This is an interesting short documentary about Beyonce where she discusses the hardships of being famous, being a feminist, happiness and much more.  I recommend watching it, its beautifully shot!

I saw this and thought it was interesting how even pregnant women are sexualized.  It shows women in two very stereotypical ways;  nurturing, as they are carrying their unborn child, and also seen as sexual.  Kourtney Kardashian is completely naked while posing in a suggestive way.  There are also examples of other celebrities posing naked and pregnant.  Why can’t they be shown clothed or wearing a sports bra and jeans or something of that sort to still show off their very pregnant bellies? Any thoughts on the matter?

http://www.vh1.com/celebrity/2014-12-02/kourtney-kardashian-nude-photoshoot-dujour/?xrs=MAIN_10am

http://www.eonline.com/news/590557/watch-these-adorable-little-girls-drop-f-bombs-and-truth-bombs-to-promote-feminism

I was scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed when I saw someone posted this, titled: Adorable Little Girls Drop F-Bombs for Feminism.  I think this video is interesting because we see two things that are completely out of the ordinary.  The first and most obvious being young girls saying the word “fuck” or “fucking” and the second is that it is the children that are sending out a strong message about feminism, when it is usually someone much older.  The message of the video is that society should spend less time getting offended by curse words and pay more attention to the fact that women are still treated unfairly.  Take a look at the video, its informative yet super funny and cute.

After watching Stan Brakhage’s short film Window water baby moving I couldn’t stop thinking about it after class.  It was a very memorable piece of work to watch and even on my ride back to the hill with a few girls from the class, we all discussed what we had just watched.

I think the way that Stan Brakhage filmed the entire piece was so artistic that as a viewer even though we were seeing a fully naked women, it was not a sexual scene at all.  I think the quick cuts, no audio and the intimate moments we saw the woman have with her husband did a good job of making the whole thing looks less sexual and focus more on the beauty of a mother giving birth to her child. It is hard to have nudity and to not view it in a sexual way through being apart of American culture and how we are conditioned to viewing nudity, but Brakhage managed to show very intimate parts of the womans body while still keeping the main focus of the short film on the beautiful birthing experience a woman has.  The way he shot close ups of the woman smiling or of her with her hands on her belly kept the primary focus of the film intact.

As we discussed in class, I appreciated the how Brakhage didn’t introduce us to the characters and we didn’t hear about their life story because as a viewer I did feel like I was not supposed to be in such an intimate private moment in this couples life, but it would have been even more uncomfortable learning about the couple through the film and then experience the birth of a couple that I feel like I kind of got to know though watching the film.

• Cooper articulates in her essay that the film is an investigation of heteronormativity through a narrative that privileges female masculinity in four ways:

1. by dismantling the myth of “America’s heartland”- Brandon going against the norm of America’s heartland
2. problemizing heteromasculinity- John and Tom portray masculinity but the film shows that in a twisted way, making it seem bad
3. by centering female masculinity- Brandon idolizes John and Tom in the beginning of the film but once he becomes infatuated by Lana, he realized he can put his own spin on masculinity
4. by blurring the boundaries of female masculinity-Lana refuses to acknowledge that Brandon is biologically female but identifies as a female, which is where the boundaries got blurred

• Cooper said the director of the film, Kimberley Peirce didn’t want to just re-tell the “sensationalized” murder story of Brandon Teena.  She wanted to reclaim why a girl would want to identify as a boy in the first place
• The media coverage on Brandon’s death focused almost exclusively on the fact that he was a girl passing as a boy
• New York Times film critic, Janet Masin, said “tabloid-ready tale attracted the kind of omnivorous media attention that distorts the truth beyond recognition and milks reality dry”
• Heteronormativity is constantly reinforced by the media, which depicts characters who transgress from heterosexuality as “comic, weak or evil” linking those characteristics with “criminality”
• Varied forms of female masculinity, including trans-sexuality have been seen in an unfair way
• Even scholars have shown no interest in masculinity
• The media illustrated Brandon as a threat to traditional family values, to innocent women, but most aggressively portraying him as a threat to America as a whole
• Perice captures Falls City, not as a town with hard working, simple, religious folk but rather as a dismal place with dysfunctional families, dead-end jobs, and abundant alcohol and drug use to pass the time hoping one day to escape.
• Characters surrounding Brandon in the film are alcoholic, depressed, violent and promiscuous, showing Brandons normalcy and good nature
• The film suggests Brandon as the one who isn’t “sick”

Questions:

Does Brandon being transsexual change the way we view rape?

Do you think it would’ve added to the story if we got a chance to see what Brandon was like when he was a girl? How might it have changed the film?

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.

I was listening to ‘Flawless’ by Beyonce and there is a part in the song where Beyonce samples Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s call to feminism.  I love the way that her speech is integrated into the middle of the song, splitting up “Bow down bitches” and “I woke up like this… flawless.”

“You can have ambition, but not too much, you should aim to be successful, but not too successful, otherwise you will threaten the man.” ties into Place’s article “Women in Film Noir” and how women play strong roles by standing behind their men.  In film noir it is clear that men need to control womens sexuality in order not to be destroyed by it.

Connecting to that statement, Adichie continues on by saying “Because I am a female, I am expected to aspire to marriage.  I am expected to make my choices always keeping in mind that marriage is the most important. Marriage can be… a source of joy and love and mutual support. But why do we teach girls to aspire to marriage and we don’t teach boys the same?” this relates  into our discussions of the stereotypical goals that a woman “should” have, which is to focus on getting married and being a good mother, while men are taught to educate themselves and get a career to make lots of money.  In Williams article “Something else besides a mother” she mentions how there is a common anecdote in films that mothers have to sacrifice everything for her family, which supports Adichies argument.

Flawless argues that girls are raised “to see each other as competitors, not for jobs or accomplishments which I think can be a good thing, but for the attention of men.” which ties back to the idea of femme fetale, and how women compete for the attention of men by letting out their sexualized self for men.

The song is super popular so I am sure most people in the class have heard it, but if you haven’t I highly recommend it.  It is catchy and has a powerful message, who wouldn’t like a song like that?

I wanted to write a little more about the discussion we had in class about the word mother vs. mama or mommy and how that translated in the film, The Help.  I think that the word ‘mother’ is used to represent someone who birth a child, but the words ‘mommy’ or ‘mama’ are words for someone who is actually a parental figure in someones life.

This is applicable to the film between Aibileene and Elizabeth Leefolts daughter.  It is very clear from the beginning of the film, how much of a ‘mom’ Aibeleene is for this girl.  She tucks her into bed and even potty trains her.  In the movie we don’t even see Elizabeth Leefolt holding her daughter in a single scene.  When Aibeleene is holding the little girl in her arms after Elizabeth Leefolt pulls out of the drive way to do who knows what, she says “you’re my real mommy Aibee” which is a line that stood out to me during the whole movie.

The fact that she calls her ‘mommy’ adds to what I mentioned earlier.  Mrs. Leefolt is her biological mother and birthed the little girl, but she is absent in her life pretty much.  The only time she expresses any concern for her daughter is when she might get dirty germs from Aibileen by standing too close to Aibileen’s designated bathroom stall.  Aibileen on the other hand is the little girls “mommy.” She love this girl so much and it is so apparent how much the little girl loves and appreciate her as well.

The scene where Aibileen is asked to leave by Mrs. Leefolt broke my heart and made my teary-eyed.  The little girl says “Don’t go Aibee!” which is another example of how important  Aibileen is to her and how she loves her so much.  When Aibileen walks out of the Leefolt household, the camera shows the little girl banging at the window and calling for Aibileen as she walks away.  That was such a powerful scene, and the fact that Mrs. Leefolt just stands there and doesn’t even comfort her little girl while she is sad goes to show how much of a terrible mother she is.

Connecting back to Kaplan’s article “The Case of The Missing Mother,” I would identify Mrs. Leefolt to be a bad mother/witch because she doesn’t love her children a way a “mom” should.  The fact that she got pregnant with another one towards the end of the film and doesn’t have Aibileen’s help scares me a bit because she doesn’t seem to know a thing about parenting, since she has no experience with it.  I would identify Aibileen as a heroic mother because she leaves her family to work and sacrifices not being with her son to take care of Mrs. Leefolts daughter.  She not only is a nanny to her, but she loves her as if she was her own child which is very clear in the film.

Today discussion of women being looked upon differently and having different standards than men made me want to write this post.  This ties into the two films we’ve watched in class so far; Blonde Venus and Klute.  In Blonde Venus, Helen plays the role of a single mother for most of the movie as she travels around with Johnny and in Klute, Bri does spend most of her time with detective Klute, but always has the mentality of a independent woman.

In class we talked about how being a single mom comes with the negative connotation of being looked down upon and being slutty.  People also associate the  single mom as a struggling mom who can’t be a good parents without help from a partner.  While in contrast to that, when single dads are mentioned, they are looked highly upon and seen as responsible.; people question where the mom is and place the label of a “bad mom” for not being there with her child and boyfriend/husband.

Helen was not really looked upon as a bad mother, in fact in this movie she shined as being a great mother.  She fought to keep custody of her child by making sure her husband wouldn’t find Johnny, and while being unstable with money and constantly worried about her husband finding them, she still managed to be a good mother to Johnny and make everything seem as if it was fine.  One scene that stood out to me was when she could not afford the meal she had at the restaurant and offered to  wash dishes in exchange for the meal, and she told Johnny “come, lets go see a big kitchen.” That to me proved how much she cared about Johnny and didn’t want him to worry about their current situation.  This film went out of the norm of single women looked upon as being weak.  Helen was the apidimi of a strong independent woman.

Bri in Klute plays a strong woman as well.  She is first the suspect of Klute, but the tables quickly turn as she uses her sex appeal to her advantage and soon enough she was in bed with Klute.  It first starts with that scene where she comes into his room and said she can’t sleep, and he kindly lets her sleep in his bed as he pulls out a bed adjacent to her.  As expected, the only reason she went to his room was to sleep with him and thats exactly what she does.  She is the one controlling Klute, when he should be the one controlling her, being the investigator.

Both Helen and Bri are not your typical femme fetal character, they posses “female sexuality and male desire” as Gledhill describes it.  They are both very wanted by men, but are able to be strong and say yes to the things they want and say no to the things they don’t want.