Orlando and Alternative Pleasures

Pamela Chan
CTCS 412 (Blog Week 3)

                To the least, Sally Potter’s art house film Orlando was more than a little thought provoking. Yet despite the controversy that has surrounded this loose adaptation of Virginia Woolf’s 1928 novel, the film, by itself, most definitely introduced me to a variety of intriguing concepts of feminism that I had initially been unfamiliar with.

We touched upon many of the different theories in Monday's class discussion, but after reading Jane Gaines’ piece “Women and Representation: Can We Enjoy Alternative Pleasure?”, it became rather clear that as a film, Orlando not only approached a highly controversial subject matter with grace and poignancy, but it also succeeded on multiple levels as an ‘art’ film, as a form of feminist ‘counter cinema,’ and as an effective example of something that might be able to disrupt Laura Mulvey’s concept of “visual pleasure.” It’s a film we might actually be able to view as an enjoyable “alternative pleasure.”

In her piece, Gaines first addresses the issues of the “male gaze,” of essentialism, and of the “impossibility of female expression in male dominated culture.” She goes on to introduce the subject of counter cinema or “the creation of a new language of desire [made] contingent on the destruction of male pleasure.” I found her advocation of the pioneering of this “new aesthetic based on refusal” to be rather intriguing. She argues “investigating women’s pleasure as counter pleasures has become politically imperative” and that it is vitally important in future gender media studies to see how “difference interacts with the dominant.”

With Orlando, Potter attempts to subvert conventional cinematic techniques in order to change the way we read and understand film, gender, and identity.  The film offers a new, feminist perspective, “gaze,” and message, all while touching upon various issues of feminism, gender politics, and imperialism.

Experiencing the sex change of a male to a female, the protagonist can most definitely be seen as a paradox. In the end, Orlando comes to embrace his/her androgyny. I think that the film furthers the notion that gender is indeed not based on biological sex, but is, instead, constructed. It also seems to blur the lines of sexual identity, as well as the various constructions society has made about masculinity and femininity. In the end, the entire film is, as the late Roger Ebert put it, simply a film about the “vision of human existence. What does it mean to be born as a woman, or a man? To be born at one time instead of another? To be born into wealth, or into poverty, or into the tradition of a particular nation?” In one of the scenes, Orlando answers matter-of-factly that there “really [is] no difference at all.” I found that pretty inspirational. 

Orlando and Essentialism

I was definitely inspired by Sally Potter's Orlando and was again intellectually challenged in yesterday's class as we began to analyze and understand the film through historical feminist perspectives. I saw Orlando as born as a man and woke up halfway through his life transformed into a woman. She was one and then the other. Her metamorphosis gave her the personal strength and confidence to become more of who she was than ever before. Or maybe she transformed once she had already found herself. Either way it allowed for a humorous and intellectual commentary on gender roles as she lived on through several centuries. I see Orlando's sexual transformation as a commentary within an essentialist perspective. Potter is playing around with the essentialist debate: how does gender define a person's nature or behavior? She presents a situation where "gender is performance and construction" no longer exists. For Orlando she is always herself (whether man or woman), yet the world around her demands male characteristics when she was a man and vice versa when she is a woman. Potter asks: if our gender is internalized before we can speak what would happen if we woke up one day as the opposite sex? I'm not sure I quite exactly have an answer or necessarily know the conclusion made at the end of the film but what I do find in Orlando is a portrayal of female empowerment within a clever, cerebral discussion of gender roles and institutions.

Spectator & Social

As a student taking this class and not already knowing that much about feminism, I have found myself intrigued by the evolving definition. Thus it allows the individual to interpret and develop their own "feminist" interest. Which leads me to the Modleski article and her thoughts on studying the female spectator and the female as a social subject. Both of these categories are an interesting way in defining what feminism is from a female perspective. It makes me think how a woman fits into various social roles, what other females think of those roles, and the power that is within them to either reconstruct or perpetuate them. I still don't have a distinct understanding on how these are important in establishing self and its greater interaction with those around oneself. For instance in Orlando she is both the social subject and the female spectator as she transforms her identity. Thus in that respect has she had an advantage in understanding herself as she has looked from both viewpoints. Furthermore, much of her journey to being comfortable as a women is rejecting male's affection or viewpoints. Therefore, has he time as a "female spectator" (when she was dressed as a man) allowed her to redefine herself through that experience as a new social subject? Food for thought.

As we discussed in lecture, defining oneself as a "feminist" is a difficult and often controversial move to make. There are major associations with the word that are intense and perhaps intimidating, which have resulted in the hesitancy to get too close. Hadley Freeman's article, "Ellen Page: Why are People so Reluctant to Say They Are Feminist" explains, in my opinion, why feminism shouldn't be quite so daunting and why more individuals should be proud to carry the label. Ellen Page stands for the equality of men and women, and it's evident that her definition of "The F-Word" is not quite as radical as others believe it to be. The article mentions that current celebrities have beat around the bush when asked if they call themselves feminists, Beyoncé stating that the word can be "extreme" and Bjork explaining that the word could "isolate" her. In my opinion, feminism should not have to be so scary, and that what it should all come down to is that we live in a society where women are seen as the weaker sex. Page seems to back up this idea, in that she isn't a male-hating radical, but is simply a female who wants more respect for herself and other females worldwide. The end of the article quotes one of Page's tweets that says: "Pretty crazy that people who can't get pregnant get to decide what happens to uteri across the nation," and I think that someone who agrees with this statement should fairly be able to identify as a feminist without any other strings or stigmas attached. I don't think that the word "feminist" needs to carry the weight that it's been given, and that there can be various levels of feminism for people to identify with on an individual level. Perhaps recognizing this would get us closer to the equality that so many "feminists" and "modern feminists" strive for.

The Fear of Feminism

In the article titled “Ellen Page: 'Why are people so reluctant tosay they're feminists?,” Hadley Freeman discusses the implications of being a feminist in Hollywood with Ellen Page. Page states, “I don't know why people are so reluctant to say they're feminists. Maybe some women just don't care. But how could it be any more obvious that we still live in a patriarchal world when feminism is a bad word?”

 This specific quote reminded me of an article I recently read in the Huffington Post titled, “Celebrity Feminists: A Handy Guide To Fame And The 'F' Word.” The article discusses the negative connotation of “the F word” as well as which Hollywood celebrities do and do not identify with the term. The majority of women quoted in the article including, Katy Perry, Carrie Underwood, Sarah Jessica Parker, Demi Moore, Taylor Swift, Beyonce, and Lady Gaga do not consider themselves feminists. Even Madonna was quoted in saying, “I’m not a feminist, I’m a humanist,” echoing the view of playwright Wendy Wasserstein. Additionally, Carrie Underwood illustrates the common fear of being called a feminist. She stated, "I wouldn't go so far as to say I am a feminist, that can come off as a negative connotation. But I am a strong female."

Many of these women who seem to support the empowerment of women, fear the term feminist. The negative connotation of feminists as “bra-burning” and “man-hating” women are what many of these “strong women” want to avoid and is the exact reason we have to change the negative stigma.

Feminism is the “theory of political, economic, and social equality of sexes.” By definition, feminism is a positive thing for women because it promotes equality of the sexes.  All of these celebrity women who fear the term “feminist” are in fact the same women who should be considered some of the greatest examples of it. But the reality of “feminism” does not match the way people perceive it.

In Hollywood today, “only 23% of speaking roles in films today are for women." Many women in Hollywood still suffer from gender inequality, yet do not identify with the term feminist. Feminism, is feared by the very women it is meant to help.

Throughout the semester I want to understand and explore this fear and the negative connotation of the word. Is this fear cultural? Is this negative stigma a product of male dominated media? Or is it something else?

in which "Orlando" helped me find much needed inner peace.

Orlando is one of those movies that leaves me scratching my head several hours (or days, as the case may be) after I've seen it. Nonlinear films are sort of a hit-and-miss for me when it comes to trying to understand them, and more often than not, it's a miss. Sifting through my notes on the movie while I read this week's readings did help a bit, though. In her article "Sexuality, Feminism, Media Studies," Lisa Henderson asks, "how might we recognize the embodiment of both sex and gender without collapsing that embodiment into immutability?" I think we can avoid that by addressing the relative artificiality of gender. That isn't to say it's shameful to associate strongly with what our culture defines as manliness or womanliness, only it really is imperative to acknowledge that it IS constructed. Then of course follows the notion that a person's sex does not necessarily need to correlate to the gender with which it is associated. We see this in Orlando when it is expressed that "it was not privilege he sought, but company," and when he says, "I no longer care for a career, only love." Both are sentiments I would have expected to see a typical female character value (as we have seen with many such heroines even in more recent times, where we tend to believe we are more politically correct). Similarly, she is a willful and independent poet. In the early half of the twentieth century, she is a single parent who rides a motorcycle. Orlando represents the very opposite of "immutable." I struggled to fully identify feminist themes in the first half of the film. Yes I knew Tilda Swinton was playing Orlando as a male character, and the Queen was played by a man. I noticed the use of men singing soprano parts. Lines like "the treachery of men!" and "the treachery of women!" caught my ear, but I missed an overlying issue. Then Orlando wakes up and we see her reflection, and from that point on, the feminist overtones were pretty difficult to miss. While wondering and trying to articulate why that was, this quote from Elspeth Probyn's "Teaching in the Field" jumped out at me: "the ['space-off'] is the space not visible in the frame but inferable from what the frame makes visible." The first half of the film seems to be giving us a typical male perspective, where the issues of women are unimportant and not of much value or interest. Their issues are not visible in the frame, so we don't care. When the film then centers around a female protagonist, however, the dialogue is very much centered on her femaleness. Every scene seems to exist to encourage a feminist conversation, as if to say- "here's your story about a woman. Being a woman is hard. If you want feminism to be an issue in your story, it's all your story is going to be about." To me, the film was thus calling out people who see gender/sexuality issues as a separate study, as opposed to a lens to be looked through. Lastly, I want to say that I realize a lot of my conclusions I reach in this class will probably be old news to many of you. Until relatively recently, I had a fairly rigid idea of what gender and sexuality were, and what they should be. The definitions were simple for me. A while ago I was with some old high school friends and one of them showed me facebook pictures of a guy who had added her recently. I was instantly attracted to him, and the more pictures I saw, the hotter he seemed to get (sorry if this isn't very academic sounding...). Then my friend informed me it was an old classmate of ours who was FTM trans. I was shocked, even though this person was fairly masculine as it was, even in middle school. I wasn't disgusted by my attraction to him, but I was incredibly confused by it. What did it say about me, and what did it say about him? Surely it had to matter. This film helped me see otherwise. When Orlando awakes and sees her naked body in the mirror, it was the first time I saw a character break the fourth wall and actually felt as if she were speaking directly to me. In a beautifully reassuring voice, she declares herself "the same person. No different at all. Just another sex."