10:31AM
Hows about a little intellectual posturing then he he?
*Would it be fair to describe British Cinema as primarily "liberal" in its treatment of sexuality?
In examining this question I shall define liberal as an ideology that appeals to principles of individual freedom from state intervention in private matters and that proposes social problems can be resolved as long as individuals are enlightened and not prejudiced.
I will focus on two filmic representations of male homosexuality, primarily Victim (Basil Dearden: 1961) and secondary for comparison Get Real (Simon Shore: 1999). Both these films depict homosexual experience and are fertile ground for a discussion of the British Film Industries liberalism then and today.
There are to many prevailing factors to adequately ascribe one political ideology over another in regards to an amalgam such as the British film industry so I will be taking into account the socio political climate that surrounds the release of each film in an attempt to define its liberal tendencies by the degree in which it has allied itself with the definitions above.
The timing for Victim could not have been better, the rise of the teenager and the popularity of the burgeoning television audience forced film makers to be commercial enough to tackle the threat of television and controversial enough to attract the new audience.
The pairing of Director Dearden, renowned for tackling controversial topics such as racism in Sapphire (1959) and Bogarde with his quest for roles that would challenge and explore his limit's as an actor resulted in an experience which Bogarde stated in an interview with Rank at the time of the films release, "pulled no punches" and could "Communicate to the younger audience who understood the films message"*.
Victim was released just as the new generation of TV watchers where returning to the cinema and was part of the vogue for gritty films with a social conscience that tackled controversial subjects head on. Throughout the late fifties and sixties films such as Sapphire (Basil Dearden, 1959, GB), Saturday Night, Sunday Morning (Karel Reisz, 1960, GB), and The Killing Of Sister George (Robert Aldrich, 1968, GB) challenged the establishment on race, gender and sexuality in new ways.
Coming on the back of the proactive state persecution of homosexuals in 1950's Britain and given momentum by the Wolfenden report, Victim proved energising for the fledgling gay rights movement in the UK. "On leaving the cinema I was given a new magazine, Manpower?Containing a plea for law reform on male homosexuality and volunteers were needed." (Douglas Brown, cited in Bourne 1996: 240).
Victim positions homosexuality as an affliction (which was the wildly held belief at the time) and does not recognise it as equal to heterosexuality. The film was defined as a blackmail thriller with a peculiar twist, the homosexuality element secondary to the marketing of the film.
Victim still needed to maintain an understanding of public feeling if they were to attain an audience and get the message across. Today, with a greater liberation for gay men the film can be seen as pandering to the already existing heterosexual hegemony. Frank the barman (played as himself) makes reference to the unhappy lot of the gay man who does not have what they have. This "liberal" call for understanding now comes off as simply offensive.
This liberal ideology is at the core of Victims message, however, Medhurst argues for a reading of Victim that advocated public expressions of homosexual desire during the "I wanted him" sequence delivered with such gusto by Bogarde. "It is the moment when irresistible sexual desire finds, literally, its voice." (Medhurst 1996: 128). He argues that this is damaging to the films message of liberal tolerance and borders on revolutionary. In effect he states the film then has to overcome this excess to work.
I would contest that including such a blatantly revolutionary statement signifies intentions thwarted by the social climate of the time.
Contrary to Medhursts assertion, that particular message was electrifying for some. "The atmosphere was electric when Dirk Bogarde, as a married barrister, taxed with his homosexual relationship, then blurted out: 'because I wanted him!' At the end there was a prolonged applause. We felt some breakthrough had been achieved. (Douglas Brown, cited in Bourne 1996: 240).
On the surface a respectable, married, successful man, beneath tormented by his condemned feelings. The emotional damage Farr as a character has suffered through the hegemony of the times alludes to the nature versus nurture argument that characterises discourse of sexuality, it also epitomises his duality. As he says, "If its love, why do I want to stamp it out" This existence marks his every (homosexual) man status, as few gay men would not be able to empathise with his situation. He is torn, partly by his learned notion of respectability and mores and partly by his over riding feelings towards Barrett. Farr is not simply a Victim of the blackmailer, he is the Victim of the state, law, and the society in which he lives and ultimately, himself.
The duality of his character illuminates the problems of homosexuality above and beyond the bawdy theatrical and often-stereotypical representations, which still appear today. The degree to which Victim influenced the parliament to change the law is unquantifiable, but as social comment it is a powerful piece of cinema for its time.
"I realise everything". In that one sentence Farr is awakened to the hegemony under which he has lived. In this pivotal moment of the film he gains the resolve he needs to begin to fight this injustice, not just by the blackmailer but also by the state and by living a hidden life himself.
The character of Farrs wife who is a psychologist dealing with children with learning difficulties, allows the filmmaker to allude, in this context, to the behaviour of the child who violently scrawls out the face of the woman he is drawn to be someway about repressed homosexuality, in addition the scenes at the school show boys frantically climbing a tree in a very physical way. The natural need for closeness with other males is here signified as ok for the young, but that it is only for them, at that time in Britain any physical or emotional intimate male responses would have been singled out as suspicious in line with the current hegemony.
Highlighting the issue across the boundaries of class is an effective method for getting the films message across. Barret is a clerk and part time labourer, Farr a successful legal man with a bright future. We have a stage actor, barber and salesmen, well to do gents and criminals, who as characters represent the class spectrum.
The more upper class homosexual characters who urge Farr to pay the blackmailer and keep the status quo, display a degree of calmness that must have come from being in the intellectual and social circles that would be more tolerant of homosexuality. It is this positioning that they look upon Farr as Shakespearean "Caliban", representative of the beast within them, that must be controlled. They have given in to the situation and only wish to remain with their power, wealth and social standing.
The barber as a character feels so powerless that he blames nature that "?played a dirty trick on me".
The car salesman has betrayed his friends and provides a narrative swipe at the rampant McCarthyism that swept America.
The female model at the bar is portrayed as stereotypically working class female, marry this to the religious battle-axe at the end and the women become ciphers in a predominantly male story. Only Farrs wife who stands by him through thick and thin is more rounded. Caught by her complicity in knowing all along that Farr was homosexual she is torn between conformity and her role as an iconoclast. We are unsure whether she stays with him because she wants to support him or because her position in "normal?" (sic) society is untenable.
Heterosexual men come off badly in the film; the brother in law is callous and not understanding, alluding in conversation to his son being corrupted by being with Farr and equating homosexuality with paedophilia as is still done today. The police officers are generally aggressive and judgemental, with the exception of the police chief who comes across as a man at odds with his dilemma over the imperative of lawful over morale right or vice versa and the undercover officer who at one point is seen asking someone to have coffee a hint perhaps at his own hidden world. The extent to which his undercover work is more personal is only alluded to. The barman at the local bar is a callous capitalist, quite happy taking the money from homosexuals but equally happy condemning them.
The inclusion of the Michelangelo painting on the wall of the blackmailers room connotes towards a suspect sexuality within him, self hate perhaps driving his actions. Using the premise of blackmail and dealing with a social menace he himself is able to indulge in his own fetishist needs in regards to homosexuality, using the phallic telephoto lens as this weapon, his resemblance to Mark, the protagonist in Peeping Tom (1959) seems more than coincidence in defining the type of character he is, sleazy and criminal in intent.
The female protagonist represents the religious body of the time. Throughout the film the subject of religious views is masked until the denouement when the ravings of the woman "Blasphemy", can be seen to represent the fundamental religious views of the time, the anchor upon which the law and condoned societal villification stand fast.
Not that the homosexuals portrayed in the film are whiter than white, two are arrested for fraud; One is a Judas character who sells his soul to save himself and the three middle class gentleman are comfortable enough off to pay the blackmailer but to cowardly to tackle the issue for fear of their loss of status. Any law that criminalises a human need alongside social stigma and persecution is a very cruel and barbarous act, Victim, wearing its liberal credentials with pride, addresses this very idea.
The revelation that the incriminating picture itself would not prompt a prosecution is kept from us until the last third of the film. This important moment connotes to the power of the media to place a spin on that representation, reinforced by Farrs wife's observations on the effect the scandal would have on them made early in the film. Barrett's panic at the possible repercussion the image engendered led to the over reaction to its potential as an object for blackmail.
Cruelly, the hubris of Farr after years of hidden conformity and fear of persecution combined with the hegemonic influences of his upbringing, lead him to fear, as blackmail, the initial contact for help made by Barrett that may well have allowed the issue to be put to rest, for Barrett if not anyone else. At the end of the film as the picture is burned, the irony of how easily the whole episode could have been avoided by the simple destruction of the evidence is apparent, but illuminates how the shift towards changing the current situation for other men like Farr required a Christ like martyrdom, re-iterated further by the comments from the blackmailer in regards to the "Judas of the piece". This symbolic gesture, (symbolic because the negatives still exist) connotes to the impotence of Farrs position over the Hobson's choice he has faced.
Forty-two years later, people still live their lives in fear and exposure just as the fictional Farr did in Victim. Which only goes to prove that you can change the law, but the validity the law gives to the bigoted will often take generations to expunge.
This is the very predicament that Farr realised would require his martyrdom. We the audience would have, at the time, been left hanging with the question as to whether Farr was able to influence the courts on the current legislation as he said he intended to do. As time allows us now to see, he did, or at least the everyman that he represents (as a homosexual) defies the stereotypical view and at the same time boldly stands against the hegemony of the time, helping to put a human face on what had been a demonised group. With this perspective we can see how the film is liberal as the original definition sets out, but that despite this the problems Victim addresses still do exist today, which brings in to question, in the smallest way only, its ultimate effectiveness as a tool for change.
The reference to witch hunts within the film frames the view it holds. This is a witch-hunt as of old and in which no modern society should participate. This is a call to arms, to recognition of the crimes of society against the individual and as such it did not go unheeded. The recognition of the victimless crime of homosexuality paved the way for more modern thinking in Britain towards the fluidity of sexuality and gender.
This frontrunner to the Queer cinema that would follow provides the first socially positive representation of homosexuality that the British cinema had tackled; it was the first film to actually mention the word "homosexual".
Victim successfully points the finger at the state for allowing a cruel law to remain, at the police for aggressive and unfair policing and at the law for being blind. The irony of Farr having to rely on the system in which he has worked and thrived to help him survive is neither lost nor resolved. It leaves open the question for the audience to answer, and they did. In 1967 the political view changed and with it the "Blackmailers Charter" was ended.
It could be argued that Bogarde and Dearden together created a controversial and challenging film that added weight to the Wolfenden report and played a paramount part in the decriminalisation of homosexuality, but this statement needs examination against a modern day example to fully exemplify it.
In Get Real, remaining hidden and persecuted are still the main themes of the narrative, mirroring Victim but as a smaller story, with the state represented by the police and the parents and peers the problem to be faced. It is also predominantly middle class with little representation of anyone outside of this sphere, and as such comes across as fantasy and at times wish fulfilment.
Nevertheless, Get Real still contains the hallmarks of many gay dramas, homophobic institutions and people, unrequited love and sexual abandon, but despite it being forty years after Victim the ideas represented are not liberal for the 90's, and in some respects they are downright conservative. Steven played by Ben Silverstone, the geek and general swot who gets picked on at every turn, and John, played by Brad Gorton, the jock and all round well-liked chap.
Stephen is aware of his sexuality and tests this out whilst cottaging at the local toilets, after initial success with a married man (this revealed later in a visit to his dads photo shop) he is surprised to find John doing the very same thing. At first the two men communicate badly, but eventually they consummate the new found friendship and the problems start from there.
Set in conservative middle England the film details the exploits of two gay teenagers, trying to experience love unfettered by hate and fear.
They swim in the pool, stay in the house while parents are away and travel around in John's smart car. With the publication of a mysterious article in the school paper about being gay, which is promptly censored by the head, the film takes an interesting turn into the political. Sadly, this issue is never fully explored and it leaves the film as purely a romance. Homosexuality is discussed openly, but often as a perversion that Steven should be protected from.
The inclusion of cottaging in a film featuring teenagers is a brave move with the current discourse around paedophilia in Britain today, but in now way does it purport to attempt to change the situation of young gay men. The attitude of the film towards the lifestyle that the pair adopts is accepting and by default liberal, but it certainly does not challenge the establishment as Victim did.
The mother provides the anchor in regards to understanding with the father practically oblivious of the situation. She even comes to save the day at the end.
Stevens's friend Linda (Charlotte Brittain) the required fag hag, provides some comic moments to the film, but simply enforces a stereotypical view of gay men and their women friends.
The climax, (a coming out speech in front of an audience of parents) is a cop out. This type of fantasy coda is more accepting of hegemony than Victim was in its time. Reinforcing stereotypical ideas that it is not ok to be gay and it some how, as a condition requires an explanation or an apology.
In comparison to Victim this film is simply fiction. Forty years after the Wolfenden report it is still not ok to be gay. Get Real does nothing to dispel that existing myth.
So would it be fair to describe British Cinema as primarily "liberal" in its treatment of sexuality?
Well in part yes, but only within the constraints of economic social and political forces. Both these films represent success in regards to gay genre, Victim much more than Get Real however.
With Victim you had a successful and household name star that could pull in the box office and was gay, this allowed the liberal agenda to be passed forward. In Get Real you have no known star and the film is not predominantly liberal, it in fact does little to move forward an agenda of any kind and is more a representation of how things are than how they should be. Yes it deals with the same issues as Victim, but is not pushing any boundaries that have not already been crossed.
Politically many of the fights for gay people have been won. Full equality is just around the corner The British film industry as it stands is not as strong as it was in the sixties, and films that challenge as Victim did now tend to come from elsewhere.
Socially a person being gay is much more accepted than previously, although still many of the ideas portrayed in Victim and Get Real in regards to perversion and danger are still in discourse today. This leaves me with the conclusion that the British film industry has been liberal in its portrayal of sexuality, but from a social point of view that sees 40 years of time change very little for the homophobic bigot of today. One could wish for it to be more radical in its approach than it currently is.
Bibliography
Medhurst Andy (1996) "Victim: Text as Context in Andrew Higson (ed.), dissolving views: Key writings on British Cinema. London: Cassell, pp. 117-132.
Hayward Susan (2000) Cinema Studies - The Key Concepts Routledge London
The Wolfenden Report: report of the committee on Homosexual Offences and prostitution (1964). New York: Lancer Books (first US paperback edition)
Web Sites
1991 http://us.imdb.com/ Online [Accessed 05/04/03] Various
1999 http://www.sbu.ac.uk/stafflag/dirkbogarde.html [Accessed 05/05/03]
Film
Beautiful Thing (Hettie Macdonald, 1995, GB).
Get Real (Simon Shore 1999, GB).
Peeping Tom (Michael Powell 1959, GB).
Sapphire(Basil Dearden 1959, GB).
Saturday Night, Sunday Morning (Karel Reisz 1960, GB).
The Killing Of Sister George (Robert Aldrich 1968, GB).
Victim (Basil Dearden 1961, GB).
