Old Boy

• Positive Western reception

Cult reception
Complex narrative
Symbolism of eating the live octopus
Powerful film
Age consent

• Negative Western Reception

Harming animals- Octopus
Sadmasochism- Hammer and tongue scene
Puerile
Does not match the standards of a puritanical majority
Age consent- America has a higher consent age than Korea
Style over substance
Adolescent audience

• Hollywood Reception 

CHN
Commodifies morals- Capitalism and greed
Alignment- Make the audience sympathise him, give him a longer backstory
Happy ending- different

31/03/15

Black females are not sexualised
The only way to enjoy cinema is to ignore racism and sexism- Kaplan, identify with the white women
Black males are able to look at white women sexually

Bell hooks

Django Unchained

White man frees the slaves

Hildi- white German influence 

Django is portrayed as white- lower than a "house nigger"

Dr Shultz has more feeling for the black community- is punished by being killed 

27/03/15

Fandoms are involved in the writing process

Snakes on a plane 

Fans have more ownership over the franchise 

Intertextual experiences changes the meaning of the text 

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the crystal skull- DIDNT please the fandom 

Pleasure- sense of community and belonging

Personal relationships 

Social media 

Dressing up makes them not ordinary, escapism 

Active spectatorship- feminism 

Oppositional gazes 

Parody

Production- novel fandom 

Brokeback mountain

Rucas 

Butler-

Masculine job roles (cowboy)

Housewife and job 

Mulvey 

Kaplan 

Williams 

Notes-

Masculine boss- finds out their secret 

Sheep- purity 

After sex the sheep is killed 

Awkward tension- coming out together 

Suppress their feelings- aggression comes out 

Freud 

Hits the wall 

The wife- sympathy for being with a gay husband 

Anal- replacement for jack 

Turns his wife away- Rucas 

Butch woman- feminine homosexual man wants her

She approaches him at the bar (dominant) 

Woman's body shown bare 

They leave the woman at home upset- Kaplan, no power 

A central imagining - dick cut off 

Jack plays the mother role 

Divorce 

Prostitute 

Eniss' daughter- masculine, gender trouble 

HARRY POTTER FANDOM

http://www.hpfandom.net/eff/

Harry Potter Fandom

A group of people of all ages, from every walk of life, ten-year-olds to thirty-somethings, who love the Harry Potter books and participate in the online community, and meet-ups, devoted to those books. 

The Harry Potter Fandom is extremely diverse, very close-knit, and incredibly crazy, with people genuinely shipping everything from Ron/Hermione to Hogwarts/Giant Squid, but (usually) all loving each other anyway. And even when they don't, they will all band together, no matter who hates who for what reason, if it means defending something that is important to them, usually Harry Potter related. 

"We need Harry Potter, 
Like a grindylow needs water."

Butler vs. Rucas

Judith Butler argued that gender is not the result of nature, but how we are raised in society rules and culture. In 500 Days of Summer, the roles of gender are subverted between Summer and Tom, therefore conforming to Butler's theory. The heterosexual male spectator from Butler's point of view will not be able to have an allegiance with Summer or Tom due to their subverted gender characteristics. Summer is more masculine than Tom, which may lead these spectators to want Tom to be more mach and as a result have a sympathy towards him.
Female spectators may take a negotiated reading from this view point because of the sympathy that they may feel for Tom could lead to some sort of attraction.

Gender trouble is created when the roles are subverted.

Derek Rucas claims that homosexual spectators can only view the movie through a female gaze. For the empathy of being suppressed.

Homosexual-

Alternative and independent cinema 

Treated like an illness till the 1990s

Oppressed 

Abnormal 

Broke back mountain- first mainstream homosexual film 

03/03/15

Queer theory-
the theory came about in 1990, due to homosexuals becoming more accepted.

Judith Butler- 1999
Suggests gender is not the result of nature but is socially constructed.
Gender is a performance.
Gender trouble- not playing up to conceived gender roles


500 Days of summer- gender roles are subverted
The way they are is down to their backgrounds
Audience- judge Summer
align with Tom
Male spectators- Not able to align with Summer or Tom
Want Tom to be more macho
Female spectators- Negotiated reading
Attraction with Tom would be through the sympathy we feel for him

Homosexuality-
Male phenomenon
Lesbianism was never cited in law- male dominated, submissive women
1950s laws to stop men taking part in sexual activities with other men
Homosexuality was classed as a mental illness until 1990
Heterosexuality is still the norm
Homophobia belongs in the past


Brokeback Mountain (2006)
First mainstream Hollywood film dealing with overtly homosexuality
Satisifies the female desire
Heath Ledger
Jake Glynnehal
Actively aware they are gay

compulsory heterosexuality sets itself as the original, the true, the authentic; the norm that determines the real and implies that ‘being’ a lesbian is always a kind of miming, a vain effort to participate in the phantasmatic plenitude of naturalized heterosexuality which will always and only fail (Butler, 312.)”  
Similar to Linda Williams

Derek P. Rucas
When a gay person watches a homosexual film it brings a much more emotionally charged element to the spectator (empathy for coming out or suppressed) .

500 Days of summer- theory

Mulvey's theory was that the woman is presented in a film for viewing pleasure for the male audience. This is apparent in 500 Days Of Summer as Summer is presented as an object, which Tom progresses to conquer. An example of this is when Tom has sex with her for the first time, he exits the street dancing with strangers. During this scene he passes spraying fountains, creating phallic imagery that centrals the celebration around the idea of  the male, Tom, conquering the female, Summer. The spectators would have an allegiance with Tom in this scene, as throughout the film we are aligned with him through the male gaze, as it is most dominant in Hollywood cinema. In this scene we do not view how Summer feels, by following Kaplan's theory we are able to.

E.Anne Kaplan argues that the spectator aligns with the male in the film, and must have to make a concious effort to align with the female. In 500 Days Of Summer we conform to the male gaze, however by making this concious effort we are able to align with Summer. Throughout the film she is not given a voice, but the dominant view point of the male gaze does not allow us to see from her perspective and therefore we end up aligning with Tom only.
If the spectator is to take a negotiated reading of the film, they are likely to not belong to the dominant group which is white, heterosexual and male, and therefore take an oppositional view.

Linda Williams explained that when the female gaze becomes the dominant view in the film, the female character holding the power will result in being punished because of this break of convention. There is often a struggle for spectators viewing the film through the male gaze to align with the female, this is apparent in 500 Days Of Summer. Summer is presented as a free spirited independent female who does not believe in love. As we see the film from Tom's perspective, we feel bad for him when Summer does not want to be his girlfriend and as a result dislike her. She does not get diagetically punished but she gets punished in terms of the spectators response. Tom in a way is punished in the film, because he ends up depressed because Summer gets married to someone else. However we do not know to what extent either of them have a 'happy ending' as we do not see Summer with her husband and are left with Tom meeting a woman "Autumn". In the final scene where the meeting takes place, the day counter used throughout the film resets to zero, implying the same events are going to happen.

Theorists

How far does a spectator's gender affect their viewing experience in contemporary cinema?

Thesis:  

To some extent gender is the most significant aspect to how films are viewed, as the most dominant view is created from the male gaze. The male gaze was a theory created by Laura Mulvey, she believes that we are made to view women from a heterosexual male point of view, therefore seeing them as sexual objects. The male gaze is apparent in the film ‘Black Swan’.

The director, Darren Aronofsky’s filmography mainly deals with thrillers and dramas. Black Swan itself is classed as a psychological thriller and drama.

The way in how the spectator views cinema, is mainly dependent on their gender. However this may vary depending on what gaze is presented in a film. The male gaze is the most dominant approach used to put across a view in cinema. This gaze explores the viewing of a film from a man’s perspective. In contemporary cinema, genders are still not equal when being presented.

Studying “Black Swan” (2010), directed by David Aronfsky. The majority of his films have been dramas, also consisting of many thrillers in which Black Swan is one of them. Being classed a psychological thriller; it automatically becomes an intellectual film causing the audience to have to work out the meaning of surreal happenings. The film is not classed as a spectacle or emotional movie, although it does strike some distressing scenes.  The alignment of the audience with the character Nina, is dependent on their gender in some scenes, however she is still objectified in the film from a heterosexual male view.

The plot of the film presents a clearer meaning when understanding Freudian theories, both psychoanalysis and the oedipal complex are significant in how gender effects the way in which the film is viewed. Sigmund Freud's theory of psychoanalysis is centred around the idea of humans "id", which is part of the brain that controls and suppresses our animalistic desires, which are our violent and sexual wants. Nina is introduced pure and innocent, she wears light colours and lives with her mother. Her bedroom is decorated in a childish way, implying her virginity. The film follows her through the collapse of her id. The audience are shown her animalistic side through her transformation into the black swan. As she prepares to perform for 'Swan Lake', her desires begin to appear. To begin her mind becomes fractured, jump cuts are used to suggest her deteriorating boundary between real and imagination. Nina's sexual desire comes through with both Thomas and Lily. Lily, is presented as the black swan who Nina desires to be. Nina has various hallucinations in the film, one of which she believes to be true is the sex scene with Lily. When Lily denies it happened, the audiences suspicions are confirmed that Nina is imagining things. Examples of her violence seeping through, is at the end when she dreams she kills Lily and in fact wounds herself.

Her sexual desire with Thomas has a clear link to Freud's oedipal complex. The audience are made to assume her father is not around as he is not shown or mentioned in the film, questioning whether Thomas is a replacement for her father figure. He is very dominating, which she indulges herself in when being taught how to be the black swan. Her mother, is very strict, where as Thomas allows herself to free herself and in turn her id. This is probably why she goes against her Mother when going out with Lily. A lack of a Father means that the oedipal complex is directed towards Nina's Mother (Erica), the scene where Nina licks the cake off her Mother's finger is suggesting phallic symbolism questioning the lack of a man in both of their lives. Erica being a strict Mother, mentions having to quit ballet to give birth to Nina, this suggests that the reason Nina is so determined to be the best is for the guilt her Mother pushes on to her. The significance of gender is important to the audience when aligning with Nina, as the male audience may align with Thomas as they view Nina sexually.

 Throughout the film there are a lot of mirrors located in Nina's home and studio. The mirrors imply her fractured personalities, as well as this they represent her id breaking a part. When the mirror is broken in the film it is a clear metaphor of her broken mind, the audience are given a god like perspective when watching the break down occur as we are able to see all personalities and hallucinations. Lacan explored child development and how people relate to their self identity. Nina is just becoming to identify with her true desires, as they have been suppressed for so long, making her become animalistic.

Lacan based his theory on men, which may be why we are challenged to identify with Nina, because the audience are not given a god like power like in other films but instead only witness what Nina is witnessing. 

06/02/15

Oppositional gaze- opposing dominant views of another gaze.
Most dominant- Male gaze (white, middle aged, middle class and male)
Explain how significant is the gender of the viewer in creating meaning?

500 Days Of Summer- Applied to Theorists

4/02/2015

• Summarise the gazes
• Relate to theorists
• Apply to our key texts 
• Define terminology, explain how it applies

Django

Magic Mike

Black Swan

Black gaze-

Marginalised group

Community- brotherhood

Christoph Wiltz

Dyer- 

Sexualising men on 'pin-ups' is fine but only under certain conditions. 

1.) no contact through the camera, not looking at the audience and therefore are not shown as an object

2.) without a penis they have to make up for this by having exaggerated masculinity (muscles etc)

3.)Denies he is an object through the female gaze, not giving females power

Berger-

Men act women appear

500 days of summer

Sexualised female -

Double takes 

People watching summer 

Summers personality challenges her femininity giving her more power than Tom in the film as he is more feminine due to his belief in love (fairytale). The audience therefore align with the male because we feel sympathy towards him. 

Summer doesn't give much emotion.- hard to relate to or align with. 

She says - she doesn't want a boyfriend

Or to be anyone's "anything" 

"Save the serious stuff for later" 

Repeats she doesn't want anything serious and yet we still feel bad when Tom is upset.

By taking a submissive view we would not feel this way.

The film switches past and present, by showing his last memory of summer joking with him it's harder to understand where it went wrong however it does also show the more present time in which she is shown not being happy.

( IKEA- shows him joking and her bored

Then in the past of them joking before )

Male celebration of having sex with summer- how does she feel 

Doesn't want anyone sticking up for her but Tom hits a man. Whether this was to protect summer or out of his own embarrassment.

"Our rooftop" tells him but he sees what he wants to see.

23/01/15 Gaze

Males dominate the gazes, when there is a womans gaze they are naturally punished.- Linda Williams

Spectators are identified by the gaze, most often the film has been created from a male perspective and therefore difficult for other people to relate.

Film works on an unconcious level, to regress the audience to the mirror stage.

Oedipal theory- male

Mulvey, Metz, Belour- Male gaze

Williams- Woman is punished

Kaplan- Submissive

Gazes

23/01/15

Para 1- responses

Para 2- intellectual

Para 3-Freud

Para 4-lacan 

Para 5- conclusion

Emotional Response

Gender- the old man kissing, females will understand this more due to sexism 

Audience factors- extra textual 

disturbing body horror-

-glass, stabbed the belly, womb pains, penetration

-nail 

-transformation- becoming the black swan.

Spectacle-

Visual effects 

Intellectual-

Subconscious 

Suppression of amimalistic desires 

Violence 

Sex 

Manipulated- 

Mother- Freud, cake scene, painting her, lack of a father figure, sexual drive not formed properly arrested development 

Mila kunis- suppressed desires, competition, fucks and kills, 

Thomas- father figure, sexual drive being created, rapey(gender view)

Punishment- becoming a woman, period pains, religious, death of innocence, 

Darren aaronofsky- director

ID- no longer suppressed, kills mila kunis

Lacan- 

Childhood development 

Mirror stage- reflective, self identity 

Multiple versions- schizophrenia 

Bleeds when she sees her reflection 

Broken/distorted mirrors

Audience- distorted illusion of power 

God like perspective-breaking continuity, jump cuts, omnipresent(go everywhere), omniscient(know everything)

Experience desires you're not allowed to in society 

Alignment- liberating, always the exploration of her subconscious

Mum- narcissist, abusive parent 

 

 

9th January 2015

Mirror stage- apply, analyse black swan(infer meaning), synthesising explain and justify different interpretations, preferred reading from the director 

E GRADE- lacan, mirror stage 

Building on Freud (psychoanalysis, subconscious) 

Identity and self image 

Childhood development 6-18months 

The child recognises themselves/ identifies with that image they see- representation of you

D/C GRADE- 

Voyeuristic act

Reflections of reality/fantasy 

Suppressed desires- fantasies 

Camera shots see everything and go everywhere to give the spectator power as they are seeing the action from the point of view shot which is the most powerful shot 

God like perspective- all watching all powerful 

See what you want to see- illusion of power 

Immersive-continuity editing

B GRADE-

First person camera 

Her self image is fragmented, by seeing hallucinations- her reality is becoming fantasy 

Subconscious 

Challenging people's godlike power in film- breaking continuity, Jump cut 

Direct address 

BLACK SWAN

Doesn't address the camera 

Mirrors 

Mother crying 

Dad issues- want for an older man 

The only person who shows her good attention- lesbian crush 

Jump cut in the bath, cut herself split personality 

Mum living her dreams through nina 

 

How is the spectator effected by "Clockwork Orange"?

From the beginning of the film, we are introduced to Alex as the main character and narrator. We follow him throughout the film forming an allegiance as the audience see the events from his perspective and therefore relate to how he is feeling. As Alex commits various crimes, which the majority of the audience would most likely not have experienced, it makes it difficult for the spectator to align with him. One crime he commits at the beginning, is when he beats a homeless man, for no apparent reason. When this happens, the man is shown at a low angle and Alex's gang at a high angle suggesting their power, their power is what makes the audience form an allegiance against them to begin with, as they sympathise with the weakest character. Another example of this is when Alex and his 'gang', rape an innocent woman. While this is happening he sings "Singin' in the rain". As the song is taken from a happy film, it contrasts with what is occurring, giving the song a new meaning and shows that the film is very controversial.  Also showing the film is controversial, is the amount of phalic and yonic symbols used to exaggerate the deranged mind of the gang. In Alex's room we are shown his pet snake, another phalic symbol as well as this there are four statues of Jesus, which symbolise how Alex views himself and his gang.

Many of the camera shots used in Clockwork Orange are fast paced, coinciding with the diagetic sound. As the film is from Alex's perspective, we assume as the audience that this is how he sees the world and what music he hears. Because of this it implies that he is not stable, which may question their allegiance to Alex as it makes it hard to figure out what he is thinking and therefore relate.

When Alex enters prison he is identified as a number, suggesting the dehumanisation of people in prison. This is the scene where the spectator may begin to feel sympathy for him. While in prison, Alex behaves well which is also what effects the allegiance between the spectators and him, as a result of his good behaviour he gets experimented on. The audience are shown the experiments from a close up of Alex's face, creating more feeling towards him as it clearer to see how he is feeling.  Following the experiments, he is kicked out of home, beaten and drowned by his old friends. As the spectator, we watch him almost become a better person causing us to feel sympathy for him when this is happening, he is also unable to defend himself due to the experiments questioning whether these are morally right. This is why the film is also intellectually demanding, because it questions societies mistakes and the government.

 When Alex tries committing suicide, we feel guilt and may align with him because we have seen his journey. However this is again challenged at the end of the film, where we see him revert to his original sexually orientated mind set.  As the majority of people are then made to question what his motives are and as a result can no longer relate to him.