I have to admit, I enjoyed the screening and Q&A that Fida Qishta hosted yesterday more than I thought I would.  Going into it I knew it was going to be violent but it didn’t particularly interest me, but I left feeling much more knowledge about the Israeli attack on Gaza.

The Q&A was also very informative and it was clear that Qishta was passionate about sending out the message of what happened to her country and her people out.  She did make the disclaimer that it was not her intention to make the audience take anyone’s side, she just wanted to document what happened in Gaza in a raw, real way.  I like how she made the conscious decision to not include herself in the film and to just do a voice over because she did not want to have the spotlight on her, instead,  she wanted the focus to stay on the Israeli attack on Gaza.

Qishta mentioned in the film that she felt that the camera was her weapon and that mentality allowed her to document what was really happening without being afraid.  In the Q&A Qishta elaborated on that by taking about filming on a small boat while the Israelis were shooting at them and how she felt it was her duty to shoot what was happening so there was evidence if someone got hurt or killed.  She also said that if she were to get shot, the image of the bullet hitting her would show up on camera.

It was very obvious from the film and from hearing Qishta speak that she was  very passionate about filming the attack on Gaza.  It was not her intention to create a film from the footage she shot.  She said that it is even obvious in the documentary that the quality got better throughout the film because her passion for filming got stronger.  Qishta said that it was challenging to film and then write the script, because usually it is done the other way around. She had hours of footage and had to select which clips she wanted to add into the film or just cut out completely.  There were many graphic images that she shot that the producers thought would not be appropriate to expose to American viewers.

I really enjoyed this film and I was definitely touched by the stories that we’re told throughout the film from different people in Gaza, especially Mona’s story.  The way the story was told with the narration from Qishta, the interviews with the people of Gaza and the  exquisite footage that was shot, the film was beautifully put together.  The dedication that Qishta put into the film showed in every clip and it informed me more about the attack on Gaza that I did not know much about before watching the film.

Something that is often overlooked in a feminism, or in our own feminist analysis, is looking at the way that masculinity is constructed and reinforced. Feminism tends to have a certain type of connotation that it only deals with women’s issues. But something important to note is that we wouldn’t have a “woman” category with something that is opposing it–or something that, in some cases, even negates it. In this case that is what the “man” category does. People tend to associate Feminism with putting the woman as the “other” or the “victim” and this reinforces that males/masculinity is the superior group. But it’s worth noting that this isn’t always the case, and the film Boys Don’t Cry supports this claim by demonstrating what a tight construct of masculinity exists for men.

Constantly throughout the film we see ways in which Teena achieves her masculinity. This is by the way she dresses, her haircut, getting in a bar fight, or simply driving a car really fast. These are ways that she has interpreted through her upbringing as ways to identify as male. Her struggle to identify as a man confirms the notion that constructs of masculinity is just as hard to achieve as constructed norms of femininity. There were even times in the film where Brandon was ostracized for not being what a typically masculine male would be.

Something else worth exploring is the rape scene between John, Tom and Teena Brandon. This scene is carefully placed right after Teena’s sex is revealed. It stands almost as a way for John and Tom to reclaim their masculinity by exhibiting their power over Teena Brandon. I speculate that there is also a battle for territory for John, since he is aware that Lana and Teena have been seeing one another.

In fact, it can be argued that rape is not so much about sex as it is about power, force, or ownership. In the films that we have seen in class, rape always occurs after very powerful moments for characters in films. For example, in Foxy Brown, Foxy is raped after she exhibits her independence. Teena Brandon is raped, not only it is discovered he is having an affair with a woman that John loves, but John is also challenged by the fact that Teena Brandon is a woman who is charming the woman he loves. In his flight to regain the woman he loves, he exhibits his power over Teena Brandon by raping her, ultimately to possess what he believes rightfully belongs to him.

It was such a great opportunity to meet Fida Qishta and to watch her film. When watching the film I really felt like I was watching these scenes unfold from the eyes of a war correspondent/journalist. The events that she captured on her camera were so eye opening. This made me think about news stations and how stories are covered.

Fida addressed this when she answered questions after the screening: social media can either promote or hide the severity of an event or activity. I think news stations like to stay away from showing overly graphic images to the masses. They think that the general public cannot handle it. But if you do not show these images, who are you really protecting? This film touched me very personally because I am international student and there have been many gruesome deaths in my country. Although we have not been involved in any recent wars, Jamaica suffers from community and gang-related violence frequently. It is a serious issue and I imagined the people in the movie as my own. The closest Jamaica has come to a war recently was the Dudus case. This case was described as a massacre and everyone was to stay inside for their safety. Soldiers were constantly driving along the roads looking for this man. And America was also a part of the search for this Don.

It’s interesting to note that not many people in America were alive when there was a full out invasion of the country. There have been attacks but the biggest direct attack was probably 9/11?  Has anyone in this class lived to see soldiers of another country destroying your house? Killing your relatives right in front of your eyes? It’s not the same as seeing it on TV. I am not trying to say that anyone is at fault, but ignorance is bliss; and you can be really insensitive to situations that you have never experienced. Again I don’t wish this experience on anyone, but it is very important to tell these stories and to share these voices. The more we know about what is going on, the more we can make well informed decisions.

I am honestly still shell-shocked from watching Boys Don’t Cry. I have been sitting with this movie for over a day now and hoping I’d be able to write this fabulous blog post critiquing the movie but I am still unable to. I finished the movie curled up in my bed with my new stuff-a-plush and still felt the movie weighing me down the entire time. After the movie ended, I began to research the story behind the film and came across the recording of the police interrogation. I found it difficult to listen to but think it is still extremely interesting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lswb1SFl_gY I think it is also interesting that the Brandon Teena/ Teena Brandon’s family seems extremely reluctant to allowing Brandon to still identify as male years later.

I think it is interesting to compare The Help to Boys Don’t Cry in terms of how much detail and how explicit the two movies are about the oppression and ignorance around the main characters. Boys Don’t Cry holds almost nothing back. Whereas The Help has a very strong feeling of sugar coating on the entire situation. Both are movies about people who do not have a lot of previous representation in the media. But I think both do the topics justice. The audience is what changes for these films. The Help is something I could comfortably let my 9 year old brother see where as Boys Don’t Cry is something I’m not even sure I am old enough to handle viewing. Racism and homophobia are still large parts of our society. These movies have two extremely different ways to approach how these topics are portrayed but both received a large amount of both criticism and acclaim. For Boys Don’t Cry, Hilary Swank received an Academy Award for Best Actress nd Chloë Sevigny was nominated for Best Supporting Actress. The Help was awarded Best Supporting Actress to Octavia Spencer and nominated for Best Picture and Best Actress (Viola Davis). Both Received nominated and awards at the Golden Globes as well. These two movies on such opposite ends of the spectrum still received such similar awards. I think it is interesting when we think about the decisions that go into filming a movie.

I think we all can agree that watching Boys Don’t Cry today was a very intense experience. I think this is made even more so when you consider it was based on a true story.

I did some research and read about the real Brandon Teena. I thought you all would  be interested too so here’s a link to learn more:

http://rememberbrandonteena.webs.com/

Something that stuck out for me was this:

“Tisdel sued the producers of the film for unauthorized use of her name and likeness before the film’s release. She claimed the film depicted her as “lazy, white trash, and a skanky snake”. Tisdel also claimed that the film falsely portrayed that she continued the relationship with Teena after she discovered Teena was not anatomically male. She eventually settled her lawsuit against the movie’s distributor for an undisclosed sum.”

I just finished watching Boys Don’t Cry – it was so heavy and emotional I wanted to get it done today. I’m still kind of reeling about working through everything that happened in the film. I have to say, I don’t know if I’ve ever been more anxious for a character. This was probably the most anxiety-ridden film watching experience I’ve ever had.

You know the classic trope of horror movies, when the girl hears a noise coming from behind a door, and every gut instinct you have is screaming “GET AWAY FROM THE DOOR, RUN!” but she only goes closer? And you just keep thinking “Oh God, something horrible is about to happen” and your stomach wrenches? That feeling was my whole experience of watching this movie. I was 99.9% sure a rape was coming at some point (given the context clues of our recent class discussions/readings), which I was definitely anxious about and worried for Brandon’s safety. And let’s be clear, the rape scene/flashback was horrendous and violent and really difficult to watch. But more than that, at least for me in terms of a long-term sense, was the constant fear of Brandon getting outed. I kept getting nervous that they would finally “find him out.”

If after watching Brandon grapple with his secret and navigate the world for the better part of two hours I was this emotionally distraught, what does that say about the experience of actual people who are transsexual? I think that this was entirely intentional through the set up of the movie, and was done really to highlight this constant fear, the constant displays/proving of gender, and the realities of the lives of transsexual people. The never-ending fear of being outed, the betrayals of their bodies (i.e., getting your period when you identify and are trying to pass as a male), the difficult process (practically and financially) of undergoing a sex-change operation, the stigma of mental illness or the disgust as other people react to them. I appreciate this film’s attempt to show the hardships of a transsexual individual.

I think this movie, because it involves transgender behavior and the main character is a transsexual, really complicates the notions of gender, rape, and representations in film. I’m excited to talk about the movie on Monday and hear what everyone thought!

Last class we talked a little about the background of Blaxploitation and it’s role in the 1970s. It was an important movement and as we learned virtually saved Hollywood. Last year in American Cinema we talked extensively about Blaxploitation in terms of Sweetback and Shaft  as well as small discussions of Coffy and Foxy Brown. This genre of film is very interesting and are some great movies, but what think is important to talk about is the other groups of oppressed people.

In the 1970s there were no other groups of minorities in film. The screen basically consisted of black and white, which is why I feel it is important to talk about other races in film. Bruce Lee broke the barrier of Chinese in American film bringing the Kung Fu genre which displayed strong women as well as a hero other than white or black. Cheech and Chong as well even though they aren’t heroes or women they open the doors for Latino actors and actresses.

I feel like this would be an interesting topic to look into. To look deeper into other groups of people and how woman are shown in these films. So far we have been very black and white, which I feel only confines us to two perspectives. Though this will be difficult as even today there are barely minority female stars in film.

Upon first seeing the phrase blaxploitation used in connection to “Foxy Brown” I was a little confused as to how black people were being exploited in the film.  Although Foxy, a black woman, endures a lot of hardships throughout the film and makes some questionable decisions, her storyline is ultimately triumphant.  She is wronged by an amoral group of drug dealers and pimps and overcomes rape and torture to avenge her boyfriend’s death and her own misfortunes.  After watching “Baad Asssss Cinema” in class I soon understood that black people were not necessarily being exploited in the plot of the film, but rather as a film device.

As we learned in the documentary, there was a sudden jolt in the 1970’s of movies that starred black people in the heroic roles.  This was a move by the movie studios to get more black people buying tickets to see their films.  After they succeeded in getting more black people to see their movies, the studios discovered that black people had also begun watching more of their regular, white-centered films and stopped making films centered around black people because it was no longer necessary.

Why do you think the studios were so quick to drop black character-centered films?  After the brief stint of blaxploitation mostly in the early to mid-70’s films reverted to being dominated by black characters.  Although I understand that the movie studios saw that they could get black audiences to see their films whether or not they had black heroes I do not understand why the black character-centered films were dropped so quickly by studios.  The actors of these films discuss in the documentary that they saw the movement towards black hero-centered films as a result of the civil rights movement of the previous decades can it really be called a success because of how quickly they stopped making these films?  I believe that althoug this blaxploitation movement came right after the “end” of the civil rights movement, the fact that these films were dropped so quickly by the studios shows that black actors and audience members were just continually used by the movie studios to make a profit.

I enjoy the discussions and comments that have taken place regarding post-feminism, gender roles, masculinity and femininity. It’s reassuring to see that other people share my views on these issues. (I have this thought after reading Boys Don’t Cry). With regard to post feminism specifically, I believe it’s the role of anyone who can look past the limitations and roles that are instituted in patriarchal society, and live against them, to be one. Not to act as if these limits don’t exist, but to exist and live knowing that these aren’t the restrictions or categories we should live by, and to instead, live freely in a sense. The decisions that an individual makes every day is how this power can be expressed. I believe a post-feminist still has the same agenda as a feminist, and fights for the same goals regarding equal pay, better representation in the media and government, etc.,  but the depth of a post-feminists’ goal is larger.  It’s more along the lines of re-defining gender.

P.S.: I haven’t 100% finalized my thoughts on the matter, these are currently just my thoughts.