woman VS woman

The movies this week, the comedy Dance Girl Dance, and the mellow drama The Bigamist, were enjoyable to me. Both movies directed by women, but each had a very different feel to them. It was very interesting to compare the two films because women did direct them allowing us to see the woman's gaze into the movie. Dorothy Arzner who directed Dance Girl Dance was known for having an essentially female presence in her films.

Essentialism suggests that a female artist will make distinctively different work than a male, because of some “essential and unmediated” relationship between gender and art.

This statment is very interesting because that means you should be able to tell a woman's work from a man's by simply viewing the piece. The Bigamist by Ida Lupino did not strike me as a movie that was clearly directed by a female. After watching I felt no difference in the feel of the film then from something that a man would have directed. However, you could see signs of a strong woman influence in Dance Girl Dance. The scene that stands out the most in Dance Girl Dance that shows a female gaze is when she is doing her burlesque performance. The character Judy does this by standing up for what she thinks by telling the audience her opinion on their behavior, an opinion that may have been neglected in a piece directed by a man. By Judy telling them that for fifty cents a night they can gaze at someone their wives will not let them look at and that she should not have to be taunted by them. These men are there to feel better about themselves and walk away with a macho feeling inside.

It is definitly hard to see how essentialism works since we saw two films by women directors, and one looked like a man directed it, not a woman. This shows that a woman does not have a difference in how their films are because they are just woman, proving that essentialism is not a theory that can always hold up as being true.

I found the Bigamist to be very unique in how Ida Lupino made you feel sorry and pull for the male character, Harry. You should completely dislike him because he is married to two different ladies and has a child with one of them. You usually see in a movie that you feel sorry for the victims like the two wives. I would have to say that I disliked Eve's character because Harry tried to get her to do couples things together but she was always focused on the business, so no wonder Harry found somone that needed him.
http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/cteq/04/33/dance_girl_dance.html
http://www.filmvault.com/filmvault/nash/i/idalupinoqueenoft1.html