Academic Awards for Road Movies (GWSS 3307, Fall 2011) Name_Andi Seymour_
Best Actor (select 2 and rank order):
(1) John Leguizamo
(2) Wesley Snipes
Actress (select 2 and rank order):
(1) Queen Latifa
(2) Abigail Breslin
Best Supporting Actor/Actress (select2 and rank order ):in order
(1) Steve Carell/ Jack Nicholson
(2) Macha Meril/Vivivca A Fox
Best Road Film from GWSS 3007 Series: Set it Off
Why? Because the representations of black feminity are complicated, and the consequences for being a black outlaw are real but the film is not too heavy handed in delivering it's message.
Best Trans-Character in Trans-Cinema Road Film: Chi Chi
Why? She is hilarious, and sweet and totally overacted which I think is appropriate for a comedian playing a drag queen. Drag itself is a flattering mockery, so I really like the way Chi Chi is potrayed.
Most Complicated Character in a Road Film Narrative: Mona
Why? Her disjointed story is never fully told or understood within the narrative, and there seems not to be a direct message that her story is trying to preach, and yet every one she meet along her journey seemed either greatly affected or intrigued by her.
Favorite and Most Memorable Vehicle in a Road Film: (select 2 and rank order):
1 Pricilla
2 The broken down VW van from Little Miss Sunshine
Best Example of the Male Gaze in a Road Film? Easy Rider
Worst Road Film screened in GWSS 3307: Girl on a Motorcycle
Why? It was hard to watch, and the female lead was embarrassingly motivated by the approval of men, and her dialog was often ridiculous.
Your favorite cop in the road movie genre___Thelma & Louise ____________
(Name the Movie)
Best Soundtrack in a Road Film:
Set it Off
Best feminist film in the GWSS series: Vagabond
Why? Mona's inversions of the gaze were powerful, and like we discussed in class I read the film as a queer film around the notion of celebration of abjection.
Best Example of "Counter Cinema" in a Road Film Narrative: Vagabond
Why? Because most of the films we watched were produced in Hollywood, many with major box office success, but Vegabond went by a completely different formula. The was it was filmed, often panning the camera counterintuitively from right to left gave the audience a much more active role in participation with the film unlike the major Hollywood films which are meant to be absorbed passively as entertainment only.
Your definition of "counter cinema" Counter cinema challenges tropes of mainstream movies both in script content, and in the manner in which they are filmed, produced, and marketed.
Best Filmic Study of Gender on the Road: Priscilla
Why? While other films interrogated gender well, there were many representations of feminity in this film and more gender representations were presented in this film which is important when interrogating gender
Best Filmic Study of Race on the Road: Set it Off
Why? There were many representations of black feminity in this film that attempted to be less stereotypical than in a lot of films about black women and how they deal with unjust legal and social oppression, and there were a lot of black male characters in the film that were interesting to analyze too. Black women on both sides of the law, sometimes the same women at different points of the movie, I think made for a really compelling place to start a discussion about race and punishment based on identity categories.
Best Filmic Study of Class on the Road: tie between Vagabond and Set It Off& My Own Private Idaho
Why? Vagabond because as a homeless drifter Mona show how resourceful poor people must be, and she represents the excluded class.
Set it Off because the film discusses the social context for race and poverty
My Own Private Idaho because of the comparison between Mike and Scott
Best Filmic Study of Queer Bodies on the Road: The Adventures of Priscilla
Why? Because there is a fairly realistic representation of how queer bodies are received when they travel to certain places, and the film shows them being rather les-phobic to a dyke character in a bar, which I think is really interesting. The idea presented in a film like Too Wong Foo, that drag queens are happy fairy godmotherly types is ridiculous, in fact queer people are complicated imperfect, and sometime homophobic themselves.
Best Definition of a Road Film from the Readings (excerpt from the readings, give page number and author):
In the discussion about Natural Born Killers, a film we didn't watch our text book says "The film becomes exactly what it protests." (Laderman). They were talking about how that film in particular critiques gratuitous violence, but then show lots of it and is based on that showing in a lot of ways, but I think this idea applies to a lot of road films. In the way that the road film narrative is supposed to be about outlaws and breaking free from normative sedentary social obligations, the subtext of most of the films reifies normative family and social structures, just in transit or in new places. The way that Thelma and Louise is supposed to subvert sexist tropes of the road film, it heavily engages the male gaze and portrays the punishment women for seeking freedom from domestication, and abuse.
I will add the page # to this after class
