so, i watched the first "pirates of the caribbean" this weekend with the Boyfriend. the second one's in the theater, as anyone who's turned on a television or glanced at a magazine cover already knows. but, living under a rock as i do, i never saw the first one, so the Boyfriend rushed to the store and bought it, in an effort to give me a crash course in all things "pirates."
we settled in, with bowls of ice cream and the surround-sound speakers hooked up and the lights dimmed. "isn't this great??" he whispered. and it was -- at least the first 15 or 20 minutes and the last hour or so. but there was one little blip, about 15 or 20 minutes in, and i almost didn't notice it, and i kind of wish i hadn't. because every now and then, it would be nice to enjoy a movie without the running social commentary buzzing in my head.
in johnny depp's introductory scene, his character, the pirate jack sparrow, announces he's come to a seaside village to rape and pillage. those are the words he uses, plus a few others. the two soldiers with whom he's speaking decide he isn't kidding. flash forward several scenes. the pirates from the black pearl -- the ship jack sparrow once captained -- descend upon the town, with crazed eyes and outstretched hands, and begin throwing fire bombs into windows and chasing screaming, terrified women. one particularly rabid pirate almost catches a frantically fleeing woman, but he's stopped when a local blacksmith lodges an axe in the pirate's back. potential rape averted! i'm sure the movie execs figured viewers would either a) cheer for the good guy, b) consider such material fair game for entertainment, or c) not notice it at all.
when i saw this, i cringed. later, when the lead female character -- played by young, doe-eyed keira knightley -- was kidnapped by the pirates of the black pearl, i asked the Boyfriend if there were going to be any rape innuendos during her captivity. after all, we know what pirates do, right? jack sparrow already told us: they rape and they pillage.
when i asked this, the Boyfriend jokingly responded, with a smile, "i knew i shouldn't have watched this with a feminist!" he was kidding. but i wasn't.
"they didn't have to put that in there," i said, regarding the pirate-chasing-the-woman scene.
"but that's what pirates DID," he said. as if historical accuracy, when it comes to pirate behavior, is of paramount importance when making a children's movie based on a disneyland ride.
but he's a dude -- so he can understand intellectually that it bothers me to see what basically amounts to a loose "rape" joke in what's supposed to be a kid's movie, but he doesn't "get it" in his gut that rape is too real to be considered entertainment -- even when it's done in innuendo, and especially when it's done in passing.
we live in a world where members of our military rape and murder teenage girls.
we live in a country where 11-year-olds are gang-raped.
unless a movie is trying to make a grand social point (boys don't cry, the accused), filmmakers have no business using rape as a plot point or a device to build suspense or tension. it's crude, it's tacky, and it's just too close to home for the majority of women around the globe for it to be considered anything remotely close to acceptable entertainment.
i don't need a movie reminding me of the days when women had to run for their lives, trying to fend off men with outstretched hands. those days never went away. to realize this, all you have to do is turn on the television or glance at a magazine cover.
3 comments:
i just watched that movie last night and was thinking the same thing. its really disturbing how casual references to such things can be dropped. a lot of it has to do with the fact that its a reference to a man doing some form of abuse to a woman, which, according to scenes in movies like this, is acceptable and even normal. reverse that scenario and it all the sudden becomes socially unacceptable. women raping men is totally obscene, men raping men even more so. then we wonder why boys grow up to be abusive men. well there are alot of reasons for that but stuff like this definitly isnt helping.
my aunt cheryl sent me to this blog and its good to see that people in montgomery are paying attention and writing about it. thank you!!!
dan griffin
dan i'm so glad you wrote! your mom and your aunt are such fabulous, kickass women.
you're right about the normalizing of violence against women. the activist and author robert jensen once wrote that rape was both totally accepted and barely illegal in our society. i think there is a lot of truth to that (especially in light of news reports about what US soldiers are doing to women and girls overseas).
i look forward to meeting you sometime. :-)
And it's certainly not over for so many women living in countries where "no" still means "yes," rape doesn't "exist," early marriage is prevalent, condoms continue to be a losing power struggle, and so on and so forth way too often and for the way too young.
Thanks for writing...I enjoy your blog and style.
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