Tuesday, November 06, 2007
Monday, November 05, 2007
Friday, November 02, 2007
Friday Ten...
I do these rather infrequently, but I'm in need of a break right now, so here it is- my Friday ten...
Ten Random Tracks From My "Women Rock" Mix
1. The Breeders - "Huffer"
2. The Gossip - "Fire/Sign"
3. Shivaree - "Goodnight Moon"
4. Rilo Kiley - "A Man, Me, Then Jim"
5. Enon - "Knock That Door"
6. Robots in Disguise - "DIY"
7. Frogpond - "How Would You Know"
8. Aimee Mann - "Ghost World"
9. Skunk Anansie - "Hedonism"
10. Concrete Blonde - "Bloodletting"
If anyone wants to suggest some must-have tracks for a kick-ass mix cd, or just feels like adding their own random ten, I'm always interested.
Ten Random Tracks From My "Women Rock" Mix
1. The Breeders - "Huffer"
2. The Gossip - "Fire/Sign"
3. Shivaree - "Goodnight Moon"
4. Rilo Kiley - "A Man, Me, Then Jim"
5. Enon - "Knock That Door"
6. Robots in Disguise - "DIY"
7. Frogpond - "How Would You Know"
8. Aimee Mann - "Ghost World"
9. Skunk Anansie - "Hedonism"
10. Concrete Blonde - "Bloodletting"
If anyone wants to suggest some must-have tracks for a kick-ass mix cd, or just feels like adding their own random ten, I'm always interested.
Thursday, November 01, 2007
*grumble grumble*
You what I hate?
The GRE.
I'm hoping against hopes that my essay topic includes "the GRE is an idiotic test that doesn't actually measure anything useful" because I've got a lot to say on that particular subject.
That is all.
The GRE.
I'm hoping against hopes that my essay topic includes "the GRE is an idiotic test that doesn't actually measure anything useful" because I've got a lot to say on that particular subject.
That is all.
Haunted Houses, Slasher Flicks and Gentrification...
I got an e-mail late last night pointing me to this article: "Haunted House Films Are Really About the Nightmares of Gentrification", with the question "What do you think?" It's an interesting article if you've got an interest in horror flicks and/or gentrification, but, I have to admit, I remain largely unconvinced. By which, I mean that I disagree with many of the things he's saying.
The basic premise is that haunted house films- a subgenre of horror- are really about gentrification. In particular, they're about people believing that their homes have been gained through violence, and will be taken back the same way, and that, since audiences are assumed to be white, and the victims of gentrification are generally communities of color, the monsters in these film are representative of racial minorities. Under this model, and according to the author, horror films serve as escapist entertainment that allows us to avoid the "truth" that we participate in the displacement of others, and that we are vulnerable to displacement, ourselves.
It's an interesting idea, and I can think of a few films where it's probably applicable, but that doesn't make it applicable to all horror. The problem is that Miller, the author, seems to want to take what is an interesting theory about some haunted house films, and shoehorn it onto horror in general, while ignoring the historic context of horror in film and literature.
Now, there are definitely films that I think you can legitimately argue draw inspiration from or can be tied into gentrification in some way. Generally, these types of films are the "rich folks sticking their noses where they don't belong" type. You take a group of rich or middle class people from "the city" and have them head out into the country, where they stumble upon some dangerous local color. It almost always involves having the city folk looking down on the locals as uneducated hicks... until the country folk turn out to be homocidal maniacs.
There's definitely some class issues at play in those kinds of stories, but it's sort of hard to know which way to take it. We're usually presented with a bunch of a spoiled, ignorant city folk who get their just deserts at the hands of insane, homicidal poor people. Think: The Hills Have Eyes or Texas Chainsaw Massacre (neither of which, it should be noted, are haunted house movies). Of course, it's never quite that simple, either. While The Hills Have Eyes is certainly about a bunch of spoiled lazy city folk, it's also shows how thin the facade of civilization is- in the right circumstances, even a "normal" middle class family can become violent, brutal, and savage. And neither of them are haunted house films.
Even if we accept that some films involve themes dealing with gentrification, does it makes sense to claim that all films are about gentrification? Miller points out that a lot of modern haunted house films are about "fictional families [that] move into spaces from which others have been violently displaced" and then "suffer for that violence even if they themselves have done nothing wrong."
I'm willing to accept that a large number of haunted house movies rely on some variation on this theme, but I think that the conclusion Miller draws from this fact is questionable: "This thriving subgenre depends upon the audience believing, on some level, that what 'we' have was attained by violence, and the fear that it will be taken by violence."
My question here is... why? In what way does this subgenre depend on this fact? Many haunted house movies depend, not upon this idea that we believe what we have was gained through and will be lost through violence, but, rather, on the notion that evil acts can stain reality. They can be about the fear of losing things to violence- and, certainly, the fear is about loss (of life) to violence- but I'm not sure that it's the case that it's always about a fear of losing your home. It's often more about the fear of the unknown, or, another cliche that Miller seems to ignore: the fear of an evil that never dies.
Movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th, and Nightmare on Elmstreet are practically the gold standard for this cliche- no matter how hard you try, you just can't kill evil. The main antagonist of Halloween- Michael Myers- is shot repeatedly, stabbed, hit by cars, thrown out of windows, tossed down a well, blown up... and he just keeps coming back for more. One of the protagonists in the first film states it rather explicitely very early in the film- Myers is evil personified.
But, those are slasher films- what about haunted houses? Consider The Grudge, which Miller specifically points to. Miller asks "is it possible to imagine The Grudge in an economic structure where housing is guaranteed -- however problematically -- and where people have extremely limited freedom to choose their own housing?"
I argue, yes, in fact, it is. Nothing that happens in The Grudge relies on the people involved choosing the house. The Grudge is a film about the ways that evil acts leave a stain- a curse- on the things around them. The film could just as easily have taken place in some kind of forced housing situation. The haunting is about the evilness of murdering your family, and the stain that it leaves.
Miller's premise, however interesting, is significantly harmed by poor justification, and what appears to be a serious lack of understanding about some pretty important aspects of horror. Horror, in both film and literature, has a long history of beening very subversive. It's often used to criticize social norms and culture, and as a means of making people uncomfortable with things they take for granted- it's generally not used to make audiences feel good about bad things.
This problem becomes really evident starting at paragraph six, when he suggests "The biggest cliche in the modern haunted house film is that of the Indian Burial Ground. In Pet Semetary, The Shining, and The Amityville Horror, the source of the problem is that the real estate parcel in question has desecrated sacred ground."
First of all, three movies does not "the biggest cliche" make. Second, the most recent of those three movies was Pet Sematary, which was released almost twenty years ago. Hell, Amityville Horror was released in 1979, almost three decades ago. In other words, this "cliche" isn't nearly as ubiquitous as Miller suggests.
There are a lot of cliches in modern haunted house films, but "Indian burial ground" isn't really one of them. More common is the "ghost of a murderer/murder victim/suicide" (in other words: ghost of a person who causes or is the victim of a tragic death)trope from films like 13 Ghosts, House on Haunted Hill, The Grudge, The Others, Rose Red, Stir of Echoes... Hell, horror movies involving demons or the devil coming to torment or possess people are more common than the Indian burial ground.
And, ultimately, Miller's argument isn't just about haunted house films, either. After his comment about Indian burial grounds, he mentions the father of all zombie films, Night of the Living Dead: "That's one of the main ways the horror genre, on its surface so apolitical, connects to the United States' histories of genocide. How far a leap is it from the menacing ex-slaves in Birth of a Nation to the zombies in Night of the Living Dead?" and:
This is probably the most blatant example of Miller misreading/misunderstanding/misrepresenting a work of a horror. How far is the leap from menacing ex-slaves in Birth of a Nation to the zombies in Night of the Living Dead, Miller asks us, and I'm happy to answer: huge.
In Birth of a Nation, Gus is presented as a monster- an animal. He is murderous, and attempts to rape an innocent woman. When he is lynched, the audience is supposed to be glad, because he "got what was coming to him". Night of the Living Dead, on the other hand, is strongly critical of racism in America. The death of Ben in Night of the Living Dead is important- Ben, the only black character, is a strong, smart character who does his best to help save everyone in the house, and is able to survive the night until "help" arrives in the form of a posse of gun-toting white folks, who then shoot him. The audience is supposed to be shocked and outraged by Ben's death, and the casual racism of those who murder him without a second thought.
Further, Miller's interpretation of the zombie film as a genre is seriously flawed. I'd certainly agree that zombie films generally represent a "capitalist nightmare", but it's sure as hell not one "of communist revolution: the brain-dead bloodthirsty working class, desiring nothing but our destruction, rises us up to besiege "us" in our comfortable homes, our malls, our military bases."
The horror of the zombie film is that we are the zombies, not communists. The zombie film is critical of the mindlessness of capitalist consumption, of the herd mentality of people who buy into consumer culture and flock like herd animals to malls and subdivisions. The horror isn't about losing your possessions. Zombies don't care about your things, they want to make you just like them. The horror of a zombie is the horror of never-ending consumption- of a hunger that never ends, and can never be filled.
Middle class America are the zombies. It's never really been a very subtle metaphor.
Dawn of the Dead is a scathing criticism of American culture- from the casual racism of the police slaughtering immigrants during a raid on a tenement and the bloodlust/thrill of violence that leads to Roger getting bit, to the dangers of greed that unbridled capitalism perpetuates.
The characters in Dawn of the Dead think they've found a paradise when they come across a mall to make their home. They've got everything they ever wanted- nice clothes, jewelry, entertainment... everything that we're told makes for happiness. And yet, they eventually realize that these things don't make them happy- they're prisoners. And when a group of bikers break into the mall, it's in an effort to loot and plunder- another capitalist pursuit.
It's no coincidence that many zombie movies show how the greatest danger to us during a zombie uprising isn't the undead, but other living humans. Greed, anger, and distrust are frequently shown as being at least as dangerous as the zombies are.
Don't get me wrong, horror films are not perfect, and many of them do reinforce some pretty terrible social stereotypes. You don't have to look far to see, for example, a lot of really sexist stuff in horror movies, and the slasher flick, in particular, is notorious for exploiting puritanical notions of sex. Essentially, having it leads to destruction.
Ultimately, I just can't agree with Miller's argument. Even if we narrow the argument down to just haunted house movies (despite the fact that he goes off to argue that all kinds of slasher films, zombie films, etc are also about gentrification), there are simply too many cases where that argument doesn't makes sense- e.g. Dark Water, where a poor single woman moves into a cheap apartment in a rundown area is about gentrification? What about a haunted house film where the house is a former asylum? etc.
A better argument could be made that many haunted house films work well as illustrations of the class or race struggles that gentrification leads to. In other words, horror movies aren't necessarily about gentrification, but can be used to illustrate the problems with it. Instead, Miller came up with an interesting theory about a couple of movies, and attempted to shoehorn it onto an entire genre of films, and is forced to use examples that don't make sense.
And I really disagree with this bit:
I'll grant that there are some serious similarities between The Hills Have Eyes, Wrong Turn, Wolf Creek, and Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and that there are some pretty obvious issues at play in the conflict there: middle-class educated people who are afraid of and terrorized by depraved, uneducated, poor people. I disagree with including films like Silent Hill or The Descent with those, though- the themes are radically different.
Silent Hill isn't about a class battle, it's about religious persecution. The evil, there, comes from a religious cult that burns an innocent child alive, and, in her pain, she makes a deal with the devil to get revenge. The Descent isn't about class warfare, either- the monsters in it aren't human, nor are they stand-ins for humans. The story is really about two women, and their reliationship to each other- it's about trust, family, love, and honesty, and how we deal with betrayal. The monsters are incidental, and are just a tool used to create conflict and force the women to undergo change.
The idea that all horror is necessarily about class conflict and monsters "who symbolize 'our' paranoid fantasies of the violent, dispossessed working class" just seems really forced and reductive, and, like I said, it seems to intentionally ignore the history of horror as a means of social criticism.
Still, I really liked the last paragraph:
Obnoxious scare-quotes aside, those are all valid questions. You don't have to think that all horror is about gentrification to address them, either.
Extra reading:
Even when I think that Miller is on to something, I feel like he takes it the wrong direction. Consider his remarks about Native Americans with regards to The Shining. Miller says:
This is interesting, to me, precisely because there's plenty of evidence that The Shining is a criticism of the way that White America ignores and overlooks the poor treatment of other races (particularly Native Americans), as this author suggests. The Shining isn't about "Indian-as-bloodthirsty-savage... transformed into the Indian-as-murderous-ghost" at all. There's no evidence that it's ghosts of Native Americans creating the problem- rather, it's the evil of our own actions coming back to haunt us. The ghosts in the hotel in The Shining are the spirits of white men, not Native Americans, and the victims in the story are all minorities- a black man, children, a woman- not Nicholson's character. Nicholson represents the evilness of the hotel, and the history of racism that it represents.
The basic premise is that haunted house films- a subgenre of horror- are really about gentrification. In particular, they're about people believing that their homes have been gained through violence, and will be taken back the same way, and that, since audiences are assumed to be white, and the victims of gentrification are generally communities of color, the monsters in these film are representative of racial minorities. Under this model, and according to the author, horror films serve as escapist entertainment that allows us to avoid the "truth" that we participate in the displacement of others, and that we are vulnerable to displacement, ourselves.
It's an interesting idea, and I can think of a few films where it's probably applicable, but that doesn't make it applicable to all horror. The problem is that Miller, the author, seems to want to take what is an interesting theory about some haunted house films, and shoehorn it onto horror in general, while ignoring the historic context of horror in film and literature.
Now, there are definitely films that I think you can legitimately argue draw inspiration from or can be tied into gentrification in some way. Generally, these types of films are the "rich folks sticking their noses where they don't belong" type. You take a group of rich or middle class people from "the city" and have them head out into the country, where they stumble upon some dangerous local color. It almost always involves having the city folk looking down on the locals as uneducated hicks... until the country folk turn out to be homocidal maniacs.
There's definitely some class issues at play in those kinds of stories, but it's sort of hard to know which way to take it. We're usually presented with a bunch of a spoiled, ignorant city folk who get their just deserts at the hands of insane, homicidal poor people. Think: The Hills Have Eyes or Texas Chainsaw Massacre (neither of which, it should be noted, are haunted house movies). Of course, it's never quite that simple, either. While The Hills Have Eyes is certainly about a bunch of spoiled lazy city folk, it's also shows how thin the facade of civilization is- in the right circumstances, even a "normal" middle class family can become violent, brutal, and savage. And neither of them are haunted house films.
Even if we accept that some films involve themes dealing with gentrification, does it makes sense to claim that all films are about gentrification? Miller points out that a lot of modern haunted house films are about "fictional families [that] move into spaces from which others have been violently displaced" and then "suffer for that violence even if they themselves have done nothing wrong."
I'm willing to accept that a large number of haunted house movies rely on some variation on this theme, but I think that the conclusion Miller draws from this fact is questionable: "This thriving subgenre depends upon the audience believing, on some level, that what 'we' have was attained by violence, and the fear that it will be taken by violence."
My question here is... why? In what way does this subgenre depend on this fact? Many haunted house movies depend, not upon this idea that we believe what we have was gained through and will be lost through violence, but, rather, on the notion that evil acts can stain reality. They can be about the fear of losing things to violence- and, certainly, the fear is about loss (of life) to violence- but I'm not sure that it's the case that it's always about a fear of losing your home. It's often more about the fear of the unknown, or, another cliche that Miller seems to ignore: the fear of an evil that never dies.
Movies like Halloween, Friday the 13th, and Nightmare on Elmstreet are practically the gold standard for this cliche- no matter how hard you try, you just can't kill evil. The main antagonist of Halloween- Michael Myers- is shot repeatedly, stabbed, hit by cars, thrown out of windows, tossed down a well, blown up... and he just keeps coming back for more. One of the protagonists in the first film states it rather explicitely very early in the film- Myers is evil personified.
But, those are slasher films- what about haunted houses? Consider The Grudge, which Miller specifically points to. Miller asks "is it possible to imagine The Grudge in an economic structure where housing is guaranteed -- however problematically -- and where people have extremely limited freedom to choose their own housing?"
I argue, yes, in fact, it is. Nothing that happens in The Grudge relies on the people involved choosing the house. The Grudge is a film about the ways that evil acts leave a stain- a curse- on the things around them. The film could just as easily have taken place in some kind of forced housing situation. The haunting is about the evilness of murdering your family, and the stain that it leaves.
Miller's premise, however interesting, is significantly harmed by poor justification, and what appears to be a serious lack of understanding about some pretty important aspects of horror. Horror, in both film and literature, has a long history of beening very subversive. It's often used to criticize social norms and culture, and as a means of making people uncomfortable with things they take for granted- it's generally not used to make audiences feel good about bad things.
This problem becomes really evident starting at paragraph six, when he suggests "The biggest cliche in the modern haunted house film is that of the Indian Burial Ground. In Pet Semetary, The Shining, and The Amityville Horror, the source of the problem is that the real estate parcel in question has desecrated sacred ground."
First of all, three movies does not "the biggest cliche" make. Second, the most recent of those three movies was Pet Sematary, which was released almost twenty years ago. Hell, Amityville Horror was released in 1979, almost three decades ago. In other words, this "cliche" isn't nearly as ubiquitous as Miller suggests.
There are a lot of cliches in modern haunted house films, but "Indian burial ground" isn't really one of them. More common is the "ghost of a murderer/murder victim/suicide" (in other words: ghost of a person who causes or is the victim of a tragic death)trope from films like 13 Ghosts, House on Haunted Hill, The Grudge, The Others, Rose Red, Stir of Echoes... Hell, horror movies involving demons or the devil coming to torment or possess people are more common than the Indian burial ground.
And, ultimately, Miller's argument isn't just about haunted house films, either. After his comment about Indian burial grounds, he mentions the father of all zombie films, Night of the Living Dead: "That's one of the main ways the horror genre, on its surface so apolitical, connects to the United States' histories of genocide. How far a leap is it from the menacing ex-slaves in Birth of a Nation to the zombies in Night of the Living Dead?" and:
The spate of slow-moving zombie films that followed in the wake of "Night of the Living Dead" represent a capitalist nightmare of communist revolution: the brain-dead bloodthirsty working class, desiring nothing but our destruction, rises us up to besiege "us" in our comfortable homes, our malls, our military bases.
This is probably the most blatant example of Miller misreading/misunderstanding/misrepresenting a work of a horror. How far is the leap from menacing ex-slaves in Birth of a Nation to the zombies in Night of the Living Dead, Miller asks us, and I'm happy to answer: huge.
In Birth of a Nation, Gus is presented as a monster- an animal. He is murderous, and attempts to rape an innocent woman. When he is lynched, the audience is supposed to be glad, because he "got what was coming to him". Night of the Living Dead, on the other hand, is strongly critical of racism in America. The death of Ben in Night of the Living Dead is important- Ben, the only black character, is a strong, smart character who does his best to help save everyone in the house, and is able to survive the night until "help" arrives in the form of a posse of gun-toting white folks, who then shoot him. The audience is supposed to be shocked and outraged by Ben's death, and the casual racism of those who murder him without a second thought.
Further, Miller's interpretation of the zombie film as a genre is seriously flawed. I'd certainly agree that zombie films generally represent a "capitalist nightmare", but it's sure as hell not one "of communist revolution: the brain-dead bloodthirsty working class, desiring nothing but our destruction, rises us up to besiege "us" in our comfortable homes, our malls, our military bases."
The horror of the zombie film is that we are the zombies, not communists. The zombie film is critical of the mindlessness of capitalist consumption, of the herd mentality of people who buy into consumer culture and flock like herd animals to malls and subdivisions. The horror isn't about losing your possessions. Zombies don't care about your things, they want to make you just like them. The horror of a zombie is the horror of never-ending consumption- of a hunger that never ends, and can never be filled.
Middle class America are the zombies. It's never really been a very subtle metaphor.
Dawn of the Dead is a scathing criticism of American culture- from the casual racism of the police slaughtering immigrants during a raid on a tenement and the bloodlust/thrill of violence that leads to Roger getting bit, to the dangers of greed that unbridled capitalism perpetuates.
The characters in Dawn of the Dead think they've found a paradise when they come across a mall to make their home. They've got everything they ever wanted- nice clothes, jewelry, entertainment... everything that we're told makes for happiness. And yet, they eventually realize that these things don't make them happy- they're prisoners. And when a group of bikers break into the mall, it's in an effort to loot and plunder- another capitalist pursuit.
It's no coincidence that many zombie movies show how the greatest danger to us during a zombie uprising isn't the undead, but other living humans. Greed, anger, and distrust are frequently shown as being at least as dangerous as the zombies are.
Don't get me wrong, horror films are not perfect, and many of them do reinforce some pretty terrible social stereotypes. You don't have to look far to see, for example, a lot of really sexist stuff in horror movies, and the slasher flick, in particular, is notorious for exploiting puritanical notions of sex. Essentially, having it leads to destruction.
Ultimately, I just can't agree with Miller's argument. Even if we narrow the argument down to just haunted house movies (despite the fact that he goes off to argue that all kinds of slasher films, zombie films, etc are also about gentrification), there are simply too many cases where that argument doesn't makes sense- e.g. Dark Water, where a poor single woman moves into a cheap apartment in a rundown area is about gentrification? What about a haunted house film where the house is a former asylum? etc.
A better argument could be made that many haunted house films work well as illustrations of the class or race struggles that gentrification leads to. In other words, horror movies aren't necessarily about gentrification, but can be used to illustrate the problems with it. Instead, Miller came up with an interesting theory about a couple of movies, and attempted to shoehorn it onto an entire genre of films, and is forced to use examples that don't make sense.
And I really disagree with this bit:
These days, the two most popular plotlines in the dozens of scary movies that come out each year are: (1) A middle class family or group of teenagers wanders into the wilderness and the clutches of a depraved monstrous lumpenproletariate ("The Hills Have Eyes," "Wolf Creek," "The Descent," "Wrong Turn," "Cabin Fever," "Chainsaw Massacre," "Silent Hill"); or: 2) A similar configuration of victims menaced on their own luxurious turf by monsters who symbolize "our" paranoid fantasies of the violent, dispossessed working class, even if they do not actually come from it ("When A Stranger Calls," "Cry Wolf," "Cursed," "Scream," all the slasher films that do not fall under the first category).
I'll grant that there are some serious similarities between The Hills Have Eyes, Wrong Turn, Wolf Creek, and Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and that there are some pretty obvious issues at play in the conflict there: middle-class educated people who are afraid of and terrorized by depraved, uneducated, poor people. I disagree with including films like Silent Hill or The Descent with those, though- the themes are radically different.
Silent Hill isn't about a class battle, it's about religious persecution. The evil, there, comes from a religious cult that burns an innocent child alive, and, in her pain, she makes a deal with the devil to get revenge. The Descent isn't about class warfare, either- the monsters in it aren't human, nor are they stand-ins for humans. The story is really about two women, and their reliationship to each other- it's about trust, family, love, and honesty, and how we deal with betrayal. The monsters are incidental, and are just a tool used to create conflict and force the women to undergo change.
The idea that all horror is necessarily about class conflict and monsters "who symbolize 'our' paranoid fantasies of the violent, dispossessed working class" just seems really forced and reductive, and, like I said, it seems to intentionally ignore the history of horror as a means of social criticism.
Still, I really liked the last paragraph:
The haunted house film makes assumptions that are worth questioning: Who are "we" as an audience? To whom do these films address themselves? Who haunts "our" homes? Whose homes do "we" haunt? But it also contains the seeds of a real dialogue concerning the human costs of the housing crisis, and our responsibility and our power to do something about it.
Obnoxious scare-quotes aside, those are all valid questions. You don't have to think that all horror is about gentrification to address them, either.
Extra reading:
Even when I think that Miller is on to something, I feel like he takes it the wrong direction. Consider his remarks about Native Americans with regards to The Shining. Miller says:
Guilt over the North American genocide persists, in spite of centuries of racist history that have clouded the general public's grasp on the extremity of violence perpetrated against the Native Americans -- the broken treaties, the Indian Removal Act, the smallpox blankets. With the death of the Western as a film genre and the success of the Civil Rights Movement in challenging the blatancy of racism in mainstream culture, the Indian-as-bloodthirsty-savage was transformed into the Indian-as-murderous-ghost.
This is interesting, to me, precisely because there's plenty of evidence that The Shining is a criticism of the way that White America ignores and overlooks the poor treatment of other races (particularly Native Americans), as this author suggests. The Shining isn't about "Indian-as-bloodthirsty-savage... transformed into the Indian-as-murderous-ghost" at all. There's no evidence that it's ghosts of Native Americans creating the problem- rather, it's the evil of our own actions coming back to haunt us. The ghosts in the hotel in The Shining are the spirits of white men, not Native Americans, and the victims in the story are all minorities- a black man, children, a woman- not Nicholson's character. Nicholson represents the evilness of the hotel, and the history of racism that it represents.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Happy Halloween! (and why Medusa kicks ass)
Halloween is one of my two favorite days of the year. I love Halloween. I love that you get to carve pumpkins and dress up in awesome costumes and that kids get to go around and horde candy. Now that I'm an adult, Halloween is an excuse to play dress-up and watch horror movies- two things that I think are tons of fun.
I've been a little busy lately (I'm taking the GRE on Saturday. Saturday!), so this is going to be an open post: what are you doing for Halloween? Did you carve a pumpkin? Want to share a picture? What's your favorite costume? Favorite horror movie? Something else?
In the meantime, I decided- in an effort to continue with the "I'm not just posting terrible things that make me angry" effort- to create a list of fictional women I like. These are women from books, video games, comic books, movies, and mythology that I think are pretty kick-ass for various reasons. Feel free to contribute, criticize, or congratulate my choices. I'll probably (maybe) post more as time goes on, but here are a few:
First up: Medusa, Queen of the Gorgons.
Why: Because Medusa kicks all kinds of classic ass. I've seen some feminists adopt the image of Medusa as a symbol, and I love it. It makes sense. Now, the image that most of us probably have of Medusa is from Clash of the Titans, where she's a horrible monster whose sole purpose is to be there for Perseus to kill and use as a weapon against the Kraken.
But there's so much more there. According to some sources, Medusa was originally a beautiful nymph, until she was raped by Poseidon in one of Athena's temples. Athena cursed Medusa, and changed her into a gorgon.
So why do I love Medusa?
Because it's an excellent representation of patriarchy in action. Medusa is a woman who is raped by someone in a position of power. Rather than blame him for his actions, she is blamed- if only she weren't so beautiful. She is punished for the transgression of being too beautiful and causing a man to lose control. Her punishment is to be made ugly. Instead of destroying her, though, this gives her more power (literally, in fact- she is more powerful as a gorgon, since her gaze has the power to turn men to stone and her blood has the power to kill or cure). When Perseus is sent to kill Medusa, he is aided by Athena- the very goddess who transformed Medusa into a monster in the first place.
Medusa became a symbol of female power- and the fear that power represented. Her blood was alternately a deadly poison, or a life-giving cure. I also appreciate that, in a world designed around the male gaze, Medusa's gaze- the female gaze- was so feared. I love the idea of co-opting Medusa- a being typically thought of as a terrible, evil, destroying women- and reimagining her. She's not evil- she's a victim who was punished for being victimized, but turned that punishment into a source of power, and was eventually slain for it... and yet, her legacy lives on. She's easily more recognizable as a figure than Perseus or Athena are.
Next up: Warrent Officer Ellen Ripley.
Why: It's no secret that I love the first two Alien movies. I think that they're amazing films. The first one is one of the most tightly filmed horror movies ever. There's hardly a wasted scene in it, and it's still scary as hell today as it was almost three decades ago. Add to that the fact that Ripley is completely kick ass, and you've got a winner.
What's not to love about Ripley? She's written as an actual character, not as a stereotype of a woman. She's in the charge, commands respect from her crew, and isn't hypersexualized. The only real cliche that she falls into is that of being the lone-survivor of a horror film, but I can forgive that, given that she doesn't spend the rest of the movie screaming in fear or relying on other characters to protect her. She's smart, tough, and full of awesome.
One thing I don't understand: How does she rank lower than Clarice (from Silence of the Lambs) on the AFI 100 Heroes and Villains list? Clarice is cooler than Ripley? Really? Because I don't remember Clarice kicking a bunch of alien ass.
Also: Part of what looks to be an interesting article about "tough women" is over here.
I've been a little busy lately (I'm taking the GRE on Saturday. Saturday!), so this is going to be an open post: what are you doing for Halloween? Did you carve a pumpkin? Want to share a picture? What's your favorite costume? Favorite horror movie? Something else?
In the meantime, I decided- in an effort to continue with the "I'm not just posting terrible things that make me angry" effort- to create a list of fictional women I like. These are women from books, video games, comic books, movies, and mythology that I think are pretty kick-ass for various reasons. Feel free to contribute, criticize, or congratulate my choices. I'll probably (maybe) post more as time goes on, but here are a few:
First up: Medusa, Queen of the Gorgons.
Why: Because Medusa kicks all kinds of classic ass. I've seen some feminists adopt the image of Medusa as a symbol, and I love it. It makes sense. Now, the image that most of us probably have of Medusa is from Clash of the Titans, where she's a horrible monster whose sole purpose is to be there for Perseus to kill and use as a weapon against the Kraken.
But there's so much more there. According to some sources, Medusa was originally a beautiful nymph, until she was raped by Poseidon in one of Athena's temples. Athena cursed Medusa, and changed her into a gorgon.
So why do I love Medusa?
Because it's an excellent representation of patriarchy in action. Medusa is a woman who is raped by someone in a position of power. Rather than blame him for his actions, she is blamed- if only she weren't so beautiful. She is punished for the transgression of being too beautiful and causing a man to lose control. Her punishment is to be made ugly. Instead of destroying her, though, this gives her more power (literally, in fact- she is more powerful as a gorgon, since her gaze has the power to turn men to stone and her blood has the power to kill or cure). When Perseus is sent to kill Medusa, he is aided by Athena- the very goddess who transformed Medusa into a monster in the first place.
Medusa became a symbol of female power- and the fear that power represented. Her blood was alternately a deadly poison, or a life-giving cure. I also appreciate that, in a world designed around the male gaze, Medusa's gaze- the female gaze- was so feared. I love the idea of co-opting Medusa- a being typically thought of as a terrible, evil, destroying women- and reimagining her. She's not evil- she's a victim who was punished for being victimized, but turned that punishment into a source of power, and was eventually slain for it... and yet, her legacy lives on. She's easily more recognizable as a figure than Perseus or Athena are.
Next up: Warrent Officer Ellen Ripley.
Why: It's no secret that I love the first two Alien movies. I think that they're amazing films. The first one is one of the most tightly filmed horror movies ever. There's hardly a wasted scene in it, and it's still scary as hell today as it was almost three decades ago. Add to that the fact that Ripley is completely kick ass, and you've got a winner.
What's not to love about Ripley? She's written as an actual character, not as a stereotype of a woman. She's in the charge, commands respect from her crew, and isn't hypersexualized. The only real cliche that she falls into is that of being the lone-survivor of a horror film, but I can forgive that, given that she doesn't spend the rest of the movie screaming in fear or relying on other characters to protect her. She's smart, tough, and full of awesome.
One thing I don't understand: How does she rank lower than Clarice (from Silence of the Lambs) on the AFI 100 Heroes and Villains list? Clarice is cooler than Ripley? Really? Because I don't remember Clarice kicking a bunch of alien ass.
Also: Part of what looks to be an interesting article about "tough women" is over here.
Friday, October 26, 2007
A note on comments...
Some of you may notice that comments require one of those word verfication things now. I'm hoping this is just temporary- I've started getting a bunch of a spam comments lately, and it's sort of a hassle to have to keep deleting them. I'm going to look for a better solution, but, in the meantime, don't let it discourage you from commenting.
Thanks!
Thanks!
Good News Friday: Today has been a good day...
Given that much of my posting, it turns out, is sort of, uh... less than happy? I thought it might be nice to have a post that talks about some nice things happening. It can be easy to feel overwhelmed or discouraged when everything seems bleak and like there's nothing to be happy and excited about. And, honestly, I think that there are good things happening and things to be pleased with. I'd say that this could become a regular Friday feature, but, well... given how successfully I've managed to keep up on past feature ideas, my new policy is "I make no promises".
First up: Mighty Ponygirl talks about the awesome new game, Portal. Portal was just released as part of Valve's "Orange Box", a package that includes Half-Life 2, the Half-Life 2 expansions: Episode One and Episode Two, and the highly anticipated Team Fortress 2.
Anyway, I haven't had a chance to pick it up, yet, but I fully intend to. MP does a great job explaining why Portal is so exciting: a game about a woman that doesn't rely on her being half-naked or waiting to be rescued? That shows her as very capable and kick-ass? That involves unique gameplay and puzzle solving in an FPS environment?
*swoon*
Second: It has been brought to my attention that I didn't actually specify a timeline for my graphic novel reading challenge. If you're interested in reading and discussing Four Women, I'd love to have you participate too. Given that it's a little older, you may have to order it or have it ordered at your favorite book/comic shop. You can find it on half.com for about ten bucks, or at buy.com for $16 (after shipping).
If you check some of your local comic shops, you might actually be able to find the individual issues (there were five, I think?), which might be cheaper than picking up the graphic novel format (although I prefer the GN format, personally- no adverts!). Anyway: It, like most graphic novels, is a pretty short read- I'd guess a few hours, at most. I'm thinking two weeks or so? November 12th, perhaps?
Sam Kieth is one of, if not my absolute, favorite comic creators. He has a very particular visual style that really stands out, and his personal creations display a lot of thought and a desire to create characters that read as real. The fact that most of his main characters are women who are written as real people with real motivations, problems, issues, desires, and personalities just adds to my love.
I'd also like to suggest taking a look at this interview Sequential Tart did with him. It's a great interview, and he really opens up about a lot of things regarding his personal life (including his marriage to a woman 15 years his senior, whom he met when he was 15) and his professional work. He talks about everything from how fans reacted to his unique style:
to his thoughts on writing women characters:
It's an older interview, but if you've got an interest in comics or in his work in particular, I think it's a pretty interesting read.
And the best for last: I stumbled upon this amazing story today. Four women got involved in a research project helped uncover the great works of Irena Sendler- a Polish Catholic social worker- who helped save around 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto and kept detailed documents of their ancestry and whereabouts hidden from the Nazis, even after being captured and threatened with torture and execution.
It's a pretty amazing story not only about the heroic efforts of this woman to save children from a terrible situation, but about the work of the women who helped bring her great works to light. Prior to these women's research, few people had heard of Irena Sendler. Now, she's been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Awesome.
It's kind of an amazing story, as their former instructor points out:
So, I open the floor to you: Got any good stories to share? See something that really warmed your heart? Hear a news item that brought a smile to your face? Watch a movie that made you giddy? Please, share it with the rest of us. =)
First up: Mighty Ponygirl talks about the awesome new game, Portal. Portal was just released as part of Valve's "Orange Box", a package that includes Half-Life 2, the Half-Life 2 expansions: Episode One and Episode Two, and the highly anticipated Team Fortress 2.
Anyway, I haven't had a chance to pick it up, yet, but I fully intend to. MP does a great job explaining why Portal is so exciting: a game about a woman that doesn't rely on her being half-naked or waiting to be rescued? That shows her as very capable and kick-ass? That involves unique gameplay and puzzle solving in an FPS environment?
*swoon*
Second: It has been brought to my attention that I didn't actually specify a timeline for my graphic novel reading challenge. If you're interested in reading and discussing Four Women, I'd love to have you participate too. Given that it's a little older, you may have to order it or have it ordered at your favorite book/comic shop. You can find it on half.com for about ten bucks, or at buy.com for $16 (after shipping).
If you check some of your local comic shops, you might actually be able to find the individual issues (there were five, I think?), which might be cheaper than picking up the graphic novel format (although I prefer the GN format, personally- no adverts!). Anyway: It, like most graphic novels, is a pretty short read- I'd guess a few hours, at most. I'm thinking two weeks or so? November 12th, perhaps?
Sam Kieth is one of, if not my absolute, favorite comic creators. He has a very particular visual style that really stands out, and his personal creations display a lot of thought and a desire to create characters that read as real. The fact that most of his main characters are women who are written as real people with real motivations, problems, issues, desires, and personalities just adds to my love.
I'd also like to suggest taking a look at this interview Sequential Tart did with him. It's a great interview, and he really opens up about a lot of things regarding his personal life (including his marriage to a woman 15 years his senior, whom he met when he was 15) and his professional work. He talks about everything from how fans reacted to his unique style:
Kids would write in and say things like: "Wolverine's okay, but his back is too round." "What's up with Wolverine's feet? Why are they growing?" And, "Wolverine is really out of proportion, I think your artist is losing his mind or something." And it was funny, because the letters I would get would be kids who really loved it, or kids who were saying "Why are you ruining my universe." They had a very specific view of the world. "I'm going through latency," they wouldn't say it in those words, but, "I'm going through this world view phase where I'm trying to categorize and order things, and you're causing chaos by giving me a version of things that are drastically different from everything else. So please, please, please go away and not do that anymore."
to his thoughts on writing women characters:
the first thing I think about is, I'm just trying to write people who happen to be female characters. So, on the one hand, if things seem more dimensional, maybe that's why. On the other, if it rings false, it's because, once again .... That whole gender question can drive you crazy, "Would I be writing this differently if I was a woman or a man?" I drove myself particularly nuts in this Four Women story. The bottom line is, yes, I think that it's probably a weaker story, yes I think that a woman could write it better, but on the other hand, I can't help who I am and the stories I'm compelled to write.
It's an older interview, but if you've got an interest in comics or in his work in particular, I think it's a pretty interesting read.
And the best for last: I stumbled upon this amazing story today. Four women got involved in a research project helped uncover the great works of Irena Sendler- a Polish Catholic social worker- who helped save around 2,500 Jewish children from the Warsaw ghetto and kept detailed documents of their ancestry and whereabouts hidden from the Nazis, even after being captured and threatened with torture and execution.
It's a pretty amazing story not only about the heroic efforts of this woman to save children from a terrible situation, but about the work of the women who helped bring her great works to light. Prior to these women's research, few people had heard of Irena Sendler. Now, she's been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. Awesome.
It's kind of an amazing story, as their former instructor points out:
“Think of it,” said Norm Conard, their former social studies teacher. “You have some rural Protestant kids from a tiny place in Kansas who decide to tackle the story of a Polish Catholic woman who saved thousands of Jews, despite the fact that they were raised in a place where there is virtually no one of Jewish ancestry. It makes absolutely no sense that Irena’s story would end up getting told like this.”
So, I open the floor to you: Got any good stories to share? See something that really warmed your heart? Hear a news item that brought a smile to your face? Watch a movie that made you giddy? Please, share it with the rest of us. =)
Thursday, October 25, 2007
Marketing a violent shooting game? Call Playboy!
(Thanks to Cara for forwarding this my way)
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men was a game that I was sort of interested in. I'm sort of a sucker for games that offer co-op play or that have interesting multiplayer options. That the multiplayer has you teaming up to complete objectives with the possibility that one or more of your team members (including you) might turn on the rest was interesting, and adds what I think sounds like an interesting element of paranoia to teaming up with people. The fact that death in multiplayer switches you to the other side, with the goal of stopping the rest of the team also struck me as a pretty cool aspect.
The story mode (single player and co-op) sounded interesting too- one character is a former mercenary opposed to harming innocent people who is fighting to save his family, while the other is a psychopath who experiences visual halucinations during gameplay. Combine all of these things with a story and gameplay that pays tribute to gangster films like Heat and the Departed, and, yeah, I'm interested.
And then the promotional campaign started.
*sigh*
This is exactly the sort of thing that I'm talking about when I talk about how gaming culture is steeped in sexism. It's not just the characters in games, it's the way that gamers, creators, and marketing teams treat women, too. This contest isn't about including women in the game- it's about using women's bodies to increase interest in their product.
This seems like such an obviously bad idea, that it's hard to know exactly where to begin. I find the use of women's nude bodies to promote the "hotness" of a really violent shooter really disturbing. Why not do a promotion that involves people generally trying to look like they belong in Kane & Lynch? Why try to tie it to looking hot and sexy? It doesn't even make sense. And, seriously, way to alienate a huge section of the population there, folks. Nothing says you respect women gamers like taking a game where the only prominant woman is a hostage, and use Playboy as a major part of your promotion. Nothing screams "We respect women gamers" like trying to use their naked bodies to advertise your product.
I'm glad to see that at least some major gaming media have expressed some reservations about this kind of promotion, too.
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men was a game that I was sort of interested in. I'm sort of a sucker for games that offer co-op play or that have interesting multiplayer options. That the multiplayer has you teaming up to complete objectives with the possibility that one or more of your team members (including you) might turn on the rest was interesting, and adds what I think sounds like an interesting element of paranoia to teaming up with people. The fact that death in multiplayer switches you to the other side, with the goal of stopping the rest of the team also struck me as a pretty cool aspect.
The story mode (single player and co-op) sounded interesting too- one character is a former mercenary opposed to harming innocent people who is fighting to save his family, while the other is a psychopath who experiences visual halucinations during gameplay. Combine all of these things with a story and gameplay that pays tribute to gangster films like Heat and the Departed, and, yeah, I'm interested.
And then the promotional campaign started.
*sigh*
This is exactly the sort of thing that I'm talking about when I talk about how gaming culture is steeped in sexism. It's not just the characters in games, it's the way that gamers, creators, and marketing teams treat women, too. This contest isn't about including women in the game- it's about using women's bodies to increase interest in their product.
This seems like such an obviously bad idea, that it's hard to know exactly where to begin. I find the use of women's nude bodies to promote the "hotness" of a really violent shooter really disturbing. Why not do a promotion that involves people generally trying to look like they belong in Kane & Lynch? Why try to tie it to looking hot and sexy? It doesn't even make sense. And, seriously, way to alienate a huge section of the population there, folks. Nothing says you respect women gamers like taking a game where the only prominant woman is a hostage, and use Playboy as a major part of your promotion. Nothing screams "We respect women gamers" like trying to use their naked bodies to advertise your product.
I'm glad to see that at least some major gaming media have expressed some reservations about this kind of promotion, too.
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
46th Carnival of Feminists is up!
Apu, over at Cubically Challanged, is hosting the 46th Carnival of Feminists right now. There's some pretty interesting reading to be done, there (*cough cough*including something I wrote*cough cough*), about a wide range of topics. Abortion rights, the lack of women represented in The Scientist's top science blogs list, "grey rape", single sex schooling, and even Death Proof are just a few of the many topics covered in this latest carnival. If you've got a few minutes, I strongly suggest taking some time to browse through to some of the blogs you might not normally be reading- there are tons of great writers out there, and it can be hard to find them, but Apu has taken the time and effort to gather links to many of them, right there.
Check it out here!
Check it out here!
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