I was reading a huge article about this movie on a feminist blog today. People were freaking out about the movie. I saw the previews for this about 3 days ago. I thought "I'll have to see that movie" Here's why: chained promiscuous girl with catholic preist hovering over her preaching. I figured it was going to be halarious. I thought it would have been a funny statement. Apparently the movie is not done in this light. Feministing.com reported that Christina Ricci told MTV that she is playing "a girl who suffers physical flashbacks to a childhood rape. Some women and young girls freak out, panic, and need to cut themselves. [My character] needs to cause herself the same kind of pain when she has panic attacks by having anonymous sex."
Sort of wrong.. but sort of right. She sounds vague and uninformed. There are very complex issues surrounding what victoms of rape go through. Many people who have suffered a childhood rape become hyper-sexual in their teens and adults but this isn't always the case.
I wanted to post my thoughts on this movie (that I have not yet seen btw) on my own blog since my comments would either be ignored or cause anger on Feministing.
As a uber sexual person, I like movies that are erotic and see nothing wrong with them. However, the general consensus at feministing was that the movie was selling Ricci's body, and basically erotisicing the submission and torture of a traumatized girl. However these are all valid complaints, I immediately figured the movie was done in a different light, maybe to make catholic and chaste beliefs look silly and fascist. and of course being somewhat sexy in the process.
*On a different note, I must write a rant about the complex issues of wanting to be sexually submissive i.e. being tied up and such, with your lover but obviously not wanting to be submissive in life or being raped. Also,I like watching S&M porn but don't like the exploitation and oppression of women that they portray even if it's all in good fun..
4 comments:
No worries, they bulldozed me over there too. I love the artwork, and am very interested to see the movie.
Thanks lady. I really did enjoy your comments though. There are some great sexploitation films from the 60's that actually seem portray women in a more powerful role.
Thanks. I didn't really articulate myself very well over at Feministing, so I'm definitely at fault as far as that goes, but my point is this: does every female lead in contemporary movies have to be powerful? Does everything that crosses my eyes have to be pro-woman, or, at the very least, unoffensive to women? It's hard to apply our mores now to art, film, theatre, literature, etc, of the past, so a lot of that gets a pass. But what about today?
As much as the people were protesting that they were discussing the marketing and poster imagery, many of the comments were about the movie itself, the misogynist director, etc. I can quite easily see how the promotional poster (not to mention some of the inane things now found on the movie Web site) would be offensive enough to many so as not to see the movie, even boycott it.
What I don't get is how others on there can't seem to see how the poster would arouse interest in someone, a feminist, even, to want to see the movie based on the image. For me, it's not about the chains, it's about how the depiction is stylized like an old comic book or b-movie poster. That is what initially appealed to me, and then reading the interview with the director, reinforced my desire to see what it was all about and how well (or poorly) it is executed.
Ah yes I can see your point. People are all too willing to be offended. Maybe people are just way too touchy in Western culture. The fact that our society is sooo liberal in comparison to the rest of the world,make people forget just how great North America actually is. Sometimes I wonder if we're not just breeding a society of whiners...myself included.
Off topic, but I actually got into reading russian literature to get a clear picture of just how liberated our society is. To try and give myself a perspective on reasons not to whine and complain. That being said, there are still plenty of reasons to complain unfortunately.
However, I agree with your opinion. Why the hell would people dismiss this purely because of the marketing strategy? and furthermore.. it seems like people are always picking on the lame ducks on that forum. The overwhelming amount of sexist, and demeaning portrayals of women are blatenly in the open on things like MTV. The mainstream music industry is saturated with objectified women. So they are selling Ricci's hottness on a movie poster (and your right, a good one, totally going for the b-movie, comic book artwork. Even her pose is a perfect throwback to the style of horror-comics in the day) - why doesn't feministing seem to point out that the music industry has made a mockery of female artists and now simple manufactures them.
blah.. I could rant forever on the problems with the music industry. I know that its not just limited to the manufacturing of female artists. But seriously, I turn on MTV and I'm apauld by the way they seem to UBER objectify women. Maybe feministing doesn't talk about it because its just so old news...
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