Core Post 1 (Cailin O'Brien)

The rise and expansion of the “star system” as explained by Janet Staiger is more intricate than I had imagined it to be. Initially you would think that the star system was a hit for theatre producers and filmmakers alike, but as she says “any public recognition actors received would inspire demands for bigger salaries”. Even before legitimate “stars” came to create this economic tension, DeCordova explains the how the degree to and way in which actors were of intrigue to spectators transitioned over historical context. Beginning as a “discourse on acting” and then transitioning to “picture personality”, the original “celebrities” of the 1920s were an entirely different concept than they are today. While today we pry into the lives of celebrities, spectators were once only intrigue by the  character roles played by silent actors of whom the spectator could replace their real selves with.  

Of rather profound influence in feminist film study is that of once famous actor Valentino who we saw perform the role of an evil Prince in George Melford’s film The Sheik. This point in time marked a transition towards the female intrigue and gaze, as opposed to pleasing masculine spectatorship. What shocked me most was the, almost, reverse psychology of the use of Valentino as en “exotic” item of desire for female spectators. While speaking of the liberation movement of the 1920s, the female condition in this time in America was under great change. Women were presented with more professional and everyday activities than the domestic household chores they once were refined to. In this time Valentino’s films gave rise to a public view that there was a “possibility of female desire outside of motherhood and family” (pg 275). Valentino did not only allow for a platform upon which female visual desire is satisfied, but for an even further experimental exploration of a more dynamic sexual drive. His character roles and the female fandom that resulted highlight “the more archaic component drives, reminders of the precarious constructedness of sexual identity”. His racial otherness in combination with a “discourse of exoticism” through roles such as the Arab Shiek or Indian Rajah, made it in a way socially acceptable for female to engage in this fantastical desire.