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?

Scrolling through Facebook I came across this video by Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Recently Gordon-Levitt has started a new movement for filmmakers called hitRecord where everyone can contribute to a community oriented project whether film, screenplay, etc. In this video he talks about his ideas of feminism and hits a lot of the ideas that we talked about in class. I think this is a great video to watch because Joseph Gordon-Levitt in apart of the Hollywood community as an actor, but also as a filmmaker with his movie Don Jon.  He also goes on to talk about Feminism as his new project on hitRecord which is something we could all possibility contribute too as well. Check out the video its actually really cool and interesting.

Showdown between Wells and Willard
http://www.theroot.com/articles/politics/2011/03/womens_suffrage_and_racism_ida_b_wells_vs_frances_e_willard.html

Black Feminists
http://msmagazine.com/blog/2014/02/19/how-many-of-these-early-black-feminists-do-you-know/

The Hidden Help: Black Domestic Workers in the Civil Rights Movement
http://digital.library.louisville.edu/utils/getfile/collection/etd/id/2543/filename/5340.pdf

Level with me for a second and strip away the elements of “historical accuracy” that come with The Help. Now imagine starting from scratch, having to tell the story with the same theme, and creating the same final product. I don’t know about you, but in that light, the film seems very condescending to me.

What we’re examining is a work of fiction. As much as we cry out, “This is reflective of the historical period of the time! Black women couldn’t tell these stories so they needed a white woman (who we see benefit mostly career-wise and not as a person of moral standing) to do it for them!,” the film we watched is a fictional story set in a historic setting. In theory, Kathryn Stockett, the author of the novel (or even the writer/director of the film, Tate Taylor, both of whom are white) could have made either Aibileen or Minny the ones who wrote down their stories. And what would have changed thematically? Nothing.

The primary response I expect to get from something like this is, “But they’re just portraying reality!” Well, no. They’re taking  (very loose) inspiration from real life events (here’s a noteworthy tidbit: the real-life inspiration for Aibileen in the novel criticized Stockett for comparing her skin color to that of a cockroach; yikes), but fabricating a narrative. Black writers could (and did) write during the height of the civil rights movement. What’s stopping the black characters in the film from doing the same? What’s to stop them from being more invested in the civil rights protests and injustices of the time, showing them be more upset with the systemic problems that cause the personal troubles they face? In reality, all that’s stopping them are those are writing the film.

I think it’s reasonable to be able to criticize the author/filmmaker for their conscious decisions. They made Skeeter the savior. They reduced the subjects of racism and hatred to supporting roles in a film about racism and hatred. They perpetuated the negative stereotypes about blacks that we used to oppress them (don’t even get me started on Minny’s insultingly stereotypical love for fried chicken).

We can’t just simply defend the conscious creators of this fiction using the shield of history. They purposely chose the perspective, the focus, and the characterizations. We know this and we simply shrug and say, “That’s the way it was.” And that’s what disappoints me, especially when we could have much better depictions of race in film.

But we can demand better. Better treatment of black characters. More active roles for black actors. The most autonomous decision made by a black character in a movie about racism is tricking a white woman into eating her own feces. How is that progressive?

Look, I know I’m being negative on this movie, but that’s just because I see the potential in it and it can be so much more. Just for the sake of fairness, here’s some constructive criticism. Make Aibileen the writer of the book. Why can’t she be? She’s most likely literate (she gives no indication otherwise). She has aspirations to write. And, to defuse one of the only arguments the film gives as to why Skeeter has to be the one to write the book, she can still make it anonymous. Think about it: No one knows the race of the writer. If anything, it would be assumed to be a white author. Aibileen is actually more unsuspecting than Skeeter.

So, with this in mind, I ask you: What’s preventing this film from giving its black characters more autonomy?

Ok, 99% of the time, female characters in film piss me off. Perfect examples would include She’s The Man, Tomb Raider, and even Cinderella. Why does Amanda Bynes have to play the final soccer game with her hair down? No one plays soccer with their hair down. Why does Angelina Jolie have to be wearing a tight tanktop and pants in order to defeat evil? I don’t know about the other girls in the class, but if I knew I was going to be battling zombies, I’d choose a sports bra and leave my Victoria Secret Push-Up for another time. Why is the entire point of Cinderella have to revolve around her ending up with a man that she has literally known for three hours?

After reading the articles for class the other day, I think the author has a good starting point for the fundamental building blocks of female characters in film. The dominatrix, rape avenger, mother, daughter, or amazon. While I do agree that these are a good starting point, I don’t think it is possible for a female character to fall under only one category. Furthermore is something that disturbs me even more. How sad is it that after all the years of making movies, it is still near possible to place every female character into only 5 different categories?

Unfortunately I had to miss class today, and I was very sad about it because I had a lot to say about the critical reviews of ‘The Help’ we watched.

‘The Help’ of course takes place in a historically tragic time for African Americans. Black maids during this period suffered great brutality, and that in no way should be forgotten/underplayed. Many maids at the time suffered physical abuse, rape, and were even killed. This is historical fact. However, as Mimi pointed out in her post, what about the maids who weren’t?

Looking back on history we tend to accentuate the obvious traumas of the time, and for good reason. However, what were the lives of maids like who were in the middle ground? Who certainly weren’t experiencing the worst that racial discrimination had to offer at the time, but at the same time were not technically being treated fairly either? These maids did exist. Their stories are far from picture perfect, and yet are not catastrophic. The lives of Aibleen and Minny are lives of backhanded discrimination and degradation. Should these lesser stories not be told?

Many are offended by ‘The Help’ being ahistorical, but I am offended by those who call ‘The Help’ ahistorical. A major danger in fiction is claiming that “the part” must represent “the whole.” For example, Lena Dunham has often been criticized for her HBO television show, “Girls.” People are offended, saying that she is making a huge generalization about young, single girls in NY and is depicting this lifestyle in a certain way. I thought her answer to these critiques was flawless. She said, “No… I am not trying to represent the lives of women in New York, I am telling the stories of these four characters.” There is a major difference.  These are the stories of Aibleen. Skeeter. Minny. Celia. Hilly…. not every married white woman and suffering black maid during the Civil Rights Era in Mississippi.

Quentin Tarantino is the master of the revenge-fantasy. The amount of backlash he receives from his films is arguably more then any other director has faced in history. However, has the man ever claimed that Inglourious Basterds is an accurate representation of World War II? I believe to my core that it is possible for us, as viewers, to lose ourselves in the freedoms of fiction while still remembering the historical realities of the time period these pieces take place in. Maybe Minny would have received a far more severe punishment for her shit pie, but its damn good watching her feed it to Hilly, right?

Can the realities of history and the fantasies of fiction be mixed? Is it allowed?

http://music-mix.ew.com/2013/10/02/sinead-oconnor-miley-cyrus-open-letter/

Letter from Sinead O’Connor to Miley Cyrus over the Wrecking Ball video controversy (for those who didn’t read)

When it was announced in class that we were watching The Help I let out a tiresome sigh. After being exposed to outside reviews did I understand why I sighed. I didn’t take Oprah’s advice to read the book but I’ve seen the feel-good movie before and I shrugged at the simple warm and fuzzy feeling it gave to see the bad guy get what was coming to them. But looking at this movie as a serious piece of text warrants a completely different opinion of the movie. The video we saw in class of the fervent disapproval of the film made me stop and really think about what I had just consumed. This feel-good film arguably strips all female characters as makers of meaning. The narrative is central around our white savior who helps the help get her voice heard through their struggle. Regardless of Skeeter’s intent or emotions this was her ticket, exploit the exploited to get to the next tier.

The poem that was posted, A Black Woman Speaks of White Womanhood, I believe is what The Help wanted to be representative of. But with certain “artistic liberties” or even fear of truly representing the strife of the time the film has become more of a mockery than anything.

Some argue that The Help underplays the civil rights era.  That was more than apparent after watching the movie review clip at the end of class last Thursday.  But unfortunately evil comes in more types than just horrific brutality the jim crow era is known for.  We do not see any lynchings in The Help, but we see the destruction of lives through mental games and higherarchy of the female social construct that was essentially law.  A construct where Regina George of Mean Girls looks kind or where ostracization and manipulation is a crowd favorite.  The Help shows that where a white man had the power to get up and shoot someone, the white woman had the power to ensure a black person could never get another job again, leaving them with nothing but the responsibility for a family they must still provide for, and a side of shame and belittlement.

I know that this is very different from the cruelty that the female critic (blanking on her name sorry folks), but cruelness is cruelness no mater what description entails, and The Help shows one of the many sides of cruel that was very apparent during this time period.

As I said in class, I actually just finished reading the help. I usually hate reading books after I see the movie (I’ve seen the help before this class) because the movie is never as good as the book, but I heard that the book and movie were very similar when it came to The Help.

Overall, the movie follows the book rather well.  Tate Taylor, the dirctor of the film, is a friend of Kathryn Stockett, the author of the book, and Stockett helped on the screenplay before production began as well.  Overall to me, there were two things that were apparently different between the book and the film.  The first being that the violence was toned down a bit in the film, in order to make it more of a PG film according to IMDB.  The other difference that was changed from the book to the movie that is worth mentioning is part of the ending of the film.  Don’t worry, the Mae Mobley and Aibleen goodbye scene is just as heart wrenching in the book.  But in the book when Skeeter goes off to New York, the paper she works for before actually gives the Miss Myrna column to Aibileen.  This is something I’m not sure why they cut from the film, especially because this tidbit of information would have given the audience more closure with Aibileen’s character, but then again, closure is a debatable word in this situation due to the time period.

In response to the video we watched on Friday’s class, I think that  it is interesting that this woman from the video is so concerned with the notion that a privileged white woman had to speak for the black women, but can she not understand that although this might be offensive/oppressive, it makes a statement about the oppression that black women faced at the given period of time this film was set in. And yes, the other types of violence in the film were also underrepresented But can she not understand that this is a film and that for the length that it was there wasn’t much time to explore all types of racial oppression. The screenplay was obviously written in such a way to tell ONE story, not all of them. (I’m not saying that those other stories/issues are not important, but I think it’s ridiculous that she would expect one movie to capture every instance of violent racial oppression)

I can see how certain stereotypes came into play in this film. But she doesn’t understand that this is a film based on historical figures/events. The screenwriter and director had to embrace the fact that maybe certain things that we consider offensive stereotypes now, were normal things to be talked about at that given point in time. I think it would be ridiculous to expect that something like that would be completely overlooked when trying to write a historically accurate screenplay. (I’m not trying to reinforce those stereotypes, but I’m noting that those things are hard to avoid when diving into another period of time.)

Also, I think it is important to understand that because feminism has become such a loaded term, I don’t think it is fair to just have a feminist reading of a film. There needs to a set definition of how the analysis will be produced. Are we looking at gender? Are we looking at race? What are the socioeconomic condititons at the time of this film in which the content is based? And how that be applied to the way we will critique the film now?

So it is not fair to just look at a film based on one type of “feminism” but rather look at the film with an appreciation for the fluidity of the term feminism, not only now, but also how it has changed over time. (For example, Did black feminism exist at the time this film was based? If not, why would it be assumed that such principals would be included in that film?)

The reason that I bring up the multitude of definitions of feminism is because this video made me think back to the first day of class when we went around the room and shared our own definition of feminism. An experience like that shows how that word can be defined differently. And those different definitions can also shape the way that we apply those principals to film analysis. Although it might be hard to come to one solid definition of feminism, I think that when you approach a film from a feminist analysis it is important to consider how this term can be defined so differently in the analysis you create.