The Dojo's Top Ten Films of 2019

Author’s Note: This list is a list of the most sociologically interesting films I have seen this year so far. It is not a list of my favorite films (though the higher the film is on the list the more overlap there will be) but of films that sparked sociological analysis in my head. I have not seen all of the films released this year. This list is subjective.

 This list will have three sections:

1) The Top Ten in descending order.

           2) Honorable mentions (Great film’s that just didn’t make the cut)

            3) The films I have yet to see released in 2019 that I am looking

                           forward to.

I.              THE TOP TEN

10) The Man Who Killed Hitler and then The Bigfoot

            This film wins for the most provocative title of 2019, and it is an apt description of the basic spine of the plot. Sam Elliot shines here as an old grizzled (and possibly immortal) former soldier who was tasked with the titular death of Hitler, and in the present (1970’s – 1980’s), is tasked with the killing of The Bigfoot that is causing a plague. More contemplative than its title suggests, this is a film that asks questions about duty, loyalty, love, loss, romance and regret. There is a great scene in a convenience store where Sam Elliot’s character pulls out a nearly unrecognizable dollar bill from his wallet and asks “Wonder how this one never got caught, to be destroyed so that new crisp legal tender could circulate.” The young man behind the counter smiles and responds “Sometimes, these old ones just hang on.” It is an interesting commentary on aging in a society and what happens when you reach an age where society has forgotten you. This film has a perfect opening shot and anthem for what it wants to be. Gorgeous.

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9) Her Smell

            Directed by Alex Ross Perry Her Smell tells the story of Becky Something (Elizabeth Moss) and her Punk Band, Something She. Told in a series of vignettes, the film drops the audience into various situations throughout Becky’s life. The real star here is Elizabeth Moss who wears the pain and struggle of Becky’s past and current issues with addiction on her face. The strain that Becky’s antics places on her other band members is slowly revealed through dialogue and actions. Sociologically, this movie gives us a glimpse at the music industry from the vantage point of an all-girl punk band. There are interesting gender codes, messages and stereotypes that come out of that that feel fresh and unique because we rarely get to experience it.  

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8) The Farewell

Lulu Wang’s The Farewell is a philosophical meditation on western vs. eastern ideas on the concept of death and dying. The film posits, that from the eastern (specifically Chinese) perspective, the realization of illness impacts the soul and psyche so much that it is a direct route to death. The plot centers around a Chinese American family who go to China under the guise of a wedding to pay their last respects to the family matriarch; who was just diagnosed with terminal cancer without her knowledge. Sociologically, the cultural differences between the Chinese American family, the Chinese members of the family and the Chinese members of the family that immigrated to Japan are really interesting to watch, as is the culture shock of the family’s decision to keep up the lie for most western viewers. Simply great.

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7) Parasite

            Korean Filmmaker Bong Joon ho for the last few years has been interested in social class dynamics. His previous film SnowPiercer and this year’s Parasite discusses the class stratification between the rich and the poor. Whereas Snowpiercer organized social class levels within certain train cars, Parasite does something similar with housing.  What is interesting about this film is the way that the title is a double entendre for all individuals within this film. Every character is living off each other in order to survive. For some, that survival is a literal removal from abject poverty, and for the other it is in order to maintain a established lifestyle. The parasites in this film are created either by desperation or by entitlement.

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6) Midsommar  

            Ari Aster’s sophomore outing after Hereditary, he wrote after a breakup. I think that a sociologist more well versed in marriage, family, and intimate partnerships would have a lot to say about this film. Since, that is not my area of research or emphasis I will try not to do a disservice in this brief analysis. Told from the perspective of a grieving college student Dani (Florence Pugh) who is invited to witness a Scandinavian commune while she is trying to navigate a toxic and gaslighting relationship with her boyfriend Christian (Jack Reynor). What proceeds is a slow revelation of archaic rituals that involve the torture and slaughter of the individuals brought to the community. Not only is this film asking interesting questions about relationships, gendered expectations and social more’s of relationships in the face of crisis, it also slips in a commentary about the importance of collective grief as a coping strategy. Which, when depicted on film, is a striking image of collectivist thinking that is more welcomed now than in the past. As a bonus, several of the characters in the film are cultural anthropologist doing research.  This hits a little too close to home and makes me want to never do fieldwork again. 😊    

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5) Maiden

“The ocean is always trying to kill you, and it never stops.” These are the words that open director Alex Homes film about the first all-female sailing team to enter and succeed in the Whitbread Round the World Race. The film is the resident documentary on this years list that also acts as a semi biography of Tracy Edwards, the young skipper and navigator of “The Maiden” This, like a lot of “glass ceiling breaking” films has the important task of expressing why these women were trailblazes of the ocean, how the deck was stacked against them, and how they became sailing icons . This film also goes the extra mile to dive into the specific relationships of each crew member and the gambles they took, choices they made and the rewards/criticism they got for those choices and decisions. This documentary is well worth your time.

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4) Uncut Gems

           This film takes you in the culture of the New York diamond district. It is a film that addresses a lot of different social issues such as blood diamonds, class stratification, and addiction; albeit indirectly. This is a film the directors, the Safdie brothers, have been trying to make for ten years. What is sociologically interesting about this film is the way that it places the audience in the shoes of gambling addict and jeweler, Howard Ratner (played to perfection by Adam Sandler). The film is so quickly paced we experience the stages of addiction along with Howard. We see him as he is needing a fix, the rising tension of wondering of the bet is going to payoff the utter elation that comes with winning big, and the horror when it doesn’t.  The directors’ strap you in, and do not let up on the tension until the very end. Sandler should at least get an Oscar nod.

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3) The Peanut Butter Falcon

            A road trip film that invokes Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Fin, The Peanut Butter Falcon tells the story of Zak (Played by Zack Gottsagen), a man with down syndrome who escapes his living facility in order to go to a wrestling school to become a professional wrestler.  Along the way he is aided by Tyler a vagabond fisherman (Shia LeBeouf) and pursued by his volunteer caregiver Elanor (Dakota Johnson).  Full of heart, warmth and genuineness that is unique in our current socio-political climate, this is both the film that we need right now and the film we deserve.

 This film would not exist without Gottsagen, (a down syndrome actor) who met the directors Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz at an acting camp.  He asked if they had a part for him in their next movie. To which the directors said that there weren’t a lot of roles for people with down syndrome (and they are often played by non owns actors when they are). An undeterred Gottsagen responded, “You just have to write a part for me.” And that is what they did.  This film is a testament to the importance of symbolic representation in film for people with disabilities. We need to be able to see all of ourselves on screen.

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2) Honey Boy    

            I was not prepared to have two films on my list that star Shia LeBeouf. I have been such a critic of LeBeouf in the past that if you told me last year that this would happen, I would have been very skeptical. However, like Nicolas Cage, LeBeouf has been redeemed through his role in the aforementioned The Peanut Butter Falcon and now Honey Boy. Honey Boy is a thinly veiled autobiography that came out of court mandated rehab LeBeouf had to endure to avoid a 7 year prison sentence. It follows him from his Even Steven’s days through Transformers. LeBeouf takes a soberingly raw introspection of his life that is full of contemplation and deep catharsis. LeBeouf actually takes on the role of his father, adding to the authenticity of the script and the film itself. He does not pull any punches here especially those directed at himself or his father. A summation of the kind of breakthrough this film must have been comes towards the end of the film. Lucas Hass (as the LeBeouf proxy “Otis”) is in rehab and he says to his psychiatrist “ The only thing good my dad ever gave me was pain. And now you’re trying to take that away from me.” LeBeouf should at least get an Oscar nod for writing.

Added Bonus: Shia LeBeouf being Interesting

The Songs:

The Interviews:

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1)  The Lighthouse

   

This is my perfect film of 2019. Not only is this film beautifully shot with stellar performances by the leads of Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson, the sound design is both crucial and amazing. This film is allegorical and mythic; drawing upon Norwegian myths and the Greek myth of Prometheus. Sociologically, this film talks about isolation its correlation with mental illness which can be exacerbated by both alcohol and gaslighting.  However, the strongest sociological theme here is masculinity. This film is very male, in the sense that the cultural norms and values that we socialize men into, and how those very things can lead to the development of mental illness and violence.  There is an analysis of male sexuality that is raw and uncomfortable, punctuated by homoerotic tension that is released with violence. This film indicates yet again the correlation that many scholars have made between masculine toxicity and violence. A brilliant, wonderfully interesting film that should be seen by everyone. Even though it may not be for everyone. This is the kind and the quality of cinema that we should strive for in 2020.

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II. Honorable Mentions:

The Art of Self Defense

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Stan and Ollie

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Booksmart

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Hustlers

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The Nightingale

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III.  Films Yet to See:

 Little Women

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Portrait of a Lady on Fire

The Dojo’s Top 10 Sociological Films of 2018

Author’s Note: This list is a list of the most sociologically interesting films I have seen this year so far. It is not a list of my favorite films (though the higher the film is on the list the more overlap there will be) but of films that sparked sociological analysis in my head and/or had wide cultural impact.

 This list will have three sections 1) The Top Ten in descending order.

      2) Honorable mentions (Great film’s that just didn’t make the cut)

      3) The films yet to be released in 2018 that I am looking

          forward to.

THE TOP TEN

10) Black Panther

           

            The film that recently caused the debate to have a popular film Oscar at the 2019 ceremony, Black Panther was a film that had a largely black cast and crew (which in 2018 is shamefully still a novelty) which allowed the central plot and the conflict between the protagonist (Chadwick Boseman’s T’Chala) and antagonist (Michael B. Jordan’s Killmonger) to be steeped in the issues black people of color face. One of the interesting impacts of this film was due to the long global history of slavery many black people of color do not know where their ancestry is from, thus once this film came out many of those without a country adopted Black Panther’s Wakanda as their ancestral home. 

9) You Were Never Really Here

            Written and directed by Scottish Film Director Lynne Ramsey You Were Never Really Here is a modern day Taxi Driver. Joaquin Phoenix plays a hitman that is assigned to recover a young girl from a human trafficking ring. As he continues the investigation he uncovers the seedy underbelly of bureaucracy and white men of power.  Powerful, tightly written with zero “fat”, this film is a lean social commentary about wealth and power.

8) Revenge

            A French Produced Gore revenge fantasy, Revenge is a gonzo Grindhouse-style film that literally ran out of blood by the end of the shoot.  The film does fall into certain sexist tropes (in the way that the female body is framed and the perpetration of sexual violence upon the protagonist) but once the titular “revenge” begins to take place, the squeals of obliterated toxic masculinity are enough to make up for how the film got there.

7) BlacKkKlansman

            Spike Lee directs the true story of Ron Stallworth a black Colorado Springs detective, who in the 1970’s infiltrated the Klu Klux Klan. The brilliance of this film is in the way that Spike Lee runs a historical thread from the 1970’s to the very issues of racism, oppression and murder people of color face today. From police brutality to subtle racism Spike lee shows us that the problems that we had in the past are still an issue today; going so far as to conclude the film with the protests in Charlottesville in 2017 concluding with the death of counter protester Heather Heyer.   

6) Eighth Grade

             Written and directed by comedian Bo Burnham, Eighth Grade is a window into female adolescence in the new millennium. There are moments in the film that everyone who went through that awkward stage as an early teenager can relate to, but there are also scenes that exclusively tackles the social issues that young girls face in our current culture. For those who think that white men can not accurately, or fully capture stories about girls and women should see this movie. Burnham is able to achieve an emotionally moving level of authenticity.   

5) Hereditary

            Brilliantly shot by Pawel Pogorzalski, Ari Aster’s Psychological and supernatural horror film Hereditary is a masterful treatise on mental illness and the strain of trauma upon a family. Grounded by a stellar performance by Toni Collette, this film is a spiritual companion to Luca Guadagnino’ s remake of Suspiria; however, if you watch them back to back, you may need to watch with all of the lights on and sing cheery Holiday carols after... or chase it with number 4 on the list.

4) Won’t You Be My Neighbor

            Strategically placed as a palate cleanser before we get to the top three, Won’t you be my Neighbor the documentary of Fred Rodgers and the program “Mr. Rodger’s Neighborhood.” captures the audience with nostalgia ( because the program spanned 30+ years ) and reveals the subtle radical social resistance of one man from Pittsburgh. The documentary shows us a less divisive and more inclusive look at social and political compromise. The film also emphasizes that Fred Rodgers was a religious conservative that treated all people with humanity, something that the film suggests we have lost sight of. Have a box of tissues at the ready.  

3) Annihilation

            A Sci-Fi Thriller by Alex Garland This film is noteworthy for the majority of its principle cast being female. The film spends time showing us the diversity of femininity in each character and how they deal with a situation that gets progressively worse. Focusing on how we deal with grief and the way that psychological trauma motivates us and shapes our perception. The Bear sequence is a marvel, and terrifying.

2) Suspiria

            Witches, Feminism and Male Panic; Luca Guadagnino’s remake is brilliant. Reinforcing the power of femininity and the power women have as a collective to challenge the patriarchal world, is amazing. Read my full review of Suspiria.

1) Mandy

            Anyone who has read my earlier review for Mandy should not be surprised by its placement on my list. Panos Costmatos’ film is full of Cheddar Goblins, Demon Bikers, and Hippie Cults, “ripped shirts” and “crazy evil” all anchored by the best performance Nicolas Cage has ever given.  Watch it, Buy it, give it to a friend…may not be for everyone.

HONORABLE MENTIONS

·         The Old Man and the Gun

·         Searching

·         Blindspotting

·         The Wife

·         Can You Ever Forgive Me

MOST ANTICIPATED YET TO COME IN 2018

Spiderman: Into the Spider-verse (Dec 14^th)

Vice (Dec 25^th)

On the Basis of Sex (Dec 25^th)

Anna and the Apocalypse (Dec 30^th)- US (wide)

Destroyer (Dec 30^th)

The Feminism of “Suspiria” terrifies the Patriarchy

INTRODUCTION

Luca Guadagnino’s “Suspiria” is a remake of the classic psychedelic horror film of the same name directed by Dario Argento in 1977. Due to the affection for both the original film and Argento himself, Guadagnino crafted (a sometimes literal) spellbinding film that both honors the original, updates the themes, and deeply explores the diversity of the female experience and the power of female unity in what Adrianne Rich calls the lesbian existence. It is through these themes, cinematography and Foley art that casts Suspira as a modern horror masterpiece. It is unfortunate that regardless of the brilliance of this hewed piece of artful cinema, this film has yet to catch on with audiences; critics and audiences alike citing the run time ( a hefty 151min) and pacing problems as some of the chief complaints with many a review calling the movie dull. The film’s tepid reception is not a reflection of the quality of the film, instead it is indicative of a culture that has become addicted to spectacle[1], and more acutely, unaccustomed to dark disturbing tales of femininity and the ascendency of women through a matriarchically hierarchy, as they vie for power. In short, this is a film completely about women and their relationships with themselves that has nothing to do with men, and for those with fragile masculinities, reinforces deep seeded cultural fears of female empowerment.[2]

PLOT

Set in 1977 against the backdrop of a hostage crisis in a still divided Germany, Suzie Bannion (Dakota Johnson) auditions for The Markos Company a prestigious, yet mysterious modern dance troupe in Berlin. Once accepted she is taken under the wing of choreographer Madame Blanc (Tilda Swinton) to be groomed as one of the group’s star dancers. As Suzie becomes deeply entrenched in the inner workings of the Markos house, she discovers a hidden world of Occultism, magic and witchcraft, fracturing from a power struggle between the organization’s top two matriarchs.    

FILM ANALYSIS

            Guadagnino’s Suspiria is a masterclass in filmmaking. Every aspect of this film is painstaking and meticulously planned out, there is nothing here that seems accidental. Guadagnino has stated that as a soft remake of the Argento film, he made choices about color, light music and mood that would separate the film from the much beloved Argento classic. Where Argento was colorful, Guadagnino was muted, Where Argento was blackly comedic and gonzo in the zeitgeist of the time, and Guadagnino was introspective and subtle. In fact, Guadagnino worked tirelessly to separate his film from the original in hopes to reducing comparisons due to the films specific diversions.  Suspiria (2018) is not Argento’s film and Guadagnino knew that any imitation would not be welcome. So he decided to make the film his own.  Unfortunately, we seem to still be stuck in the gravitational pull of popular nostalgia and the form of comfort that it can provide a mass audience. Thus, it is clear that many people were looking for an Argento update rather than the rich, layered, allegorical narrative that Guadagnino provides through the Cinematography, sound and soundtracks art and film directing, and a trifecta of performances by Tilda Swinton makes this version of Suspiria superior to its predecessor.

Cinematography

 It is though the film’s cinematography that Guadagnino solidifies the differences between this rendition of Suspiria and Argento’s vision.  As mentioned above, Argento’s film is full of bright neon and psychedelic colors that is more invoked by Panos Cosmatos’  Mandy than its own remake whereas cinematographer  Sayombhu Mukdeeprom subdues the gonzo maniacal intensity into something grimier and grainy that is far more evocative for a film about ethereal supernatural forces. Guadagnino’ s film seems to tap into a different style of the Post Civil Rights Zietgiest before the era of Reganist excess thus being more reminiscent of 1970’s crime thrillers[3] than the original film. The use of shadows and dark browns gives the audience a feeling of constant dread. It is this look that gives texture to the backdrop into which the story unfolds; adding to its bleak perspective. The harsh reality of an economically shattered and divided Germany weighs on the film and intensifies the story before us. Mukdeeprom and Guadagnino give us no respite and nowhere to hide. That results in a nail biting psychological tension that grips the audience like the taunt muscles of someone being drawn and about to be quartered.

Foley Art

            The other constructive style of this film that intensifies the atmospheric tension that Mukdeeprom creates is the use of sound.  The music for Suspiria was composed by Radiohead singer Thom Yorke and while his contributions to the films soundtrack and music are important in keeping the tone of the film, the more awe-inspiring work that adds to the distinctive ambiance is the work from the Foley team of Nicolas Becker, Olivier Guillaume, Carsten Richter, Hanse Warns and Olga Pasternak. Foley is the film term for the sound effects of everyday life named for sound effect artist Richard Foley.  It is their job to recreate the ambient sound within the film. Therefore, the Foley artist is attempting to create and or maintain a film’s mood through ambient noise.  However, the Foley team on Suspiria is not only integral in maintaining the bleak haunting texture of the film, but adding to the social commentary of the film’s prose.

            One of the best examples of the impact of the Foley art on the overall film is during Susie’s dance audition for the company. Guadagnino smartly strips all of the sound out of the scene which emphasizes the work of the Foley artists.  In the scene, the creaking and groaning of the wooden floor as Susie moves through her routine with a force that epitomizes the strength in her body.  We hear her deliberate and controlled breath as she strikes each pose hearing the twisting of her body, the whipping of her hair, and the magnitude of the density of her body as she crashes upon the floor. The result of the Foley’s work is the reinforcement of the power and athleticism of ballet dancers and the female form in general. While this power is on display throughout the film in other small ways (I am thinking of the “jumping” scene) none compare with this first scene.

            The other example that takes this inherit power of the female form and takes it into the realm of the Supernatural is the scene of Olga’s destruction. Here the power of Susie’s dancing is displayed through the violence upon Olga’s body.  The scene of Susie’s dancing of the lead of the new piece called “Volk” is intercut with the destruction of dissident and disillusioned dancer Olga. With each movement, Susie systematically breaks down Olga from the inside; until she is nothing but a contorted heap upon the floor. The Foley art on full display echoes each break of Olga’s bones and heightened screams as she is mangled through Susie’s movements. Through this Foley work the power of Susie and the power of the coven is on full display.

SOCIAL ANALYIS

Laying the Ground work

This film is dense and rich with distinct content that is ripe for Sociological analysis. There have been many reviews that reinforce the film’s social importance. Some comparisons to holocaust analysis and the parallels to the Alt-Right to a repudiation of masculinity. That being said, the major criticism that is levied against the film is just how feminist it is. There have been some arguments leveed against the film it is misogyny masquerading as feminism that, as one review noted:

[There is an] unintended, undercurrent of misogyny, epitomized not only by the theme of witchcraft (a manifestation of men’s fear of women’s power, if ever there was one), but in the film’s frequent nudity and violent objectification of women’s bodies. Two scenes feature female characters being grotesquely contorted by supernatural forces. There’s a thin line between indicting the male gaze, as Guadagnino claims to have intended, and reveling in it.”[4]

In social analysis, especially about gender, it is difficult to parse out whether the use of the male gaze and sexist troupes are subverting it or reinforcing it. This all comes down to individual interpretations on the execution of that theme.  For instance, Luca Guadagnino, in an interview with Jezebel outlines his feminist intent for the film[5], but that does not negate the fact that most of the individuals behind the scenes, the architects of the film are men. This then leads into the basic and fundamental questions of how well can men tell female stories, and can those stories be feminist?

Generally, if I could make a crude summation of the literature that I have head and been privy to, the answer is complicated. Yes, men can tell stories about women, and those stories can be feminist, as long as they involve women behind the scenes, making them integral to the process with the understanding that there is no one singular female voice. One of the most important roles of this collaboration is to make visible the internalized masculinity and or misogyny that the male creators have been socialized to. It is important for any male creative to be self-reflexive about their understandings of gender and be able to be challenged by others allowing the piece of art to be as egalitarian as possible.[6]  This is in addition to having a whole host of racially, economically and ability diverse female creators of new content.  But if men want to create, they also need to be inclusive. However, it is unfortunate that regardless of this increase in inclusivity, there are some, (granted a loud and vocal minority) that the feminist fundamentals of a film like Suspiria terrifies them; and this is where I believe the movie shines.

Witchcraft, Feminism and Rich’s Lesbian Existence

There has been a long history of Witchcraft being a feminist allegory in media The current resurgence of pagan attitudes and feminism can be traced back to fallen feminist ally Joss Whedon and his use of Witchcraft to not only reinforce feminist sentiments but also as an allegory for Queer identity.  There is an attraction to these pagan beliefs for any marginalized group, but especially for women. Witchcraft provides an independence and power to women that is often denied them in oppressive male dominant structures like the patriarchy.  To that end, actual witchcraft, has positioned itself as a trending alternative to more traditional and historically masculine religious institutions. Witchcraft has a collective component that is less emphasized or absent in those systems and plays on the strength of what Adrianne Rich calls “The Lesbian Existence”. In her article, Rich exclaims:

“Lesbian existence comprises both the breaking of a taboo and the rejection of a compulsory way of life. It is also a direct or indirect attack on male right of access to women. But it is more than these, although we may first begin to perceive it as a form of nay-saying to patriarchy, an act of resistance. It has of course included role playing, self-hatred, breakdown, alcoholism, suicide, and intrawoman violence; we romanticize at our peril what it means to love and act against the grain, and under heavy penalties; and lesbian existence has been lived (unlike, say, Jewish or Catholic existence) without access to any knowledge of a tradition, a continuity, a social underpinning. The destruction of records and memorabilia and letters documenting the realities of lesbian existence must be taken very seriously as a means of keeping heterosexuality compulsory for women, since what has been kept from our knowledge is joy, sensuality, courage, and community, as well as guilt, self-betrayal, and pain”

As the term "lesbian" has been held to limiting, clinical associations in its patriarchal definition, female friendship and comradeship have been set apart from the erotic, thus limiting the erotic itself. But as we deepen and broaden the range of what we define as lesbian existence, as we delineate a lesbian continuum, we begin to discover the erotic in female terms: as that which is unconfined to any single part of the body or solely to the body itself, as an energy not only diffuse but, as Audre Lorde has described it, omnipresent in "the sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic," and in the sharing of work; as the empowering joy which "makes us less willing to accept powerlessness, or those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial[7]

Rich identifies in this stitched together passage, (as in the article as a whole) that in a patriarchal system women are taught to see other women as a source of contention and competition for male attention (Thus making heterosexuality compulsory through socialized behaviors, reinforced by rewards from social structural institutions (Marriage, family, Military economy etc.)), and denying the reality of the power women have among and with each other by placing undue emphasis on the type and nature of a relationship rather than what that relationship provides for the individuals involved. Thus, women are socially trained through compulsory heterosexuality and patriarchal oppression that the most important relationships that they have are with men, and that all other relationships are secondary within this structure. This is fundamentally the opposite of what Witchcraft is, and the very thing that Guadagnino’s Suspiria challenges in its story and character representation.   

                 In the story, we find out that the coven was created as a refuge for women after WWII and the Nazi regime. This places the coven in direct opposition to war which is an obvious thinly veiled allegory for masculinity. Additionally, the only male character Jozef Klemperer in the film doomed his wife by not listening to her protests and prophetic statements about the spread of Nazism and in the story he only functions as a witness to the unbridled power of the coven, doomed to forget everyone, including his wife. As Klemperer, is being dragged down to bear witness to the final ritual, the coven’s feminist thesis is succinctly spoken. Miss Huller (Renée Soutendijk) states “When women tell you these things, you don’t believe them. Instead, you call them delusional.”  Additionally, Guadagnino’s remake has no principle male actor’s in any major role. All of the roles, are played by women including Klemperer played to perfection by Tilda Swinton (in one of three roles in the film: the others being Madame Blanc and Madame Markos) thus it is a feminist story portrayed entirely by women[8].

  

Male Panic disguised as Criticism

There have been critiques of this film, usually by men, that attempt to use feminist thinking to “out” this work as being offensive and antifeminist. This technique is called “Abstract Liberalism”.  A technique that is often associated with a critique of Anti-Racism, it is when individuals invoke a liberal idea as a way to justify the dismantling of a behavior, policy or action that would eliminate oppression. A famous example is from Sociologist Eduardo Bonilla-Silva’s book White Supremacy and Racism in a Post-Civil Rights Era where he identifies abstract liberal language as such “I am for equality that is why I am against affirmative action.” When we apply this notion to the critique of feminism in Suspiria the issues that are often invoked are shallow understandings of feminism (such as people critiquing the female on female violence in this film) or feminist understanding still steeped in a heterosexual male gaze perspective.

 One such instance was when the aforementioned male reviewer believes that the amount of female nudity in the film is offensive and oppressive. This is only offensive and oppressive because, due to the male gaze, the writer cannot see, because our society has not taught him, to see female nudity as anything but exploitative. The writer does not recognize the possibility that female nudity could be empowering, and that his distaste for it, is not a feminist ally critique, but a representation of oppression. He didn’t like the nudity in the film because it wasn’t sexualized in the context of the film. By displaying female nudity as not only something powerful, but also to have nothing to do with men shatters the construction of fragile masculinity that our culture pieces together; Thus, by lashing out at a depiction of the female body that is not designed for sexual titillation of men, reinforces the patriarchal structure rather than dismantles it. Additionally, this male panic was legitimized, and validated in the way that many of the promotional materials for the film visually depicting a source of power in the film as vaginal was later obfuscated in the final film.

 Anecdotally, I saw this disguised male panic happen in every screening I went to. As I would exit the theater, there would be one of my fellow male audience members that would be complaining about the film, (initially citing the film’s length or pace) and as the complaint continued is very quickly shifted into a thinly veiled sexist rant. However, if this film illicit such a visceral response in insecure mediocre white men, then it must be doing something right.

CONCLUSION

In his article The Globalization of Nothing[9]  Sociologist George Ritzer defines nothing as anything that is general mass produced and which ultimately is devoid of distinct and rich content; conversely he identifies “Something” that is uniquely created and that is rich in content and structure. The problem that people have with something is that usually it both has a built in audience that may or may not include a specific individual’s tastes and that it is making a particular statement. Thus, Ritzer concludes that most people believe that they want something rich and distinct, but in reality, based upon consumption patterns, we instead want a large variety of nothing.  The variety of nothing gives the illusion of something while retaining a mass market appeal, and making those products impermanent so they can be replaced. It is a process that supports continuous capitalist consumption and commodification.  To this end, those who were just looking for a carbon copy, updated version of Argento’s film were looking to be satisfied with Nothing. However, it was through the cinematography, art and film direction to the Foley work and casting coupled with rich and dense themes that accompany it, Guadagnino’ s film makes a statement about feminism, women’s relationship with other women and its inherent power. It is the embodiment of Something over so many other films that disappointingly turn out to be nothing.

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[1] The only movies that are making money anymore are the big superhero tent poles. This causing an overall reduction of the numbers of films being made from original content.

[2][2]  Thus, if men find that they cannot relate to what is happening on screen, they assume that it is a fault of the film, rather than their own fallibility, and the oversaturation of male stories within our culture.

[3] https://www.indiewire.com/2012/11/5-great-70s-crime-thrillers-103521/

[4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2018/11/02/very-witchy-suspiria-is-supposed-be-radically-feminist-movie-how-so/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.6538b47e6013

[5] https://themuse.jezebel.com/director-luca-guadagnino-on-assaulting-the-senses-and-i-1829994124

[6] Though if you listen to the cheeky brilliance of Chief Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, she believes the only way to have equality on the Supreme Court is if you have an all-female court structure for as long as there was an all-male supreme court. J

[7] Compulsory Heterosexuality and the Lesbian Existence by Adrianne Rich

[8] This of course means that is also passes the Bechdel test with flying colors, in terms of representation.

[9] https://www.jstor.org/stable/23250006?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents