seeing the sex and romantic comedic side in "10"

        One of my first thoughts about watching romantic comedies from the 70s and before compared to the romantic comedies that I see today, was that the comedy element in the 70s movies focuses more on real life problems or incidents that if they happened to you, you would only be able to laugh when looking back it.  To where the comedy element in today’s movies tend to be these obvious jokes that most often the characters (and the viewer) recognize as funny as soon as the happen.

Even thought the movie and story elements have stayed the same over the years, the type of humor and comedy has changed making it hard to see the relation and the similarities between the movies made back in the 70s versus today.  However, after learning and understanding the characteristics that are a part of the radical romantic comedy, it is clear that the characteristics are still there, just in a different form.

        One of the main characteristics I saw throughout the movie “10”, was the “masquerade” element.  In comparing to the article, the movie “10” has the male lead, George, take on the masquerade elements as he knows he is unhappy with his age, and has his mid-life crisis.  His girlfriend and friend/partner know that something is wrong with him as he shares a little about how he’s feeling.  But when he up and flies to Mexico in order to hunt down Jenny, they do not know about his whereabouts, or what he has been feeling with jenny.

        As far as “self-reflexivity” goes, I believe it shows up in George, Sam,and Jenny as the characters display it in different areas.  I think George shows it as presenting a complex problems that’s still an ongoing battle with individuals today.  Many people have mid-life crisis’ and George getting this idea in his head that he has to have his perfect women, yet when he does get her, he realizes it was a mistake to go to such great lengths to pursue her.  This holding the ‘modern and more realistic form of romantic comedy’, seeing as that we still see this in rom-coms today, and as well as it being an actual struggle for some.

        The women of this film are interesting in contrast to one another, yet still viewing them both in the aspects of self-reflexivity.  Both Sam and Jenny find sex to be an important part of a relationship, but Sam’s views are more traditional seeing that sex should be just between the two people in the relationship and neither of them lusting or desiring anyone else.  Jenny however clearly sees that the importance of sex is for showing love and appreciation even if it’s not with the other person you are in the relationship with.

       Unfortunately, I could not find the film anywhere online, so I didn’t see what happened, but I did look it up and read about the ending.  I thought it was an interesting second have of a movie because I would not have expected for Jenny and her new husband’s romance to have allowed George to sleep with Jenny.  That’s not something that’s common in today’s romantic comedies typical...yes, we sometimes see a lost and confused character have a crisis, and maybe even go on the chase, but it is rare for them to be chasing someone who is already married, and for them to get that married person.  By having George realize what he’s done and how outrageous it was for him to make the decision to chase newly wedded Jenny we return to the same formula that we see in sex and romantic comedies...it ends with boy getting girl.

old fashion rom-coms

        It’s funny that one can think that something is such a new genre and that my mother, for example, wouldn’t understand why “Rom-Com”’s are so appealing to me and my friends.  I sometimes get this idea that sticks that my mom (or other elders) can’t ever think of relationships or sex as comedic.  I was raised to respect love and the sanctity that marriage holds, but I guess because of this, I subconsciously thought that my mom never saw or understood that sex, romance, or relationships with various people could be made light of, or enjoy as they were made light of.  I guess what I most lacked was the understanding of what elements, or characteristics sex comedy holds...and because of not being aware of this, I failed to understand that sex comedy has been around for quite some time, and that my mother is well aware of what it is.

        To be totally honest, I don’t think I can name one romantic or sex comedy I’ve seen before the 90s, but I know they exist.  However, even when I do think back to the earliest 90s rom-com I’ve seen, it does hold the same characteristics that I see in the Jason Segel, Jennifer Aniston rom-coms that I find myself excited to see today.  I love this idea of “battling lovers” that The Sex Comedy talks about, because it seems to be a conflict issue that could literally be around for years to come (and if I saw a good old fashion romantic comedy, it would be believable still if it was part of the plot).  Men and women have their differences, obviously, and no matter what amount of time goes by, I think that biologically men and women will have different views on romance and sex.  This can bring forth the “hierarchy of knowledge” element into discussion which in a way leads us right to hegemonic masculinity arguing that men know more than women, yet “we” the viewers of said movie or situation, know more or better than both.

        Over all I think one of the things that grabbed me the most in the readings was that time doesn’t change reality.  Yes, true that there is mostly a specific image branded to romantic comedies, and that it can be easy to quickly judge that genre of book or movie as fictitious but in reality, regardless of the exact situation portrayed, all of the elements and/or characteristics discussed in the reading could easily take place in a relationship today.  People in relationships still experience emotions other than love before love itself, there tends to be a hierarchy of knowledge in almost any romantic or sexual relationship, “battle of wits” often shows up in relationships commonly before one really gets going or as one is ending.  As much as I’d like to think that relationships aren’t so textbook, it becomes clear to me that relationships are a comedy that whether or not I like it, have certain elements that don’t just change or disappear over time.

Casino Royale Presentation

        When it came time to pick the text for the presentation, I was completely torn.  Half of me wanted to do something that was closer to current times (the movie or social networking site) and the other half of me wanted to take a chance to learn about an older text and it’s relation to pop culture, structuralism, post-structuralism, etc.  I ended up choosing Ian Fleming’s Casino Royale because the fact that was written some years back still holds a great amount of popularity (movies that I enjoy today), not to mention the fact that this story and it’s main character has literally lasted generations, intrigues me.

        There are a few things that went into the preparation of this presentation,  the first of which was discussing the book as a whole and as a group.  We met a few times discussing the reading and the (possible) correlations that Casino Royale has to the class material, but after a few of those meetings I felt that we needed to break down what it was exactly that we all wanted to talk about and ask to get the class discussions going.  I set up two different meetings for the group so we could use this time to make sure that our subjects would not overlap and then asked the rest of the group in which style they would like to present.  During these two meetings we decided to composed a power-point as an outline for our audience to help keep them on track.  We each designed our own slide (shout-out to Nick for putting all the slides together/letting us use your computer!) which would contain what main points we wanted to talk about, along with pictures and clips that we felt demonstrated the points and ideas we wanted to bring up.  I am leading the discussion on Vesper and other topics containing women that interact with Bond and how the text Casino Royale’s elements differs from how women “should” be treated by a man in pop culture today.  In addition to setting up the meetings and designing my slide, I came up with the classroom activity idea.  We all discussed different ways to split up the classroom into groups, but I thought it would be fun to have trivia questions in between the different topics that we wanted to cover to break up the deep theory-relation thinking, and add a little fun, basic text (and movie) reference thinking.

        I seriously could not be happier with my text choice, but I have to say that I don’t ever think I’ll hear “James Bond” and not think about all the analyzing that I did in relating it to everything we’ve been learning in class.  I think it’s great that I know I have the ability and the desire to view things in a deeper, more objective way than I would have before.  I know that this is all part of learning but one of my favorite things about deconstructing a certain book, movie, or play is that the story resonates with me differently and every time I hear the title or plot being discussed I’m please that I know more than just the story.

love according to Jerry

       Last year I did a group project about love.  We wanted the project to cover both scientific and biological aspects as well as emotional.  It was fun interviewing people, collecting, and reviewing the surveys and seeing what college attending people had to say about love.  Mostly people thought of it was a controlled emotion, you either feel for someone or you don't, you fall in love, you fall out of love... few thought of it as being biological or chemical.  Without going deep into the research we found, we did discover that love is both a emotional feeling that we develop as well as chemical reactions involving oxytocin, dopamine, and hormones acting as neurotransmitters giving us the biological part of love.

        In the movie Jerry Maguire, it covers a lot of life and personal choices between the relationships that Jerry has with his clients, girlfriends, fiances, wife, and ultimately himself the audience can see almost every type of love there is.  So if we ask ourselves what makes love possible in any of the relationships Jerry has in this movie, we see that there are multiple factors some of which we could find in our own love life’s.  First there is the selfish love that we see in Jerry.  At the beginning of this film we see how in love Jerry is with himself.  He loves his job, getting what he wants, himself, and his material things.  Jerry doesn’t care what lie he has to tell or who he has to backstab to get what he wants... he loves himself enough that he would do anything for himself.  By the end of the film, we see a change in Jerry where he starts to put others before himself, becoming more selfless then selfish.

        We see motherly love as Dorothy Boyd protects and cares for her young son thinking about his safety and health in the decisions she makes both in her career and personal life, and along with that, we see family love from Rod Tidwell as he strives to provide for his family and when he is injured we see the concern from his wife and family.  Another love that we see (and the main one of the movie) is the romantic love between Jerry and Dorothy.  Dorothy, again, displays selfless love that that both emotional and chemical as she take a leap and supports Jerry when he is fired and stays with him as he tries to continue his career as a sports agent.  Jerry however, seems to first feel chemical love for Dorothy, before it become emotional and he allows himself to fall in love with both Dorothy and her son.

       Today, I think that it’s rare to find a movie like Jerry Maguire with a subtle undertone and not overdone theme of love.  I feel like most movies are either about love specifically or have nothing to do with the emotional and chemical aspects or love.  But here’s the thing; I believe that pop culture has transformed love into any sort of relationship we have.  Work, personal, friend, family, sexual... pop culture often implies that love is a guaranteed thing in each one of those relationships.  Movies, music, clothes, food, and other material things are sold in a sex advertising way which I believe has now morphed with being the same thing as love.  Pop culture today takes the word love and uses it as a way to sell material goods rather then try to define or display its actual meaning.  Sadly, I think that because of this newer definition of love, many have lost sight and appreciation for the meaning of love, hopefully love will be re-redefined so once again the emotional, biological understanding of love will be popular.

cat thoughts...

        So, can you believe that this was my first time ever reading or learning the story plot of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof”? (rhetorical)...  As soon as I finished the text, I thought I had it all figured out.  It was a story of favoritism, jealousy, and selfishness.  While it does include all of that, after reading “The Cat Has Nine Lives” article I totally understand it as a story about the cycles of life and how they were all animals just trying to make it.  However,  I want to bring up my thoughts/opinion on a question that the group that presented closed with: if Maggie was a woman in today’s time, would she still be wasting her time trying to make her (somewhat obvious failed) marriage with Brick work, and still be trying to have a baby with him having the resources that women have to date (i.e. being able to be a single woman with a job and support herself).

        It seemed as though most people in class said she would not be waiting around for Brick, considering she was still young, had no children to hold her back, and of course was a beautiful woman.  But, one gentleman shared that he did think Maggie would be trying to stick around for the money/estate.  I couldn’t agree more.  Even though today’s society offers women much more independence then the past ever did, I think that the core concepts of Maggie sticking around and staying with Brick are still alive today.  Money and greed can make people endurer a lot just so they can get their hands on some cash, and feeling outdone can make one want to outdo.  Maggie feels pressure to have a baby, yes, but she also knows that if she can become pregnant then husband Brick (and family) is forever tied to her.  Even to this day when a woman has a baby, the father of that child is almost always tied to her and the child in some sort of way...mostly finically.

        I think that there are plenty (no, not all) of women who would try and get something out of their marriage before they left it empty handed.  Yes, these days I do think that a lot of marriages take place because of money in the first place, but in comparing myself to Maggie, if I were a young attractive woman who fell in love with a young handsome man who came from money and married him, then our relationship went south and I thought that it might end, I can say that I honestly would deeply consider having a baby by him to ensure either  some of his family’s money or better yet, in hopes that he would clean up his act and step up as a man.  There is no way I would let myself walk away empty handed regardless of the fact that I could go get a job and make it on my own and possibly even remarry.   I say this not to sound selfish or like I’m a thief, but because if i had the chance to get money out of what I felt was partly mine, I would.

post-class thoughts

         okay, so because we don’t have a specific subject or reflection for this week’s blog entry, i want to talk a little more about feminism and women equality (or lack there of).  it was very interesting to do the in-class logo and picture analysis for a couple reasons... first off, i am the only female in my presentation group, not to say that the rest of the group was on a completely different page but it was really fascinating to note either what they totally overlooked or how they interpreted something from a different angle.  second, i never in a million years would have analyzed the pictures the way i did if i had not read the chapters assigned.  however, having said that i feel like the three different insights were totally different take on how i view women inequality.  

        another thing that is different for me when i think in terms of saussure, derrida, and beauvoir and how they view feminism... i do feel like all their input is so deep with theory and i am use to taking a much more current take on feminism.  i would never think that men’s past (early 19th century) is still a way to frame why there still is all this inequality.  i feel like society still has these deep rooted views that are slyly taught to younger generations, and we need to push and keep exposing this unfairness.

        as for the short video clip that we watched in class, i thought it was really interesting to discuss in simone de beauvoir terms because i could have analyzed it without  ever reading “woman as other”.  i think that using simone de beauvoir points and theories to analyze that clip extracted from the bigger picture.  yes, women are used for viewing pleasure, and yes they are often viewed as almost non-human and just an object that is to satisfy, but no matter what, there is going to be the other side to that.  part of that clip to me was viewing the women holding the power, i think that part of me viewed that video in today’s times... nowadays it’s thought to be a power if you can sell yourself as entertainment and it is easy to get caught up in believing that selling yourself for attention is power.

       sadly, i don’t think that this is true or a well rounded way to view empowered women, but it’s something that is so common that i forget what kind of power women really do hold.  hopefully there will continue to be the awareness that women still don’t have equality and that this will not only help males understand, but females as well.  wanting to sell yourself for another’s enjoyable entertainment is the same disrespect as buying for your entertainment.  i think that it will be very interesting and fun to tie in a few of these feminist views into my research presentation and see what the rest of my team thinks as well as the class. until then.... 

"other" doesn't fly by me...or others :}

        Okay... I’m not going to lie, I was totally set on writing about "The Second Sex" as soon as I finished it.  Don’t get me wrong, I spent some time thinking about the other ones, and in fact, “Differance” got a good intellectual discussion going between my sister and I, but due to the fact that my backbone was raised on third wave feminism, publicly offering my thoughts on “The Second Sex” was the only one that really seemed right.   I guess I would like to take just a quick moment and say that personally, I am a feminist.  Not to ridiculously extreme levels or anything, but rub me the wrong way with trash or down talking women and I promise you, you’ll hear my thoughts.  It’s funny actually because I typically stay so quiet about things to avoid confrontation you’d never even guess I felt differently on a matter than what someone is going on and on about, but bring my sex into it and I get surged with passion to explain why I think referring to women as “Other” is wrong.

        Yes, I  understand that over half of the first part of “The Second Sex” was information and opinions that was not pulled from people just yesterday.  And yes, I do think that society is on a grand stride to the equalization of women, but here are my thoughts on a few things in the reading that really stuck with me and got my wheels turning:  women make up half of the human race and as Dorothy Parker was credited for writing “men as well as women should be regarded as human beings.”  To me, that is most simple and easy to understand way of putting it...that info alone makes the point that women are not others and says ‘get over it, stop acting like men are better/more capable of things’.

        The next thing that got me thinking throughout the reading was the points made about the physical differences.  Yes, most everyone learns early on in life that females have uterus’, ovaries, and the majority of women were born with smaller frames but that doesn’t mean they don’t know, or can’t learn how to use their fists.  Simone de Beauvoir also brings in woman as “man’s dependent” and is bold enough to use the word “slave” in his point making that women have never achieved 100% equality.  Even though woman as her man’s slave is not as big of a problem as it once was, I think that the idea of it still lies within some of the misconceptions of what women should be.
        The clip that I have attached is a commercial saying that a soda (which up until now has never been gender oriented) is only for men, because only men like action, or what worse, only men are allowed to like action movies...it then goes on to say that the Dr. Pepper drink is also only for men to like, and 10 calories becomes man only thing as well.  Why is it okay to have a drink that is made only for men? I also thought of other things that took a food, drink, or program that is for both men and women, but then singele gender it and make an "only man" product out of it.  

        To sum up the rest of the reading (along with my opinion) Beauvoir addresses the multiple factors that contribute roadblocks keeping women from being equals with the other half of humanity.  Economically today, women still make less doing the exact same thing men do.  Lacking a certain level of physical strength always seems like a plausible excuse used to stop a female from something that she may be completely capable of, but I think that the biggest ‘in between the lines’ message that not only shows in this reading, but others as well is that men still hold more credibility and until that changes neither can the inequality.