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Film and Feminism
This essay is concerned with the role of film in feminism and of gender and sex in film, particularly the extent to which the dominant patriarchal ideology is embedded in film; and the notion of film as moral educator, as a tool for social reform.
Feminism is a social movement which has reshaped the way we think about film. From a feminist perspective film is recognized as an ideologically informed medium for the naturalization and perpetuation of socially constructed myths about both sex and gender. From this recognition was born a new school of film theory and criticism � a feminist one � which is particularly concerned with spectatorship of and representation in film, more specifically, the relationship between the two. The concern is that the prevalence of stereotypical and distorted images of women in mainstream cinema, could have a negative impact on the spectator � indeed a particularly insidious one in the measure in which it is unconscious. However, the generation of positive images is not enough to change the underlying patriarchal structure to film. The omnipotence of phallocentric images is considered in terms of psychoanalysis, in the hope of exploding and remoulding narrative to create a new feminist cinema.
Both spectator and film-maker are susceptible to patriarchal ideology. The spectator is conditioned to read film in an uncritical manner; the film-maker is challenged by the degree to which he or she surrenders to the established norms of representing gender.
Teresa de Lauretis explains the patriarchal perception of woman as mystery, woman as the question which man must answer. Man is perceived as seeking knowledge and eventually truth through sexual desire. This is the structure of every film narrative. According to de Lauretis, narrative is oedipal in structure - it sets up roles and differences, thus position and power. Thus traditional film is not merely incidentally phallocentric, rather it is so by its very nature.
Claire Johnston uses Roland Barthes� notion of �myth� to explain the notion of the myth of �Woman� in traditional cinema narrative; that is the ideological meaning that �woman� has for men. In relation to herself she means no-thing; the only representation available to women is one by which they are negatively defined as �not-man�. This is because cinema represents not reality, but rather an ideological representation of reality, it represents not the female, but our ideologically mediated perception of the female. These representations of �woman� nevertheless appear natural, realistic, because the viewers attention is distracted from the artificiality of film by its quality of immediacy; film is the most realistic and, as a result, illusionistic medium available in the modern world. This, coupled with its availability ascribes it a dangerous power.
A film-maker and feminist film critic, Laura Mulvey, made use of two central tools to analyse gendered address in classical narrative film: psychoanalysis and semiotics. Her seminal article �Visual pleasure and narrative cinema� involves a feminist appropriation of Freudian psychoanalysis. She believes that in all forms of contemporary media, including advertising, the sexes are dichotomously represented as active male and passive female. Mulvey explains that while the man is the bearer of the �determining male gaze� (33), the woman �holds the look�(33), in �an active/passive heterosexual division of labour�(33). Mulvey states that �Traditionally, the woman has functioned on two levels in the media world: as an erotic object for the characters within the story, and as an erotic object for the spectator� (33). The media presents us with woman as object ... �She is isolated, glamorous, on display, sexualized�(33). She is exhibited and �can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness ... she plays to and signifies male desire�(33). Mulvey draws our attention to a particularly clear example in the advertising world, where male spectators are invited to view the woman as object. She �holds the look� and is the prize to be won if the product is purchased.
Thus images of women are inevitably culturally filtered, to fit the perception of �woman� in society. However, these images are problematic for men. The image of �woman� is fundamentally ambiguous in that it combines attraction and seduction with an evocation of castration anxiety. There are two ways that men deal with this castration anxiety: the first avenue is fetishism. The second avenue is the Freudian notion of scopophilia � the desire to see. These avenues are unconsciously used by males to alleviate their castration anxiety by controlling and dominating females.
Fetishism is a psycho-sexual ritual in which some part of a person, not normally considered sexual, is elevated to such a status, to the exception of all else. It is a process by which the male spectator seeks to glamorize female beauty, to focus her body as sexual, to overvalue the physical beauty of the woman, and turn her into an object that is satisfying and pleasurable to look at as a means of both drawing attention away from the lack of penis and thus abating his fear of castration. Prime examples of the fetishizing of the female in the film industry include Marilyn Monroe and Marlene Dietrich. It is precisely a fetishistic response to castration anxiety which has led to the cult of the female movie star.
Mulvey goes on to differentiate between types of scopophilia - voyeuristic visual pleasure and narcissistic visual pleasure. The former is produced by looking at another (character, figure, situation) as our object, whereas the latter is derived from identification with another (character, figure, situation) as our subject. The desire to see functions in accordance with gendered binary opposition of activity and passivity. In voyeuristic scopophilia, the woman is objectified, defined by her �to-be-looked-at-ness� by a masculine subject. This has associations with sadism in that males see females as deserving of punishment when they are bad and of reward when they are good and moreover that it is the man who should mete it out.
Mulvey discusses narcissistic scopophilia in the context of Christian Metz�s discussion of primary identification. Metz writes, in turn, in a context of Lacanian psychoanalysis; stressing the importance of the �mirror stage� in psycho-sexual development. The spectator must identify with �the more perfect, more complete, more powerful ideal ego�(33) which is traditionally defined in film as the male figure. The female, on the other hand is depicted as passive, powerless and intellectually void. The spectator must identify with the male figure in order to satisfy his (or her) Lacanian narcissism.
This brings us to a question at the heart of patriarchal imagery in film. Is the gaze male?
The answer is complex.
The female spectator may not only identify with the passive femininity, which has been programmed for her, but may also choose to adopt the masculine point of view. Mulvey elaborates on the notion of transsexual identification and spectatorship by discussing the fantasy of omnipotence which is equally active for girls as for boys, and which, being pre-oedipal and phallic, is essentially masculine. In order to attain �proper� femininity, women will have to shed that active aspect of their early sexuality. Mulvey speculates that female spectators may negotiate the masculinisation of the spectatorial position in Hollywood cinema, because it signifies for them a pleasurable rediscovery of a lost aspect of their sexual identity. This experience cannot be entirely satisfying though, for the female spectator remains �restless in her transvestite clothes�(p. 37).
Do these interpretations of female spectatorship demand the unpleasant conclusion that the female look is impossible and that the gaze is necessarily male? For some time this was thought to be the case in feminist theory. For instance, in her analysis of Hollywood woman�s films of the 1970�s and 1980�s, Kaplan argues that female characters can possess the look and even make the male character the object of her gaze, but because she is female, her desire simply has no power � it is a mere shell, an illusion of dominance. Pragmatically speaking she may only �desire to desire�(Mary Ann Doane; the title of her essay). Many feminist films, particularly in Hollywood, only are empty portrayals of the female gaze, which only obscure the real patterns of phallocentric dominance. The gaze is not male, �but to own and activate the gaze, given our language and the structure of the unconscious, is to be in the �masculine� position�. (p 30)
The female look was thus effectively circumscribed by the majority of feminist film theorists as either male, masochist or marginal. Gertrud Koch however sought to find an outlet for the female gaze. She contended that women could enjoy the image of female beauty on the screen as women, not just in terms of sex, but in terms of gender. This strain of feminine homo-eroticism relates back to a pre-oedipal stage, in which the mother is love object not only for the boy child but for the girl child. It is associated with the (now largely defunct) cult of the vamp, the archetype of which was certainly Marlene Dietrich.
Silverman expands on this notion, taking Laura Mulvey�s feminist film �Riddles of the Sphinx�, as an example. According to her this film is based on a fantasy for the maternal enclosure which stems from feminine homo-eroticism is the organizing principle of. The figure of the Sphinx is given the role of a narrator, from whom we are distanced by emphasis on her fictional nature. This disembodied voice speaks of motherhood, in terms of psychoanalysis and feminism, thus firmly establishing the maternal in the film. The film is centered upon the female desire to recover the Oedipal or symbolic mother, represented by the Sphinx. The maternal fantasy can be found not only in the pre-Oedipal development, but also in maternal enclosure of mother, grandmother and child. �Riddles of the Sphinx� depicts a feminist community of women and this female collectivity, like female subjectivity, is based upon the passionate desire for the mother, which defines the Freudian negative oedipal stage, in which the father is �a troublesome rival�(Freud quoted in Silverman p. 153) whilst the girl child both identifies with and desires the mother. Thus �Riddles of the Sphinx�is a film which exploits the female capacity for homo-eroticism in spectatorship and seeks thereby to provide a female gaze.
Carol Clover goes a step further, contending that both men and women have a bisexual spectatorship. She constructs her thesis around a discussion of the representation of women in the horror genre. It is so much more common for the victim in a horror film to be female � who can forget the infamous shower scene in �Psycho� which sees Marion stabbed to death. This suggests that the horror genre is informed, as much as any other genre by patriarchal ideology. However, characteristic of the modern horror film is the �final girl�, the heroine who, though the target of the killer, saves herself
(and sometimes others) and defeats the killer. The �final girl� possesses the gaze, and dominates the action, and is thus masculinised. Recent examples include Jennifer Love Hewitt�s final girl, who survives �I know what you did last summer� and its sequel and Neve Campbell�s Sidney, who saves the day in Scream, Scream 2 and I believe even in Scream 3! According to Clover, the modern horror genre uses the important distinction between sex (anatomy) and gender (social construct) to generate a �theatricalisation of gender� which feminises the audience, thus making the gaze female. The �final girl� is the hero, �the more perfect, more complete, more powerful ideal ego� and her self-rescue forced the male viewer to give �up the last pretence of male identification�. Clover then finds, in the midst of the misogyny of the horror genre, which targets women as victims so habitually, a glimmer of hope in which gender roles are subverted.
Thus the female gaze � as opposed to the feminine � is, according to Koch and Clover, possible. It cannot be denied, though, that it is so rarely catered to in mainstream cinema, as to be of little relevance.
Still film succeeds in tricking us into thinking that the patriarchal images on the screen, derived from the dominant social order, are the truth, are reality. In finding a way around this for feminists, Mulvey brings up some complex ontological issues; namely the notion that there is no reality, only various representations of phenomena. According to Mulvey the �mask is all there is�. That is to say we are embedded in language, we cannot in principle achieve a neutral encounter with phenomena, unmediated by language. When we realize that all representations are equally ungrounded we become less bound by them. Hammet, in her discussion of Mulvey, does not hold that �the recognition that our beliefs are merely beliefs, representations�(p. 249) necessarily makes �us any less committed to them�(p. 249). As she sees it �we have no more reason to doubt our representations than to believe them�(p. 249). However, even if Mulvey is right in asserting that the recognition that what we took to be real or true, is merely a representation will ipso facto weaken our support of it, does this not imply that any power feminist images in film might hold is equally diluted by the fact that they too are mere representations? Moreover, do we not move from a situation in which there is no truth, only opinions, to a situation of relativism in all fields. What then of morality? Is Hitler�s point of view as valid as ours with regard to the Holocaust? Of course not, is what we need to be able to say. If all that is accessible to us are representations, then the question arises: representations of what? Moreover what reason do we have to postulate even the existence of a reality that is, in principle, unknowable. Neither Mulvey nor Hammet address these implications of their positions.
Nevertheless Mulvey�s discussion of the feminist counter-cinema was ground-breaking.
She defines the feminist counter-cinema as an avant-garde film practice which would �free the look of the camera into its materiality in time and space and the look of the audience into dialectics and passionate detachment�(p. 26). This is to say, it will redefine narrative by shunning classical techniques and pave the way for a new feminist discourse in film.
According to Mary Ann Doane �the most interesting and productive ... films dealing with the feminist problematic are those which elaborate a new syntax, thus �speaking� the female body differently, even haltingly or inarticulately from the perspective of a classical syntax�(p. 34)
A popular means of achieving a new cinematic language involved a feminist appropration of the montage techniques of Sergei Eisenstein, Bertold Brecht�s notion of �Verfremdung� (distantiation) and the modernist aesthetic of Jean Luc Godard.
�Thriller� , a Sally Potter film, is an excellent example of feminist counter cinema. It operates on two levels to deconstruct a classical melodrama - Puccini�s opera �La Boh�me�. The film splits the female character into two: Mimi 1, who is placed outside of the narrative in which she is the heroine, Mimi 2. Whilst Mimi 2 acts out her role in the melodrama, Mimi 1 overtly analyses the phallocentric objectification of her other self in the narrative. In an attempt to disassociate itself from traditional cinema, �Thriller� shuns traditional cinematic technique. �La Boh�me� is told partly in shots which are pictures of photographs of a stage performance, and partly by way of the actors� highly stylized movements. Potter also uses mirrors to get her ideological point across; that is, to demonstrate the psychoanalytic stages of Lacan�s mirror phase. For example, when Mimi 1 recognises herself as object her shadow is thrown up on the screen. Mimi 1 is then shown with her back to a mirror, facing the camera. This image is repeated in a series of mirrors behind her, reflecting her face, rather than the back of her head as it would naturally do. This is designed to express Mimi 1�s awareness of her split self; an awareness which leads Mimi 1 to reject her narrative duality and embrace Mimi 2.
Chantal Akerman�s feminist film �Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles� was made by a female crew, under young director determined to ignore the traditional requirements as concerns length, style and content. Stylistic abnormalities include �frontally centered images and elliptical and disjunctive editing� , while the film deals with an unusual topic: a woman�s alienation from her daily routine as a housewife, involvement in prostitution and her eventual murder. A particularly interesting stylistic technique used by Akerman in her film, involves a marked separation between the visual field occupied by the camera and the field observed by the camera. This separation is created by the abandonment of the �conventional shot/reverse-shot rhetoric of editing and a skilled use of ellipsis that emphasises the
separation of these two fields.� This distances the spectator from the subject and avoids the objectifying nature of the gaze.
Since �film reflects, reveals and even plays on the straight, socially established interpretation of sexual difference which controls images, erotic ways of looking and spectacle� , it cannot be used to challenge oppressive and unjust social constructs, such as patriarchy � at least not in its classical narrative form. What is necessary is a rephrasing of authorial, spectatorial and textual desire. Many feminist film-makers feel confident that they have succeeded in creating a truly feminist film. But is this really the kind of film that has the power to change the fabric of society?
In order to answer this question it is necessary to examine how and why films � and art in general - have the effect that they (sometimes) do on our lives. How is it that a film can so often make us change our opinions, when logical argument cannot? Effective films enter our psyches at an unconscious level; they appeal to our emotions. Once it has invoked an emotional response in the spectator, a film is able to invoke an intellectual one. Thus, in the measure in which it has the power to manipulate the emotions a fortiori through the unconscious, film can be used as a moral educator. By the same token however, it can be and is, used in any number of ways which are damaging to society.
Film is an ideal mechanism for communication since it�s appeal is so wide-spread; people who have never read a book in their life go to the movies along with intellectuals. What better vehicle then, for social reform? The irony here is that film attracts so many spectators for highly circumscribed reasons. According to Freud, on whose theories Mulvey heavily relies in her article, people go to the movies to enjoy some kind of psycho-sexual fulfilment involving voyeurism or fetishism. On another level they go precisely in order to have their familiar ideological systems endorsed, so that they may be unconsciously reassured. Finally the majority of people go to the movies to relax, certainly not to think or to be challenged. Subversive cinema would therefore be well-received only by those who are already ideologically emancipated. Thus it is likely that this feminist counter-cinema will indeed remain a counter-cinema, an alternative to the dominant ideology�s mainstream.
Copyright 2000 BlueSuzanne
Bibliography
Fetishism and curiosity / Laura Mulvey
Bloomington: Indiana University Press; London: British Film Institute, 1996
Visual and other pleasures / Laura Mulvey
Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Macmillan, 1989
Visual pleasure and narrative cinema / Laura Mulvey
London: Macmillan, 1989
Men, Women, and Chain Saws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film / Carol Clover
London: British Film Institute Publishing, 1992.
The Desire to Desire: The Woman's Film of the 1940s / Mary Ann Doane
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1987.
Women and Film: Both Sides of the Camera / Ann Kaplan
New York and London: Methuen, 1983.
The Acoustic Mirror: The Female Voice in Psychoanalysis and Cinema / Kaja Silverman
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988.
The Ideological Impediment: Epistemology, Feminism and Film Theory / Jennifer Hammett
Film Theory and Philosophy - Richard Allen and Murray Smith Oxford University Press, 1997.
(Sally Potter)
http://www.wmm.com/catalog/_makers/fm3.htm
(Chantal Akerman)
http://www.fluctuat.net/cinema/interview/akerman.htm
http://www.varsity.utoronto.ca/archives/118/mar05/review/many.html