up bra. I know that wasn't an example that bell hooks gave but I think it shows how feminism is gaining no ground as far as films go. However, there was a film that just came out this past week called "the women" and there are no male characters, no men talk through the entire film and it is directed by a woman. I think that is the first movie I have ever heard of that has no men! There are so many aspects of popular culture that we could look at but I am a huge movie buff so what bell hooks was saying about films really made me think about the movies I watch everyday too. I will think about those types of things the next time i sit down and watch my favorite movie.

Posted by izzy at 3:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

In her film, "Cultural Criticism and Transformation," bell hooks teaches us new ways to watch films. She encourages viewers to take a more active role as audience members. She stresses the importance of analyzing film, television, music and current events. She criticizes directors and filmmakers for being patriarchal, capitalist and white supremacists. She definitely embraces the intersectionality tenet of Women of Color Feminism. The majority of the film is spent addressing racial issues, rather than those dealing specifically with gender inequality, and she points out that the feminist movement is not just about sex.
It was interesting to hear her interpretation of the "color caste system." I have heard about this before, almost a racism within a race, and she pointed out its prevalence among rap videos. bell hooks is obviously a very powerful and respected woman, and it was so refreshing to hear her ask the tough questions that many are afraid to ask. When she asked the director of Smoke why he chose to make the thief black, she was calling him out on his stereotypical action. No one wants to admit to consciously reinforcing those racial stereotypes. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing hooks' opinions of popular culture, because being a black woman she has a different perspective on things than, for example, a white person may have. I liked how she pointed out the power of popular culture in our lives today, because I think this impact is often overlooked. We are constantly bombarded by images and messages from the media, and it is so important to take a closer look at what is being communicated.
This film has definitely altered the way I will assess media in the future. I will pay more attention to the underlying messages that filmmakers are sending, rather than assuming a passive and accepting role as a viewer. I will challenge and criticize images and ideas that are being presented in the media.

Posted by herma216 at 3:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In "Cultural Criticism and Transformation", Bell Hooks taught about being an enlightened witness. This lesson proved basic yet essential when watching films critically. This same idea applies to music, as well as culture and every day life. She also mentioned the importance of critical thinking and literacy in order to develop the enlightened eye. Reading about our history as well as current events is a strategy Hooks spoke about. She combines these ideas with the knowledge of key terminology providing a strong base for critically analyzing popular culture and films. Hooks talked about the institutional construct that is made up of capitalism, patriarchy, and the white supremacist. She also focused on the portrayal of women in movies showing clips from Leaving Las Vegas, Kids and others. While viewing these clips, she points out the framing of women, slow motion, and close-ups that are often used to reinforce the "to-be-looked-at-ness" of females in film. In the reading, "Intro: Woman as not Born but Becomes Woman", McCabe writes about the female types in film consisting of the glamour goddess, femme fatale,

and the self-sacrificing mother (pg 4). These titles coincided with Hooks' identification of the female in film. Hooks made clear the importance of including skin color in the critical eye of the enlightened witness. She disagrees with the idea that green (money) is the only color that counts anymore. It is important to ask why the character in the film or the dancer in the music video is the color they are. These tools that Bell Hooks provided are ones that I will use throughout the semester and for years to come. I think that her idea of an enlightened witness is very important and I will strive to improve my critical eye through the strategies she provided. I will not only use them for film class but also in every day life in order to better understand our culture and how the female is portrayed within it.

Katherine Jonas

Posted by jona0062 at 2:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

There are many ways in which Bell Hooks’ film “Cultural Criticism & Transformation� has taught me to watch films critically. Hooks, has shown through her analysis of the documentary film Hoop Dreams that all is not what it seems. One of the young men in Hoop Dreams decides to focus on his education and family instead of basketball, but instead of praising him for this choice he is shown as a failure. I have seen Hoop Dreams two or three times and I see now that her analysis of this film is accurate. Whereas, before I even viewed him as somewhat of a failure. I thought here this young man throws away a great opportunity to play basketball and not only that but he also has a baby, what a waste. Another great example that is used is the film KIDS. I have seen this movie as well and I did consider it to be a radical film. However Hooks, feels that it offers a very conservative right wing view on gender, race and HIV. She also feels s that KIDS reproduces a lot of stereotypes through transgressive sexuality.

Hooks, also speaks of a scene in the film where the main female characters speak, but what this scene does is trick people into believing there is gender equality in this film. Hooks, has taught me to be a more proactive viewer, listener, reader and to not just take them at face value. But to really analyze what it being feed to me.

Hooks, uses several terms throughout “Cultural Criticism & Transformation� that she employs to teach us to analyze what we are watching or listening to. One key term is enlightened witness- becoming critically vigilant about the world that we live in is vital. After watching Hooks I do feel like I am closer to becoming an enlightened witness. I feel that our media has desensitized so many of us. I can turn to a few different T.V. stations or radio stations at any given time and see or hear women being objectified in a misogynistic manner. We live in a society that is very patriarchal and it is greatly seen in our media.

Posted by thoughts at 2:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

"The issue is not freeing ourselves from representations. It's really about being enlightened witnesses when we watch representations." -bell hooks
I think that Bell Hooks' film teaches us how to watch films critically by using history as a back bone and what actually happened or occuring at a point in time shows in films. She breaks her movie up into two parts. In the first part she lays out the theoretical foundations of her work, emphasizing that film imagery and media representations are purposly made to portray messages that support the authority of "powerful" white males, degrading women and people of color. In part two, she uses concrete examples how to recongnize the "white supremecist", patriarchal values shown in popular media. She emphasizes that we need to learn how to identify somewhat hidden messages about race, gender, class in popular media. Her examples come from the O.J. Simpson trial, Madonna who she has quoted saying that black men are rude and inconciderate but yet she still uses them in her videos because they look good.

I think that she makes very persuassive generalizations about how media culture has degraded women and colored people and how the media supports the white supremicist! I think that i have always noticed where racism comes into play in a movie or media along with discrimination against women but Bell tought me a way of looking deeper into the movie in that aspect of why things still exist.

Posted by week0065 at 9:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

In “Cultural Criticism and Transformation,� bell hooks demonstrates how important is to think critically about the media we are taking in. This means being an enlightened witness, by vigilantly paying attention to what we’re being told and how we’re responding to it. She points out how powerful pop culture is in its ability to affect people and also how useful it is in helping us grasp concepts of feminist criticism. I thought the film did a great job of giving example after example of the things you notice when you take the time to think critically. I think we often take for granted what hooks calls motivated representation, and that there are “conscious manipulations taking place� in the media we consume. We like to assume the best of filmmakers and don’t always realize that they ultimately have the power to shape our thinking in this way. A good example of this was when hooks talked about constructed narrative in Hoop Dreams. I think it’s really important to realize that even in a documentary, things can be manipulated to send the

message that is desired. I already knew this was true for MTV “reality� shows, but considering that even high quality films can do this was something I hadn’t really thought about before. I have never seen KIDS, but it really struck me how it was constructed for the viewer to identify with the misogynistic white males. This was a good example of Mulvey’s “2nd look,� where the audience member identifies with the male onscreen. It’s particularly disturbing when you take the rape scene into account. It scares me to think that this may have been intentionally portrayed in a way that eroticized the act.

I also found the segment on rap music very thought-provoking. In the years since high school I have gone from completely ignoring the messages in rap music and dancing along to it anyway, to paying attention to the words and being disgusted. hooks makes an excellent point when she says that the rappers are responding to the larger culture, and what sells. My only issue with this is that making this distinction risks removing the responsibility from rappers. I think that changing the culture has to start from the ground up. Rappers producing less exploitative lyrics would be a step in the right direction, whereas waiting for mainstream culture to change first is a lot less productive and doesn’t necessarily get us anywhere.

Posted by happyfeet at 11:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

From watching one video on bell hooks I can now view her as one of the most accessible public intellectuals I've ever heard speak. When doing some research about her I found a quote by her stating " The issue is not freeing ourselves from representions. It's really about being enlightened witnesses when we watch representations." And watching her video "Cultural Criticism and Transformation," she taught me just last. She teaches us to
watch films critically by thinking critically, being open minded, look at all perspectives and looking out for stereotypes, something as small as violence and the roles people are playing. An example is watching the role of a women in a film. Watch the angles of the camera and what they are focusing on for the majority of the time when i female is on set, something a lot of people don't even think twice about. The biggest thing i learned from bell hooks is to watch things critically and not how society wants us to view it. The strategies she uses to employ in order to analyze was having first focused on the foundations and positions of her work and then moving towards the value of cultural studies in concrete analysis through showing clips of films and videos and then discusses and argue about the certain issue. She used the word "enlightened witness" a lot, which is referred to as becoming critically vigilant about the world we live in. This can be achieved through critical thinking and greater literacy, not censorship. After watching this video I feel like my goal in life should being able to consider myself a enlightened witness and be able to think crucially about most situations and I will start trying but know i will never come as close to bell hook when it comes to her analyzing and critical thinking.

Posted by bues0040 at 8:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Bell Hooks really inspired me while watching this movie. It was amazing how intellectually stimulating all of her various criticisms were. She made me think about movies in a whole new way. Hooks has really inspired me to watch films more critically and think about all of the criticisms she mentions in this movie by using the various themes and concepts we have learned thus far. Bell Hooks makes a compelling argument for the trans formative power of cultural criticism.

Hooks discusses the theoretical foundations and positions that inform her work. Hooks also explains why she insists on using the phrase "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy" to describe the connecting systems of domination that define our reality. One term that helps explain this domination would be, scopophilia, visual pleasure through looking; the audience as viewing through the main male character of a film, the male gaze. She showed numerous examples of how women are objectified through looking by these dominate white males. Some examples of how this is done would include: close-ups, slow motion shots, fragmentation of body parts, and literal framing of the women’s body.

Further into the movie, Hooks demonstrates the value of cultural studies in concrete analysis through such subjects as the OJ Simpson case, Madonna, Spike Lee, and Gangster rap. The aim of cultural analysis, she argues, should be the production of enlightened witnesses, audiences who are critically vigilant about the world around us. In conclusion, this was a truly inspirational film that definitely persuaded me to start watching films in a more critical way and to try to truly understand all of the various themes and concepts Hooks talks about in this film.

Posted by sulli396 at 7:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

After watching Bell Hooks’ interview, I was unable to think about anything else for the next 48 hours. She discussed a lot of the issues that I had thought of, but not to the extent of scrutiny that she had. Her analytical way of thinking blew me away in awe. I understood that the mass media played an important role in the everyday life of America, but I didn’t really consider how “the mass media is being used to get the women out of feminism and back into some patriarchal mode of thinking� (Hooks). And she is correct. Hooks uses some interesting strategies to watch films critically. She talks about how women are framed just right or how black women are “color coded� to appeal to the white supremist consumer. Hooks also uses some key theories and terms to analyze pop culture. Those terms are as follows:

--White Supremist Capitalist Patriarchy: “interlocking systems of domination that define our reality and not to just have one thing be…important issue, but for me the use of that particular jargonistic phrase was a way, a sort of short cut way of saying all of these things actually are functioning simultaneously at all times in our lives…� (Hooks).

--Enlightened Witness: “being enlightened witnesses when we watch representations, which means were able to be critically vigilant about both what is being told to us and how we respond to what is being told� (Hooks).

--Constructed Narrative: representations, such as documentaries, biographies, and news casts, are never truly depicting the actuality, but are depicting some sort of “actuality� façade that is streaked with covert and overt messages that further the goals of the creator, writer, etc.

--Color Coding: Hooks thinks that in rap videos and movies the female body is being “reinscribed in very traditionally sexist pornographic way�. She then goes on to say that even the Black female body is being represented as adhering to the white supremist culture as “the light skinned, preferably long haired, preferably straightened haired female (who) becomes once again reinscribed as the desirable object…�

--Commodified Blackness: “Blackness in a commodified form can be possessed, owned, controlled, and shaped by the consumer.� However blackness in the form of an “engagement with black culture might require one to be a participant and therefore to be in some way transformed by what you are consuming as opposed to being merely a buyer� (Hooks�).

I would have to agree with Hooks, de Beauvoir, and Friedan (McCabe) in their statements that the images of women produced in a patriarchal pop culture is a major contributing factor to gender and racial hierarchies and inequalities. Examples of these statements can be seen almost anywhere you look or listen in history or present day. I thought it was interesting how Hooks responded to the OJ Simpson Trial. It was refreshing to see how she didn’t get sucked into the white vs. black aspect of the case (like what seemed every news caster did), but how she focused on what everyone else should have been focused on: domestic violence to such an extreme it led to homicide.

After watching Bell Hooks’ interview, I will be more of an “Enlightened Witness�. But I just won’t be an “Enlightened Witness� when it comes to film, but also an “Enlightened Witness� when it comes to pop culture in general. For example, I have never been a fan of rap music. I have always despised the way that women are portrayed by the men and how captive the women seem. However, I have (ignorantly) never thought about how the white male CEO’s have the ultimate control over what is produced and put out on the market for mass consumption. Belle hooks has inspired me to become more active in the research aspect of pop culture consumption. But on the same line of thinking, another part of me wants to say, “Hey Bell Hooks, wait a minute! Aren’t the “artists� producing what the CEO wants, because the CEO knows that is what will sell big amongst the masses of America?� So who really "started the fire" in this case? Is it the “artists� because it’s their words? Is it the CEO because of their greed? Or is it the masses of America because of their ignorant consumption? If America didn’t want it, it wouldn’t be bought and thus wouldn’t be sold or produced. It is quite a complicated circle in my head right now.

Posted by Eleanor Roosevelt at 5:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

“Cultural Criticism and Transformation� shows many ways to watch films critically. Hooks outlines many different aspects of films, such as the way women are portrayed, violence, and different stereotypes that are portrayed in movies, which need to be thought critically of. Films can be taken apart to get a closer look at the characters- their race, gender, age- this can help the viewer to understand certain stereotypes that exist in our society. An example of this is when hooks explains that a movie, which is based on a book, the thief is changed from a white male in the book to an African American male in the movie. She speculates that in our society it is often more believable for an African American teenager to be a thief. Intersectionality is a term hooks uses that could explain this idea. An African American, adolescent male has different stereotypes than those possessed by a white, adolescent male. There are so many forms of oppression that coincide with each person’s many identities, that it is easy to overlook some of the stereotypes.

Another idea that hooks uses is creating women in media as sexual objects. This is when women are purely shown to be sexualized. An obvious example she looks at are rap videos. Women in rap videos are there specifically to be sexualized and be placed below the male rappers. This is a problem for our society because it is accepted that the women in these videos serve no real purpose other than to “worship� the male rappers, they become subservient to them.

There were many examples of oppression and stereotypes that she used in this film that I may not have been really aware of before. This is a problem for me, I don’t want to watch and accept stereotypes specifically because they are so common in our society that it causes me overlook them in movies. To use my example above, I probably wouldn’t have thought twice about the thief being African American. Stereotypes have become so ingrained in our society that I think there are many problems with our media that is overlooked. I hope that after viewing this film I will be able to take a deeper critical look at the movies and images I see.

Posted by luco0005 at 3:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

bell hooks, like many film viewers coming from a perspective different from the "standard" white male perspective, teaches us to be more aware of the different lenses we can use to evaluate a film from. She herself is a black female, and thereby is able to see films/tv shows/music from both a black and a female perspective. Even if we are not necessairly black or female or gay or whatever, bell hooks' film makes it clear that trying to adopt such a perspective allows the viewer to understand the film in a many-layered way. The viewer must break from what Mulvey called the "male gaze" (that is, the straight white male gaze) and see the piece in a different way. One of the key steps to breaking away is understanding what hooks refers to as "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy" as being the overriding viewpoint in our society. hooks' film has definitely made me more aware of the different elements that come into play when approaching a piece of popular culture as well as how other people might view the very same thing.

The thing I found the most interesting in the film was her view on the OJ Simpson trial. In this case, she did not see the trial from some kind of racialized perspective, but rather saw it from a strongly gendered perspective. This was an excellent example of how everybody has multiple perspectives/identites and certain of these identites become more important than others in certain contexts. This is also something to consider when viewing the films, inspiring such questions as - "why does this scene make me feel this way?" and "when can I identify with the woman (as a woman) and when can I not?"

Posted by seitz057 at 2:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

hooks is a very wise and insightful woman, and has a lot of important and fascinating things to say. Her movie, Cultural Criticism and Transformation exposes racist and anti-feminist messages woven into popular culture. Her opinions are supported by excerpts from music videos, feature films, and television news coverage. The OJ Simpson trial, Spike Lee, and "Hoop Dreams" all come up for analysis. She also takes on the movie Kids, rap, Hollywood's appropriation of "blackness," and the media representation of the black female body. The film has two main focuses. The first focus laid out the foundations of her work, arguing that film imagery and media representations are deliberately crafted to convey messages that reinforce the authority of powerful white males at the expense of women and people of color. The second focus demonstrates how to recognize the "white supremacist, capitalist patriarchal values" reflected in popular media and public debate. hook reveals how black politics, feminist politics, and critical thinking can help you see what you didnt even notice was in front of you.

Posted by conlo027 at 1:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Transgender questions one's self-identification as male, female, or neither--in divergence with the normal "gender" determined at birth and by societal opinions. Transgenders often feel the gender assigned to them is a false or incomplete description of them.

Posted by lenth006 at 11:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

bell hooks not only encourages society to watch films critically, but to take our analysis and insight gained and use it to recognize our daily encounters with “"white supremacist capitalist patriarchy." bell hooks stresses that the images of women on screen—whether they be degrading, violent, or stereotypical—are more than just an image to be immediately consumed, and thereafter forgotten. Rather, she urges all of society to recognize the many causes and consequent effects of these depictions.

For example, I have always strongly disapproved of the modern day rap video. The “subservient sex slave� female idolizing the “male rap god� as he runs off lyrics, which demean women and establish them as an object that belongs to him and serves only to achieve whatever sexual or violent fantasy he creates. The cause for this always seemed self-evident: male superiority. Yet, this image, as disturbing as it is in and of itself, requires so much more interpretation if we are to fully comprehend our societal tendencies in popular culture. bell hooks points to the white CEOs and presidents of the record label companies which produce and control this; in addition, one must consider the young suburban, white male population that demands and subsequently supports this type of industry. As well as the music video producers, who almost force-feed viewers the image that the “light� African American female is preferable. So by looking at the larger social constructs as bell’s insists, one recognizes that in a rap video it is not just a the portrayal of patriarchy, but also the power of capitalism and deeply engrained racist ideals that lead the numerous negative effects (such as increased violence against black women).

The effects of “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy� can also be seen in the popular roles given to women in film: the femme fatale or the objectified sexual object to name a few. I could go on and on listing examples of women being literally “framed� in these roles as seen through the “male gaze� of the male protagonist. Yet, the problem isn’t that this exists, but that we are unaware neither of its existence nor of its effects upon us. For example, women feel the need to become these characters, which supposedly are a reflection of what women in society ought to be. Men subconsciously come to expect these impossible standards of women in real life. Creating two forms of impossible expectation. Another example, is the frequent casting of black men in the roles of violent villains—even when a script does not specify the race of the character, the director knows a black villain will sell best. We cannot continue to see movies as merely entertainment when it is so evident that the repeated representations of women and people of color in such demeaning roles is having significant effect upon society.

As my eyes were opened to the repercussions caused by these portrayals in current and past film and society, I immediately wanted to know what has been or can be done to erase this. I was deeply interested in bell hooks response. She believes it is through books, not movies, that we will begin to repair the situation. To achieve freedom and justice in our society we need more “mass literacy.� In her view, it is only with critical thinking and literacy that we will achieve a true transformation. This surprised me at first, but it makes absolute sense the more I ponder it. Movies are so dictated by the white men of Hollywood and the social pressure to provide what sells, that true avant-guard films will never provide the permanent solution to the unfortunate status quo. It is only through the readings of intuitive and informed thinkers like bell hooks that society will begin to first acknowledge and then erase the terribly flawed perceptions and attitudes it currently holds of all races and genders.

Posted by lenth006 at 11:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Bell Hook, in her documentary Cultural Criticism and Transformation, emphasizes people to think critically about what they watch in popular cinema by becoming an "Enlightened witness." Hook says that the power of representation through film is a major force in how we as people may think about various subjects. Thus, it is necessary that we view films by thinking about the ideas they represent by considering who made the film, what was the motive behind it, and what is the film REALLY trying to say? She gives the example of the film Braveheart. By watching this film, audience members may put the liberation struggle of Ireland on their social maps when never before did they consider this social issue. Hook also suggests that since it was a white male as the main character, the audience may feel that this may give the film credibility. This idea of a white male in power as natural and good is because of a White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy says Hook. White supremacist male dominated ideas are perpetuated due to a system rather than just attitudes and behaviors evoked by a certain number of people.

This system of white patriarchy may be perpetuated by the fear of the loss of a phallus, as Laura Mulvey suggests in her essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema." She says that women are feared and disregarded because they are thought of as a castrated male. Thus there is this backlash against feminism because if feminism is embraced, it could mean leading to the castration of all males, or at least ideologies and behaviors associated with feminism, i.e. castration of males.

Posted by hadix001 at 1:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Bell hooks’ film "Cultural Criticism and Transformation" teaches us how to watch films critically in a number of ways. She employs the strategy of thinking critically about representation on film and avoiding the temptation to think that a film is just entertainment or art and doesn't mean anything. In the film "Kids� she critiques the scene where the kids beat the black man to death and notes that Larry Clark intentionally used a dark-skinned man in order to play on the antipathy of the audiences. She also looks at what types of people produce the images we see in film. For example, only privileged, wealthy people are able to produce a major Hollywood film and their personal and political ideas, both latent and manifest, are projected through the film. Bell hooks encourages viewers to watch films while consciously thinking about how ideas of patriarchy, conscious manipulation, white supremacy and capitalism play into the image that we see.

She offers thorough analysis of films by identifying instances of scopophilia and watching the films with an oppositional gaze. Her film has helped me to consider that filmmakers often use manipulations and stereotypical shortcuts to help tell the story they want. Bell hooks uses "Leaving Las Vegas" as an example of a film representing the backlash of the feminist movements. I don't agree with her critique of "Leaving Las Vegas". I feel like it supports the ideas of radical feminism more than rejects them. Sera, the prostitute, drives the narrative and is a sympathetic character. It sends a clear anti-patriarchic message, especially the gang-bang scene. When I watch films in the future, I will try to identify what images are products of white supremacist, capitalistic patriarchy and what images are simply just part of the story.

Posted by Da provida at 12:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Hook's is a truly remarkable woman. She knows and understands how the
media portrays people among race, class and gender. She taught me how to
look at how people are portrayed within movies or shows. For example, when
a black man was hired instead of a white man to play the role of a thief or
bad guy. When asking the director why he chose a black man he didn't have a
straight answer. This is why media is shaped by us and the way people
establish it. Some strategies and key theories she employs include that you
need to look at media knowing that you have already been brainwashed before
by stereotypical thoughts. The main thing I learned from Hook is to look and
evaluate everything. How the woman is looked at up and down, in a frame
square. How people of color are played as bad or stereotypical low class
people. How men are looking at woman. These all make more sense to me know
that she put this in clear view. I guess I never knew that most of the
media industry is controlled by white men. White men usually have the same
point of view on theories like these. She hints that the white man is the
reason behind the race, gender and class scrutiny in films, images, and
songs.

This has made me think more critically about the movies I watch. I found it
interesting that the male gaze is used so inappropriately. Mulvey explains
the male gaze as a world ordered by sexual imbalance. A traditional
exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with
their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so they can get
this to-be-looked-at-ness. I agree with her, men stereotyped us to be a
piece of meat. Like in the rap videos, they are hardly wearing nothing and
dancing around the man like he is a god. I have learned that it is who is
behind the camera that makes decisions how how people are portrayed. Before
Hook's I was not looking understanding that women are portrayed as sex
objects, white male dominant, people of color are played as usually bad and
lower class because I am brainwashed by how society is. She wants people to
understand and watch things how they interpret it, not how the media wants
us to.

Posted by lemme021 at 9:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Popular culture, as opposed to elitism of academic analysis, offers rich and accessible field for interpretation of various representations and images. Popular culture allows to analyze images and ideas in terms of difference and otherness, such as race, class, and gender.
bell hooks does not suggest that there is a simple and direct correlation between representations and social reality, but calls to be attentive how certain images and ideas might normalize certain unacceptable behaviors and actions, such as violence against women or racism. Hollywood or media in general, has an enormous power “to alter people’s perceptions.� For example film “Braveheart� caused enormous sympathies and deep emotions with colonized people, but bell hooks calls attention to who is represented (white European male) and why and how these representations instead of challenging reproduce white male privilege.

Similarly, just because there are women or Black people on the screen does not mean that there is a fairness in representation, Black people and women in the media industry are just as able to reproduce and reinforce ideology of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy as white men (bell hooks gives examples of Madonna and hip-hop). Ethics and morality are constantly undermined in the name of profits.
bell hooks calls to pay careful attention to what on the surface might appear as transgression, while in reality it might be a mere reinscription of conservative values (e.g. “Kids� in terms of race and gender). People are seduced by transgression as a value in itself, without failing to notice how transgression can be a simple commodity which does not challenge status quo in any serious ways.
In her discussion about rap music bell hooks compares it to colonialism – rap becomes a site of exploitation and exoticism for the largely white suburban audiences. The records that portray more misogyny, sexism, and violence sell more. There cannot be discussion about authenticity in (popular) rap music because it does not exist in the marginal location anymore – it is clearly a part of larger cultural production under capitalism, where profit is a driving force. It is understandable that people want to produce records strategically in order to make money, but bell hooks calls for examination of those choices, as well as impact they have on the audiences.

Terms:
Motivated representations: images in the popular culture are not random – they are not simply outcomes of imagination and creativity but serve certain political ends. For example, representations of “good� or “bad� film characters are often racialized or certain representations of women used serving backlash against feminism. These practices – “conscious manipulations� – reproduce existing power structure.
White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy – term to make sense of life in the US. Various interlocking elements of institutional structural power that allow to analyze one’s identity and place in the hierarchy.
Enlightened Witness – “being an ‘enlightened witness’ means becoming critically vigilant about the world we live in.� This can be achieved through critical thinking and greater literacy, not censorship.
Constructed Narrative – representations are never just accurate documentation of reality, but are made with particular goals in mind, reflecting creators’ interests and ideas (for example documentaries, or you can think of news in the same way).
Color Coding – although there are a lot of Black female representations in videos, they are almost exclusively portrayed as overly sexualized. bell hooks calls attention to skin tone which is typically lighter and straight hair. This implies that there is certain adherence to whiteness as superiority.
Commodified Blackness - Blackness represents transgression (dangerous, exotic, sexualized etc). It is consumed as a commodity, keeping safe distance, not engaging in meaningful ways, not showing genuine social and cultural interest.

I think bell hooks has a lot to offer, but not in terms of ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ answers/analysis, but in stressing the importance of critical thinking and engagement beyond the surface of representations. Films or whatever other media is seen and interpreted by different people differently and there can never be simply one way of analyzing (we still can try, I guess.) Although I admire her analysis, I think in some ways she falls in the same trap as psychoanalytic feminist theory – which might sound “right� theoretically, but it does not go into anything concrete, for example, how real people interpret it, what they think about, in what ways it touches/influences them etc. I think it is important to analyze not only ideological constructions that operate in films/other media, but also locations of viewers (or producers) for that matter. So for example (I think I read/heard this somewhere) sometimes assumption is made that media influences poor, less educated, and so on people in more significant ways then the ones who are more educated and can consume the “worst� media and stay untouched by it. I would be interested in finding more about it, but I think such assumptions are deeply troubling. bell hooks would argue that all we need is more mass based literacy in order to counter influence of ‘bad’ media. I agree, but I think we also need to examine who and why judges which media is wrong in the first and for whom it is safe to consume and for whom it is not.
I also think that bell hooks is not very attentive to whatever can be found positive in the media. Although overall I agree that media is just a big spectacle-money-making-capitalist-machine, I think we still need to look at ways it empowers certain people, through role models, ideas, transgressions, possibilities etc.

Posted by Arnoldas at 6:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Bell hooks begins “Cultural Criticism and Transformation� with a declaration of the ability and necessity of thinking critically. Because popular culture is the most dominant and widely accessed stage for the exchange and enshrining of cultural ideas and images, it becomes a necessity to deconstruct the ideologies popular culture produces. Hooks concretely examines how representations of race, class and gender operate onscreen (read productions of racism, sexism, classism). More importantly, however, she explains how intentional the motives are behind these representations, and the impact they thus enjoy in popular culture. As Ann Kaplan explains in her introduction we must ask “how meanings about women are produced on film as these relates to meanings about women produced elsewhere i.e. socially, politically, and culturally in different national contexts�. One could substitute in place of women: Blacks, Latinos, Queers, persons with disabilities...etc. hooks and McCabe both touch on the influence and power of feminism but also the brutal backlash against feminism which is perhaps most clearly shown in women's representations in film (bell hooks looks at “Leaving Las Vegas� and McCabe takes up Haskell's text From Reverence to Rape)

hooks touches on two major terms "white supremacist capitalist patriarchy" to describe the intersectionality systems of oppression and the idea of the enlightened witness- as someone who engages with popular culture with an eye towards criticism. There was a moment, which could be categorized as a second wave/third wave clash in film which emphasized for me the need to think critically even about the perspective of bell hooks. At one point as hooks is taking about the rape scene in the film Kids and says something to effect that at one point this film would not have been accepted and people would have protested but now with the “domestication of sado-masochism and acceptance of sexualized violence.... the film made the rape seem sexy or cool. The indictment of SM (consenting adults who participate in domestic SM) seems totally irrelevant to the way rape was shown in film at the 1990's progressed. Why hooks felt that community deserved the finger of judgment as opposed to other forces (feminist backlash, patriarchy, etc) seems deserving of questioning. What I took from the film for watching future films was hooks ability to constantly question and constantly find the ways in which issue intersect. Also the importance of identifying the true questions popular culture raises which are not always on the surface. For instance with hip-hop for many is seen as a perfect example of how patriarchal and misogynistic images of women are produced, but in fact the first questions that must be raised is about capitalism's influence over product and industry.

Posted by Sofia at 2:29 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

I found bell hooks to be really interesting, and I think that she is an incredibly intelligent woman. I feel like she was never really bias, and that she truly thought of things from a much deeper level than most people. I liked how she would talk about something and than there would be a clip along with it that would give us a visual example. After listening to her talk and than watching the clip everything she said was so blatantly true. For example, she discussed how the African American male’s body was sexualized, and than there was the clip from the movie “kids� (which by the way looks like one of the worst movies ever), where there were close-ups of the shirtless young African American boys. It was done in a similar fashion as the way women are filmed with the close-ups of their faces and body parts. The person viewing this scene is totally bombarded with images of the body rather than images that have to do with the story.

I found a lot of what she said in her film to be really true, and often quite disturbing. Her ideas about the portrayal of race were really enlightening to me. I guess when I have watched films with an all African American cast I never thought about how the directors, producers and all the other people behind the scenes were white and probably mostly male. I have watched movies like “Waiting to Exhale,� and I thought that this was a film from an African American female filmmaker’s perspective. Now I know that I can’t just assume that just because the entire cast is African American the movie represents real African American people’s views and lives. Obviously everyone is different, no matter what color their skin is, but I just found this whole discussion really interesting. One can see how maybe the glass ceiling works when bell talked about Spike Lee and his career. It was an interesting point she made about his work being criticized in the press all the time, when he is the most successful African America filmmaker. Another interesting point made was how the African American Woman’s body is displayed in rap videos and films. The woman is usually very thin, light skinned and has straight, silky hair. I thought about it, and I couldn’t think of many famous African American women in the media with dark skin and curly hair. These are things that most people don’t even think about. African American women are completely objectified in rap videos.

I was still a little confused about her term “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.� I looked at the posting on the blog of glossary terms and that helped (thanks). This term totally makes sense, and I think it’s true. Everything in our media is completely controlled by white men. In the film, they showed all the record labels that have rap artists signed to them. All these labels, and production companies are run by the white male. However, the rappers often play into these roles because they get so much money for it. In the end, money is what matters most. It’s so disturbing to think about how our entire culture is largely created by rich, wealthy men. Not only do they control our government, but our pop culture and media too. I agree with bell hooks in that today, the movies have a huge, direct influence in our culture. It was interesting when she talked about how white, suburban boys who may not even know any African Americans watch rap videos and get this idea of what an African American woman and man are like. They might start dressing like a rapper and listening to rap music and think they know everything about African American culture.

I was still a little confused about her term “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy.� I looked at the posting on the blog of glossary terms and that helped (thanks). This term totally makes sense, and I think it’s true. Everything in our media is completely controlled by white men. In the film, they showed all the record labels that have rap artists signed to them. All these labels, and production companies are run by the white male. However, the rappers often play into these roles because they get so much money for it. In the end, money is what matters most. It’s so disturbing to think about how our entire culture is largely created by rich, wealthy men. Not only do they control our government, but our pop culture and media too. I agree with bell hooks in that today, the movies have a huge, direct influence in our culture. It was interesting when she talked about how white, suburban boys who may not even know any African Americans watch rap videos and get this idea of what an African American woman and man are like. They might start dressing like a rapper and listening to rap music and think they know everything about African American culture.

Posted by Alias at 4:08 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

What I learned from the film is that in order to think critically when looking at media a person must realize that their perception has already been twisted from all past experiences of media, consciously examine the details of the work, and then evaluate how their own assumptions relate to the work itself. In Mulvey’s essay she presents the idea that the audience of a film subconciously identifies with the subject of the film, and therefore their attitudes toward the film will be biased if they choose to examine it critically. Two of bell hooks analytical strategies in regards to film include the understanding that all forms of oppression intertwined, and the concept that media is always created by human beings. Her examination of the Simpson case reflected these two strategies in that she pointed out that the mainstream media’s exlusive focus on racism was dismissive of the central issue of domestic abuse, and that both forms of subjugation required simultaneous analysis in order to inform the case.

Hooks uses the words patriarchy, white supremacy, and capitalism as a single term “White Supremacist Capitalist Patriarchy� in the film. This term emphasizes the key elements that comprise her theory that those white, male capitalists who have directed (and continue to direct) the mainstream culture determine from their own ideals how to portray life on screen. The “patriarchy� hooks refers to is reflected in McCabe’s introduction when she presents the idea that the representation of women in most films is as the “objects�, because the “subjects�, target audience, and creators of those films are men. Overall, the film challenges me to be more aware of all sensory experiences especially when I am taking in media as a form of entertainment. That said, I don't know how well I will actually be able to face this task. Often when I am critical of something I see I end up feeling a bit at a loss of what to do with that criticism. I could tell other people I suppose, or I could write about it, but mostly I end up frustrated and have not done anything substantial with my objections other than acknowledging them. I think in terms of my major, architecture, what I hope is that I will be able to better understand how a built environment could be created that would take into account the idea that people are more alike or different not on the basis of gender, race, sexuality, class, ect, but instead because of the way their minds retain and create, the way they move; by their personalities.

Posted by CrazyOldMaurice at 12:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

After watching Hook's movie the biggest element that stood out for me about watching movies critically is knowing everything that is going on screen and how things are being represented. What I mean by that is, there are certain things that we have been trained to understand by movies, music, television, and other mediums to almost assume certain stereotypes. We are trained to automatically understand that blacks are dangerous, that women are sexual objects to men, that white people are middle class, upper class, or maybe nerdy. And because we are trained to understand "roles" this way, a movie with a robbery does not work as well if an African-American is not the person committing the robbery. I think Hook is trying to let us know that these could be forms of racism and sexism but we are passive when we see them in movies because we are so used to it. By brining this issue of being able to think critically about movies into the open, we can now begin to look at things not as popular culture wants us to view it, but rather we can engage in our viewings and see items from a different perspective. She does not want us to be empty, helpless shells absorbing images and messages, but human beings that are able to choose and filter what we

are being presented.
I do not think because of this video that I will watch movies here after much differently. I understand that popular culture has these views. Does that make these views right? No, I do not think so, but there is not a whole lot I can do about it. But at the same time I think it is sometimes okay to use some of these stereotypes because it makes viewing easier to understand and sometimes it can add a comedic value. I personally hate it when parents say that violent video games are affecting a child's mind and warping a child into a violent creature. Well, hate is too strong of a word. I do not hate it but I can not fully agree. I played violent video games at a young age and my Mother worried slightly, but I could tell the difference between fantasy and reality. Now I understand not all children can differentiate and that we might need to protect some children from the things Hook is talking about. I am a person that likes to joke around a poke fun at popular culture from time to time. When my friends and I joke around, nothing really is taboo. I have made jokes about blacks, whites, Asians, men, women, but it does not mean I believe in those stereotypes. I also understand that I would never use these jokes outside of my group of friends because they may offend people. I guess that's where the issue comes up because the mass media and popular culture are presenting these items whereas I am in the basement with my friends. I can agree and I am glad hook brings up these issues, but I also worry that if we look at things too critically, we start picking at little things and blow things out of proportion. A friend of mine made me listen to a new rap album recently and I told my friends that no one pimps that many hoes and is high all the time and carries guns with them all the time. The scary thing about rap is that it is a serious presentation and it might be difficult for young children to differentiate since many rappers claim that their music is an extension of their reality. I think that's what Hook want us to be able to do is differentiate fantasy and reality.

Posted by leex2356 at 7:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Hello, my name is Teena. It took me till now to figure this thing out!

Posted by rasmu281 at 3:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An imitation of a person, event, literature, etc. that is often satirical or humorous.

Posted by AJ at 12:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Hiya,

My name is Julia, and I'm a Senior double-majoring in print Journalism and Gender Studies. My favorite movies are: The Godfather (parts I and II only), Drop Dead Gorgeous, Strangers With Candy, Jesus is Magic and All About Eve. I love the Daily Show, the Colbet Rapport, Curb Your Enthusiasm and Weeds, and I'm addicted to anything written by Maureen Dowd or David Sedaris. I'm also a political junkie, so if you want to trash Sarah Palin I'll be your best friend.

Love,
Julia.

Posted by J Kriegs at 12:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The "other" is generally viewed as that which is different from the "norm" of sociocultural standards. Any variation from these standards are demonized and pushed to the peripheries of society. This, in turn, seeks to invalidate the struggles of those that fall outside of the white, patriarchal and heteronormative dominant culture by making them invisible. The term "other" describes this forced invisibility as a result of the denial of one's personal identity.

Posted by J Kriegs at 11:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Misogyny is the hatred/contempt of women. Classical examples of misogyny include the Greek mythological belief that man lived as one with the Gods before the creation of women and the Judeo-Christian tradition of the "fall of man" as result of woman (Eve). In its most overt form, a misogynist will dislike women simply because they are women. However, misogyny can include subtler forms such as prejudice against women and dislike for women who do not fit into "acceptable" categories.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_11-nzoYFuQU/SDLEwSm1G4I/AAAAAAAACak/J-jBijhPgB8/s1600/misogyny.jpg

from wikipedia

Posted by thur0139 at 11:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello hello. I'm Amanda Ellig and I'm a senior in GWSS. I took a couple years off, and now I'm back to hopefully finish. I've always wanted to take a film class, so this fits in quite beautifully with that interest and my major.
I just got a computer, I never go on the internet, and I haven't had cable in years. However, I love movies and I am writing my first blog... so things can change.

Posted by AJ at 11:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

hey, my name is benjamin thurn, i'm a senior and will be graduating with a degree in english literature. after graduating i'm moving to greece where i hope to hunt octopus for a while. eventually i'd like to go to grad school and teach at a university level. my interests include searching for expensive things on the internet, saunas, vegetarian burritos, and dinosaurs.

Posted by thur0139 at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Avant-Garde is used to describe something as new or experimental, especially in the arts such as filmmaking, photography, etc.

Posted by Mel at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello! My name is Michelle and I'm a sophomore at the U studying I/O Psychology and Spanish. I took a film class my junior year of high school and was lucky enough to go to the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. I'm from a northern suburb of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I'm really looking forward to seeing and discussing the films that this course has planned!

*I've never used a blog before, so please excuse me if I do it incorrectly!

Posted by Mel at 10:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fat Positivity Movement is a type of feminism that promotes acceptance and equal treatment for overweight women. Women who do not fit into society's preferred body image - the starving model - are automatically at a disadvantage in every day life. Not every woman can physically achieve this model size, and the women who do are usually unhealthy. Women naturally carry more weight than men, are expected to be thin again right after childbirth, and are ridiculed for liking food and having curves. Society needs to change its view on the female body!

Posted by Tina Fey at 9:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

To be obsessively fixated on an object, a person, a body part, an action, a reward, etc.

Posted by Ms. Chevious at 2:31 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello, I'm Elizabeth. I am an art senior, a feminist, and a pet lover. I can't wait to watch these films! Good times;)

Posted by Ms. Chevious at 1:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A derogatory term applied to feminists who are considered "militant" and "extreme" in their views. The term was brought into the mainstream by none other than Rush Limbaugh, the conservative talk-show host.

Posted by kko at 12:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Literally: "the love of looking". The desire to watch others in order to fulfill voyeuristic fantasies. In feminist film theory this term is often connected with the idea of the "male gaze", in which women are seen as merely passive objects to be looked at.

Posted by allora at 10:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Intersexed is the term for an individual who cannot be categorized as either male or female. An intersexed individual can have both male and female characteristics including genitalia, secondary sex characteristics, and sex chromosomes (or a combination of the list above).

Posted by flemi136 at 6:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey everyone my name is Ben, I'm a junior studying mechanical engineering. I think it's pretty sweet when people say interesting things about themselves in their introductions so I'll try to do the same. I love ice cream, I've been skydiving, I took a year off of school to do a term of AmeriCorps and movies might be considered one of my favorite pastimes.

Posted by joh02629 at 6:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Objectification is regarding a person as if they were an object. Neglecting a person's free will, or treating them only as a tool towards an end is objectification. Commonly pornography is seen as objectification because women (and men) are viewed as objects of lust rather than individuals.

Posted by joh02629 at 5:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Montage, most often refers to collage including photomontage and sound collage. Montage is also a technique in film editing that can refer to a segment which uses rapid editing, special effects and music to present compressed narrative information.

http://blog.lib.umn.edu/cgi-bin/mt.fpl?__mode=view&_type=entry&blog_id=8496

Posted by ande4840 at 1:34 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi I'm Erin Anderson, and I am a senior at the University. I am an art major, with an emphasis in photography. I am from Mound, MN.

Posted by ande4840 at 1:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Diegesis is the term which refers to a story that is told to a given audience through spoken words rather than by the actions and scripts spoken by actors.

Posted by bergm154 at 11:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Buddy Film-Productions that emphasize the relationship between two males in friendship. This is an important part of popular culture and has only recently been realized in film parlance within the context of female friendships ("Thelma and Louise"). Prominent examples of the Buddy Film highlighting the importance of comradery include "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid" as well as "The Sting".
http://www.buddyfilm.com/

Posted by thoughts at 6:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello- My name is Angela and I am a transfer sudent from Normandale. I am in my junior year working on my B.A. in Political Science and hope the next 2 yrs go by really fast. With the very little freetime that I have I spend it with my boyfriend, family and friends. I really enjoy dining out (which is hard to do when your are a poor college student), traveling, learning about different cultures and new experiences.

Posted by thoughts at 5:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Penis envy is a freudian term relating to young girls being ultimately jealous of their father's penises. Freud claims that at a certain stage in a young girls psycho social development, she begins to imitate her mother in an attempt to take over her mother's role and ultimately reach her father's penis. Freud claims young girls want to cut their mothers out of their lives, because they have a sexual desire to be with their fathers and they want to control their fathers.

Today, the term can mean men being jealous of the size of other men's genitals or women wanting to physically have a penis instead of their own sex organs.

Posted by izzy at 5:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Suffrage is the term used to describe the civil right to vote, or the exercise of that right. More specifically, women's suffrage is the right to vote on the same terms as men. In 1920, the 19th Amendment was added to the U.S. Constitution, stating: "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex."

Source: Wikipedia

Posted by herma216 at 4:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

My name is Bailee and I'm a senior child psychology student. I want to eventually get my master's in marriage and family therapy. i love eating green apples.

Posted by herma216 at 3:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My name is Abbie, currently a sophomore! I am an International Business major! For my first semester of college I went to Arizona State University and it was so beautiful and hot down there and was really fun! Thats about it!
I actually did this on friday or something but i forgot to rebuild it so it might not have shown up
Sorry

Posted by week0065 at 1:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Refers to the specific arrangement or placement of all visual elements (props, actors, etc) in a particular shot according to the director's preference.

In French "mise" is a form of the verb "mettre" which means "to set," "en" means either "in" or "on" and "scene" means "stage." So put together it means "to set on stage," so it's actually a quite literal term (at least in French).

Posted by kafka at 9:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello All,
I think this class will be very intresting and I'm looking forward to it. I wanted to attach a photo, but I couldn't figure out how to make like a normal attachment... So I think I'll be seeking some help.

Bon weekend!

Posted by kafka at 8:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My name is Kaiti and I am a transfer student. This is my fourth year of college and I am a Psychology major. With my degree I hope to work as a Birthparent Counselor. Birthparents are people who decide to relinquish their children to adoption. I am a proud birthmother with a 2 1/2 year old boy named Jakob. I have an open adoption with his adoptive parents and am still a big part of his life. I am very fortunate and I want to help others in the future with their their decision of adoption for their children.

Posted by flemi136 at 8:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey everyone... My name is Jessi and I'm a junior transfer student. My major is English, so I'm taking this class for fun. I've seen a few of these movies already, but I thought they were good and look forward to seeing them again. I read Persepolis over the summer and I am most excited to watch that film. See you on Wednesday...

Posted by Tina Fey at 6:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey!

My name is Katherine Jonas. I am a junior planning to declare my major in GWSS! I live downtown Minneapolis this year with my best friend. She is conveniently named Kathryn! I recenty got back from a semester abroad in Australia. My trip was amazing! I was there for five months and had the time of my life. Some of the adventures included scuba diving in the GBR, traveling to Sydney and Melbourne and getting to know the Aussie lifestyle! I plan to travel to Ireland this summer with my sister! So thats a little about me. I'm really excited to get to know everyone and for the class itself! See you all on Wednesday!

Katherine

Posted by jona0062 at 5:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Glass ceiling is a term used to describe when a person, often a woman, person of a different race, class, gender or religion is unable to be promoted or reach the top of their field or profession because of discrimination. The person knows that he/she has all of the qualities and experience necessary for the position or role but will never be able to attain it.

Posted by Alias at 4:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi everyone,

My name is Margie Siggelkow. I am a junior who transferred this year from Wisconsin. I work at the student service office for the Architecture department. I am a GWSS major. I love movies and my favorite movie is Amelie. II think that this class will be really interesting and will change the way I think about the media, and it's role in the portrayal of women, race, class and gender.. I haven't seen most of the movies in the class so I am excited. Good Luck to everyone this semester!

Posted by Alias at 4:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Femme is a term used to describe a distinct group of lesbians who emphasize their femininity and feminine characteristics through the way they think and behave. This term may also be applied to gay men, although less commonly. In a butch-femme lesbian relationship, the femme lesbian may take on the female role as in a heterosexual relationship while the butch may take on the male role.

*The following websites were used as resources for this entry:
http://www.bg-lesbian.com/lesbian/2maineldef1eng.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femme

Posted by hadix001 at 4:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey everyone,
I'm Andrea and I'm a junior majoring in Child Psychology. I've lived in MN all my life and actually really love it here. :) I do like love to travel though and hope to do more as I get older and have more opportunities. I spent a month in Romania this summer volunteering at an orphanage, which was an awesome experience. I'm pumped for this class because I love the way GWSS classes make you look at things in a whole different light, plus we get to watch movies.

Posted by happyfeet at 4:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello everyone, my name is Asbah Hadi. I am a senior in microbiology and hope to graduate come Spring 2009. I hope to attend graduate school to study viruses and eventually would like to work for the Centers for Disease Control. I was born in India and moved to the US when I was one and have lived in Minnesota ever since. I have a variety of interests including traveling, cooking, reading and the outdoors. I look forward to gaining a new perspective on film from this class!

Posted by hadix001 at 3:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Castration Complex:
Also known as "Castration Anxiety" is an idea by Sigmund Freud. Freud says that a Castration Complex is a fear, in small boys, that usually develops during the phallic stage of sexual development. The Complex makes the boys think, when seeing female genitalia, that she had her penis cut off as a form of punishment. The Complex turns into an anxiety as the boy thinks the same will happen to him.
On a more profound level, Freud thinks that the boy fears he will ultimately lose his power in society via the loss of his penis.
**I would like to credit MSN Encarta Dictionary for helping me with this term.

Posted by Eleanor Roosevelt at 2:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hey everyone, my name is Jolene Lewis. I am a senior majoring in Sociology-LCD. I plan to graduate next spring. I have lived in Minnesota my whole life. I recently became an aunt and my favorite thing to do is play with my nephew, Kody. There's not much else to tell about me. See everyone in class!

Posted by Jolene Lewis at 2:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

According to wikipedia, internalized oppression is when people believe and accept others' negative opinions and stereotypes of themselves. It is often associated with internalized racism, which is a more specified version of oppression. One example would be the women who don't believe that a woman could be president because she would be too emotional or too weak or something like that.

I would like to apologize for posting this in the wrong place, but I can't figure out how to post a comment on someone else's entry.

Posted by Katie Green at 2:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi, my name is Trevor Keilholtz and I am a junior. I recently transfered from Winona State University to the U of MN. I am majoring in Studies in Cinema and Media Culture with a possible minor in Human Sexuality. Two reasons for me taking this class: 1. My love for film. Movies are my life and I am open to anything that will further my knowledge of this medium 2. I took a feminism course (Feminist Discourse: Women in Popular Culture) at my previous school and I really enjoyed it hoping to possibly take another course like that again. Well what do you know as I am registering for classes this course came up and I knew right away that I was going to be taking it no matter what. That is all I have for now, can't wait to dive into this class because from the looks of the syllabus it seems like we are going to have a good time.

Posted by keilh004 at 1:57 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My name is Stephanie, I'm a sophomore. I'm majoring in Mathematics-Actuarial Sciences and minoring in Statistics and Economics. I'm looking forward to this class because it will be a nice distraction from all of my math classes (I'm taking like 3 of them this semester alone, BAD IDEA). I've live in Minnesota my entire life and I still do not understand why or how people could possibly enjoy the extremely cold parts of the winter season. I hope to get to know more of you as the semester progresses.

Posted by robes002 at 1:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

According to Wikipedia the First-wave feminism refers to a period of feminist activity during the nineteenth and early twentieth century in the United Kingdom and the United States. It focused on de jure (officially mandated) inequalities, primarily on gaining women's suffrage (the right to vote). The term first wave was coined retroactively in the 1970s.
What I got out of First Wave Feminism is that it was the first time in history that women were standing up for their right as human beings to equal rights.

Posted by breme071 at 12:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello, my name is Karissa. I am a transfer student from MCTC, this is my first semester at the U. I have lived in Minneapolis for nine years, but I still don't know my way around the U. If you see a women walking around with a map out looking lost and confused, it's me. I received my women's study certificate from MCTC and will be a GWSS major here. I am really excited for this class.

Posted by kko at 11:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi. My name is Katie and I'm graduating this fall with a double major in Art and Art History. I have taken classes on both film and feminism, but never the two combined. So I am really curious to see how this class will go...

Posted by allora at 12:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My name is Katie Green, and I'm a sophomore. I'm originally from a small town in upstate New York, but I've lived thirty minutes outside of Atlanta, GA for the past eleven years. I'm double majoring in English and Journalism with a minor in Political Science. I'm also terrible at anything dealing with technology, so I'm really hoping this post shows up like it's supposed to.

Posted by Katie Green at 6:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Intersectionality according to Wikipediea states that it is a “theory which seeks to examine the ways in which various socially and culturally constructed categories interact on multiple levels to manifest themselves as inequality in society�. Basically, intersectionality looks at the many different identities a person has and how they all interact with each other in every individual’s life. This theory is used to assess the oppression within a society based on such identities as gender, race, nationality, sexual orientation, class, etc. Through this we see the many different forms of discrimination that exist. An example of this would be an African American woman; she feels oppression as an African American as well as for being a woman, another “intersection� could be added if she was also a lesbian, for she would feel discrimination for that too.

Posted by luco0005 at 3:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi my name is Meghan Lucore, but I prefer Meg. I'm a psychology major with a minor in GWSS. This is my fifth year and final semester before I graduate this fall. I'm super excited about this class because I love watching and analyzing movies but I'm terrible at blogging, so I'll be working on that. Anyway, it'll be fun getting to know everyone throughout the semester.

Posted by luco0005 at 3:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

According to Dictionary.com, a transgenered person is "a person appearing or attempting to be a member of the opposite sex, as a transsexual or a habitual cross-dresser."

Posted by conw0077 at 2:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My name is Jonathan. I'm a senior majoring in child psychology. I chose this class partly because a friend of mine was supposed to be in it and then decided to drop out without telling me. I also chose it because I thought it would be fun and kinda different than what I usually take here at school. For fun I like to go fishing and work on cars and then race them.

Posted by bergm154 at 2:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hi! My name is Mandy Conway and I'm a sophmore at the U. I'm from Madison, WI, but don't worry I HATE the Badgers. Right now I'm majoring in Political Science with a concentration in politics and law. As for a minor, I'm hoping that I can do french. I think this class will be a nice, fun break from all of my boring politics classes!

Posted by conw0077 at 2:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Hello everyone my name is Audra. I am a senior and