California State University, San Bernardino CSUSB ScholarWorks Theses Digitization Project John M. Pfau Library 1996 Classical Hollywood film directors' female-as-object obsession and female directors' cinematic response: A deconstructionist study of six films Sharon Jeanette Chapman Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project Part of the Film and Media Studies Commons Recommended Citation Chapman, Sharon Jeanette, "Classical Hollywood film directors' female-as-object obsession and female directors' cinematic response: A deconstructionist study of six films" (1996). Theses Digitization Project. 1258. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project/1258 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the John M. Pfau Library at CSUSB ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses Digitization Project by an authorized administrator of CSUSB ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. CliASSICAL HOLLYWOOD FILM DIRECTORS' FEMALE-AS-OBJECT OBSESSION AND FEMALE DIRECTORS' CINEMATIC RESPONSE; A DECONSTRUCTIONIST STUDY OF SIX FILMS A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of California State University, San Bernardino In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts in English Composition by Sharon Jeanette Chapman September 1996 CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD FILM DIRECTORS' FEMALE-AS-OBJECT OBSESSION AND FEMALE DIRECTORS' CINEMATIC RESPONSE: A DECONSTRUCTIONIST STUDY OF SIX FILMS A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of California State University, San Bernardino by Sharon Jeanette Chapman September 1996 Approved by: Dr. Bruce Golden, Chair, English Date Kellie Raybuirn Dr. e Pigeon ABSTRACT My thesis consists of a short study of the theoretical backgrounds of feminist film study and Classic Hollywood norms and paradigms to prepare the reader for six readings—Singin' in the Rain, Rebecca and Touch of Evil from the Classic male-directed canon; and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Desperately Seeking Susan, and Home for the Holidays directed by women. Each reading deconstructs the text, placing knowledge in the possession of women. Through exploring woman as ^subject' or the ^other', feminists uncover a number of unifying conditions in the lives of women and their experience with patriarchal hierarchy. This thesis will also consider the active participation of female spectators in interpreting the structural and thematic paradigms which construct film. This process can be discouraging sinCe Hollywood cinema has traditionally excluded, silenced or severely distorted the female image and voice. I intend to reclaim Hollywood cinema for women by understanding its structures, by appropriating and formulating woman's own unique point of view and by subverting the destructive abuse created by masochistic tendencies of some feminist theories. Women in film and viewers of film may choose not to be victims of its patriarchal structure. Ill ACKNOWLEDGMENTS While writing this thesis, I became increasingly indebted to Dr. Bruce Golden, whose scholarly advice as dialectician and mentor enriched and influenced my thinking. I wish also to thank my family, who has knowingly and unknowingly informed my perspective on feminism and film. And, I especially thank David Chapman for his boundless film trivia knowledge and unwavering support. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv LIST OF TABLES . .. v INTRODUCTION I CHAPTER ONE 8 Theoretical background: Feminist Film Theory— Gender Differences, Marxism, Psychoanalysis and Semiotics. CHAPTER TWO 27 Hollywood Classical Film: Norms and Paradigms. CHAPTER THREE 50 The Interpretative Process: Referential, Explicit, Implicit and Symptomatic Meaning. CHAPTER FOUR 62 Hollywood Classical Films: Three Interpretations—Slngin' In the Rain^ Rebecca and Touch of Evil. CHAPTER FIVE 110 Hollywood Female Directors and Their Films: Three Interpretations—Fast Times at Ridgemont Highr Desperately Seeking Susan and Home for the Holidays. CONCLUSION 156 WORKS CONSULTED 161 V INTRODUCTION There exists an established, thirty-year old debate concerning the American film industry and its treatment of women. Although 1993 was designated as The Year of the Woman in Hollywood, few women were represented in the list of nominees for technical, production and artistic academy awards and fewer still received those honors. Certainly, women have endured in acting roles {the quality of which is subject for further controversy), but they have yet to break into the circle of directors, writers and technicians in significant numbers. These visually obvious omissions are merely the surface symptoms of what some feminists have considered a persistent credo which condones the exclusion and, more so, the suppression of women in the Hollywood industry structure and product. This practice has, through the perpetuation of myth, extended beyond the realm of entertainment and is considered an intrinsic part of a socially constructed patriarchal system which has yet to include women in its sexual hierarchy. Since the late sixties, ^woman' and gender as academic scholarship has become a meaningful category. Through this exploration into woman as ^subject' or the ^other', feminists have uncovered a number of unifying conditions in the lives of women and their experience with a patriarchal hierarchy; however, they have also found disconcerting differences in the way one might personally experience life within a patriarchy which are generated by the difference in race, age, occupation, religion, sexual orientation and so on. Although this is a current issue in feminist studies, it is not possible for me to address the issue at this time. Instead, I intend to focus on mainstream cinema, the system accused of excluding and victimizing woman in such a way as to beget oppression, and I intend further to examine contradictions that arise through interpretation—those repressed and unresolved issues which are potentially threatening to the patriarchy. This thesis will consider the active participation of women as spectators in the process of making meaning. For many feminists, this activity is extremely discouraging since they view Hollywood cinema as a system of exclusion which silences their real voices and distorts their image. Since they view themselves as victims, as spectators of the product, they tend to assume the identity of masochist because they ''^either identify with Marilyn Monroe or with the man behind me (them) hitting the back of (their) seat with his knees." Ruby Rich explains that "this misplaced pessimism stems from their overvaluation of the production aspect of cinema, a misassumption that cinematic values are irrevocably embedded at the level of production and, once there, remain pernicious and inviolable" (Multiple 34). And later describing the approach of other critics, she says "a woman's experience is like that of the exile, whom Brecht once singled out as the ultimate dialectician for that daily working out of cultural oppositions within a single body" (Multiple 35). In the first part of this study of women and film, I intend to address the two previous attitudes—l)the female spectator as masochist or 2) dialectician. I will also discuss my chosen critical tools and apply them to a number of films in the Hollywood Classical canon, all directed by men, in which women have been ^subjugated', some critics would claim, within the power structure of the patriarchy. I hope that this study will also reveal the difficulties which arise in the process of male and female socialization and construction, a revelation, similar to that of Tania Modleski, which would find some redeeming qualities in classical cinema for the female spectator. This study should yield a catalogue of structures which have been accused of creating the status of women in these films. In an attempt to determine the progress made by women to alter their status, I will next interpret three recent films—Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982), Desperately Seeking Susan (1987) and Home for the Holidays (1995)-­ directed by women. These interpretations are expected to reveal to what extent women, as directors, have broken free from classical paradigms to create their own structures, have turned the classical structures inside out, have actively been engaged in a cultural dialect or have been quietly subsumed in the larger structure. My interest in these differences is not unique; other critics have been interested in how women's films differ from those produced by men. This interest has simultaneously spilled over from other fields. Silvia Bovenschen asks, "Is There a Feminine Aesthetic?" She challenges women who tend to de-emphasize gender differences to understand first that a woman's experience throughout history differs from a man's, concluding that a feminine artistic production takes place by means of a complicated process involving conquering and reclaiming, appropriating and formulating, as well as forgetting and subverting" (Erens xix). I am aspiring through my interpretations to 1)understand and reclaim Hollywood cinema for women by understanding its structures in relation to men and women; 2)appropriate and formulate woman's own unique point of view, and; 3)forget or at least subvert the destructive abuse created by masochistic tendencies of some feminist theories. I believe these three actions are necessary if we are to move forward in our pursuit to claim a language, story and place for ourselves as woman, and still come to terms with the unity of men and women