“Feminist” Movie Day

I watched That Obscure Object of Desire the other night (Luis Bunuel’s last film) and started thinking about feminist film interpretation again. This movie is an undeniable classic, and contains multiple layers of possible truths that can be picked apart for days on end, but no matter how you approach it, the film is completely encompassed within a male frame of reference. It was made by a man, every character in the movie is approached only from the male perspective, and every idea in the movie is valid only from a man’s point of view. It’s not a misogynistic film, but it’s a little bit annoying to watch a film like this – not because of its inherent masculine one-sidedness, but because this film was made in 1977 – three freaking decades ago, when I was one year old – and the plight of women in cinema has not improved one iota in the thirty years since then. I swear, it hasn’t!

When a true feminist is working in the system, her movies tend to slip by the public unnoticed – how about Jane Campion (The Piano, In the Cut) or Mary Harron (American Psycho)? Isn’t there a way to make a movie for women, by women, that can also be enjoyed by men? If I can enjoy the most hyper-masculine movie, is it too much to ask that an intelligent man enjoy a challenging movie made by women? I’m not asking for a slew of feminist manifesto-type films… just anything from a female perspective that even comes remotely close to reality would be a nice change. It doesn’t even have to be directed by a woman (see The New World)!

This is basically a long preface to let you know that I accidentally saw two films centered around women today – but neither of them had much to say, except that women are loud, needy, and vacuous without a strong man to hold them in check.



#1 – Because I Said So – This film was basically crap. It was enjoyable in parts, and I find Mandy Moore very appealing, in large part because of her almost-normal body frame. I mean, you can see at least an ounce of fat on that girl’s upper arms. But this movie was the worst of chick flicks – unreal at every moment, and indulging in the most gratuitous of Hollywood Female Fantasies, i.e. the Noble Single Father. And would women this repressed really have graphic conversations about sex with their crazy mother? At one point Mandy Moore’s character is about to have a fling with a guy, and tells her mom that he’s uncircumcised (in so many words) on the phone right as she’s about to do the deed…. A wee bit unbelievable.



#2 – Factory Girl – This was a pretty good movie, worth watching, but nothing superb. I knew nothing about Edie Sedgwick before seeing this, and they made her out to be a slightly more intelligent version of Paris Hilton – basically, the first person to be famous just for being an heiress. It was sad, she took a lot of drugs, she had no real friends, she was super-needy and never found what she truly wanted, etc.

So, after nearly four hours of women crying, bitching, screaming, and being pathetic, I feel like I don’t even know where to turn… It’s even more depressing to see people that should be strong, interesting female role models (hello, Diane Keaton) doing work that makes us look worthless. Can’t we stand on our own two feet? Why does every “Female Empowering” movie have an ending where the woman finally finds the man that makes her Complete? And if she can’t find that man, she dies completely alone and desperate in a hotel room of a drug overdose? Honestly, with the choices the movies give me, I prefer the hotel room O.D.