Ruin your favourite books/films with a spot of feminist analysis

WIth SATC, I felt that there was a more insidious message to women, rather than there necessarily being things done which were specifically anti-woman (there were a mixture of generally shitty things done to both sexes!). I thought it was quite a low for women. (Of course it's not reality for most of us, but if you've ever hung around a group of eg thirty-something London media types, you do get more than a whiff of it (including the looming yet absent presences of the Big-a-likes). Tra la la.)

Gosh, that's fascinating Clanger. Obviously in some films gender would be relevant to the script (thinking in particular any involving pregnancy and birth, ha ha. Though of course it would translate to other areas- exploring a mother/daughter relationship is not necessarily identical to a mother/son one), but in lots of sci fi, there should actually be no reason you couldn't write a gender neutral script and then just cast it. It would certainly shake up the writer's assumptions about male and female characters.

Hi comixminx it's me Dilys here (still haven't changed back from
Halloween, should use feminist thread to prompt regaining personal identity).

Someone mentioned Alien again -

When the script was first written, the characters only had surnames. The casting notes specifically state that all of the human/living roles were unisex, and could be cast as male or female.

Sigourney Weaver was originally cast as Captain Dallas, and Tom Skerritt as Ripley. I can't remember why they switched parts.

There are problems with any story in which someone achieves love as a reward for their own goodness - it presents the other person as some sort of cosmic prize. There's a natural feminist tendency to say either "oh the woman is just a passive object to be gained by the hero" or "oh the woman has been domesticated at the end / rewarded for conformity" depending on who's been being good, but I think it's just formulaic storytelling in which minor characters are seen as means to an end, rather than necessarily sexist storytelling (although it can be that as well, we can all think of examples like that).
Not quite sure where I'm going with this vis a vis Buffy though....

Glad that the Bechdel test has got into the thread! Yes, it's often surprising what passes the test (the horrendous Sin City does), but as pointed out the test is really about things like the lack of female characters in Hollywood generally.

Film critic Mark Kermode is very sensitive to feminist aspects of films and talks about that quite often - his Sex in the Coty rant is mostly an anti-consumerism rant but includes bits about the feminist issues with it too.

On a different note, it's easy to confuse the characters / world in a film with the fact that someone made certain choices when writing it. Someone was saying up-thread that the guy who sleeps with the girl in Trainspotting doesn't know she's underage - well fine, but nevertheless someone wrote that scene, making her manipulative and him innocent (well, of something, anyway).

MrsVincentPrice - Riley has hangups about Buffy because she can kick his arse. He leaves because he never believes she really loves him, which she doesn't.

"Not deserved" by Angel and Spike - not sure about this. By that logic any unnatural being who is as strong as she is will never deserve her, which is very close to the idea that women always lower themselves when they have sexual relationships and they taint themselves by pursuing their appetites. No one is good enough - either too weak or too close to evil.

Or - the show is aimed at a teenage audience who live and breathe unrequited love and are always in the lonely delicious throes of some crush or other, so it enhances their ability to identify with her.

Shallow, yes, consumerist yes, but sexist? Not necessarily unless you equate feminism with socialism (I'm a feminist lefty but I don't equate the two).

SATC: I was in my late 20s when that was on tv. My abiding memory is of 4 women who - yes - were good friends, but spent their time obsessing over men, and otherwise focusing almost exclusively on wealth, consumer goods, clothes, appearance, social status.

I watched a couple of series with an American friend and we had a few laughs but it was so, so empty of any relevance to, well, anything. I felt quite strongly that the message was: you are empty. But these Manolos are fabulous. Oh, and that man you fancy but who's a lying, manipulative shit? Keep trying.

I think point A is correct there MrsVP - Riley was just sooooooooo dull.

Actually didn't he go off and have a weirdo blood-sucking affair thing?

The reason why Buffy doesn't get together with Angel or Spike is because they are being punished for their sins and don't deserve her, not because she's too strong to be desirable.
Yes perhaps she could have lived happily ever after with Riley but a) the audience would have died of boredom b) she was only 20 ish at the time, so is not compelled to find The One and c) Riley ended up marrying a completely kickass special forces operative, so there's not a hint that he left Buffy because she was too strong.

No one in Buffy really manages a long-term successful relationship, though (Willow and Tara probably come closest until the whole dying thing gets in the way).

With you on BVTS harpsichord. I read a great summary of Things That Teenage Girls Learn from Twilight recently, full of gems such as: Threatening to kill yourself so your girlfriend will return is acceptable; if your normal friends disapprove of your boyfriend you should ditch them; creeping into a girl's bedroom to watch them sleep is really romantic.
What stood out is the fact that although BVTS has an almost identical setup it dodged every one of those pitfalls. Buffy an Angel do some crap teenaged things (lying to friends and family for example) but someone always calls them on it.

I would defend SATC from that latest kicking, although it's fundamentally a fluffy show about dating it covers much more than sex and shoes over the years: money, family, kids, health all get a look in, and although three of them make conventional romantic choices in the end (as most of us do or would like to), they retain their individuality. I would exclude the films in this, which I think says something about the distinction between films and TV, I think that most films have only got room for one and a half stories and if you're trying to get every woman in the world to watch your movie then there's an obvious choice of what one of those stories should be - not right necessarily, but obvious.

Hmmmmm, Buffy. Love, love, love Buffy; but am a little disturbed that she seems to be punished for her strength by not being able to have a successful relationship. It seems that powerful women can't have love. Anyone who wants to tell me I've got this all wrong will get a very willing hearing.

The Smallclanger, I think there is a good feminist bit in the book of Trainspotting, when someone plays a sexist joke on a woman in front of a whole pub and Mark realises it isn't friendly laughter - it is lynch mob laughter. I think that whole bit is really well written for showing that kind of humiliation for what it is.

I watched Criminal Justice (first series) and I felt that was in some way quite worrying because while I am very fond of the main actor - Ben Whishaw (very good at playing male roles in a feminine way), the whole story is about the distress caused to a man who is falsely accused of murder and rape. There is also a strange kind of reinforcement of male derision of female roles as he is treated badly partially as a consequence of behaving in quite a feminine way. Perhaps I am overthinking it though.

Legally Blonde - yes, yes! I was going to mention that it passes the Bechdel test - named women talking about law.

Also - was very suprised to read Sister Carrie, written in 1900: you think it is going to be a drearily moralistic tale where the woman who slides into Living In Sin under economic pressure will eventually die of consumption or some STD aquired while on the game or something. But no! She makes it big time in the theatre, and the man who took her honour ends up in the gutter.

Had a big fight with fuckwit exboyfriend about Pretty Woman - he said I was a dishonest snob for pretending not to like a charming, popular mainstream film on principle, and I said there was no pretence whatever involved in a visceral reaction against a film glorifying prostitution and implying that everything will turn out for the best as long as someone marries you. He refused to see what sort of a twisted person could sincerely not like the film. I do not see him any more.

Ahem, slight correction, I did know that Wilkie Collins also wrote The Moonstone.

E&M - I didn't know about that book. I like The Woman in White but didn't really know he'd written anything else (and didn't check). Will definitely look at that one.

Love, love, love Buffy... I'm 45 but have the entire series on DVD. I even had them on video before. I used to eagerly await their issue and would then have a Buffy weekend where I would just watch the whole latest series. If anyone wanted to see me, they had to watch Buffy too. This was, of course, pre-child

My first "date" (at 13!!) was to see Grease at the cinema. The boy's mum took us both to see it I've thought a lot about Grease over the years and I still love the film but, really, it's crap, isn't it?

Re: Grease - I don't think it's right to say that Kenickie is all carefree when Rizzo's singing that song - at that point he doesn't know the baby is his - when he hears she's pregnant she says it wasn't him it was some other guy - I think that Kenickie is burying himself in his car because he was hurt by Rizzo - who was probably worried that Kenickie would let her down so got in first, if you like. She and Kenickie are far better characters than Sandy and Danny - why would she want to be with Danny??? He's awful.

Wow, I've never though so seriously about Grease in my life.

I agree about the Barbie films NO TOO BAD, even Thumbelina...

Say Anything (Cameron Crowe) is a fantastic film with a real feminist message.
And, of course, the wonderful Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

(Not the twat who dumped her at the start)

I went to see Legally Blonde the musical in the west end this weekend (hilarious!) and she even proposed to her boyfriend at the end!