Representations of Femininity in American Genre Cinema: The Woman's Film, Film Noir, and Modern Horror

225 Pages·2011·2.62 MB·English

by  David Greven

Representations of Femininity in
American Genre Cinema
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Representations of Femininity in
American Genre Cinema
The Woman’s Film, Film Noir,
and Modern Horror
David Greven
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representations of femininity in american genre cinema
Copyright © David Greven, 2011.
All rights reserved.
First published in 2011 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United
States—a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY
10010.
Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe, and the rest of the world, this
is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered
in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire
RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and
has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the
United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN: 978-0-230-11251-3
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Greven, David.
Representations of femininity in American genre cinema : the woman’s film,
film noir, and modern horror / by David Greven.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
1. Femininity in motion pictures. 2. Women in motion pictures. 3. Motion
pictures—United States. I. Title.
PN1995.9.W6G745 2011
791.43'6522—dc22 2010037447
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Scribe Inc.
First edition: April 2011
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America.
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For my mother, Florence; my aunts, Chantal,
Che-Che, Jannah, and Nan; and in loving memory
of my grandmother, Marie Therese Moïse
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Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Femininity and Film Genres 1
Part I: Freud and Classical Hollywood 9
1 Freud and the Death-Mother: Freud, the Woman’s Film, and
Modern Horror 11
2 Transformations of the Woman’s Film: Or, Feminine Myths 29
Part II: Modern Horror 81
Preface to Part II: Modern Horror as the Concealed Woman’s Film 83
3 Medusa in the Mirror: Brian De Palma’s Carrie 91
4 Demeter and Persephone in Space: Transformation, Femininity,
and Myth in the Alien Films 117
5 The Finalizing Woman: Horror, Femininity, and Queer Monsters 141
Coda: The Brave One 179
Notes 183
Index 205
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Acknowledgments
Portions of the manuscript have been previously published in article form. The
author gratefully acknowledges Refractory: a Journal of Entertainment Media for
permission to reprint “Medusa in the Mirror: The Split World of Brian De Pal-
ma’s Carrie,” originally published in the issue “Double Trouble: Special Issue on
Split and Double Screens,” Volume 14, 2008; and Jump Cut: A Review of Con-
temporary Media (no. 52, Summer 2010), for permission to reprint “Demeter
and Persephone in Space: Transformation, Femininity, and Myth in the Alien
Films.” The URL for the original Jump Cut essay is http://www.ejumpcut.org/
currentissue/GrevenAliens/index.html. I warmly thank the editors and anony-
mous readers at both journals for their incisive guidance and encouragement.
With equal warmth, I thank Mike Black and Black Summers Productions
for kindly supplying me with a pre-DVD-release copy of Black’s 2009 doc-
umentary Queer Icon: The Cult of Bette Davis. My thanks also to my friend
Corinne Ondine Pache for her insights into the Homeric Hymn to Demeter.
And, as ever and in all ways, to Alex Beecroft.
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