Supplemental Post 6 Presley

Cvetkovich's reading was particularly interesting to me, because I myself have been questioning Mulvey's 'male gaze' theories lately as well. Mulvey used to be my favorite theorist, I feel, and I was constantly defending or describing her thoughts to others, yet the more and more films I watch critically, the less I can buy into it all. For one, male's are an object of the gaze so often- such as the Olympian swimmers scene in Gentleman Prefer Blondes. And two, women are often much more than just objects of the gaze but instead fully fleshed protagonists. I think it's silly to say women characters are never more than something to be looked at as a love interest or in a sexual way. I just feel, overall, I've had to say to myself 'wow, this movie really subverts Mulvey's theories on the male gaze' far too often, to where the theories can barely stand up for me anymore. There are definite movies where it works, many even, however, in so many contexts it doesn't that I'm not sure it can be translated to film in general anymore. Especially new films have worked against falling into such stereotypes due to her theories, which is why I still find them so important and influential. Cvetkovich discusses how the gaze can be used as a position of power, which I agree. In many situations, it is empowering to be gazed upon. Perhaps this is because the patriarchal society has made it so women's only way of having a voice or garnering attention is through her beauty/body. However, it can't be denied that holding that amount of attention is one of the few ways women can maintain power and influence. At the same time, this gaze is negative in that it belittles women to their body/physical attributes. It's such an interesting dichotomy. I actually just finished a research paper on Cleo From 5 to 7 in which I discussed a similar topic. The essay was entitled "the trappings of female beauty" in which I delved into how Varda uses the film to describe how Cleo is trapped by her beauty into a certain role. She can't overcome that, and hardly wants to because she receives so much positive reinforcement from playing that role of the beautiful women. Her power and social status has come from maintaining that role and she has been able to get everything she wanted in life because of it. She is spoiled rotten by everyone around her, which is exactly what ends up making her so upset in the film.