Don Jon

For my gender journal this week, the movie Don Jon caught my attention. After completing the reading for this week from Hardcore Romance, this film popped back into my head after watching it once months ago. Specifically, the article mentioning the idea of “sentimentality” and the “pornification” of culture being similar seemed to be an idea that was reflected in this film. While at first glance this film appears to be yet another romantic comedy, it is actually a surprisingly critical look at how society digests ideas about romance and sex through use of the media. What could be a more perfect topic for this week’s gender journal?

            What is interesting about Don Jon is that the two main characters (who are each other’s love interests) each have equally warped expectations for sex and romance. Jon, the male lead is addicted to porn. In fact, in the trailer he says his porn is one of the most important things he cares about in his life. Throughout the film this leads him to have unrealistic expectations when it comes to sex and generally leaves him disappointed and unfulfilled when it comes to sex and intimacy. His character represents the disconnect between porn and the reality of sex.

            On the other hand, the female lead, Barbara represents the misrepresentation of “sentimentality” that Hardcore Romance talks about. Also in the trailer, it mentions that she is obsessed with the kind of rom coms most people pegged Don Jon to be similar to. In this sense, the film equates Barbara’s “romance addiction” to Jon’s porn addiction. These movies create false expectations for romance and eventually lead to her disappointment with her relationship with Jon.   

            Joseph-Gordon Levitt, who stars in, wrote and produced the film to comment on the influence of mass media and pornography on people’s expectations for sex and romance. He mentioned in an interview that his mother was an active feminist in the ‘60s and ‘70s and that she always pointed out to him the objectification of women often occurring on screen. In a way those opinions come through in the film as well as a different look at how romance can also seem disappointing when compared to the movies and other culturally produced stories. Sentimentality and pornification can be equally damaging in some ways.

Kingsman: The Secret Service

This past week, I went on a double date with some friends to go see the new movie Kingsman: The Secret Service. Considering my roommate’s boyfriend picked it, I was expecting a pretty typical action-y, “guy” movie. However, since the boys were less than enthused with my roommate and I’s suggestion of Fifty Shades of Grey, we settled on this film. Despite my expectations I was quite pleasantly surprised by a lot of progressive and forward-thinking elements in this film that countered stereotypes about gender and sexuality.

The basic plot of the film centers around a secret undercover, crime-fighting group committed to stopping evil doers all over the world. This group, that recently lost one of its 10 highly trained members now must have each remaining member select a new candidate to fill this spot. One kingsman selects Eggsy as his candidate: a impoverished, tough, but good hearted kid from the wrong side of the tracks. He is selected because his father too was a kingsman and gave up his life to save the rest of his friends by throwing himself on a grenade during a mission. Eggsy, along with 9 other candidates compete for the coveted spot on the team of secret spies, while also trying to battle an international villain named Valentine: insane, risky, nail-biting action ensues.

While many elements of this film are traditional and reinforce gender stereotypes, surprisingly many of the female characters are extremely important to the plot and are totally hardcore. The first character who really stood out to me was Gazelle; she is Valentine’s sidekick and a total badass. While some people may criticize the film for Gazelle and Valentine’s relationship as reinforcing female inferiority, there isn’t a single moment that Gazelle is on screen and doesn’t exude power and intimidation, a powerful portrayal of a female character. What’s more, Gazelle is a double amputee whose prosthetic legs have been reinforced with razor sharp blades that she uses to fight. I was extremely pleased to see such a powerful role in a blockbuster film for a disabled female character.

Another important point in the film: while the secret spy group is named Kingsman, there are two girls who compete for the final spot out of the ten candidates. In fact, (spoiler alert) Eggsy doesn’t win the final spot. Roxanne (Roxy), his friend from the very first day of training wins. Another thing that is important about Roxy’s relationship with Eggsy is that there is never any romantic undertone to their relationship that we always seem to see in these types of movies. Eggsy always views her as formidable competition for a spot as a Kingsman, and when she does finally beat him for the final spot, he never doubts her ability.

While I could probably go on about a lot of empowering elements in this film that counter gender stereotypes and ideas about sexuality

, Roxy and Gazelle were probably the characters that struck me the most as a step in the right direction for female characters in these types of films. Additionally, their relationship with male characters in the film say a lot about changing attitudes towards sexuality and women’s role in relationships as far as media portrayals are concerned. Overall, while some feminists are still critical of the film, I thought it had a lot of shining moments for a blockbuster action movie.

Lovehoney Advertisments

For this week’s gender journal I decided to analyze some advertisements for sex toys. After watching the “Enjoying your vibe” video from the Good For Her website, I remembered coming across an advertisement for a UK company called Lovehoney that ran in to problems when trying to air their own television commercial. I was surprised when I viewed both their daytime and late-night advertisements that they ran in to so many censorship problems. What I viewed as extremely tame and subtle advertisements took months of re-editing and censoring before it was deemed suitable for British telivison.

When observing the differences between the day and late-night advertisements, the differences are extreme. It's hard to believe that despite "The Kiss" being the UK's first daytime ad for sex toys, Lovehoney isn't even permitted to openly name the product they're advertising! These tight restrictions were somewhat loosened in the late-night ad, in which they use the phrase "sex toy" exactly once. While this advertisement is groundbreaking in the sense of being for a company that sells sex toys, it’s mind-blowing that this fairly conservative commercial is subjected to harsher censorship than Hardy’s commercials that feature nude women seductively eating cheese burgers (who knew that was possible?).

When I say conservative, I mean that aside from the subject matter, the commercial reinforces many traditional values. For example, each couple in both the day and late-night ad are modestly dressed and are part of heterosexual relationships. In fact, in the daytime clip they flash the couple’s wedding bands in almost every-other frame (I’m not exaggerating). Anyone who would stumble across this commercial would encounter more sexually explicit material in a PG-rated movie. Ultimately these advertisements reflect western society’s warped view of sexuality when objectifying and hyper-sexualizing women in advertisements causes less of an uproar than an ad featuring monogamous couples exploring their sexuality.

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Super Bowl XLIX Commercial

While watching the Super Bowl with some friends, I came across a lot of possible topics to inspire this week’s gender journal. However, one commercial really stood out between the flurry of funny and thought-provoking advertisements. Always’ “Like A Girl” commercial really made an impression on me and even managed to capture the attention of some of my sports-crazed friends.

The basic content of the commercial asks post-adolescent girls, women, and even a man to do certain things “like a girl” (i.e. throw like a girl, fight like a girl, etc).  Next they contrasted the reactions of older girls, men (and a young boy) to the responses of younger girls when asked to demonstrate these actions “like a girl.” The differences were obvious, the girls aged about 10 years old and under ran, fought, and threw like they normally would, while the older participants displayed weak, comical interpretations of the actions. The message Always was trying to present came across pretty straightforward. Being a brand that markets primarily to women, they point out that using “like a girl” as an insult has an increasingly negative connotation over time for girls as they grow up and then consequently link that to a drop in girls’ self esteem during puberty. However, I think there are more observations to make relating to gender roles for girls and boys in this commercial.

Something that I found notable about the video is that all of the participants who interpreted “like a girl” to mean weak, silly actions were all adolescent and older except for one young boy. This young boy who could not be more than 10 years old still had the negative interpretation of “like a girl” despite his young age. This seems like it would be contradictory to the goal message of the advertisement that “like a girl” becomes an insult after puberty, yet they still include this charming little guy in the commercial to help prove their point.

What conclusions can we draw from his reaction? To me, this suggests that not only does society create a hostile environment for girls as they grow up, but boys are also victim to the gendering process and it begins for them at an even younger age. The young boy’s female counter parts still viewed “like a girl” to be a positive or neutral statement while his interpretation of the phrase as an insult was obvious. He must have heard phrases like this from older men, on sports teams, etc. The pressure on young boys to be masculine (and consequently not “like a girl”) is equally as damaging to their self-esteem. I love that Always strives to celebrate femininity in this advertisement, but I wish they would have acknowledged that boys suffer just as much as girls in interpreting and asserting their gender as they grow up.