Deconstructing the Male Gaze: Masochism, Female Spectatorship, and the Femme Fatale in Fatal Attraction, Body of Evidence, and Basic Instinct By Miranda Sherwin AlexAlex ForrestForrest (Glenn(Glenn Close)Close) meetsmeets herher lover,lover, DanDan GallagherGallagher (Michael(Michael Douglas),Douglas), Alex Forrest (Glenn Close) attacks Dan Gallagher aandnd hhisis wwife,ife, BBetheth ((AnneAnne AArcher)rcher) iinn FFatalatal AAttraction.ttraction. (Michael Douglas), in Fatal Attraction. Abstract: Fatal Attraction, Basic Instinct, wife. In Basic Instinct (1992), Nick Cur- ogy that posited masochism as a central and Body of Evidence are three films that ran (Michael Douglas) willingly places mechanism of spectatorial viewing for forge a connection between the cinemat- himself in the same position as the vic- women. Female spectatorship was theo- ic femme fatale genre and an imagistic tim of a sex crime, allowing himself to rized in light of assumptions about the and narrative focus on masochism. The be tied up and seduced by the woman primacy of the male gaze and of a per- author argues that the foregrounding he believes to be the murderer, and later ception of masochism that stressed vic- of masochistic desire acts to compli- calls the experience “the fuck of the cen- timization and passivity. Thanks in large cate our understanding of the male gaze tury.” In Body of Evidence (1993), Frank part to queer theory, however, there has and female spectatorial pleasure; thus, Dulaney (Willem Dafoe) discovers that been a reevaluation of this model. Revis- these films present a serious challenge to he finds it sexually pleasurable to have iting and challenging long-held assump- inherited theories of spectatorship. hot candle wax poured on his genitals. tions about sadomasochistic desire and Together, these three films forge a con- power dynamics, recent queer theory Keywords: feminist film theory, femme nection between the cinematic femme has proposed a more nuanced model that fatale, the male gaze, masochism fatale genre and an imagistic and narra- emphasizes strategy, control, and the tive focus on masochism. mutability of gender roles. Many femi- n Fatal Attraction (1987), Alex For- The past fifteen years of the twentieth nist and film scholars have contested the rest (Glenn Close) absentmindedly century saw a proliferation of films that, theory of the male gaze, but it has not Iand repeatedly slashes her own leg like these, foreground scenarios of mas- yet been examined within the framework before turning the knife on her lover’s ochism. Not coincidentally, film theory, of this different way of understanding especially as practiced in academia, was masochistic psychodynamics.1 Although Copyright © 20082006 Heldref Publications invested in a psychoanalytic methodol- film theory has in recent years moved 174 Deconstructing the Male Gaze 175 tle producer Lynda Obst (qtd. in Andrews spectators must either take a masochistic H22). Fatal Attraction tells the story of stance or adopt the male gaze, becoming Dan Gallagher, a happily married man spectatorial transvestites. who nevertheless has a brief affair with Fatal Attraction perfectly exempli- Deconstructing the Male Gaze: Forrest. Although Forrest assures him fies the filmic negotiation of castration that she is discreet, she refuses to leave anxiety that Mulvey asserts as central to Masochism, Female Spectatorship, and the Femme Fatale in Fatal Attraction, him alone when the weekend is over. He organizing spectatorial pleasure around triestries toto eraseerase herher fromfrom hishis life,life, butbut asas thethe thematically male psychoscenarios. Body of Evidence, and Basic Instinct By Miranda SherwinSherwin moviemovie progresses,progresses, sheshe becomesbecomes increas-increas- She contends, “The male unconscious inglyingly intrusiveintrusive andand threatening:threatening: sshehe ccallsalls has two avenues of escape from this himhim atat work,work, tturnsurns uupp aatt hhisis hhome,ome, ppoursours castration anxiety: preoccupation with acidacid onon hishis car,car, cookscooks hishis daughter’sdaughter’s the re-enactment of the original trauma petpet rabbit,rabbit, kidnapskidnaps hishis daughter,daughter, andand (investigating the woman, demystifying finallyfinally triestries toto killkill hishis wife.wife. ForrestForrest isis thethe her mystery), counterbalanced by the quintessentialquintessential femme fatale, the sexually devaluation, punishment or saving of the dangerousdangerous woman.woman. guilty object” (35). Forrest evokes the WhatWhat makesmakes thisthis a “male“male myth,”myth,” pre-pre- fear of castration in Gallagher, but he is sumably,sumably, isis thethe controlcontrol thatthat thethe malemale able to investigate her and “demystify her protagonistprotagonist cancan exertexert overover thethe femme mystery.” He breaks into her apartment, fatalefatale and what she represents. In Laura looks through her medicine chest and her Mulvey’sMulvey’s influentialinfluential essay,essay, “Visual“Visual scrapbook, and finally pronounces judg- PleasurePleasure andand NNarrativearrative CCinema,”inema,” wwhathat ment: she is “sick.” In fact, she is so sick womenwomen representrepresent isis sexualsexual differencedifference that there is no possibility of “saving the itself,itself, which,which, inin turn,turn, isis thethe principleprinciple guilty object”; instead, she is devalued aroundaround whichwhich spectatorshipspectatorship cancan bebe theo-theo- and punished, killed by his long-suffer- rized.rized. AccordingAccording toto Mulvey,Mulvey, “Ultimately,“Ultimately, ing wife, Beth (Anne Archer). thethe meaningmeaning ofof wwomanoman iiss ssexualexual ddiffer-iffer- This film appears to be quintessen- ence,ence, thethe absenceabsence ofof tthehe ppenisenis aass vvisuallyisually tially male: it narrates the male psy- ascertainable,ascertainable, thethe materialmaterial evidenceevidence onon chodrama of the resolution of castra- whichwhich isis basedbased thethe castrationcastration complexcomplex tion anxiety; it establishes identification essentialessential forfor thethe oorganizationrganization ooff eentrancentrance with the male protagonist, who controls toto thethe symbolicsymbolic orderorder andand thethe lawlaw ofof thethe events; and it objectifies and finally pun- father”father” (35;(35; seesee aalsolso MMulvey,ulvey, ““After-After- ishes the woman who threatens him. The Alex Forrest (Glenn Close) meets her lover, Dan Gallagher (Michael Douglas), AlexAlex ForrestForrest (Glenn(Glenn Close)Close) attacksattacks DanDan GallagherGallagher thoughts”).thoughts”). InIn thisthis formulation,formulation, womenwomen attraction is, after all, fatal only to For- and his wife, Beth (Anne Archer) in Fatal Attraction. ((MichaelMichael DDouglas),ouglas), iinn FFatalatal AAttraction.ttraction. onon bothboth sidessides ofof thethe screenscreen becomebecome rest. Body of Evidence and Basic Instinct elidedelided withwith absence.absence. AsAs filmicfilmic repre-repre- follow the same pattern, although the away from this primarily psychoanalytic sentations, women are the bearers of the “investigation” of the woman is situated focus toward a more historicized meth- bleeding wound of castration, the signi- within a legal discourse, as one male pro- odology, it is worth reexamining both fication of the lack of penis/phallus. As tagonist is a lawyer and the other a police the films that take masochism as their spectators, women are forced into either detective. In theory, then, there should be subject and the theories about masoch- passive masochistic identification with no female spectatorial position that is not istic spectatorship. This article, then, the female protagonist, always depicted masochistic; and indeed, Susan Faludi, undertakes a closer examination of these as the object of male desire, or into mas- arguing that Fatal Attraction is part of a theories and their manifestations in these culinized identification with the male backlash against women, depicts women three films. This exploration will com- protagonist and his controlling look. viewers as uncomfortably silent, voice- plicate notions of the male gaze and pas- In what has become one of the most less, while the men around them urge sive masochistic female spectatorship as quoted passages in feminist film theory, Gallagher to “[p]unch the bitch’s face in” well as open up new possibilities in the Mulvey argues, “In a world ordered by (112). Yet, a closer examination of these theorizing of male and female spectato- sexual imbalance, pleasure in looking films reveals narrative and cinematic rial pleasure. has been split between active/male and strategies that undermine male identifi- passive/female. The determining male cation and dislocate the male gaze. Deconstructing the Male Gaze gaze projects its fantasy onto the female Andrews’s review of Fatal Attraction “I’d love to find a film with a strong figure, which is styled accordingly” (33). illustrates this point: “Did this movie premise that isn’t as sexist as Fatal Because identification with the objecti- ever explain what was so great about the Attraction but that taps into a girl myth fied and controlled female protagonist Michael Douglas character? Yet a bril- as powerfully as that movie tapped into a must be painful and because the male liant, accomplished career woman went boy myth,” comments Sleepless in Seat- gaze is active and controlling, female stark raving mad and boiled a bunny just 176 JPF&T—Journal of Popular Film and Television because of her passion for him.