Laura Mulvey's Theory
Laura Mulvey is a feminist who applied psychoanalytical theories to film as a political weapon against female suppression , taking inspiration from both Freud and Lacan to create her theory of the male gaze.
Mulvey looks at the elements of film and applies the ideas that film fascinates us and how the mainstream of cinema had become dominated by men and male characters whilst making female characters less deep and more passive. Mulvey then preposed a theory that can be applied to film and media called the Male Gaze in her 1975 Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. It explores the fact that in cinema we view through the perspective of the camera and that viewing is pleasurable. If the camera is directed by that of predominantly heterosexual males then the outcome would be that the gaze of the camera is a Male Gaze. This becomes a potential problem where in this view women are portrayed as passive and sexual whilst men are cast as the ones with choice and are the star then this reflects on audiences. Audiences who watch these films will then aspire to the portrayal with women focusing on their appearance and men on their choice and dominance to the point where it is not only accepted but expected. This can apply to what state of mind the individual has when it gazes upon the world and their ideas of masculinity and femininity.
Freudian Scopophillia theory is the theory that looking is pleasurable (Sigmund Freud 1905). To have the camera as the point of view for which the audience views we start to associate that with being pleasurable. To have the image be that of passive women with close ups and pans splitting her into a commodity we are positively rewarded from seeing these images and would indulge more into our repressed perversions. The way in which this can be seen as a problematic theory if its is used too much is how it can effect the minds of the audience by changing there morals.
Freudian Scopophillia theory is the theory that looking is pleasurable (Sigmund Freud 1905). To have the camera as the point of view for which the audience views we start to associate that with being pleasurable. To have the image be that of passive women with close ups and pans splitting her into a commodity we are positively rewarded from seeing these images and would indulge more into our repressed perversions. The way in which this can be seen as a problematic theory if its is used too much is how it can effect the minds of the audience by changing there morals.
"Although the film is really being shown, is there to be seen, conditions of screening
and narrative conventions give the spectator an illusion of looking in on a private
world. Among other things, the position of the spectators in the cinema is blatantly
one of repression of their exhibitionism and projection of the repressed desire on to
the performer."
How it can be applied to film is to that of heterosexual male dominated productions, a lot more considered the "norm" from the start of hollywood and the increase of rich male investors through until sometime after Mulvey released her theory. It helps when she said that she would use it as a political weapon as people of her generation fought to bring rights to other peoples but it doesn't mean that the theory is fully out of use using more modern examples. In some cases the "Gaze" has just changed from it being a male one to that of a female one or a queer identity gaze. This can be seen in advertising and mainstream films in a joking almost over gaze to try and absolve the previous transgression of the male gaze but doesn't work as there is no apology and the examples of this, a mostly negative thing, is still outweighed by the examples of male gaze in movies today. Movies be male directors like Michael Bay's Transformer's franchise fetishise its female characters. More insidiously you could say that a new generation of male dominated teens are brought into this by "Teen/College" films like the American Pie franchise. Most may think Mulvey an outdated theory to apply but it can still be utilised to some extent today.
How it can be applied to film is to that of heterosexual male dominated productions, a lot more considered the "norm" from the start of hollywood and the increase of rich male investors through until sometime after Mulvey released her theory. It helps when she said that she would use it as a political weapon as people of her generation fought to bring rights to other peoples but it doesn't mean that the theory is fully out of use using more modern examples. In some cases the "Gaze" has just changed from it being a male one to that of a female one or a queer identity gaze. This can be seen in advertising and mainstream films in a joking almost over gaze to try and absolve the previous transgression of the male gaze but doesn't work as there is no apology and the examples of this, a mostly negative thing, is still outweighed by the examples of male gaze in movies today. Movies be male directors like Michael Bay's Transformer's franchise fetishise its female characters. More insidiously you could say that a new generation of male dominated teens are brought into this by "Teen/College" films like the American Pie franchise. Most may think Mulvey an outdated theory to apply but it can still be utilised to some extent today.
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