Whip It (good?)

not this:


but this:


moving on now...

i first saw Whip It soon after its release at an absurd cinema near my university. it was Monday night, and my yin and i snuck in one bottle of water, homemade granola bars, and a black bean burrito. but this is beside the point.

the point is that i initially read the film as clearly feminist - female protagonist, a spectrum of strong female characters, sisterhood, implicit (interracial) lesbian romance, etc.

i shared my point of view with a friend from school. she, in turn, informed me that i was way off base.

[lapse six months]

yesterday we screened Whip It, and this time i could not help but see the awkward melange of competing discourses. a brief rundown:

1) 3rd wave feminism weighs in most obviously, with Ellen Page buying her boots, buying her skates, and consuming her weigh towards equality.

2) this is pocked and peppered with pustules of post-feminism, most notable the women's love for make-up and Drew Barrymore's pummeling of her boyfriend at the party.

3) undergirding it all, however, is a strong foundation of traditional patriarchal values. this is where Daniel Stern comes in, as the emasculated father who sets his house back in order by reclaiming his manhood and "allowing" his daughter to become her own woman.

i'm reminded of the words of Linda Mulvey:

"It is said that analyzing pleasure, or beauty, destroys it.
That is the intention of this article."