Sometimes a Rose is Just a Rose (and a Zombie's Just a Zombie): A Critique of the article "Hell is Older People"
I am a feminist. I really enjoy reading feminist zines, watching feminist films, engaging in feminist discourse. But every once in a while I read something that just makes me want to be like, "Oh COME ON. Are you really gonna play the gender card on THAT?"
Such it is with the article "Hell is Older People: Aging as the Ultimate Cinematic Horror"*. Even the title annoys me. Really? The ULTIMATE cinematic horror? Ok. Let's arbitrarily pick the first 25 movies that I reviewed in my sidebar at Come Play With Us, Danny and see if that holds true. Out of the 25, only ONE of them even remotely deals with aging or someone aged (Burnt Offerings). A far cry from aging being the "ultimate cinematic horror" I'd say. So when Prochuck again asserts, "the genre's movies are often dominated by elderly characters--usually elderly women", I can't help but roll my eyes. Again, out of 25 films, ONE features an elderly person, and indeed it is an elderly woman. But again: one. Not exactly a "domination" of a genre and thus, possibly not even something worth remarking upon.
These statements alone left me wondering: Have you ever WATCHED a horror flick, Alana Prochuck? Or a horror flick BEYOND the 6 that you use as examples here? Because if you HAVE, then perhaps you'd realize what a fierce exaggeration both assertions are. But wanting to give her the benefit of the doubt, I trudged on through the article.
Prochuck's main thesis in this article is that the elderly (particularly elderly women) are negatively stereotyped in horror films in a sloppy attempt to reveal our culture's fears of "isolation, frustrated attempts to communicate, bodily decay, imminent death." And she argues this point by picking apart examples of the elderly in 6 specific horror films: Drag Me to Hell, Dead Alive, The Exorcist III, Homebodies, The Skeleton Key, and The Hunger.
The main problem with the article is that Prochuck takes often minute examples of the elderly in films and forces what are frequently ridiculously overblown readings (that I'd argue aren't even within the text of the film) on them and then criticizes them based on these readings which are highly debatable in the first place. Her readings are often a ridiculous stretch, oftentimes just a mere second or two of a film expounded upon and given much more attention than it receives in the movie itself, and sometimes flat-out misappropriated to make her point. For example, when discussing Dead Alive, she mentions the elderly mom's transformation into a zombie, stating, "as she writhes and moans in pain, her wound pulses orgasmically, and her arm twitches in what can only be described as a masturbatory motion." (Really? Orgasmically? And not just disgustingly?) But let's roll with that and give her the benefit of the doubt that this sexualized reading is accurate. She then goes on to say, "Both the humor and the horror of this scene are rooted in the assumption that elderly women are sexless: As if to emphasize how harmful orgasms are to the health of little old ladies, Vera wakes up from her post-bite sleep lurching, slurring her words, and making a mess of her lipstick..." Hmmm, yes. Surely the lurching, slurring of words, and messy lipstick are a commentary on healthy orgasms in the elderly AND NOT JUST THE HUMOROUS END RESULTS OF A WOMAN WHO JUST TURNED INTO AN EFFING ZOMBIE. In critiquing horror films, we can't overlook the basic machinations of the film in favor of our reading just to make a point, and we can't just tack on a modifier ("orgasmically") so that our readers will assume that the movie intended it to be read as such. Sometimes a zombie transformation is just a zombie transformation and not a commentary on orgasms in the elderly. Prochuck tends to overlook the function of certain scenes AS PLAIN OLD PLOT in order to foreground her feminist reading of the scenes, and to do so means overlooking the fact that sometimes a rose is just a rose (or in this case, a zombie is just a zombie) and not a sexless but orgasmic old woman.
Another of her extreme overreadings of a very minute moment in a film deals with Exorcist III, in which she mentions a scene where an elderly woman crawls across the ceiling, stating "This woman is both infantile (crawling) and animilastic (hovering like a fly), but certainly not a responsible adult." Ha ha ha. WHAT?? The woman is CRAWLING ACROSS A MOTHER-EFFING CEILING, and you're critiquing whether or not her character was stereotyped as "not being a responsible adult"??? I think this is part of the problem in critiquing horror films in such a way: such critiques fail to acknowledge that pretty much EVERYthing in the horror film is no longer functioning within the realm of the realistic. If you can have an old lady who can crawl across a ceiling, is it even possible to critique her character within the realm of normal standards (whether or not she's being represented as a "responsible adult")? I mean, yes, perhaps she's not being depicted as a responsible adult, but SHE'S ALSO BEING DEPICTED AS BEING ABLE TO CRAWL ACROSS A CEILING, so I'm pretty sure we've moved out of the realm of realism at this point. So what does this mean for a critique that hinges upon the "realism" of certain characters' depictions within a film? It seems an enfeebled house of cards once that fact is acknowledged.
Again and again Prochuck also points out, with a weird bit of surprise (which again makes me think: have you never WATCHED a horror film, Alana Prochuck), how horror films embrace and reinforce *gasp* stereotypes (in her case, particularly stereotypes about the elderly). Well, good god, lady. That's like being shocked and perturbed by the fact that westerns *gasp* typically have cowboys in them or gunslingers and often take place in the west. THE HORROR. Those are the tropes and machinations of mainstream pop horror films**. Is it a brag-worthy quality for a movie, this embracing of stereotypes? Well, of course not. But that's the construction of modern horror. Most of these films rely on a standard horror film equation (one that was mocked by Scream for example) and that equation is RIPE with stereotypes and tropes and unsurprising story-arcs. So yes: they are reliant on stereotypes. This really is no surprise to anyone even remotely fluent in the genre. So is the problem here that they stereotype? Or is the problem that they're stereotyping the elderly? Or is the problem that, when it comes down to it, she just doesn't like what makes a horror movie? It's never quite clear.
The other problem with Prochuck's argument is that she fails to contextualize the examples she gives within their place in the movie. Using Drag Me to Hell as an example, it is indeed true that the elderly female lead in it is DISGUSTING and her "elderliness" is horribly exaggerated to the point of being nauseous. But so is everything else in that movie. She is not being given special treatment. The movie itself is over-the-top to the point of being absurd, and that was the joy of the ride. It might be different if the one character was being singled out, but indeed, the movie itself is a lesson in ridiculousness and camp. EVERYTHING is exaggerated and silly and gross and overdone. Mrs. Ganush isn't being singled out. So should we be singling her out in our criticism of the movie? I mean, in a movie where flies spew forth from a woman's mouth, is the depiction of an old lady as "gross" really that surprising?
What bothers me even more about this article though is that while it's criticizing stereotypes in horror films, the article itself is embracing stereotypes to make its point. In criticizing Drag Me to Hell, for example, Prochuck makes the statement "But when Christine exerts her professional power by denying Mrs. Ganush the mortgage extension, she is punished spectacularly for her lack of feminine compassion." Wait a minute. Yes, she's punished for her lack of compassion. I concur. But the movie doesn't make a statement about it being a lack of FEMININE compassion. Prochuck herself has tacked this modifier on to make her point and connect this back to gender. But in doing so, it's SHE who's stereotyping compassion as feminine, not the FILM. How much weight can we give an argument that, while criticizing stereotypes, uses stereotypes to clinch its own point?
I do indeed think a critique could be made of the depiction of the elderly (particularly women) in horror films. But this article does not even come close to making a good argument due to its failure to a) acknowledge that once, for example, an old lady is able to crawl across the ceiling in a movie, perhaps we need to acknowledge that we're no longer working in the realm of realism any longer and critique with a working acknowledgment of that, b) avoid stereotyping while criticizing others' stereotypes, and c) have some working knowledge of the horror movie genre beyond only 6 films.
Horror movies ARE the primary exploiters of our fears. That is HOW THEY WORK. They exploit our fear of the dark. They exploit our fear of the unknown. They exploit our fear of death. That is why we watch them. They scare us with our own fears. So really, is it any surprise that they offer "the exploitation of elderly folks... as cinematic shorthand for everything our culture most fears: powerlessness on one end of the spectrum and unrestrained evildoing on the other"? You could take this statement and replace "elderly folks" with any other subject, and the statement would be just as valid. This is the nature of the horror film: to exploit the subject matter (which is a representation of our fears) in order to scare us. It's not just elderly folks they exploit as cinematic shorthand for these fears, it's EVERYthing and ANYthing. The woman running blindly through the woods in an attempt to escape her pursuer = fear of powerlessness just as much as the elderly person does.
So ultimately, I'm not even sure how to respond to this article, other than with a "Seriously?" and also a "Duh."
*Bitch Magazine, Issue No. 46, p. 66
**Let us be clear that both Prochuck and I are differentiating between the artsier, interesting horror films out there and the mainstream American (or "western") horror films that are pumped out to mainstream movie theaters across the country. We're talking the cookie cutter horror films. (Her only debatable exception would be the 1983 film The Hunger which was more of an art film.)
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What I Thought About While Walking Back from the Cafeteria Today
Accidentally slipping on the ice. Falling in front of an oncoming car. Oncoming car running over only my hand. All bones in my hand crushed. Hand replaced with a prosthetic hand. Initial depression over my massage therapist dreams being crushed is quickly replaced with an insatiable desire to overcome adversity. Master very fine-tuned, mind-blowingly impressive massage work with my new robotic hand. Become #1 Massage Therapist with Prosthetic Hand IN THE COUNTRY. The End
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Harem-tastic
Chris Pratt.
Justification: The "Hunting Trip" episode of Parks & Recreation. I have not laughed so hard at a tv episode in probably a year as I did during the scenes between Andy (Chris Pratt) and April the Intern.*
I want to eat him with a really big spoon in a huge-ass plastic bowl of soymilk.
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*Alas: the episode and/or clips from the episode are nowhere to be found on-line otherwise I'd post them here. Also: piggyback.
Labels: harem
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Pros & Cons to Wearing a Ponytail
Pro:
I like the way it swishes against my neck when I walk.
Con:
I feel like I should be wearing socks with little pom-poms on them.
Pro:
I like the possibility of someone using it to pull me towards them and kiss me fiercely on the mouth.
Con:
Makes me feel like Stephen Seagal.
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Scabs, The Dark Baroness of SCAT, and Her Gastrointestinal Accordian
So my cat Esme (formerly known as Scabs) is hands down THE gassiest cat I've ever met. About an hour ago, she did a flip and farted as she landed. She farts when I pick her up. She farts when she's sleeping. Any time she folds or bends her body, a fart usually accompanies it. And when she's not farting, her stomach is churning away loudly. The other night, I actually thought I was hearing birds. I even asked out loud, "Are those birds?? AT NIGHT?!?" (because I frequently ask my cats questions, with rarely a reply), and then I realized it was her stomach. (And I'm not being even remotely hyperbolic when I say that.) Birds. A noisy flock of birds.
So in my head, I've created an elaborate persona for Esme:
By day, she is mild-mannered Esme, fey and waify; she talks in a whisper and all the boys think her "pretty" and "gentle." She is willowy and wears thin cotton dresses that catch in the wind, and if the sun lights on her in just the right way, one might even say she's beautiful:
But by night she is Scabs, the Dark Baroness of SCATology, headliner in Cleveland's Underground Circus of Freaks, where she literally plays her digestive system like an accordion, wowing the city's seedy masses who pay her a nickel to see her wail on her gastrointestinal accordion.
She bends and contorts her sleek body, cocking her eyebrows crazily as notes squawk from her innards, forming bawdy tunes that leave the crowds howling for more.
All the men are in love with her. And yet all the men fear her. (And for that, they love her even more.)
Here she cackles with delight as the men swoon at her feet:
Baroness of SCAT, and Her
Gastrointestinal Accordian
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Oh, Urban Dictionary! It's Like You're Writing My Biography!
[Favorite excerpts from the Urbandictionary definition(s) for my first name]
Lauren Is a name of which it means perfection and totally awesome And can relate to terms of awesomeness and a total cow sometimes
greatest living person alive
a term for a female who can't make hot chocolates properly.
only girls who have Sexy wavy hair, cute freckles, a sweet butt and give the best hugs are named this.
2.)An expert in bed, gives good head.
Drives a Gay ass Rabbit
HAS SOME PIMP SUNGLASSES!!
massive tits but a total slag takes pictures of herself naked and likes beating up boys
normally very hairy, like a man, including under arm stubble that ceases to vanish even right after a thourough shave, a mind boggling moustache, jungle like crotch area, and when the legs graze any part of the body, you feel as though you have been violated by a wildabeast/caribou.
Usually a racist, heartless, cold, soulless girl who all the asians like but she neglects and hurts. The asians are all affectionate towards Lauren. She is bitch.
anything you can think of.
A cat-like girl, or a cat who has been turned into a human being.*
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*This explains SO MUCH.
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Womens
Even though I don't actually know them, I love these women. And respect 'em. And read/stare at/squish over their web-pages every day. So give them some love:
We Own These Streets
Colossal Youth
And also these blogs (tumblrs? Not sure what tumblrs are other than misspelled containers you shake your booze in)--check 'em:
http://fuckyeahbeardedladies.tumblr.com/
http://genderqueer.tumblr.com/
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DREEEEE-EEE-EEEE-EEE-EEEAM, DREAM DREAM DREAM <--supposed to sound like that song but hard to replicate in print
Esme (the cat formerly known as Scabs) wakes us all up EVERY morning at 4am. And it annoys the piss outta me. But I must say: the vague sleep I get between 4am and 5:30am each morning has been the catalyst for some wild-ass dreams. And I haven't dreamed like this in a long while (or remembered my dreams, for that matter), so part of me appreciates the disruption.
Case in point is this morning's series of dreams:
- Dream 1: Franny is leaving massive orange shits around the house. When I say massive, we're talking the size of my forearm. I'm horrified that she's sick, and as I clean up after one of her messes, I look over, and she has changed into an orange cat. I reach out to pet her and as I do, she changes back into a black cat, kind of like those hypercolor shirts from the 90s.
- Dream 2: Hot hot sex with a friend of mine that is younger than me. Significantly younger than me. Thus, said person shall remain nameless. Mostly because sex dreams about friends should ALWAYS remain that way. Nonetheless: Mmmmmm.
- Dream 3: A large semi has apparently lost control of itself and slammed up my driveway and into my car, pushing it into the backyard. I don't see the actual accident take place. I just see the aftermath. I call 911. They don't answer. I find myself walking out to Mayfield Hts. from Tremont to get to Borders. I have no idea why. When I return, the semi is still there. I go to call 911 again, but one of the maintenance men is outside with the driver of the semi and he tells me he's already called. He also tells me the driver is drunk. The driver is lying on the ground in a fetal position, clearly injured, and breathing shallow. The maintenance man and I stare at him for a while. The maintenance man nonchalantly tells me we'll probably have to perform cpr on him soon. I nod. We continue to watch the driver suffer. Even more disturbingly, as I drift in and out of sleep this morning, I find myself hoping that the semi-situation is actually true 'cause then I won't have to go to work and train people from overseas. I am willing to accept a suffering and possibly dying driver if it means not having to go into work. MORAL TURPITUDE.
/END SCENE
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Nina Simone, I Love You So
True story: It was the soundtrack to The Big Lebowski that first introduced me to Ms. Simone. I owe the Coen Bros a thank you for that.
Labels: musics
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What If
A few weeks back, a friend of mine gave me a bag of spare cat food. It was a fairly junky brand, with ground corn being the first ingredient and several different types of "meal" and generic, unspecified "meat" ingredients also appearing close to the top of the ingredient list (all of which cat owners are told to steer clear from when buying cat food). I say this not to rip on her cat food choices but because MY CATS GO ABSOLUTELY NUTS FOR IT. I normally get them a healthy organic cat food, free of corn, meal, and unspecified "meat" ingredients, with bits of dried fruit & vegetables, and they're ok with it. But if I mix the two together in their bowls, they will literally pick the unhealthy, crappy food out and eat only that. And they eat it VORACIOUSLY. They will actually scavenge each others' food bowls just to get the unhealthy, crappy food out of them.
Which got me thinking with a bit of horror last night, if human beings aren't the only ones who'll opt for unhealthy, fastfood-quality food (which I'd always assumed was the case), what implications does this have?? Granted, both brands of food my cats choose between are processed, unnatural foods. But if the natural inclination is to eat that which tastes better, even if it's crappy and artificial and unhealthy, EVEN WITH NON-HUMAN ANIMALS, what does this say?
Is it possible that the "survival of the fittest" evolutionary tendency/programming many of us invest our beliefs in may actually be getting usurped by a self-destructive evolutionary programming? Could animal species (humans included) actually be evolutionarily programmed to reach a point in our timelines in which we begin to eradicate the existence of ourselves from the planet so that SOME other evolutionary heavyweight can step up? Are all these things that we're fighting so hard against--the health and environmental destructiveness of our food choices--actually PART OF the natural and intended course of evolution??
What if Werner Herzog's statement in Encounters at the End of the World that "human life is part of an endless chain of catastrophes" is dead on?
I don't know if I believe this of course, but good god: what if it's true?
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