Oscar Cliffs Notes.
OK, so I've been using my WGA card to full advatage and scoping as many Oscar-nominated films as possible over the last few weeks -- for free! And thank God they were free, because lemme tell you, overall I'm far less impressed than I thought I would be. I can't remember an Oscar season when so many movies got such great buzz AS "SERIOUS films"
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A. The "close" relationship between Olive and her grandpa Edwin is not a typical relationship. Their relationship is predicated on two types of love, one that is familial and the other which is too familiar. In all the reviews I've read about this film, not a single one attempts to infer the nature of the relationship or to question the cause and effect sequence of a little girl learning the moves of erotic dancing. Questions popped into my head like, How did he teach her to dance erotically? What motivated him to teach her that type of dancing? His intentions were not innocent. There are enough contextual clues in the movie for any viewer to tag him with the moniker of "dirty old man." The little girl was sexualized by her grandfather without her consent and without her awareness. Of course she could dance erotically! For little Olive, it was just a dance that grandpa taught her. For grandpa, however, his motivation was sexual. Not unlike the porn magazines that Frank bought for grandpa, Olive is just another medium for the old man's lewdness. Magazines don't talk and tell, little girls--especially if they aren't directly molested-- don't either. The predatory message is very sublime.
B. The camera work. One scene in particular comes to mind. Remember when Olive goes down to her brother to talk to him after he's found out that he's color blind? At the end of their conversation they walk up the bank. As she's walking, her bright (pink? red? orange?) shorts, which are tight, bunch into the cleavage of her ass. As a stand alone scene--innocent. Within the context of the whole film, however, that scene takes on a different, more perverse, meaning.
I don't think the movie was subversive in the classic sense. It did send the message that it's ok for men to use girls/women for their pleasure as long as the girls/women are unaware and unharmed. If anything, that message is a reinforcement of the norm.
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It helped to illuminate the perversity of teeny-bopper beauty pageants
But you also complain that:
The little girl was sexualized by her grandfather without her consent and without her awareness
The problems with your argument are
1.) That the second thing allows the first thing to happen.
The whole point, IMHO, is that, in innocently acting out a dirty old man's fantasies on stage, the little girl is making plain what the beauty pageant is really about: the sexualization of girls. The only difference between the grandfather and the pageant audience is that the grandfather was on enough drugs to actually render his fantasy as it actually was, instead of dressing it up in chiffon.
2.) I don't know if, considering the grandfather's character, you can consider him some kind of child predator. Given his fondness for adult (not child) pornography, it seems more like the idea is that he has these porno-mag fantasies, and he almost accidentally expresses them through his granddaughter's beauty pageant number -- the only medium available to him. This is a beauty pageant number as designed by a drug-addled guy whose only idea of beauty comes from porn mags and strip clubs. I don't feel like he has actual sexual feelings for his granddaughter.
3.) I think there's a distinction between the family rallying around the girl at the end, and actually agreeing with what the grandfather did. The family makes the most of the situation, turning something obviously perverse into an opportunity for solidarity. That doesn't mean the movie is suggesting that what the grandfather did was awesome. I think it suggests families make do with what they have.
As for the shot of the little girl's shorts, I sure don't remember it, and I'm not sure you can say unquivocally that kind of detail was intentional, certainly not as some sort of overt sexualization of the girl.
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I agree with you that the film IS showing us exploitation. One level is sexploitation--the BrittantSpearification of the girls in the pageant--and the other is the personal sexualization of Olive by her grandfather. These two forms of exploitation, however, are not the same. In the former the girls are transformed into caricatures of sexiness whereas in the latter Olive has been deliberately trained to satisfy her grandfather's misplaced gratification via the pretext of a beauty pageant. Is one more nefarious than the other? Yes. Here's why. In #2 You wrote:
"Given his fondness for adult (not child) pornography, it seems more like the idea is that he has these porno-mag fantasies, and he almost accidentally expresses them through his granddaughter's beauty pageant number -- the only medium available to him."
You say that he has adult tastes in sex and then you state that he "almost accidently" expresses those fantasies through a kid. You seem to excuse the character's actions because a) he lacks the company of an adult woman and b) he's a heroin addict and can't think straight. In my opinion, whether he consciously or subconsciously intended to use his granddaughter for his pleasure, he did exploit her. Deliberately. Not "almost accidentally."
The film critiques the exploitation of girls. No question. The film, however, does not critique the more personal aspects of that exploitation because it presents us with the human face--and all his foibles--of the grandfather. That type of equivocation is disturbing.
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It's really hard for me to dislike an Alan Arkin character. I really don't want to. So I preferred to think of him as lewd on the surface and good on the inside.
I mean, yes, he curses, talks about sex, buys dirty magazines, and teaches his grandaughter an erotic dance. But the beauty pageant spectacle is worse, though gussied up to be something wholesome.
In other words, the Grandfather is a pervert, but honest. The pageant is perverted, but subverted.
I *think* the pageant would have been worse for the little girl than anything her grandfather did or said, had she not been rescued and supported by her family, including her father.
Earlier in the movie, her father tried to get her obsessed with winning, and obsessed with her weight, et cetera, and the rest of her family rescued her.
I think it's a story of redemption. The family, who are all fucked up in one way or another, take a journey and get their act together, and decide to save and protect the youngest, instead of destroying her.
But it does walk a fine line, I agree.
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"the Grandfather is a pervert, but honest."
--That's the problem with most child molesters. They act out their honesty.
and
"I *think* the pageant would have been worse for the little girl than anything her grandfather did or said, had she not been rescued and supported by her family, including her father."
--In my opinion, the shame of being exploited and betrayed by a loved one has more profound and lasting emotional effects on a woman than any embarrasing social incident can have.
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I prefer to believe that the Grandfather's narcissism and lewdness and crudeness did not cross the line with his grandaughter. That would be a depressing movie. But if it were real life, I wouldn't have left him alone with her, because those things do happen.
All in all a thought provoking movie!
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But in your last points, bronco, you don't address my point #3, which I think is what really absolves the filmmakers of what you call "equivocation." When the daughter starts doing that dance, the family is rightly shocked. As are we, the audience -- it's a very edgy and dangerous moment in the film, and I think the filmmakers intended it to be that way. There's no question that the girl has been expolited by her grandfather and that this is not a good thing. But then the family decides to band together and turn this moment into a celebration of themselves and the daughter, and a thumbing of their noses at the pageant (representing everything that's kept the family from being a family -- concepts of "winning" and "beauty" that Pete mentions).
The fimmakers aren't endorsing grandpa's actions, they're endorsing the rest of the family's.
And yes, the grandpa gets off lighter because you get to know him as a character, good side and bad. But I have no problem with that. In this it's similar to, say, the movie "Quiz Show," the point of which is also that flawed people (and we are all flawed, aren't we?) do indeed commit immoral acts when they're put in a position to do so by a society that in many ways sets them up for a fall. That kind of society, those insane norms, are indeed more worthy of scorn -- and Grandpa, an obviously flawed human being, more worthy of forgiveness.
But that doesn't mean it's some kind of endorsement of sexing up your granddaughter.
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In terms of #3 I agree with you, the family does rally around the little girl and the moment is saved AND transformed. However, that is also the problem with the film! Because the moment is transformed and rendered positive, we can feel more forgiving of the grandfather. That dance, rather than be a source of shame, becomes a catalyst of sorts. Everyone--the little girl, her brother, the entire family, the viewer... shit- even dead grandpa! -- is empowered by the experience. But, you know what? There are no saviours in real life. Had the movie ended without that transformative moment, grandpa would have been dubbed a predator. But the movie did not end tragically, it ended with redemption. Does that mean I should judge him less? Nope. Grandpa is a sleazeball and Olive is a victim.
And yes, we are all flawed and nut flavoured. However, nutty and all, we alll have the responsibility to limit the amount of harm we do to others, especially when kids are involved.
ps: i'm practicing my british spelling just in case i become a landed alien--er, immigrant--in canadadadadadada!
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But British spelling? On this issue we stand as one! Show your soon-to-be Canadian colours, sister!
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I was, let's see, AB in Anthropology and an MAT in English/Comp Lit.
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An "I'm old, she thinks this is fun, this'll really fuck with everyone, and hell, it's the only dancing I know, so why not?!" motivation. Since every other comment he made towards his grandaughter was totally innocent and non-sexually adoring.
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