Away We Go: New Genre Type and the emphasis on a new type of family

This film is one of my favorites, it is the story of two a late twenties/ early thirties couple pregnant with their first child trying to find a place to settle down. The films follow the couple as they travel around the country visiting their old friends while the man tries to find a better job. They remeet people that they haven't seen in years and inevitably find that just as they feel that they have found a new home a dealbreaker occurs. The couple is a relationship of equals, just two complicated people trying to find their way in the world. The film seems to fit into a genre that also includes Juno and Little Miss Sunshine. Films that do not glamorize the average home or what people really look like when they get up in the morning. These details lead us to believe the rest of the story by giving the audience these signals of authenticity. The films focus more on the complicated dynamics of families and in these everyday occurances that happen in between them. These movies focus on new types of families than the 1950's family model. These movies tell the stories of real familes, where everything is not cut and dry but that doesn't mean that they are broken.

In Away We Go the couple deals with many issues involving how to raise children with a few examples as to how not to raise your children. As well as the little mundane issues and problems that come up between couples during pregnancy. One in particualr being that of female body image during pregnancy and that while the man keeps trying to be supportive by saying he would love her if she gained weight he is in fact not helping.

The film lays out the paths for the main characters, almost like windows into the future of each place they could live. Until finally *SPOILER* they end up at the womans childhood home and decide to create their own future and theat while the future is uncertain together they will try and make it through.

Blog Review: Movie Rights to Tragedy

After reading http://hootnaholler.weebly.com/ entry on the documentary following Aileen Wuornos: The Selling of a Serial Killer I started thinking on the nature of how female criminals are portrayed on film as a whole. There is a show that reruns constantly abotu the 15 most notorias acts of female violence. The violence is often the result of a failed interpersonal relationship. The violence that Aileen Wuornos shows is a result of her poor home life. The representation of the women feels like they are talking about a very dangerous animal most of the time. They show shots of the women with half cut eyes to make them seem more peculiar.
Having not seen the movie that the other blog is talking about I am drawing on my other expereinces of how she is portrayed. I feel fairly comfortable doing this because Hootnaholler described a similar expereince and type as seen in the other films. Where the drama gets in the way of the story, where the flash overpowers the facts...did we not all learn in our first computer class that just because powerpoint offers graphics doesn't mean someone should use all of them. However the blog entry also addressed the issue of profitting off of a story like Aileene Wuornos. It is my understanding that criminals can not profit off their crimes so how ethical is it for others to profit off of their crimes?
The blog mentioned that one of the last interviews with Aileen she made the point that not only was her once lover profiting off of her but so were the officers assigned to keep her. Also that at the end of the film that reports were going on investigating the officers that  may have profited off of her. If the officers were paid for their time to give the interviews about Aileen is that wrong? and if documentary filmakers profited off of their documentary about her and the murders she committed is that wrong? Perhaps this needs further mulling over.

My Guilty Reality TV Viewing

Like many people I have my share of favorite shows many of them follow characters that I would like to emulate. Reality TV shows on the other hand I usually watch because the actors/people (whatever they are) make me feel like a better person. However the two shows that I watch on and off are two portrals of women over the course of their lives, and the emphasis that is placed on events in their lives where they are the prime subject of a gase. The women are taught that being the center of attention is crucial and that money is no object to acheive this goal. For example the two reality shows that I watch are Bridezillas and Toddlers in Tiaras. I watch these shows almost as reminders as to what I never want to be, the shows do an interesting job of showing the reality of how women act. In bridezillas the women are usually completely over the edge screaming and lashing out at family members and friends and in general acting like children when they don't get their way (ironically this is the behavior of many of the girls in toddlers in tiaras). It is rather scary to see what can be spoiled and entitled little girls plastered in sequins, dancing provocatively or lying in the floor screaming turning into overgrown spoiled women doing the same thing while cursing. The cameras often are more sympathetic to the actual children, showing the parents usually as the over the top crazy ones and then the children as a byproduct. While in bridezillas the humor/ entertainment in the show is the voice of god nararator who sarcastically takes the audience through the trials of the week before the wedding. Often playing the cliche violin to add emphasis to the pity party the bride usually throws herself. The problem I have with the shows is that they continue to show women as the overly dramatic look obsessed version of women.

Dreamworlds 3: Why Portrayls in Music Videos Matter

Sut Jhallys Dreamworlds represents the fantasy world of the music video and its effects on popular culture, and its representations of masculinity and femininity. The film is almost whole shot of intercutting scenes from various music videos, however these are just the visual intercutting the songs that are so catchy are not played only Jhallys commentary on the images. Jhally makes the point that the stories being told by this fantasy dreamworld are not diverse, they are the fantasy world of heterosexual male fantasy. In this world women “know their place”, are always ready for sexual escapades and are highly allergic to any form of clothing. The film at first does nothing as most of the images are so common that we do nto notice them as unusual. However as time goes on and we are being informed of the message behind the images and what the really mean, you as a viewer gian this sense of discomfort. In some ways as a viewer I was able to see these images for what they really were for the first time. Jhally also addresses that while women are portrayed as passive sexual beings men are played as overaggressive abusive characters who exude power.

Jhally addresses the fact that while some objectification of bodies is alright it is not good when the only way that women can be presented in music videos is through this highly sexualized lens. He makes the point that while these videos do not cause the problem they do create an environment for problems such as attacks/abuse against women is more acceptable. One of the most moving segments is when Jhally shows footage of a riot during which several women were assaulted, the footage is then intermixed/intercut with mainstream music video and with the mainstream song played over it. The riot footage of the women being attacked and the club scene footage are almost indistinguishable.

Tough Guise and the Performance of Masculinity

Tough Guise ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79ijDA_1FVY&feature=related ) talks about the crisis in masculinity and the effect it has on the larger world. What is this crisis, this tough guise? This is the guise that men are taught to put up from a young age to repress feelings for fear of being seen as weak/emasculine/feminine. This repression results in men/boys releasing their feelings in the only social acceptable fashion, violence. Jackson Katz the creator uses the example of the Wizard of OZ. Specifically the scene when Toto pulls back the curtain on the wizard to reveal that the great and powerful OZ is in fact just a small man putting up a front, its all smoke and mirrors. That Masculinity is a performance. Katz goes so far as to show the scene during the documentary, this is a film that most people have seen and yet you find yourself looking at the scene a little differently.

Tough Guise also interviews young men and what they think a real man is and the consequences you face if you do not measure up. Often these insults are meant to insinuate homosexuality, these boys have such a narrow idea of what it means to be a man. That to be a man is all about being tough and stoic, not about showing emotions or compassion for others. In fact the opening sequence shows a blurred imaged with very aggressive male voices. As the image clears, you begin to realize that the picture is of little boy children posing flexing their muscles. This image sums up Katz's thesis for the movie that just as these children are performing so are other older men performing their own masculinity.

The move talks about the limited ways in which types of people are portrayed in the media and how it has only gotten more severe in some cases. For example looking at the way women are seen (getting smaller and smaller) and the way men are viewed (getting bigger and bigger) Katz theorizes that this is part of a backlash to the rise of women into spheres that were once reserved only for men. The best visual example of this is when the film shows what superheroes looked like originally in film (Adam West as batman) and how this changed dramatically as time went on. Another good example is showing what Star Wars figurines looked like in the 70s and then what the same characters looked like in the 1990s, the differences are startling. A modern example of change could be that of Captain America going form the small asthmatic boy to the impossibly huge Captain America that could lift a truck.