Queer Theory in Boys Dont Cry - Essay Example

Queer Theory in Boys Don't Cry Queer theory and Queer politics is often hard to comprehend, and harder to define since part of its basis is intentionally having no set definition. Queer theory is surrounded by contradictions, difficulties, opposing thoughts and political debate. Queer theorists have different ideas on what is 'Queer' and what is not 'Queer' and some Queer theorists believe there is no set doctrine in which to be 'Queer' because that would adhere to the 'norm's' of heteronormativity. Examining different 'Queer' thoughts can help aid our own formulation of what is 'Queer' and what 'Queer theory' is to the individual and how it can help develop understandings around sexuality, gender, history, societies, cultures and heteronormativity. Queer Theory presumes that sexual characteristics that are a function of representations. It assumes that representations pre-exist and define, as well as complicate and disrupt sexual identities. Queer theory results in an effort to speak from and to the differences and silences that have been suppressed by the homo-hetero binary, an effort to unpack the monolithic identities 'lesbian' and 'gay' including the intricate ways lesbian and gay sexualities are inflected by heterosexuality, race, gender and ethnicity.' Queer theory allows us to examine Western culture and problematize its approach to attributing everyone to not only certain behaviour's but identities and its tendency to label, box and categorise. Queer theory also seeks to not only break down gender roles, sexual order and dichotomies but break down the very thoughts around sexuality in regard to biology and reproduction. Much discussion in queer theory has been cantered on the issue of spectatorship. In her frequently quoted and highly influential essay 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,' Laura Mulvey (1975) described how dominant cinema codes have been constructed by a patriarchal system of looking and the desire to obtain and consume. The gaze championed by Mulvey (p.11) is assumed to be male, white and heterosexual, and therefore endowed with the power and privilege enjoyed by white and heterosexual men in a patriarchal society. In essence, she contends that in a classic narrative film, the subject of the narrative and the gaze, is male; woman functions as spectacle, the object of the gaze. In terms of spectatorship, the viewer is split between these two positions - the male subject and the female object of the gaze. Hence, being the spectator - identifying with the subject of the narrative and the gaze, presents a difficulty for female viewers (Mulvey, p.11). However, when Mulvey penned this article, she seemed to have neglected the presence of queer audience; her account of the sexual hierarchy of narrative cinema has been challenged by many critics who have insisted that identification can also occur across gender and sexual demarcations (Smyth, 1995, p.125) As Doty (p.151) argues, all texts are open to multiple interpretations; queer readings of texts are not alternative or sub-cultural readings, but readings to position side by side to normatively straight readings. "Boys Don't Cry" is arguable the earliest mainstream movie that is based on a real life story, to scrutinize the female to male transvestism. The 'gender as performance' notion is explicitly depicted in Boys Don't Cry; in the opening sequence, Brandon (Hilary Swank) is seen grooming and gearing up for her date. The idea of performance in this sequence seem to have a dual connotation, besides performance as in portraying a male role, I see performance here also as theatrical presentation where the socks for her crotch and the cowboy hat are seen as her props, and her cousin Lonny (Matt McGrath), and spectators of the film are the audience. Further into the film, when admiring Brandon's facial features, Lana (Chloe Sevigny)'s mum (Jeannetta Arnette) commented that Brandon looks like 'like a movie star', further emphasizing the performative nature of her gender to the likes of a movie star acting. Also, before getting dressed, Brandon displays an array of 'props' - socks, plastic penis, elastic fabric binder, among many others, that enables her to personify a male character. Boys Don't Cry establishes the legitimacy and durability of Brandon's gender by forcing spectators to assume, even only for a short time, Brandon's gaze - a transgender gaze (Halberstam, 2001, p.294). In the emotionally-charged abuse prefacing the rape, Brandon is pinned down, weeping, in a constrained bathroom as John (Peter Sarsgaard) and Tom (Brenton Sexton III) examine his genitals. The dreadful mortification of this instant is marked by a slow-motion sequence interrupting the fast and furious quasi-medical scrutiny of Brandon's body, and shots from Brandon's point of view reveal him to be in the grips of an 'out of body' experience (Halberstam, p.295; Pidduck, 2001, p.100). Light shines on him from above, and his agonized expression peers out at the crowd of onlookers who have gathered in the bathroom doorway. The crowd now includes a fully clothed Brandon, a double, who blankly returns the gaze of the tortured Brandon (Halberstam, p.296). In this shot/reverse-shot sequence between the castrated and the transgender Brandons, the transgender gaze is constituted as a look divided within itself, a point of view that comes from two places simultaneously: one dressed and one naked. The clothed Brandon is the Brandon rescued by Lana's refusal to look; the Brandon who survives his own rape and murder; the Brandon who unites with the audience, a figure who merges momentarily, the activity of looking with the passivity of the spectacle. The naked Brandon is the Brandon who will suffer, endure but finally perish (Halberstam, p.296). This is a moment that marks the end of Brandon passing off as a male figure. Henceforth, Bandon is successively entrapped and stripped of his already weak access to the masculine privileges of mobility and to Lana's body (Pidduck, p.101). The eventual death of Brandon seem to demonstrate that masculine women have been seen as having failed in the masquerade of femininity. Masculinity is seen as 'stolen' and must be buried, for women to function unpunished in society, in traditionally male roles. Womanliness and the masquerade are seen as the same thing, with masculinity as the norm and femininity its dissimulation (Smyth, p.126). Works Cited Butler, Judith (1990), 'Subjects of Sex/Gender/Desire' in Gender Trouble: feminism and the subversion of identity, Routledge, New York, p.1-34. Creed, Barbara (2004), 'In the Pink: queer theory, queer cinema' in Pandora's Box: Essays in Film Theory, ACMI, Melbourne, p.123-139. Doty, Alexander (1998), 'Queer Theory' in The Oxford Guide to Film Studies (eds) John Hill and Pamela Church Gibson, Oxford University Press, New York, p.148-152. Halberstam, Judith (2001), 'The Transgender Gaze in Boys don't Cry', Screen, vol.42, no. 3, p. 294-298. Jagose, Annamarie (1996), 'Introduction' in Queer Theory, Melbourne University Press, Victoria, p.1-6. Lugowski, David, 'Genre Conventions and Visual Style in The Crying Game', Cineaste, vol. XX, no.1, p.31-33. Michel, Frann, 'Racial and Sexual Politics in The Crying Game', Cineaste, vol. XX, no. 1, p.30-35. Mulvey, Laura (1975), 'Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema', Screen no. 16.3, pp. 6-18. Pidduck, Julianne (2001), 'Risk and Queer Spectatorship' in Screen, vol. 42, no. 1, p.217-221. Smyth, Cherry (1995), 'The Transgressive Sexual Subject' in A Queer Romance: Lesbians, gay men and popular culture (eds) Paul Burston and Colin Richardson, Routledge, London and New York, p.123-143. Read More