Annotated Keywords: Gender and Sexuality in Film - Article Example

Prof’s Annotated Keywords: Gender and Sexuality in Film Commodification: The act of “turning something into a product for sale”(Benashoff and Griffin 42). An actor’s image undergoes commodification during the process of creating celebrity. In Film: Commodification is likely the most common form of dehumanization that takes place in film. Commodification creates commercial acceptability. One of the complaints that come from avant guard film makers is that their work has been commoditized by the mainstreaming of the concepts on which they first began to defy the commercialized film industry. Therefore can be said that commodification takes place both inside and outside of film. The good example of commodification and film occurred over the culture of being a transvestite. Where at one time it was considered a high level of taboo, because of the mainstreaming influence of film, the culture has been commoditized so that is a sellable to the audience. In this case, commodification may not necessarily have been a bad thing because it is a culture that was highly marginalized and made it acceptable under certain conditions and within mainstream audiences so that the voice of the transvestite community was no longer unheard. Todo Sobre Me Madre, Pedro Almodovar (All about my Mother, 1999) Although the concept of commodification is almost always a negative, in terms of mainstreaming marginalized communities it can be a positive. Taking what is misunderstood in society and giving it a human face with human of motions can change the way in which society accepts certain types of behaviors and lifestyles. Transvestites have often suffered under the burden of not being accepted in society. In a film like Todo Sobre Me Madre (1999) the concept of an alien ‘lifestyle’ can be brought into human terms through the exploration of common emotions. The public is then ‘sold’ on the human factors which make up this alternative to mainstream life. As the scene reveals a moment of emotion it allows the audience to slip inside the humanity of this character so that they become a part of what is going on. Selling the audience on ideas is a way of commodification in terms of selling the film as well as selling the ideas behind film. Incorporation: The act of “stripping of an ideology or cultural artifact’s more ‘dangerous’ or critical meanings so that the watered-down artifact can be sold to the mainstream culture” (Benashoff and Griffin 42). In Film. The concept of incorporation in film usually comes from taking a given system and deconstructing it so that it is acceptable to the mainstream audience. One of the ideas that is consistently incorporated is patriarchy. Jameson writes that patriarchy is watered-down so that the subtleties that occur in a variety of different forms can be accepted in mainstream by both men and women because they already used to the convention. A very strong example is the shower curtain syndrome which was developed in Hitchcocks Psycho. A number of different concepts are incorporated in this scene of violence. The development of a rape psychology is present as well as the concept of dominance whereby the female is naked and the male is transgendered but still carrying a weapon of penetration. In many ways, the dominance of the male not only overtakes the female, but he has also taken over the presence of his mother by taking her identity. Lat den Ratte Komma in, Tomas Alfredson (Let the Right One In, 2008) (Youtube, Let). In the film Lat den Ratte Komma in (2008) the subject of childhood sexuality is examined by breaking down certain conventions and reconstructing them so that it can be more acceptable. The female character is a vampire, a character that is typically sexualized in film. One of the unusual things about this film is that the female character is powerful whereas the male character is victimized. However, it becomes clear that the female character is not effective without a male protector and as she seeks out this new individual to take care of her, the predatory instincts of her species becomes translated into sexual predatory actions in order to attract the right male to her cause. Although sexuality in children is often discouraged as something that would be represented in film, this film manages to incorporate the idea by diminishing the problem with the supernatural aspect. Although the film is disturbing on many levels, it does not ever fully become disturbing on the level of sexuality because of the way which the ideologies have been diminished. Marginalized: “The process whereby something or someone is pushed to the edge of a group and accorded lesser importance” (Business Dictionary). In Film: Ferguson describes marginalization as “that complex and disputatious process by means of which certain people and ideas are privileged over others at any given time” (7). Marginalization means that a group is ignored or trivialize, rendered invisible and essentially they are unheard in society. Ferguson goes on to describe marginalized groups as “inconsequential and deauthorized” wear as in contrast another group is valorized (7). This is often found in comparing the roles of women to men in film. Women become the damsels in distress, their function produced to victimization and the inability to act. Men become the heroes who fix the problem that is presented through an elevated ability to act. In terms of gender, the most common dynamic exists between the ineffectual female and the highly effectual male. The opinion, position, and character development of the female is set aside so that the male is the focal point in the only position on which the plot rests. Orlando (1992) Sally Porter (Youtube Orlando) In Orlando (1992), Sally Porter plays with the concept of gender through a character that has the ability to change gender. In this scene, Orlando is a woman and having to listen to the ways in which men position of women. Because her back is to the camera, Orlando is visually marginalized as the men speak of women in terms that are marginalizing the female physician in society. The first male says that “women have no desires only affectation” and another says that “ah, but I consider women to be a beautiful, romantic animal who should be adorned in furs and feathers, pearls and diamonds”, but then goes on to describe how unpleasant it is when a woman tries to improve her mind (Youtube, Orlando). As Orlando reacts to this insulting description of the position of women, one of the men declares that she is aflame and silent, then stating that this is perfect. At the end of this particular scene when it is insinuated that women can only find their character through a father or husband, is made clear that without either in their lives of woman would be lost (Youtube, Orlando). The very core of the scene is to describe marginalization and show the experience of it. Objectification: The reduction of the humanity of a person into the treatment of an object so that their emotions, intellect, and status loses status (Halwani 187). In Film: Female objectification is one of the most common problems found in film. Objectification means a number of different things, including creating stereotypes. The female representation is often passive and submissive, and she has not been she is somehow punished for not representing the ideal. Kuhn and Radstone write that “the term sexual spectacle is used in feminist film theory to describe the construction of the female as passive object of desire, on display for male approval and crotic gratification… Popular film appeal to masculine desires to possess, control, and punish feminine sexuality and propose a masculine spectator position which reproduces the patriarchal organization of sexuality around an active/masculine and passive/feminine divide” (363). Objectification is then formulated through all of the aspects of the way in which is seen as constructed which include lighting, costuming, editing, and the way in which the cinematography is approached (Kuhn and Radstone 362). Blue is the Warmest Color (2013) Abdellatif Kechiche it would not necessarily be thought that this particular scene is a moment of objectification unless it is observed in the context of the filmmakers commentary. This character is objectified because she is symbolic in this scene. The filmmaker Abdellatif Kechiche describes her in terms of her physical appearance and what she brings to Adelle, the main character. She is a “smile from destiny” (Youtube Blue). It is not necessarily the internal character that is important in this moment. She is a physically attractive woman who brings the appearance of a solution merely by her attractiveness. Although objectification is usually much more blatant, this use of the female presence and that the purpose of her parents is clearly meant to be representational rather than a fully fleshed out human being which is at the core objectification. Objectification means placing an individual character is a physical representation without the depths of character development and this is the case at this particular moment in the film. Sexploitation: The use of women as objects as willing partners in the victimization of exploiting their sexuality (Flowers 181). In Film: Sexploitation is the exploitation of most often women’s sexuality in which the female is reduced to their body parts rather than understood as human. Although pornography is the best example of sexploitation, slasher films also literally reduce a man or woman to their body parts as they are violated by violence which reduces their body to blood and gore. Most often the penetration of the body is accomplished by a knife or cutting instrument of some sort and in death the female or male victim has been reduced to nothing more than blood and tissue (Clover 57). Sexploitation often involves positioning breasts as the “signifier of sexual difference” (Jancovich 150). Most nude scenes are focused on the female breasts as the focus and raison d’etre of the existence of the scene. What most often occurs is that power of the woman is directly linked to the size of her breasts (Jancovich 150-151). La Dolce Vita (1960) Federico Fellini (Youtube La is) This scene from La Dolce Vita (1960) is a good example of how the female body is used in order to satisfy the male gaze. The female figure is dancing, her body slick with water as she defies human convention and allows her dress, hair, and makeup to be ruined for the pleasure of the male gaze. In the case is seen her power is derived from the display of her breasts which are large, indicating that her sexual power is also large. Because of her actions and the way in which her breasts are prominently displayed, this is a prime example of exploitation in film. The use of her sexuality is at the core of the scene and her intellectual capacity is set aside in order to exploit her as a sexual being. The filmmaker fully intended for her breasts and her sexuality to be at the core this shot. Works Cited Benshoff, Harry M, and Sean Griffin. America on Film: Representing Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality at the Movies. Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2011. Print. Business Dictionary. 2014. Web. 6 July 2014. Byars, Jackie. All That Hollywood Allows: Re-reading Gender in 1950s Melodrama. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1991. Print. Clover, Carol J. Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press, 1992. Print. Flowers, Ronald B. The Victimization and Exploitation of Women and Children: A Study of Physical, Mental and Sexual Maltreatment in the United States. Jefferson, NC u.a: McFarland, 1994. Print. Ferguson, Russell. Out There: Marginalization and Contemporary Cultures. New York, N.Y: New Museum of Contemporary Art, 1990. Print. Halwani, Raji. Philosophy of Love, Sex and Marriage: An Introduction. New York: Routledge, 2010. Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism, Or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. Durham: Duke University Press, 1991. Print. Jancovich, Mark. Defining Cult Movies: The Cultural Politics of Oppositional Taste. Manchester: Manchester Univ. Press, 2003. Print. Kuhn, Annette, and Susannah Radstone. The Womens Companion to International Film. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994. Print. OPray, Michael. Avant-garde Film: Forms, Themes and Passions. London [u.a.: Wallflower Press, 2003. Print. Youtube. Blue Is the Warmest Color | Anatomy of a Scene w/ Abdellatif Kechiche n.d. Web. 6 July 2014. Youtube. La Dolce Vita (1960) – Federico Fellini – Trailer, n.d. Web. 6 July 2014. Youtube. Let the Right One In Official HD Trailer. 6 October 2008. Web. 6 July 2014. Youtube. Orlando (1992( The lady is aflame…and silent, 2 October 2011. Web. 6 July 2014. Youtube. Todo sobre me madre /All About my Mother (1999) Movie Trailer n.d. Web. 6 July 2014. Read More