Shock Corridor

Howdy, first thing first - is that a terrible title? I think that might be a terrible title. I have to do this stuff unsupervised so things like that will happen. Anyhee, this post will have a wee look a 'strong' female roles by focusing on two recent-ish animations:   Brave (Mark Andrews and Brenda Chapman ( co directed Steve Purcell ), 2012) and  Monsters vs Aliens ( Rob Letterman and Conrad Vernon, 2009). The main reason for this is twofold I've loved Monsters vs Aliens  since the first time I saw it, in Norway no less, and I think it was woefully undervalued, in particular the lead character always who stood out for me. The other reason is the (over)praising, as I see it, of  Brave; it was garnished with awards , fawning reviews, and all sorts so it must be good, right? Well, it's not only good but it is politically challenging! It's shaking cages and rattling...some...some other cages - and knocking bins over or something...I dunno - it's progressive! Bu...

The continuing (limited and selective) ramble in defence of Alfred Hitchcock's portrayal of women. A wee while ago I had a look at Rear Window (1954). Inspired by an article I read that reduced Hitchcock's portrayal of women thusly:   'Hitchcock's women are outwardly immaculate, but full of treachery and weakness. But, hurrah, he doesn't kill them all. He just teaches them a thoroughly good lesson.'  ( Bidisha, 2010 ).  In that post I intended to suggest that Hitchcock counterpoints male and female points of view and that ultimately the male point of view is the one that shifts (that was the idea, don't know if I pulled it off). Here I want to look at the women in The Birds (1963) and how these characters fit into a wider societal context. Bidisha distils the essence of The Birds to this: The message is that women (a) are all about men and (b) can't get along because they're so busy pecking and squabbling over men. Mitch's mum hates Melani...

Howdy. Offft! This one has been a long time coming but here's another wee post looking at some of Alfred Hitchcock's output...his filmic output, nothing else - certainly nothing biological that would be disgusting. It seems timely as a load of his films have had a digital makeover and Vertigo (1958) completes it's 30 year climb to the top of the BFI: Top 50 Greatest Films of All Time list. Anyhee, the gist is, I read an article in the Guardian recently which described Hitchcock's representation of women in a less than flattering light: 'the female characters in his [Hitchcock's] films range from stupid to cunning to traitorous' ( Bidisha, Guardian, 2010 ) and I thought...ohh, I don't know about that and immediately sprang into action, composing this response. In my own immutable, straightforward and succinct style, this is currently looking like two posts and it will hopefully end there. The crux of these posts is to suggest that the female charact...