HEY, YOU GUYS, LET'S TALK ABOUT HOW MUCH THIS YEAR'S OSCAR NOMS SUCK!

[bookshop]

*Best Picture 2010 nominations list*
- Avatar <-- racist, imperialist white liberal guilt fantasy (everyone, native peoples, mountains, animals, trees and tree-nerve-endings, get exploited by white people, awesome!!)

- The Blind Side <-- i haven't seen this, but true story notwithstanding the trailer just me cringe. It really, really seemed

Comments

[tangledtale]

Ugh, okay, so I'm sorry I was so quick to be defensive there (even though I maintain that Whip It is also almost homogeneously white and the relationship between Pash and Birdman still annoys me - for reasons other than the fact that clearly Pash/Bliss are OTP) I do agree with your views on Avatar (obviously), Pixar's gender bias, and that Hollywood in general is filled with the straight white man's POV. I haven't seen Hurt Locker, A Serious Man, District 9 or Up in the Air so I can't really comment on those but I'm wondering what you mean by 'smug pretentious violent white-guy "the enemy is us" "oh no, war movie" because you apply that to both The Hurt Locker and Inglourious Basterds which have male protag/female director and (arguably)female protag/male director respectively, so I'm puzzled as to what overarching criteria makes a film feel 'white-guy', or if it's just a case-by-case sense you get from each?

[bookshop]

I am not pretending Whip It is a perfect film, I'm not saying that at all and I hope that hasn't come across. i think it's a wonderful film because it's so anti-gendered and so antithetical to all these, what I think of as white male narratives. And it's the narrative that makes it feel like a straight white man's story to me, not the directors/actors etc. It's, imo, stories that are played out in a traditionally masculine landscape - stories of war, stories of conquest, and violence - women can participate in these stories and act them out, but the narratives themselves are narratives of conquest, power, and finding meaning in an inherently (or necessarily) violent world. those are the kind of narratives that men have been telling from before the Iliad. It's not that women don't tell/participate in those stories too, but the other narratives that women tell, faith narratives and community narratives and peace narratives, get drowned out by these male narratives of violence/dominance/conquest, over and over again. Does that

[tangledtale]

No, that makes sense. I can see what you mean about how certain narrative-types that centre on violence and conquest as its mode of conflict do hold more traction for the (largely white, largely male) Academy and maybe the critical community in general. I remember doing a class on sport once where our tutor told us that the reason Raging Bull and boxing has a primordial fascination is because it tells the story of human history - one man against another - which is probably exactly what I should have expected from a class on sport

[arboretum]

I still rebel at the notion that violent narratives are male narratives and that peace and faith and community narratives are female narratives

that idea somehow pisses me off lkfjglkdjfg, it's possibly a personal thing though, I just can't ever not be pissed off by the gender divide.

[bookshop]

Yeah, i like... i don't think the gender divide *should* exist, I am just pointing out that for better or worse it does exist, and as long as the traditionally female narratives get bested by the traditionally male ones, there won't be a real path for them to complicate each other and merge so that those roles don't exist.

(up until i moved out here, i genuinely believed that we lived in a post-feminist, post-gendered society and that people were really over these type of gender assignments. i've since realized that we're *not,* and so the last year and a half or so has been huge for me in terms of even realizing just how gendered some of these tropes are. so that's also what i'm reacting to in a major way: the realization that not only is the gender divide still in place but it reveals itself in all these ways like film tropes and meta-narratives, etc etc. i just feel like i spent most of my life being... really blind.)

[quicksylver_btg]

I think that person's point, however, was that your comment did just the opposite and maintained the gender divide, rather than move beyond it. The problem with feminism has always been the underlying assertion that women are superior or better or more goddess-like than men. And in a way, reinforces some of those same female sterotypes by simply inverting the power structure that it proclaims it is trying to destroy. It also has the lovely side-effect of insisting that any "real" woman must somehow encompass, not only that gentle/community-building/emotionally-connected/mother figure, but also the straight-forward/aggressive/protective/working/father figure as well. We can't be people; we have to be superheros. I may be Woman, but I draw the line at wearing tights or a cape.

[bookshop]

Also! just FYI:

a) I didn't have a problem with Rosa Sparks' depiction in the film, because I felt like every time she was onscreen, she was being amazing, and the constraints of the storyline meant that all the derbygirls got minimal screen time (I wish they'd cut out the love interest, sigh) so I didn't see her lack of screen time as something specific;

b) I did and do feel really... weird and perplexed about Birdman. His whole role in the film just seems marginalized and a little icky, like he's just there to be used as needed. He, himself, seems pretty awesome, but his context... no, just, no.

c) (sorry but BLISS/MAVEN!!!)

[tangledtale]

c) (my priorities are in order) THE MOVIE CLEARLY SHIPS PASH/BLISS WHAT MOVIE WERE YOU WATCHING. I'm open to any and all variations of cast/cast pairings though