Document Type : Research Paper
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Abstract
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to investigate the construction of femininity in Rakhshan Bani-E’temad’s cinema. The main question here is the aesthetic and social form of femininity in Bani-E’temad’s feminine cinema. In order to study this issue, the researchers have used a series of categories in women’s social studies on the femininity construction ; categories such as motherhood, manhood, gender stereotypes, common feminine experiences ,etc. The theoretical framework of the article is that Bani-E’temad’s cinema constructs femininity as the entity bearing reconciliation in case of structural conflicts. Afterwards, four completely feminine films directed by Bani-E’temad were investigated; which involved Nargess (1992),The Blue-Veiled (1995),The May Lady (1999), and Mainline (KhunBaazi) (2006). Also, further studying of these films in terms of aesthetic and social perspective, revealed that in case of aesthetics, Bani-E’temad’s femininity are asexual and also she hopes that femininity based on romantic and musical love, overcome the social and class struggles. What distinguishes Bani-E’temad’s films from other filmmakers is her focus on femininity or the very female subject of her works. Female body in her works has no trace of an erotic and aesthetic body. Sexual gaze has been replaced by camera’s viewpoint. Despite of some close ups, camera without gaze, has no place for beautiful women and the beauty of female body for female characters. Two prevalent views of the films, i.e. close-ups and medium longshots, incite the audience to have a melancholic and thoughtful impression about the female characters. The ideology of the film, puts the female protagonist exactly where the audience should eye-witness the collapse of rubbles or crises. Concretization and reification of the crisis on the female body can be observed in all the four mentioned films. In Nargess, the rubbles fall on Nargess’s and Afagh’s naïve bodies. Sara’s, Forough’s, Nobar’s and Kaboutar’s bodies are notable position for this downfall; what cannot be located on male bodies. The social and historical construction of the contemporary society, poverty, solitude, homelessness, crime, etc. all and all have deprived Bani-E’temad’s female character of her femininity ,which could have been presented beautifully and erotically. In all these movies, it is the social class which causesmen’sdominion over women. Patriarchy is the theme which can be easily observed in Bani-E’temad’s films, in such a way that the female character’s identification and personification occur just in case she has a man as her overseer. The conflict in Bani-E’temad’s films, is the conflict of human beings with the circumstances caused by “the traditions”, and Bani-E’temad depicts the restrictions caused by the traditions, well. Women’s world, is a male one, and women have no choice other than seeing themselves from men’s perspectives. Thus, for women, the watching “other” is a strange being from the opposite sex, while for men, the watching other is a similar being with the same culture. Therefore, considering the importance of the male role, women are obliged to reconcile among the controversial roles,in this patriarchal system. In Bani-E’temad’s films, love is defined as the basic factor for survival,as if the filmmaker tries to regard love as a reason for life and development, in a female world isolated from women’sreal social class and life conditions.
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