...In which our heroine gives a gift.

A confession, dear readers; I've turned into quite a nice little feminist this semester. Through learning that the true definition of feminism is simply "equal treatment for both men and women," my domestic violence writing class, Culture Race and Media, and some very snarky male film majors, I've become much more assured in my abilities as a woman, and the flawed portrayals of women that the media presents.
This is my final paper for said domestic violence writing class, and one I promised to share with Quarternotelife, posted here because it is still her birthday my time. This is a gift you've helped me work on for years -I feel like this is the paper the two of us spent a childhood researching as we shrieked and giggled in her dark basement. We'd make good case studies about the women who love horror films, and the effects that viewing violence from a young age has. Be warned though, it is fairly academic as I try to be all edumacated and stuff...

Virgins Live, Sluts Die, and the Final Girl Always Wins: The Role of Women in Horror Films
We've all seen it – a scantily clad young woman runs through a house, stalked by a masked killer. Her chest and breasts heave under a tight shirt as she flees the killer, often portrayed as hyper-masculine. Often times, as much focus is placed on what the woman is wearing as the amount of danger she is in. Also common is that this woman has been shown as the “slut” throughout the rest of the film, and acts of violence often accompany acts of sexual expression. Look to any of the major money-making horror franchises – Friday the 13^th, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween – and you will find that women are objectified, hyper-sexualized, and meet violent, brutally gory ends. A more disturbing thought then is that a large portion of the audience for these films is young males – what messages do they receive about the effect of violence on women, especially women who express their sexuality. Horror films can be cheaply made, and produce healthy profits, making them a great investment for film producers (Clover 18). Thus, horror films are here to stay, but what exactly do they say about violence towards women? Perhaps more interestingly than the culture of violence they promote, what do horror films say about women in positions of power, such as Ellen Ripley in the Alien films (Stephens)? Or, could horror films even promote feminist ideas with the centralization of a “final girl” who triumphs over horrific obstacles to escape victorious, an idea widely explored by Carol J. Clover in her book Men, Women, and Chainsaws: Gender in the Modern Horror Film (Clover). The exploration of these ideas will be the focus of this paper, as will a study of if horror films have an impact on their male viewers.
The role of sexuality of female characters in relation to the violence perpetrated against them is perhaps the most disturbing aspect of horror films. In a few major examples, the horrors that commonly exist in many horror films get a violently sexual twist on them. One of the most notorious horror films of all time, I Spit on Your Grave, was released in 1978, and featured its female protagonist being gang-raped, beaten, and left for dead by several rednecks (she ultimately extracts various forms of revenge on them including cutting off one of their penises) (I Spit On). In 1981, Sam Raimi's The Evil Dead featured one female character gets dragged through the woods before ultimately being stripped, beaten, and raped by possessed tree branches (The Evil Dead). Released several years later, Stuart Gordon's Re-Animator featured a restrained naked woman screaming in terror as a severed head performed oral sex on her (Re-Animator). Unfortunately, this trend has continued into the 1990s and 2000s: 2007's Hostel: Part II prominently featured one female character hung naked from the ceiling, gagged, and throat slit with a scythe as another woman lay below her, drawing orgasmic glee from it (Hostel: Part II). With these examples and countless others, it becomes apparent that the link between a woman's sexuality and her own death or torture is prevalent in many horror films. Earlier examples include 1978's Halloween and 1980's Friday the 13^th in which a sex act is directly followed by the murder of the female participants (Halloween, Friday the 13^th).
Women who do not exhibit their sexuality in horror films fall into the role of what Carol J. Clover calls the “final girl” (Clover 260). The final girl is often portrayed as more innocent than her other female peers, virginal, and far less sexual. Clover describes the final girl as a “double for the adolescent male... a homoerotic stand-in,” meaning that the final girl does not threaten the masculinity of the male characters within, and could easily be substituted for a male character (Clover 261). Her femininity is repressed to the point where she becomes just like the males within the film. However, Clover explains this phenomenon as actually being a feminist issue, stating that the final girl “triumphs over her the perversity of her tormentor, and in the process undergoes a change from passive acceptance to active dominance” (Clover 260). However, Clover makes no mention of the fact that in this change from passive to active, the final girl is still not allowed to be sexualized or get any pride out of the fact that she is a woman – an example of this would be of the character of Kirsty in Hellraiser, who does ultimately triumph over the evil Cenobites, but yet is left to languish in oversized t-shirts and no make-up, further relating her to her male counterparts and squashing her female characteristics (Hellraiser).
However, there are horror films that transcend both sexual violence against women as well as the final girl mythology. One of the most prominent examples would be the Alien films, featuring Ellen Ripley as a protagonist who bests her male counterparts to defeat the alien. Daniel Stephens, a horror blogger, explains how Ripley functions in the film and subverts her male co-horts: “Ripley is the strong female character who makes active judgements and survives what is trying to kill her. The male character's activity is largely passive - most die quickly, others wait for her command. It is Ripley who makes the plan to defeat the alien which works, while the 'powerless' male Captain makes bad judgements as his unsure plan fails” (Stephens 1). While it could be argued that Ripley is in face de-feminized – with her job as a lift operator, the baggy space suits she wears – it is in the second film, Aliens, when her former life as a mother is explained as she is given the chance to care for the orphaned Newt, and she is allowed to maintain a major part of her femininity that other female protagonists in horror films must relinquish (Aliens). However, the treatment of the other female characters in Aliens, two space marines, fall prey to the horror movie trap of being masculinized and even accused of being lesbians (Aliens). Another film, 2006's The Descent features a core of strong female characters who find cannibalistic creatures as they independently explore underground caves. On the surface, it appears that the women subvert the usual horror film trappings, when only two are left and trying to survive, they end up battling against each other over the infidelity surrounding one of their husbands (The Descent). Unfortunately, it is difficult to come up with a fully positive portrayal of women in horror films, and as explained, even Aliens and The Descent, which appear to be feminist horror films on the surface, fall victim to the same trappings as their genre competitors.
It becomes apparent that the horror films certainly show a skewed view of women, but what effect does this have on the viewer? Daniel Goleman explores what exactly horror films to do the viewer in his 1984 essay “Violence Against Women in Films.” For male viewers, the numbers are quite disturbing: one in three men becomes sexually stimulated when viewing acts of extreme violence towards women, while another one out of three is aroused even when the violence is non-sexual (Goleman 1). The statistics come from a 1983 survey from the American Psychological Association that also found after five days of viewing horror films and then presented with a mock rape trial, the males surveyed sided with the rapist over the rape victim (Goleman). The same effects were not drawn from test males in the group who did not watch the horror films, or even watched hardcore pornography such as Debbie Does Dallas (Goleman). Though this survey is twenty-five years old, it does present some terrifying statistics in terms of how horror films and their treatment of women affect male viewers. Feminist author Myriam Miedzian supports this idea in her essay “How Rape is Encouraged in American Boys,” and uses the same study from the American Psychological Association to conclude that of the “ two hundred and thirty five studies done over the last forty years [the idea that] viewing violence helps viewers get violent impulses out of their systems is a mistake. Viewing violence encourages violent behavior”(Miedzian 156). While statistics and facts about the exact number of men that exact violent behavior on women because they've seen violent acts against women in horror films can't be stated definitively, the evidence certainly seems that it viewing such films is not a totally innocuous act.
However, men are not the only viewers or producers of horror films. Pet Sematary, Near Dark, and American Psycho are three tremendously violent films that all feature acts of violence against women, yet were all directed, and in the case of Near Dark and American Psycho, written by women (Pet Sematary, Near Dark, American Psycho). In a New York Times article, “Taking Back the Knife: Girls Gone Gory,” lesbian author Rita Mae Brown, who wrote a satirical horror film in 1982 with The Slumber Party Massacre, states that the reason she believes horror films to be so popular amongst women is that “films in general, not just horror films, are one of the few places left for women to make progress” (Orange). The article also discusses how women can appreciate Clover's “final girl” theory as a means of feminist catharsis - “audiences love a woman who can take back the knife” (Orange). Perhaps it is for this sense of empowerment and a reclaiming of violated rights, both of mind and body, by masked killers, that makes horror films so tremendously appealing to women.

The topic of the effect of violence against women in horror films, or what exactly makes the “final girl” formula so appealing has not been studied extensively enough to draw major conclusions about the issues. What can be said however, is that the extreme and prevalent acts of violence against women in horror films do have an adverse effect on their male viewers if seen in large quantities. What can also be said is that perhaps a truly realistic portrayal of a woman in a horror film has never occurred, but then again, the media is notorious for stereotyping and making generalizations about all groups, not just women. For the time being, the final girl will continue to triumph over her male counterparts in horror films, and until female screenwriters decide to change the formula, audiences will continue to delight as she takes back the knife.

Isaac Brock is another rock star whose children I'd gladly bear -

...In which our heroine has a requiem.

Like another lady I know, the blogs have been frequent lately. I should be reading a Howard Zinn article, but let me take a moment to lament for times gone by.

My dad always calls me on Mondays. He doesn't have to work until 4, and I don't have class. We talk about nonsense mostly. He asks me what I've been reading, watching, listening to. We talk about Mad Men, What Would Tyler Durden Do?, movie trailers, what have you. I look forward to these talks. As he says it, he taught me how to be cool, and now I keep him hip.

Today he broke my heart without even trying. Dads are good for that. He had knee surgery last week and thus can't work. He asked me for a sizable amount of money last week since I got my refund check, and what am I supposed to say? So I get to pay the phone bill for a few months.

That wasn't what broke my heart though, it's just money. He asked me about finding him a picture - for the first edition of A Game of Thrones, his most beloved and most valuable book. There is a picture of us, with the author, George RR Martin, on my desk from when we got it signed when I was a sophomore in high school. I asked him why, and he said so he could put it on eBay. And then my heart broke. Those, above all else, were the series of books that showed I was an adult. When I got to read them, it was his acceptance of me as a grown-up. We went to Dayton for the signing, and ate Uno at one in the morning on a school night. It's one of my favorite memories with him, getting those stupid goddamn books signed. "What do you want me to say, Kate? We're just scraping by," he said. I don't know what I wanted him to say.

He talked about selling my oboe and my clarinet, which I could give a shit about, but he talked about selling the others in the series, all signed. I bit my lip to keep from crying. Yeah, they're just books, but these are the things I get sentimental about. I hate that it has to be like this, that he ran our finances into the ground, drained my bank account to pay bills, so that when things like this or wisdom teeth or my grandma getting sick happen, it becomes dire straits.

But it's my dad...I know it kills him to ask for money, or at least I hope it does. I have to become financially independent but I can't say no to my parents. I think the truest test of growing up is realized your parents have just as many fucked up problems as you do, and that they are not the gods we build them to be.

This is one of those days I wish I was five again and my biggest worry was where the matching pink pumps were for my Barbies. I should stop bitching - one of my mom's friends has super invasive brain cancer and isn't doing well. Things, as always, could be worse.

We stopped talking about the book and started talking about what a weak year it has been for movies. He says he's going to watch The Hurt Locker, which I sent him. We talk about Kathryn Bigelow, female directors. I tell him I'm done editing and he says he's glad I'm so on top of things. I found a picture of the book, I tell him where to find it. I tell him to feel better and he tells me he loves me, monkey,...and not to forget to pay the phone bill. What was I supposed to say?

...In which our heroine takes a look back.

An ode in several movements: Katydid's favorite childhood movies. Watching these crappy 90s trailers for them makes my heart happy. I remember my first trip to Blockbuster, but am hard pressed to think of the first movie I saw in theaters. My dad and I were talking about how he let me watch anything as a kid, and it made me think of all this garbage.

Addams Family Values - I worshipped this movie. I wore out two Morticia action figures, from the cartoon version and had the book on tape, which I also worshipped. The goth in me started young.

Hook - To this day, if I'm freaking out, my dad will look at me and say "think happy thoughts." I will say this is one of the few on this list I enjoy as much now as I did then, despite how terrible it is. RUFIO!

Bingo! - Man, this movie fucking sucks, but it was right up there with Hook and Addams Family Values for most watched childhood movies. A dog with sunglasses, hilarity ensues.

Straight Talk - I'll make a post someday about my obsession with Dolly Parton from ages three to five, and while this isn't a trailer, it played on the VHS copy of the movie that was rented endlessly for me. 9 to 5 and The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas (which is a GREAT children's movie) were also in heavy rotation.

Straight Talk @ Yahoo! Video

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest - This was pretty rad, going green 1993 style, pandering to four year olds. I didn't get it, but I sure loved it.

Beauty and the Beast - Although The Little Mermaid, The Lion King, and Pocohontas also rate, this was the coolest. Pizza Hut at one point gave out oversized action figures from the movie that made awesome toys. For this movie alone, Angela Lansbury will always be "Angeberry" to me.

Beetlejuice - I could still watch this often. I loves me some Tim Burton, and this along with Pee-Wee's Big Adventure and Frankenweenie were favorites. (Braveheart with my dad was fine, but The Nightmare Before Christmas was deemed too scary by my mom.)

The 'Burbs - Why I was allowed to watch this, I'll never know. But it had something to with my love for Princess Leia, since Carrie Fisher is in this. Also by Joe Dante - Gremlins, which used to make me cry.

Beethoven 2 - I never liked the first one as much, and my stuffed Missy dog from the movie is testament to that. Poor thing is totally threadbare.

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm - If anyone ever needs a gift idea for me, the collected seasons of the Batman cartoon from the 90s would be great - although ChemGuy already started the collection. I liked both of Burton's Batman movies as well, especially Batman Returns, but the cartoon sticks out more vividly in my mind.

Nostalgia for childhood makes me so happy. Even if I was a weird, capricious little thing who liked Batman and Barbie with equal fervor and started reading Stephen King at nine. Thus, this is my favorite Barbie I've ever owned. I mean, green fishnets and green boots, c'mon!

...In which our heroine has sixteen candles, down the drain.

The Lollapalooza post is coming, but more pressing matters are at hand...

By now you know John Hughes died Friday, and although much has already been said about his passing, I have to contribute my thoughts.

There is a clear memory - sitting on my couch with my dad, I was probably six or seven. My mom was dyeing her hair in the basement. We were watching a movie of undetermined origin. Then, an adorable redhead in a heinous pink dress turned a corner down a long hallway and was greeted by a geek with a pompadour and mirrored glasses before they "plow" into prom. It is one of my earliest recollections of being moved by film, as it was of course Pretty in Pink. Watching that then, I had no idea the impact John Hughes would have on the way I watched films.

Here's another picture - ten year old, geeky Katydid taping double features of The Breakfast Club and Pretty in Pink off of TNT. Those two along with Sixteen Candles would complete what I lovingly call the Fiery Trifecta of Awesomeness with my girl Molly. All in all, I'd say that I've watched those films about 20 times each. I was smitten with the synth-pop soundtracks, the exploration of a teenage world I did not yet know, the unbearable whiteness of being.

Over the next few years, obsessed was not the word for how I felt about the films of John Hughes. Most of my early internet explorations were to a now defunct website called The John Hughes Files that contained every piece of trivia about the films. I made my mom check out a 1995 issue of Premiere magazine for the piece it had about The Breakfast Club. For months, the Pretty in Pink soundtrack put me to bed. I know things that define minutiae - like that The Pretenders were supposed to sing "Don't You Forget About Me," but Chrissie Hynde got pregnant so her husband Jim Rourke of Simple Minds stepped up, or that Molly Ringwald played "Pretty in Pink" so incessantly on the sets of her first two Hughes films that he wrote her a script about it, or that the band name written on her binder in Sixteen Candles, The Rave-Ups, appear as the house band in Pretty in Pink...I got all day with this stuff.

As all things do, the adoration I had for Hughes faded over time. High school - the very time that his films were made for - consumed me and I lost track. But now as an adult, or at least a post-high schooler, I've reconsidered his films and how damn good they are. The films I loved when I was really little, like Beethoven, Home Alone, and Curly Sue are his, and it all makes sense why I liked them then. We watch Christmas Vacation every year on the day, and I've had to school some college friends on the wonders of Molly Ringwald.

If I really think about it, the films of John Hughes were the first things I ever saw that showed me how well a synthesis of pop music and film could work. Few things make me happier then Duckie trying a little tenderness or Samantha blowing out her birthday candles with the Thompson Twins.

I wore out VHS copies of Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, The Breakfast Club, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, but my eternal favorite, Pretty in Pink, is the only one that made the jump to college with me on DVD. When I was getting ready for prom, I re-created the montage in it set to "Thieves Like Us" by listening to the soundtrack, just like Andie. I just wish I would of had a Duckie, or even a Blaine waiting for me...Maybe the reason I like the Fiery Trifecta so much is because Molly is the outsider, but always gets the guy - Jake Ryan makes me weak in the knees - and it gave me hope.

My sub-conscious did a good job in sending me to Chicago - after all, it's where all of the Hughes films take place. I've seen where Ferris Bueller twist and shouted, longed to make a pilgrimage to the fictional Shermer, Illinois. John Hughes was the first director I ever loved, the single greatest auteur of the teenage film before I even knew what that word meant. So it couldn't be more fitting that here I am, in the city I saw immortalized by some awkward teenagers, trying to make some movie magic of my own.

And at the end of the day, we were/are all some character in one of John Hughes's films - the geek, the basketcase, the rebel, the princess, or the jock - although mostly we're a little bit of each. And in his films, John Hughes showed that was okay. In the roundtable in The Breakfast Club, Allison says "When you grow up, your heart dies." Whoa. As much as we don't want it to be true, it is at least in the sense of the eternally hopeful teenagers in the Hughesverse. Talk of sequels always bothered me - who wants to see Samantha and Jake in a loveless marriage twenty years down the line? Above all else, I think John Hughes films pay tribute to the infinite possibility of what being a teenager means, standing on the brink of adulthood yet not quite there, and certainly not all the scary grown-up stuff that comes after.

Like everyone else, I owe a great deal to John Hughes for helping me navigate those troubled teenage years. I wish only he wouldn't have become such a recluse in the 90s-present because I'd have loved to know what he thought about my generation. I guess I'll just have to write it for myself.

He entertained and inspired me, so I am eternally thankful the films of John Hughes. For Samantha, Claire, Andie, The Donger, Allison, Duckie, Watts, Cameron, Farmer Ted. For Shermer, singing in the shower, blackest black eyeliner, hideous pink prom dresses, The Smiths, black and white capturing the moment, pawn shops, and St. Bernards. For making me an eternal optimist - although I'm more of an Allison then a Claire - that hopes Jake Ryan or Duckie really exists, or that Keith will choose Watts over Amanda. For making me remember to never let a geek borrow my panties, not waste good lip gloss or to always make-up wishfully,  to buy a pool when you might just end up with a jelly of the month club, but most of all, to not let my heart die when I grow up.

Cheesy, but well-edited:


Perfection. That is the boy:


My heart belongs to you forever, Duckie:


Making amends for that travesty at the end of Pretty in Pink:

Best. Lunch. Ever:


And if you haven't read this story about the man himself, please do.

...In which our heroine re-visits.

It's been a good week for nostalgia: A friend who I hadn't talked to in a year have chatted twice this week, I've been watching copious amounts of Roseanne on TV Land, the Pixies are bringing Doolittle back for a US tour, the joys of hangovers and working coupled together. But most importantly, there's been LISA FRANK.

If you were a female child in the 90s, you know what I'm talking about. It's all so exquisite:

That rainbow vomit artwork is so glorious! Unicorns and hip-hop teddy bears, yes please. It so reminds me of grades one through four. I really wish I still had all my stationery, stickers, folders, paper, pencils, erasers, and various other trash. The colors and the artwork are so heinously awesome.

This on the other hand is just plain awesome. I'm going to start posting a song per entry.

Today is Bon Iver's "Skinny Love." It's a song that marks a significant relationship, and it breaks my heart with its beauty.