Tuesday, 3 November 2009
Feminist Exploitation
Kira Cochrane - who is called on so often by the Guardian to give a feminist perspective on horror films I'm hoping she'll be converted to the genre one day - writes about "feminist slasher" Jennifer's Body in today's edition. Unfortunately it sounds pretty unremarkable and not particularly feminist, despite the credentials of writer Diablo Cody, director Karyn Kusama, and indeed lead actress Megan Fox. I agree with Cochrane that a film really needs some sort of political subtext to become feminist, not just a few ballsy female parts, which often counter-productively reduce characters to femme fatale stereotypes anyway.
Cochrane lists a few interesting-sounding exploitation films she considers feminist, but I was disappointed to see no mention of The Witch Who Came From the Sea. Shall I send her a copy, or do you think that would look a bit weird?
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I finally got round to watching Jennifer's Body recently. It was really disappointing, especially considering the calibre of the scriptwriter. It didn't know whether to be cute or scary and ended up being neither. I didn't see anything particularly feminist about it, either.
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