Soumya Sir, Journal Final
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Indian Journal of Health, Sexuality & Culture Volume (5), Issue (1) Invited Expert Commentary Queer Depictions in American Cinema: Assumed Identities Martin B. Beaudet FauxMeme Productions, Damascus, OR, USA Abstract Like most aspects of homosexuality, depictions of gay ‘lifestyles’ and identities were rare in any public forum in the United States, including cinema, prior to the Stonewall Uprising on June 28, 1969. The subject was treated in most social and academic circles as too vulgar for discussion, let alone depiction, and there was a genuine fear that the very discussion of homosexual behavior would encourage it among those who had never before considered it. In this environment, those who sensed in themselves an attraction to members of the same sex, or any other anomalous gender identity leanings, had only rumor and scandal to inform their sense of identity. For many queer individuals the derogatory descriptions and condemnation that such stories perpetrated resulted in them assuming negatives identities, often leading to self-hatred and sometimes-attempted suicide. This essay will look at the effect of emergent queer cinema and depictions of non-heterosexuals in mainstream cinema on the self-image and psychological well-being of those who identify as queer. Keywords: Homosexuality, Queer, USA, American Cinema, Assumed Identities Date Received: 30th April 2019 Date Accepted: 29th May 2019 Correspondence should be made to: Martin B. Beaudet FauxMeme Productions 13825 SE 180th Avenue, Damascus, OR 97089 USA Email- [email protected] Prevailing Views on Queer result of the ensuing liberalization Identities in America of American attitudes toward their There can be no doubt that a queer compatriots has been the turning point in American attitudes assimilation of the latter into toward homosexuality (and related mainstream culture. There is no gender identity issues) was reached better place to observe large-scale when, as a U.S. presidential social change than in television and candidate in 1992, Bill Clinton cinema, two realms where creative voiced support for LGBT rights.[1]A minds strive diligently to reflect predictable, though often ignored, back to us the lives we are living. Indian Journal of Health, Sexuality & Culture 01 June 2019 Indian Institute of Sexology Bhubaneswar Indian Journal of Health, Sexuality & Culture There is however, ongoing debate identities of many real-life queer within the American queer individuals. community as to whether such assimilation is a positive[2] or negative[3] Allusive Depictions development for queer culture. For The years following World War II those individuals who do not saw many films in which cross knowingly have any queer friends or dressing men played drag for family, the media[4] is often the only comedy. Cary Grant in ‘I Was A Male source of information on what it War Bride’ (1949),[9] Tony Curtis and means to be queer. Cinema in Jack Lemon in ‘Some Like It Hot’ particular can have a profound (1959),[10] and a slew of Jerry Lewis effect on society's shifting attitudes, films from 1950-1956 are the most [5] for better or worse. notable examples.[11] Cinema Before Stonewall Non-Comedic Queer Characters. In the years prior to the Stonewall Alfred Hitchcock, one of the most Uprising, a night upon which gay respected and prolific directors of men-many in drag-resisted what his time, hinted at a gay male had become habitual police relationship[12] in the psychological harassment of patrons at a thriller ‘Rope’ (1948)[13] is a dramatic neighborhood pub in New York's imagining of the murder of a 14- G r e e n w i c h V i l l a g e , [ 6 ] q u e e r year-old boy by real-life roommates individuals had rarely, if ever, seen Nathan Leopold and Richard people like themselves on television. Loeb. [ 1 4 ] While a homosexual Likewise, any depiction on the Silver relationship is never specified, the Screen until that point, had been sub text is clearly there, the allusive at best, never spoken or message overwhelmingly negative named, and almost without to those who found it: gay men are exception negative.[7] Gay men dangerous psychopaths preying on dominated these depictions, one innocent boys. assumes, perhaps because such were seen as more salacious and This stereotype is teased out to its most gruesome conclusion in t h r e a t e n i n g t o t h e a l m o s t [15] exclusively male writers, directors, Suddenly, ‘Last Summer’ (1959), and producers of the day. Lesbians- wherein Sebastian (portrayed by the bisexual-but-closeted Montgomery or what heterosexual men thought [16] of as lesbians-if they were shown at Clift) uses his beautiful cousin all, were often merely sex objects Catherine to lure young boys for sex and fantasies of straight men. They during an island holiday. The plot were rarely seen as existing apart centers on Catherine's recovery from the men who desired them, from the trauma she experiences and the relationship was often after witnessing the boys mob, kill, i n f e r r e d . [ 8 ] T h e l o n e l i n e s s , and eat Sebastian. The unmistakable desperation, and unlikability of message: the homosexual got what such characters also informed the he deserved. 02 June 2019 Indian Institute of Sexology Bhubaneswar Indian Journal of Health, Sexuality & Culture Sympathetic Depictions In 1970, just a year after Stonewall, Sympathetic depictions of gay men The Boys in the Band[21] became the prior to Stonewall were rare and, first Hollywood film to address gay again, mostly allusive.[17] The most (men's) lives head on. It remains a notable film that avoids judgement watershed moment for the queer of male-male love is ‘Lawrence of community.[22][23] While it was, by Arabia’ (1962).[18]Lawrence, of today's standards, rife with course, is a classic: the dramatic re- stereotypes and bitchy, miserable enactment of T. E. Lawrence's gay characters, it opened the door to involvement in the 1916 Arab Revolt film makers who wished to depict on behalf of the British Crown. Co- non-heterosexual lives without sub written by Lawrence himself, the text and inuendo. Queer people no film avoids any explicit homosexual longer had to be pathetic, villainous, engagement (just as Lawrence or ridiculous; they could be seen as himself denied any such activity in average, flawed individuals, like his own life), but the film makers anyone else. didn't shy away from male-male intimacy and love between Unveiled But Unsympathetic Lawrence and his beloved friend Capitalizing on the nascent ‘gay Sherif Ali. In fact, Director David liberation’ movement that arose Lean later said, “Throughout, from Stonewall, film makers in the Lawrence was very, if not entirely, 1970s no longer felt the need to hide homosexual. We thought we were the queer identities of their being very daring at the time….”[19] characters. But homosexuality was still illegal in many states Cinema After Stonewall throughout the decade. As a result, The news depictions that emerged film makers felt the need to tread from the Stonewall Inn of drag carefully in their depictions of queer queens resisting uniformed police characters so as not to offend officers and subsequently being industry censors or, more importantly, manhandled into waiting paddy the paying mainstream movie goer. wagons, electrified a largely closeted While queer Americans were finally American gay population. For many seeing themselves on the big screen, in the audience, particularly teens the characters they saw were often and adolescents, it was the first not fully realized and still not acknowledgement that there were allowed happy endings. others like themselves in the world, actually gathering together in Twisted and Tragic public places to socialize. It was also Transgender visibility hit cinema in the first time anyone in America had a big way in 1970 with the release of seen queer-identified individuals The Christine Jorgensen Story,[24] a fight back against an authority that dramatized biography of a male-to- demonized them.[20] It gave LGBTQ female woman, documenting the Americans a new paradigm and led transition from her point of view. to the adoption of new proactive While the film was profoundly identities. 03 June 2019 Indian Institute of Sexology Bhubaneswar Indian Journal of Health, Sexuality & Culture educational and ground breaking in laundry, raise kids, and work nine- its honesty, producers felt it to-five office jobs. Queers were still necessary to titillate mainstream anomalies and outsiders. audiences with tabloid-headline- emulating promotional art that Cinema Verité: HIV/AIDS screamed “Did the surgeon's knife As tragic as it was, the HIV/AIDS make me a woman or a freak?”.[25] pandemic was a watershed moment for queer cinema.[31]It also marked a Transgender issues were also turning point, albeit a gradual one, played for comedy in 1971's Myra in the depiction of gay men in Breckinridge.[26] One could argue mainstream cinema. Hollywood was that the saving grace of this film was still portraying gay men as victims, that it was panned as “one of the often pathetic, and-where AIDS was worst films ever made”[27] and, as concerned-implied that their such, didn't gain a wide audience. suffering was a natural result of their own choices. The difference ‘Cruising’ (1980),[28] starring Al however, in films such as the made- Pacino, marked a low point in for-TV An Early Frost (1985),[32] was depictions of gay men, featuring a the empathy that depictions of serial killer in the leather bedridden, dying men elicited in community. Gay men were again straight audiences.