How Fandom Can Be a Part of Individual Identity and Authenticity - Movie Review Example

Shuyi Liu CHN 152 Final paper 12/10 Creating Authenti through Adopting Popular Culture Icon Representation In the film Forever Fever: Thatsthe Way I like It (1998) the character Hock has a number of parallels to the character that John Travolta played in Saturday Night Fever (1978).Two scenes in particular create a sense of how celebrity idolatry becomes intermeshed with personal identity. The scene at the dinner table is similar to one of the scenes in Travolta’s film as well as the scene where the transformation of Leslie is seen by his father. These two scenes help to make parallels with desired identities versus realities of living on the fringes of fandom for those who base their personal beliefs and values on the ideals presented to them in film. Although different in tone and in what they represent to the film, the scenes in which the family is eating dinner and where Leslie presents his true self to his father are examples of how fandom can be a part of individual identity and authenticity. One of the scenes in Saturday Night Fever shows the entire family at the dinner table where it deteriorates with Travoltas character’s father hitting his hair, his mother hitting his father who hits her back, and then she hits the daughter. The idea of hitting the hair is also seen in the dinner scene that occurs within the film “Forever Fever: That’s the Way I Like it” with a repeat of the father hitting his sons hair, which shows that Hock’s life is reflecting that of Tony Manero, John Travolta’s character. The protagonist of this film, Hock, is drawn into this belief that he can imitate his icons and reveal his authentic self through their public characterizations. Earlier in the film he is imitating Bruce Lee until he sees John Travolta on the screen in Saturday Night Fever. Suddenly Hock is wearing silk shirts and entering a dance contest. A great sense of humor is created as he starts paying attention to his hair and using it as a part of a new identity that he has created based on Travolta’s character. The parallels that are created between the two films create humor while showing how Hock has identified with Manero. Hock begins to see what he wants for his life through imitating Manero. However, the scene at the dinner table where his father has no respect for the lifestyle he has chosen and blatantly shows a preference for his brother is very similar to the scene in with Tony where he is being compared to his brother. In the film Saturday Night Fever, Tony’s brother is a priest which means a great deal to family in terms of status and importance in their community. Tony’s brother does not particularly want to be a priest and this creates an important subplot that helps to define Tony’s identity as well as his role within the family. In Hocks family, his brother Leslie is adored by his parents because he is studying to become a doctor, which is similar to the work related status role that is found in Tony’s brother the priest. Hock sees himself in Tony’s shoes as his family disrespects his choices because they do not have the same status as their respective brothers. By this point Hock is clearly imitating the character that Tony from the film. IN the beginning of the film, Hock was obsessed with Bruce Lee, admiring his character and morals and trying to find his authentic self through becoming like this icon. After seeuing the film, Hock is becomes obsessed with Saturday Night Fever and creates an emotional connection to Tony who appears to reveal something more authentic about Hock than Bruce Lee. The way in which he walks, the style of movement that he adopts, and the dress and hair that he now wears all suggests that he is trying to be Tony’s character. It is also interesting that where before he was imitating Bruce Lee the actor, here he has begun to imitate a character in a movie that happened he played by John Travolta. It is as if the emotional connection he has made with Tony is more fully developed, possibly because the character of Tony is fictional with revealed complexities that might not have existed in his obsession with Bruce Lee. Hock has created a transformation within himself that has combined with his identity in order to form a secondary location of celebrity in the sense that he has taken the parallels between himself and Tony in order to authenticate his experiences. The more interesting transformation, however, occurs with his brother Leslie. In Travoltas film the brother is a priest who has decided to leave the priesthood. In this film, the brother has transformed from the desire to be a doctor to one in which he expresses his identity through dressing as a woman. What is interesting about this scene is that he arrives looking like Audrey Hepburn. He wears the dress that she wore in Breakfast at Tiffanys. This dress is intended to create a reaction as it is form fitting and elegant. The representation of Hepburn is very feminine and elegant within popular culture that extends way beyond the film in which she portrayed his character. The iconic image of Hepburn in this costuming can be found on merchandise and posters so it is represented outside of the film in which it was introduced. Leslie has used this representation as a way to represent his internal self, adopting this persona as a way of expressing his authenticity. The interesting thing to note about this particular scene is that while Leslie is trying to make a statement of his authentic self, he is using the identity of a representation of a character from the film, Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Emulating Audrey Hepburn provides a release for Leslie that he could not get from his daily life. Creating this lovely identity is a part of him trying to express himself, but it does not translate as an expression away from those ideas about his sense of true self and what he knows to be his personal identity. Using her representation brings him a sense of his own purpose and place in life which is interesting considering he is claiming that the person that he was living before had nothing to do with his own ideals and goals. In representing the identity of a celebrity, Leslie is better able to grasp his own personal authenticity. John Fiske discusses social identity in his work relating to popular culture. Fiske writes that “social identities that people struggle to produce for themselves could never be free of determining social relations as expressed through categorization such as gender, race, class, age, and so on; they are never totally determined by those relations, either” (322). Leslie had been representing himself to his family in a way that was in conflict his own personal desires. Through relating himself to Audrey Hepburn, he was able to define himself in very different terms than that which he had presented earlier. The scene in which Leslie confronts his father and shows him who he is in terms of what he wishes to represent is one in which the social norms become broken. Breaking norms that he had followed earlier is also an act of reconstruction. Despite the fact that he is breaking his relationship with his father, he is also reconstructing his identity for his father so that both can move forward in a more authentic manner. Once again, the conflict is that in embracing the identity of a celebrity, Leslie is freeing himself from his own constraints so that he can represent himself in way that is more real for him. The scene in which the relationship between Hock and his father parallels that of Tony Manero and the scene in which Leslie reveals his true identity to his father both show how celebrity brings out the authenticity of their lives. Hock spends the movie transforming into the icons that he has come to identify with so that he can find a place in his own social realm. Leslie is trying to find a way in which express his authentic self and does so by imitating a classic icon in the form of Audrey Hepburn. Hock wants an authentic experience, but he bases this on externalized expressions that are reflective of lives he has seen in films. Leslie is looking to externalize his internal impulses that more authentically describes his essential identity. Both characters are looking for ways in which to express themselves and by finding an identity in popular culture, to create a way in which to express what they feel to be their authentic natures. Works Cited Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Dir. Blake Edwards. Perf. Audrey Hepburn, George Peppard, and Patricia Neal. Jurow-Shepard, 1961. Film. Fiske, John. “Popular Culture” (321-324). Found in frank Letricchia and Thomas McLaughlin (eds). Critical Terms for Literary Study. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1995. PDF. Saturday Night Fever. Dir. John Badham. Perf. John Travolta, Karen Lynn Gorney, Barry Miller, and Joseph Cali. Robert Stigwood Organization (RSO), 1977. Film. Forever Fever: That’s the Way I Like It. Dir. Glen Goei. Perf. Adrian Pang, Medaline Tan, and Caleb Goh. Chinarunn Entertainment, 1998. Film. Read More