ENGL 2231 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Bell Hooks, Classical Hollywood Cinema
Document Summary
The gaze of the spectator and that of the male (heterosexual) (cid:1) characters in the film are combined. (cid:1) (cid:1) Female passive (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) (cid:1) Women in classical hollywood cinema are there to be looked at. Men are the subjects of the film (complex psychology, motivation); women are the objects of the male gaze (flat psychology, they motivate action. Camera technology (as exemplified by a deep focus in particular) and camera movements (determined by the action of the protagonist) combined with invisible editing (demanded by realism) all tend to blur the limits of screen space. The male protagonist is free to command the stage, the stage of spatial illusion in which he articulates the look and creates the action. The male gaze is a way of talking about how film form passes off a. Invisible editing produces the illusion of naturalness. biased or subjective pov as natural.
