Tag: superman

snivllus:

naomialmaz:

Can someone show me where the male gaze is used in Man of Steel and Batman v Superman? I keep trying to thing of where it might be hiding, but I just can’t find it.

Like, take Lois’ bathtub scene, right? She’s curled up into a ball (after all that stress I don’t blame her) and the most we see of her above the water are her shoulders and collarbone area (along with her knees). Not once does the camera or Clark try to sneak a peak: they both focus on Lois’ face. We don’t even get a POV shot from behind her head to show her looking up at Clark. It would have been an easy way to show more of her bare back, but that never happens.

There’s no male gaze at play there, so where is it? Can someone tell me?

Oh man, I have so many thoughts on the male gaze and
BvS. That movie is a gift to humanity. I would totally argue that the male gaze
is not just missing from the
movie but subverts the traditional way women are presented in mainstream
blockbuster cinema.

As Laura Mulvey points out the male
members of the audience identify themselves with the male characters, who in
turn objectify the female bodies on screen. Through objectification, the man
can work out his castration complex and his anxiety over women’s role as
mothers. (This is a super short summary but check out Mulvey’s “Visual
Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”)

Superman throughout the movie struggles
with the way society perceives him, and his feelings towards Lois’ (his whole
world) and how, at the end of the day, he’ll always want to save her no matter
what. In a society where men are told women are their b*thes, and the female
characters are only the love interests of men, Clark’s devotion to Lois, and
that fact that the movie emphasizes her importance is unusual. Instead of
Lois being the damsel in distress, it is Clark whose entire world is gone
without her.  If you identify with Superman you aren’t encouraged to objectify Lois, you are encouraged to respect
her for her intelligence and bravery.

And then we have Batman, who is supposed
to be the coolest superhero, but instead he’s a guy who speaks in
absolutes, went through trauma, his only support system is Alfred, and he has
constant nightmares. The Nolanverse movies and the comics emphasise his
decision not to use guns, and this decision, where a lot of his moral standing
comes from, is totally missing from BvS. I’m not saying it’s impossible to identify
with Batman, but this Batman is angry, and traumatized and really, really sad
instead of the male empowerment fantasy most people expected Batman to be.

According to Freud and Lacan men find women’s role as mothers
uncomfortable. Guess whose roles did BvS emphasised over the fathers? Guess
which scene was generally hated by critics? Both Supes and Bats places a
special emphasis on the importance of their mothers.  Bruce’s father’s tomb is never even shown,
instead in his dreams he sees his mother’s grave. Superman repeatedly
demonstrated throughout MoS and BvS how important Martha Kent is.

Finally, Diana Prince enters the screen
and bitchslaps the male gaze into the next century. When Bruce tells her he’s
known women like her before, she assures him he’s wrong. Her mysterious past
isn’t mysterious so they don’t have to spend time explaining her motivations,
but to tease her own solo movie. When she’s watching the news coverage of the
Doomsday fight she has an Iron Man moment and she decides to suit up and help.
She saves Batman. She stands in front of the male heroes, who are in awe of
her, instead of objectifying her. She’s just as strong as Superman but well
trained, and obviously enjoys fighting, instead of having the “in pain” face on
she smiles. She has the most recognizable theme music. WONDER WOMAN. I’m
going to build a statue for DC just for the amount of work they put into WW.

So, no. No male gaze in BvS or MoS. Now I have to save
this on my computer.