Tonight we discussed the history, the institutional context of women within the film industry. We looked at the idea of the woman’s picture, whether it is possible to identify particular themes and content that could indicate a film is targeted for a female audience. We wondered whether it is useful to employ some of the cine-psychoanalytical approaches that would argue for a gendered gaze – in particular, whether it makes a difference that a man or woman are behind the camera (as director/cinematographer) or are part of the writing.
Thinking about the clip Beau Travail – is it helpful to consider it as reflecting the gender of the filmmaker? Using the ideas we collected around The Piano, I would argue there is an amusingly ironic play of the private/domestic (stereotypically female) activities with our ideas of the French foreign legion. The soldiers’ beautiful bodies are on display, but are domesticated – we see their private, ordinary interactions (as the Russian soldier learns French through naming the washing). This is juxtaposed with Rahel, a local girl, hanging out her own washing – more brightly coloured, less uniform. Has Claire Denis taken an archetypal male domain and somehow made it feminine?
Is it equally relevant that Denis spent her first ten years in West Africa (where her father was serving as an administrator in the French colonial services)? Her first feature Chocolat drew directly on this experience and Beau Travail continues this engagement withh French postcolonial identity.
Some of us talked about the sensory experience of these films, for example, the strong emphasis on touch in The Piano – as it starts with that x-ray shot of her fingers. Denis, for me, is visually really striking – creating sensations of that world just through the light and colour on display. Some women film critics have argued for touch to be a particularly appealing to female audiences and filmmakers. Do you agree?
Some of this, and our discussion, focussed on the form (camera shots etc) rather than the content. But what do you see as the most relevant questions to ask – about form, about the content of the films or about the context of the filmmaker?
itp Global Film 
To start the ball rolling, I’d like to comment (on the basis of the clip that we saw, alone, not having seen this film) that I thought the depiction of the men in the context of their domestic duties was done in a way which was humourous but which still allowed us to see their dignity, and also to encounter the power of the ideals being espoused by the figure in authority over them, whose views we hear. I thought what we saw expanded the traditional view of the subjects, rather than taking a cheap shot at their ‘masculine’ identities with a visual laundry gag!
Another expansive element was the way the legionnaires’ bodies were shown partially unclothed, and the way we are given time to look at them, to see that they might be attractive to women/men who are attracted to men. But the scene was in no way all about this to the exclusion of the other qualities I mentioned. I don’t think it HAS to be a woman who is directing for this to occur, but given the norms in the film industry at present it seems that would make it more likely, for now.
I’d like to hear more, though, from someone who’s seen the whole film…!
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It’s an interesting point you raise. After the class I discussed with Rona whether that particular sequence was representative of the film as a whole. We decided that it is quite surreal but also in keeping with the overall look of the film. There is actually a recurring motif of laundry and ironing, but used more as an indicator of daily routines than as a visual gag, so I think you are right there.
As to the display of men’s bodies, there is a great deal of this throughout the film for all kinds of reasons, but it is probably more interesting to discuss how the male body is being shown rather than why. Here I think it is worth emphasising that it is the combination of three women’s skills (director, cinematographer and editor) that is relatively unusual in this film.
The other aspect of the film that is important is the use of landscape and natural light, especially when the men are shown training, exercising etc. The film was shot in Djibouti on the Gulf of Aden. You’ll see something similarly surreal in ‘The Day When I Became A Woman’ shot on the Iranian island of Kish in the Persian Gulf.
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I completely agree with your comment, Sally – that while there was humour, it was overall a celebration of the subjects. This is elsewhere in the film – there’s a fantastic sequence where they are performing very controlled, tai chi movements in the deserts, doing pointless military exercises and peeling potatoes. As you say – they (director/writer/cinematographer aren’t criticising their masculinity, but the juxtapositions of all of these are raising a question of how these highly-trained men cope with an inactive existence.
Male bodies are often culturally treated as a piece of technology (see Men’s Health etc?) and this seems repeated in mainstream movies. I like the way this film is questioning/problematising this representation of men, particularly through representing their humanity and ordinariness.
It’s certainly something Denis (with Godard, her cinematographer)returns to in L’Intrus, which we’ll see later on.
I also really like the way Denis is able to make a narrative out of such fragmented pieces. Even in that short sequence, there isn’t a strong narrative drive, yet each scene adds something to our understanding of the characters and their situation. I find it quite mesmeric?
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