Kathryn Bigelow the first woman to win an Oscar for Best Director: a victory for feminism? I disagree.
Before I go on, I have to disclose that I haven’t seen any of her movies. No, this isn’t laziness: this is Ireland. Only the blockbusters in the Hollywood blockbuster list make it to the big screen or the bins of Xtra vision. I will not comment on her style, but only on the genre of movies she has chosen to direct. And if her directing is truly ground-breaking within the chosen genres, I apologise.
Fighting movies, biker movies, detective movies, and finally war movies, culminating with her award-winning The Hurt Locker. Apparently, there was only a bum note in her action-movie career, her 2000 film The Weight of Water, a portrait of two women trapped in suffocating relationships.
So Kathryn Bigelow can do men flicks, as well or better than men. So film has moved to the stage where women don’t have to take “George Elliot” as their nom de plume to write Victorian novels – sorry, Hollywood blockbusters. It’s good. It’s great, it’s certainly an advance. There are some who might ask “did Katherine Bigelow win the Oscar for Best Director because she was the best, or because she was a woman?” but as I said, having not seen her movies, I am not in a position to comment.
This shows however that film, unlike literature, has not moved beyond the phallocentric Victorian novel. Or at least that mainstream recognition has not yet been given to “feminine writing” in film. By this I don’t mean chick flicks. I mean revolutionising the form of film, like James Joyce revolutionised the novel with "stream-of-consciousness" narrative. As Bigelow said in 2009: “I've spent a fair amount of time thinking about what my aptitude is, and I really think it's to explore and push the medium. It's not about breaking gender roles or genre traditions. ”
Hi Anne! I have a lot to say on this subject from a cinematic point of view! Hopefully, it is not too long a comment for you, though, to have to read!
ReplyDeleteFirstly, insofar, as it had never been done before, a woman has now won the Oscar for Best Director. Hurrah! Like all barriers, someone had to be the first to break it and perhaps that will make it easier for future female directors to now follow suit. Moreover, she did so with a film that scored well-above-average for Hollywood in terms of having something worthwhile to say. To the extent that anyone gives a hoot about the Oscars (not me!), and putting to one side all of the politics and campaigning that goes into who wins what on the night, then I think that she did win this award on merit.
Yes, it is a war movie and, by extension, I can understand why you might label it a man’s movie. As something of a student of war movies though, I think that this one is as much a character study of certain masculine traits, as it is a violent drama, and that, for me, is a woman’s movie (simply to borrow your phrase – I do not think about films that way, in truth!). Granted, it is not quite as poetic or as thoughtful as Clarie Denis’ “Beau Travail” (1999) – a film that looks at certain masculine traits through the prism of the French Foreign Legion, but it still has quite a personal and intimate tone to it. As such, it sits well outside of more recognisable sub-genres such as jingoism or war-as-hell.
That is not to say, though, that the film does not fit well within the modern canon of war-themed films (e.g. realism of detail, graphic exposition, greater aspiration towards historical accuracy, “bigger picture” getting ignored)- it does. Rather, it is to give Ms. Bigelow some deserved credit for her achievement – female director, small budget in Hollywood terms, intelligent subject matter, and only a modestly grossing work at the box office (again, in Hollywood terms). Not too many films with those labels on the reel-casing get that kind of major commercial recognition!
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You do make an interesting point then re the scarcity of feminine writing in mainstream cinema. Is it too simplistic to describe that as cinema that does not sexually objectify women (as opposed, for example, to the gender of the screenwriter)?
While it is not a strong point of mine, it is something that I began thinking about recently in the context of whether or not we should be distinguishing between actors in awards ceremonies on the basis of their gender.
Now, I freely admit that this hardly sounds like the most intellectual cause that I could be applying myself to. However, what began as an idle thought developed into a more stringent self-questioning as to why I struggle to think of a healthy list of contemporary strong female actors when I can list dozens of male ones at the drop of a hat.
Is it a numbers issue in terms of actors of either gender? Is it a thematic issue in terms of plot and characterisation (which hopefully ties back into the point that you are making)? Or is it a bias on my part insofar as I recognise and therefore identify more closely with masculine attributes as opposed to feminine ones?
Now, I watch a great deal of art house cinema and know that there are plenty of feminist films (as per my simplistic definition above) out there. However, it is hard to think of many female actors who have built successful careers based more or less on such roles alone.
Anyway, it is a thought process that I am currently working my way through. If you have any thoughts on the subject please that would be appreciated. Perhaps even as a blog post, as it might attract wider comment that way?!!
P.S. Good luck with your blog newbie! Keep at it – it is fun... mostly! :-)