My colleague Alexandra Gutierrez reviews the much-anticipated Jennifer's Body and -- surprise! -- concludes that it's not a worthy heir to horror's feminist traditions
In their efforts to create a feminist horror film, [Diablo] Cody and [Karyn] Kusama made a movie that is truthfully neither one of these things. What they missed is that their objective could be accomplished without redefining genre conventions -- horror already has plenty of space for feminism.After all, one of the major takeaways of horror films is that strong women can stand up to those who would rather control them through fear. The formula of the "Final Girl," as Carol Clover termed it in her oft-cited Men, Women, and Chain Saws, allows "the rezoning of the feminine into territories traditionally occupied by the masculine." In the Final Girl formula, the woman prevails against her antagonist and saves herself -- which neither lead of Jennifer's Body does -- promoting the idea that "triumphant self-rescue is no longer strictly gendered." It's no coincidence that most of horror's memorable heroes are actually heroines.
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God. Jennifer's body looks soooo lame. The stupidity dripping from the trailers is so overwhelming, I can't even imagine too many dumb and sexist stereotypical males going to see it.
Then again, so does Sorority Row.
While I absolutely agree with about 95% of the article, I'm not sure how she's casting Drag Me To Hell as a feminist film.
That said, Megan Fox is just going to get more crap from this, which makes me angry, because I don't like the cultural meme that we're supposed to dislike her. (We = people in general. The meme mandates different kinds of dislike for different genders.)
There were some feminist elements in Drag Me to Hell. The struggles that Alison Lohman's character was experiencing at work echoed feminist views of sexism in the workplace pretty accurately.
Nice... more female on female hating. Lame.
My favorite feminist film blogger, Melissa Silverstein, has a different take on Jennifer's Body:
http://womenandhollywood.com/2009/09/17/jennifers-body/
I'm still seeing the movie this weekend. the thing is, some of you might not see the film as feminist, while some of us others might consider the film as feminist...
You're not supposed to use "lame" as a pejorative.
Where's the female on female hating in Gutierrez's review? She's "hating" just because she doesn't share your opinion of feminism in the film (...which you apparently haven't even seen yet)? There's nothing particularly vicious or unfair in that review.
I HAVE already seen the movie, as I'm a huge horror fan, and I was underwhelmed. I was optimistic, at least about the feminism angle, since Diablo Cody has said a lot of things I thought were interesting about it being a commentary on how culture consumes women, etc, but her thoughts on the film are way more interesting than the film itself. I just don't think the subversive feminism comes across particularly well, nor does it really bring anything new to the table in terms of female empowerment in a horror film (yes, Jennifer's the aggressor, but revenge horror is a genre staple). Also, as a horror film it's just not very well done, as many reviews have already said, neither scary nor funny.
So Megan's 0/3 on decent movies? I hope she gets cast in something not-horrible while she's still the It Girl.
I know this is a derail but with only 6 comments I've already seen 2 people use the word "lame" as a descriptor. Can we PLEASE stop using that word. I'm sick of having to point this out thread after thread. Thank you.
That said this review said exactly what I was thinking was going to happen with this film. I'm glad I won't be wasting my money on it.
I'm not challenging you, just asking: Do you know if any disability rights groups have made a statement against using "lame"? I feel like I've only seen this discussion on feminist blogs, and from people who do not identify (in their comments) as disabled. I googled "disability rights" and "lame" and found this page from the Council for Disability Rights... which uses the phrase "lame duck."
http://www.disabilityrights.org/1006.htm
Sorry to continue the derail...
But there is a big difference between "lame" and "lame duck." Lame, by itself, means unsatisfactory, disabled, impaired. Lame duck, as a phrase, means that a person is holding a position but a replacement has already been chosen. One is always pejorative, the other can be used pejoratively but is about something very different. I am not sure if an advocacy group has launched a direct campaign against using "lame," but I think that might be in part because "retard" is a hurtful word on which many groups are focusing their attack. I think comments about "lame" come up in feminist circle because the word is used all the time, whereas the r-word is not. But as feminists, I think we should be on the forefront of striking hurtful language from our vernacular, both words included. Otherwise, how can we really say that we care about and want to improve the lives of women if we actively use words that hurt some women?
(OK, so TheWhiteRaven said it better than I did, while I was fighting my computer to let me registed, but here's my two cents anyway.)
The word "lame" refers to a physical disability. Using it to describe something as "boring" or "pathetic" equates having a physical disability with being "pathetic" and/or useless. This is offensive; same as using "gay" to mean "bad," "stupid" or "undesirable" and using "retarded" or "tard" to mean "stupid."
The term "lame duck" has a different meaning and it's a coined phrase. It refers to a person, usually an elected official, who is not able to function properly, or as well as before. This is more aligned with the true definition of "lame" and is not necessarily used to mean "pathetic" or "useless."
saying this movie or the commentary made about it is "lame" is not only offensive, but an incorrect use of the word, because neither the movie nor the discussion about it possess legs to have disabled or crippled.
Do you really need to hear from someone official to believe that it's a hurtful word? If you say so...
http://www.womanist-musings.com/2009/08/its-not-just-lame.html
http://www.womanist-musings.com/2009/06/using-lame-as-descriptor-is-always.html
Of course you have to hear it from someone official. Just like you have to talk to your local GSA before you stop using fag as an insult.
That's a general you by the way.
The title itself sounds to me like sexual objectification. Can't women be powerful without being sexual objects?
isn't that kind of the irony, here she is killing and being 'powerful' (I guess) but she is overly sexualized.
The title is from a Hole song
http://www.lyricsmode.com/lyrics/h/hole/jennifers_body.html
Take from this what you will
The movie does sound terrible from the article's description!
I appreciate the person who linked to the more positive review. I would have liked to see you guys put up both sides in the interest of letting us decide where we fall.
Either way, I'm not going to register a decision on the movie until I see it, which I hope to do tonight.
You need a blog to put up multiple reviews of a movie for you to decide where you stand? Might I recommend www.rottentomatoes.com? And what constitutes "both sides"? It's a movie, so there's going to be more than two diametrically opposed opinions on it.
No, but when there are conflicting viewpoints on the same topic regarding a movie (in this case, whether or not it is feminist), I feel that it would behoove the blog to put up both sides for their readers. And as I said, I'm not going to form my own opinion until I have actually seen it.
You did say you wanted both viewpoints (though again, what are "both" viewpoints?) in the interest of helping you decide where you fall on the issue.
I guess I just don't expect a blog to put up every single viewpoint on something, especially when the article linked to is by the author's colleague. She's inviting us to discuss the article she linked to.
If I say "You know what book I like? 'The Princes in the Tower' by Allison Weir. She sure convinced me that Richard III did not kill the princes," am I then obligated to recommend books that say Richard III did kill the princes, or can I safely assume that you can figure out that various people believe different things? Why shouldn't I assume that if you're unconvinced by my recommendation that you are capable of seeking out other books?
Again: when I said "both sides" I meant both sides of whether or not it is a feminist movie. Pretty much if that's the question, there are two main responses: yes and no. There may be different arguments to support it, but there are two basic conclusions.
And you'll note I said "us" not just "me." I meant that all readers, whether they are planning to see the movie or not, should be see them both. It really doesn't matter to me that the author is a good buddy of one of the bloggers. I think that when feminists are split on something, a feminist outlet, be it blog or otherwise, has a responsibility to let us know that more than one viewpoint exists.
And for the third time now I am not going to decide where I fall on the issue until I see the movie.
And not being familiar with the Princess and the Tower, I'm not even going to respond to that last part. Except to say that it sounds like you've gotten to the point where you're just nitpicking and trying to get under my skin, and if that's the case, then we've left the realm of rational argument and this conversation is over.
while it's been a while since i read Clover's piece on the "Final Girl", I had a much different reading of it than Ms. Gutierrez does in this article.
Clover analyzes the final girl phenomenon in terms of psychoanalytic theory; while it is true that gender fluidity exists with both the Girl and the Killer, the Girl is ultimately successful because she is able to mature into, essentially, a grown man, which the Killer can't achieve. It has a lot to do with who is wielding the phallus and the killer's oedipal complex. Anyway, I saw her argument as saying that a female, in order to become a hero, needs to adopt masculinity and *reject* her "girlhood".
The Final Girl story characterizes females as worthless unless they adopt the behavior and qualities of men; is it fair to judge this film based on the fact that it *doesn't* use this trope?
I'm not convinced by that reading. How, exactly, does the woman abandon her womanhood to overcome the killer? By resorting to violence? By picking up a phallic symbol as a weapon? Am I missing something?
If it's by resorting to violence, your argument implicitly cedes violence in the abstract to men. We are all capable of violence, and sometimes violence is righteous, like when there's a crazy killer running after you with an axe.
As for the phallic symbol, let's take a brief survey of the universe of hand-held effective weapons. How many could not be construed as some kind of phallic symbol? I can think of two: a chakram (a la Xena) and a bowling ball. Now, as hilarious as it would be to see the killer catch a bowling ball in the teeth, is it fair to insist that the heroine not use a sword, axe, shotgun, chainsaw, 2x4, pistol, missile, crossbow, phaser...?
If I'm missing something, please explain.
I haven't seen 'Jennifer's Body', but I bet 'It Creeps' is a better "feminist" horror movie:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GCLE5NFPpxM&feature=related
I'm glad that there are feminist reviews of this film online. I was planning on seeing it tonight or tomorrow. I'm writing a review of it for my college paper from a feminist perspective so this has been really helpful.
After seeing Megan Fox on Conan last night--and her accompanying clip from the film, which was just male-bait (it was the scene with the girl-on-girl kiss)--I'm not too optimistic, but I guess we'll see later.
"jennifer's body" certainly doesn't seem like a feminist movie. megan fox actually made some poor comments regarding this film. she said something like "it disgusts me the way women use their sexuality to manipulate men, like when daughters talk to their father's in baby voices" and then "god gave men physical strength and women their manipulative sexuality. if god gave it, i'll use it." (paraphrasing)
hhhmmm
Here's how I've seen feminists react to Jennifer's Body:
1. Vicious Hater :They totally rail against every fiber of the movie. They decry that there could be nothing feminist about the movie and refuse to even acknowledge the (feminist) director and (feminist) writer's intentions.
2. Eager Zealot:They probably had generally positive ideas about the movie, but exaggerate them to a rhapsodizing, worship-filled reviews to compensate for the other reviews.
Almost all feminist reviews I've read fall into one of two radical camps that seem to be more about argument than actual review.
It's similar to how many feminist blogs have commenters who will either a) dissect posts to crumbs to find something to pick about, whether or not it's significant, or b) those who will hold up all feminist ideas, no matter what, probably because they feel the need to balance out Group A.
It makes my head hurt. How does in the internet compress us into this silly positions?
That happens with any discourse on the Internet, though. If someone doesn't give a fuck either way about Jennifer's Body, why would they post about it and prove that they do, indeed, care? If someone's posting, it's because they have an opinion.
This particular feminist's reaction is lukewarm. And again, I wouldn't call the linked review that of a "hater." It just says that the film's not groundbreakingly feminist, which a lot of people seem to be taking as an attack. No one's saying it's ANTI-feminist, but given how high hopes seem to be for Kusama and Cody to produce a feminist horror film, I think it's fair to note that there's nothing in Jennifer's Body that distinguishes it from standard horror fare, feminism-wise. I was hoping against hope there would be, and I was disappointed. The ideas that Cody has talked about in interviews didn't really play out in the film, and the mere fact that there are female leads and and one of them kills people doesn't really do it for me, personally. The whole Final Girl trope exists because it's typical in horror to have female protagonists who step up and kill people.
Some problems: Jennifer's a cypher; she's shallow, mean and manipulative to her supposed best friend in the brief glimpse we get of her before her transformation, and she's the same after. She's killed because some guys want to sacrifice a virgin; because she's "impure," i.e. a non-virgin, she becomes an evil demon-possessed killing machine instead. Is that supposed to be a win? She also doesn't use her newfound power for revenge on men who have wronged her or as some kind of equalizing force, as some reviews have said - she just kills random innocent guys who have done nothing to her or anyone else, until the other female lead kills her (her final words: "My tit!"). Her story is really a tragedy, but the film doesn't offer her much sympathy or deal with that aspect of it, which I think WOULD have made for an interesting feminist horror film. The friendship between Needy and Jennifer is also pretty underdeveloped considering it's supposed to be the linchpin of the story.
I haven't seen the movie, but from everything I've read, your summary and analysis seem pretty accurate. And if they are, count me in as a hater. I think doing something half-right is most times even worse than fucking up entirely.
I like About-Face's take on this - that it's another portrayal of how men fear women with sexual power. http://about-face.org/blog/archives/1500
I saw it and really enjoyed it. It wasn't overwhelmingly feminist, but there were some feminist themes and I thought the overall story carried some messages about women that were worth my attention.
I may be reading something the wrong way, but I really loved Megan Fox's character, Jennifer, and how she was used to depict an overall social fear that a beautiful girl without any moral hesitation could wreck a community.
"I may be reading something the wrong way, but I really loved Megan Fox's character, Jennifer, and how she was used to depict an overall social fear that a beautiful girl without any moral hesitation could wreck a community."
That was absolutely my reading as well.
I don't think Cody's other works about being an "Unlikely Stripper" (unlikely how? That she was educated and it was faux progressive ironic?) or Juno were particularly feminist either. Having a woman writing or producing a piece does not make it feminist.
No, openly identifying as a feminist and claiming to make feminist movies is what makes Cody a feminist.
She said Cody's WORK, not Cody herself. And no, just because Cody identifies as a feminist doesn't make every piece of her work "feminist" simply by virtue of having been created by her. You can be a feminist and do bad work, and you can be a feminist and do work that doesn't communicate feminism at all.
One can absolutely be a feminist and do bad work. I don't personally agree that Jennifer's Body or Cody's book fall into that category, but I'll just have to agree to disagree with some folks on this thread.
What I was responding to, however, was the claim that "Having a woman writing or producing a piece does not make it feminist." My point, which I probably didn't articulate at all well, was that reviewers, bloggers, folks like myself consider Cody's work to be feminist because she claims that label herself. I'm very, very uncomfortable with deciding who (or what works) do or do not get to carry the feminist card.
I really didn't mean to attack anyone though and I'm also not trying to claim that we shouldn't engage in critical analysis of feminist cultural production.
When I heard about Jennifer's Body, I was really excited to see Cody use a Hole song as the title for the movie. I don't know why, I guess it's just a song and a band that I really like. So, that's how I always thought of it, as a title from a Hole song.
But then I realized the other day that many people don't know that the title is referencing a song at all. And if you don't know that it's a song, the title just seems like it's literally referencing Jennifer's body... or, that is, Megan Fox's body. That just adds even more completely unnecessary emphasis on Fox's sexuality and looks. And I wonder if Cody understood that it would have that effect. If so, that doesn't seem very feminist to me.
Still, I haven't seen the movie and still plan to see it. I like reading reviews and seeing what other people have to say, but I'd like to know what I'm talking about before having an opinion.
My guess would be she was well aware of it and was vibing on the double entendre.
But I haven't seen it yet so I don't have an opinion on how the title plays into the plot or anything.
The emphasis on Megan's sexuality and looks are completely necessary, as she doesn't bring anything else to her roles and none of the movies she's been in seem to offer any thing else either.
I know Cody has identified herself as a
feminist, but I see some problems with her
way of thinking. I can't find the link now,
but somewhere in her comments on the film
she states that "teenage boys are harmless"
and that teen girls are deceptive and
manipulative. This is not a feminist idea.
While she stated that it is our culture that
promotes competition between teen girls,
her comment makes me think that she believes
teen boys are somehow more innocent because
they are not exposed to this culture, which
we know isn't true. I see boys all the time
taking advantage of girl culture to play
girls off one another and contribute to
rumors, gossip, and violence. They seem to
think its funny to see girls fighting each
other this way...
The fact that Diablo Cody (I'm assuming it was her choice, anyway) named this movie after one of the greatest feminist punk rock songs of all time really just adds insult to injury. If I were Courtney Love, I'd be going all undead on her ass right now.
I wouldn't see this movie with a gun to my head, but I'm enjoying reading the vicious reviews.
If "Jennifer's Body" were either entertaining or ultimately had a point, it would have a good enough reason for existing. Even if its star, the bodaciously built Megan Fox, were sexy in anything but a plastic way, you could make an argument for it as gore-fest eye candy. But "Jennifer's Body" -- directed by Karyn Kusama, from a script by Diablo Cody -- is so contemptuous toward its own characters, and its audience, that it chokes off any visceral thrills it might have offered. The movie substitutes calculation for brains, and the filmmakers seem to think we'll all be too stupid to notice. I can't remember the last time I saw such a naked display of opportunism and exploitation at the movies -- and when I use the word "exploitation," I don't mean the good, old-fashioned grindhouse kind, but the "Let's make a buck by pretending to be transgressive" kind, the kind that really makes you feel dirty.
[...]
And they're just filler for the big showstopper, anyway: Line up now, guys, for the gratuitous lesbo makeout session. Watching two women kiss, when it's done right, is a glorious thing. And the effectiveness of a girl-to-girl kiss has as much to do with attitude as with presentation: David Lynch got it right with the gorgeous, deeply erotic love scene between Naomi Watts and Laura Elena Harring in "Mulholland Dr."; so did John McNaughton in the frankly, joyously exploitative "Wild Things" -- the kissing scene between Denise Richards and Neve Campbell is a woozily sexy thrill ride that also happens to serve the story. Both are honest approaches. But a kissing scene can also be a cheap attempt to titillate the audience, particularly when it has no real context or reason for being -- it doesn't matter if there's a man or a woman behind the camera. Needy is certainly in thrall to Jennifer, possibly sexually. But Jennifer treats Needy so badly, it's impossible to understand how these two women could be friends, other than out of habit (they've been pals since childhood). And as Jennifer, Fox's mannequin eyes are lifeless; they betray an attraction to no one -- there's no sex in her sexiness. The kiss comes from nowhere and leads to nothing. Its calculated eroticism is enough to make you long for the tyranny of the male gaze.
http://www.salon.com/ent/movies/review/2009/09/18/jennifers_body/index.html
I was just rereading Cody's BUST cover story. It's kind of funny, she points out that feminists can be very hard on other women and were the most resistant to her when she first came onto the scene.
Yeah, I'm so resistant to her that I went out and spent $10 to see her film on its opening night. (Based entirely on liking what she said in her interviews, for the record, because the trailer was silly.) But never mind that the movie's getting plenty of all-around lukewarm reviews from both male and female critics outside the feminist blogosphere; clearly the fact that there's nothing in JB to differentiate it from Carrie, The Hunger, The Fury, Firestarter or any other of horror's zillion adolescence-is-hell, superpowered-girl-as-metaphor-for-fear-of-female-empowerment films is just me being hard on her because she's a woman. No matter what criticisms I or anyone else articulate about the clarity of her possible feminist messages, the way the characters were handled, or the quality of the story as a whole, we're just looking for reasons to tear her down because she's a woman. Oh, and I'm probably also just jealous because Megan Fox is pretty.
So is Amanda Seyfried, come to that. This poor film never had a CHANCE against my feminist vitriol!
Yeah, cause something Liza said implied that any of that was the case for you.
The topic is feminist criticism of Jennifer's Body, so I'm not sure what else a quote about how "feminists can be very hard on other women" is supposed to imply. If the claim that feminists are hard on other women and have been resistant to Cody personally isn't supposed to be somehow relevant to feminists' responses to the film, there's no point in bringing it up.
Because you are every feminist and every feminist is you?
Because my own experience is a counter to the generalization that feminists don't like this movie just because they're Mean-Girling Diablo Cody. If you're going to frame a comment as a generalization about feminists, then yes, as a feminist I am going to respond, because yes, the generalization that feminists as a group are just looking to tear down other women is offensive. Especially in light of the fact that there's no basis for it, since we have plenty of legitimate criticism of the film from various quarters (...like I already said). Countering criticism with "well, feminists just don't like Diablo Cody" is basically going the "y'all are just haterz!!11" route. It's not true, it's dismissive and it contributes nothing. I don't have to think that I am every feminist and every feminist is me to call that out as bullshit.
Who made you the arbiter of what people are and aren't allowed to respond to? One commenter implied that people didn't like a movie because of X. The second commenter pointed out - albeit sarcastically - that she didn't like it because of Y. So what? You obviously have nothing to say on this topic, so I have no idea why you feel the need to try to silence and invalidate others with pointless snide one-liners.