The Problem With Jennifer's Body

Please wake me up in about two years, so that The Hunger Games movie has come out and the fandom has had enough time to make their way through all the usual complaints a fandom undergoes when their beloved source material is changed on its way to the screen and I can talk with people again about the actual content of the story as opposed to whether or not every single person cast looks right for the role. And by looks right, not, I don't mean is made to look right via training and make-up and costume. I mean bitching about how a young actress actually has meat on her bones and is thus an inappropriate choice despite what the author and director say.

Despite being a bit above the target age range for Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games trilogy, about a month and a half ago I decided to give it a spur of the moment read and I admit I was instantly addicted. It's an engrossing story with what I think are generally interesting characters and pretty decent writing. I will happily discuss whether the love triangle is annoyingly overplayed in Catching Fire, whether Katniss' behaviour in Mockingjay is either due to proper characterization or author laziness, and whether the ending is sufficient or not.

What I cannot stand, however, are the same debates I participated in, intensely, mind you, once upon a time when I was a thirteen-year-old crazed and newly indoctrinated Harry Potter fan. Was I pissed that Daniel Radcliffe had blue eyes and not green and found it silly he wasn't wearing contacts to fix that? You bet. When I was older and I realized that a) such an obsession was stupid, b) that it really didn't matter that much, and c) that Daniel Radcliffe was unable to wear the contacts because of irritation, I got over it. I think most fans did eventually because we realized what a stupid little debate it was. Harry's blazing green eyes, like his mother's, are a huge deal in the books. In the movies, they're less so. They're still a deal - Lupin remarks on them particularly in the third film and I imagine they'll play their related role in the final film - but the films adjust for the problems faced.

These sorts of issues, as The Hunger Games movie inches slowly towards filming and, eventually, completion, are floating around the fandom in abundance. People are bitching about everything, and while Willow Shields' unibrow was a big hot topic, the biggest hot topic of all is the casting of Jennifer Lawrence as the beloved lead character of Katniss Everdeen. Now, I think Jennifer Lawrence is a great actress and I can completely see her personifying what I think is a strong female protagonist in Katniss. She probably doesn't look anything like I originally imagined Katniss to look like, but I can see it in her, just like I started to see Peeta in Josh Hutcherson, who also looks differently than one might have imagined Peeta (and don't get me started on the fans who are still obsessed with picking naturally blonde actors who are rather stringy in my opinion). Some people, however, are far too obsessed with the appearance, particularly parts of Jennifer Lawrence's appearance that are harder to fix than her hair color - and I'm not talking about the debate raging over Katniss' skin color, I'm talking about her weight.

The objections to Jennifer Lawrence's curves, to put it bluntly, piss me the fuck off. It rings in my ears of all the horrendous standards that we hold women up to and the ways in which women are still objectified so much in film as having to be whatever image we deem correct and if it doesn't fit with our mold, then it is wrong. I know that when most people comment on Jennifer Lawrence's curves, they don't mean that actresses can't be curvy. Of course not, we have Queen Latifah, known for her bodacious body. But this is really not the norm. We have such bizarre and unrealistic and every-changing standards for women and we never seem to be able to do it right. As Jennifer Hudson has lost weight, many of her fans have been rather shocked and disappointed that she felt the need to lose weight, while simultaneously people are constantly wondering if Gabourey Sidibe should lose some weight because she might be dangerously unhealthy. Don't get me wrong, I do think obesity is a problem in this country and not one we should glorify. But neither should we glorify appearances that are unattainable or at the very least extremely difficult for normal women to attain. While we encourage girls to embrace their curves, we continue to bash women whose weight changes regularly, like Kelly Clarkson. When Lady Gaga puts on a few pounds, suddenly her stomach becomes a huge national problem - Why isn't she as skinny as she was in the Telephone music video!?!?!? we wonder, because it's wrong for these women who are supposed to be visually perfect to ruin our images of them by being human. Weight fluctuation is hardly unheard of amongst the normal folk and beneath the personal trainers and strict diets, celebrities are normal folk too.

That said, then, shouldn't we choose actors who can physically embody the very specific framework we have in mind for a character? Dumb, dumb, dumb. I get it, Katniss' character is very specifically one who has suffered from malnourishment her entire life. But even if we get a sickly stick of an actress who could potentially perform the role of Katniss brilliantly, there's still a difference between a healthy, skinny body and a malnourished, skinny body. And let's face it, we're not going to cast someone that is literally malnourished - that is, unless Christian Bale was in the role and he would just make that choice on his own probably and the fans would hail him for it, but would it be right? Everyone also worries when Christian Bale does such a thing, and we'd worry for whatever actress that played Katniss that would do it too. But, BUT, beneath that worry, don't even lie to yourself, you'd be proud of that actor for taking such a dramatic step. You'd be impressed and pleased that the actor would be willing to take such a risk for the sake of art. I'm not going to lie, I'd probably be impressed too. But while being impressed, I'd also be disgusted.

There is a poster that hangs in the health services office in my college. It shows two pictures of legs. One is a starving child. One is a runway model. Their legs, despite one pair being cleaner than the other, are indistinguishably similar in shape. That horrifies me, which is the point of the poster. If you are naturally skinny, there's nothing you can help about that. Same with if you're curvy. But there is still, always, a difference between what is natural and healthy and what is unnatural and unhealthy. You can suffer from either no matter what shape or size you are.

We need to stop boxing women into categories based on their size though. Daniel Radcliffe has grown up to be a lot stockier than I imagined Harry in the books to be - Harry always seemed so stretched and, at times, lanky. Daniel Radcliffe is of more average height and weight in appearance. But he has also grown into becoming a better actor and a better Harry over the years. Movie!Harry and Book!Harry are different in their appearance and y'know what? That's okay, because Daniel Radcliffe still manages to capture the general essence of what the character of Harry Potter is, at least in the movies. A smaller debate has raged in the Potter fandom community over the looks of its female characters. In the books, Ginny is supposed to be very popular and supposedly pretty good-looking, but Bonnie Wright's beauty doesn't seem to be particularly played up in the movies making her a bit more plain. Alternatively, in the books, Hermione is generally pretty average looking from the perspective and her hair frizzy, but by the third movie, Emma Watson was clearly turning into a pretty young woman and her hair was no longer made to look quite so frizzy. I have long contended, particularly in Hermione's case, that these are just examples of how different the book and movie versions of the characters are. And THAT'S OKAY.

Why is that okay? First of all, when it comes to movie adaptations of books, I tend to believe that the best adaptations are more interpretations. Good adaptations should be done by fans of the original source material, but intelligent fans who have enough distance from the source material to be able to know what the story is about without obsessing too much on details that may be less important. My favorite example of an adaptation is Lord of the Rings. I love the books and the movies, but though they capture a similar plotline and a similar essence, they are truly different stories, but they are both grand and know what story they want to tell. My main problem with, say, the Harry Potter movie adaptations is that they're a bit scatter-brained, not just because of the different directors, but also because most of the earlier films didn't give strong enough hints of what this story was supposed to be about. I have no expectation that The Hunger Games movie will be just like the book, and I really hope it isn't. I want to watch something that takes the plot and the morals and the characters and shape them ever so slightly different to fit the very different medium that film is from novels. I want the actors to be good and the script to be strong and the effects to be well-done and all the elements of filmmaking to be well-executed, and if it isn't the same as the book, so long as it's well-made, I am totally okay with that.

Secondly, reality is not so easy to manipulate as the written world of a book and whatever live-action movies are, they are capturing something that was physically there, in reality, at some point (not counting CGI). Reality can be manipulated, but in a different way, for different reasons.

Finally, I want to break out of the boxes we have created for women. Katniss can still be Katniss even if her ribs aren't frighteningly protruding. I cannot accept the fact that women have to be defined by their appearance, that Katniss can only be a skinny girl, for instance. Stanley Tucci is a pretty fit individual, small and seemingly average in his weight and yet isn't Caesar Flickerman supposed to be rather rotund? I have not heard a single person complain that his stomach isn't the right size for the role. You may argue that that isn't the same, it doesn't define Caesar like it does Katniss, but Katniss is defined by much, MUCH more than her weight. If all Katniss was was a malnourished girl, she wouldn't be the strong character I believe her to be. Women's appearances are a part of who we are, certainly, but there is so much more that goes into defining ourselves, just like men, that I really wish we could stop placing more value on a woman's appearance than her other features. "The Girl Next Door" is more of a look than a personality type. "The Blonde Bombshell." "The Femme Fatale." These types and the many others women exemplify are so defined by appearance in our minds rather than attitude, and most of the categories really are about the attitude.

So, in conclusion, either the entire world needs to change or I really need to learn how to bite my tongue. Well, I've already got a scar from biting through my tongue a lot as a kid, I might as well keep up the hard work.

My Thoughts on Eclipse. Let Me Give Them To You.

I have to give credit where credit is due. I may not have wanted to face it, but I admit that The Twilight Saga: Eclipse is probably the most tolerable Twilight movie. There were fewer moments than the earlier installments where I just wanted to scream it was so bad, but there are several reasons for that and there is one in particular, near the end, that stands out.

As much as I can't stand Bella as a character, she does give an interesting speech that I think relates to a lot of fantasy stories, the central idea being that, only in said fantasy world does she really belong. Now, I don't know if that stems from the actual book or if it's a movie only thing because I've never read the book, but it was interesting. I'm not sure if I like it, though, because it is a question that I feel is important to consider in any fantasy landscape.

The Hero's Journey, as written about in a book I recently read on screenwriting entitled The Writer's Journey (by Christopher Vogler), has a step near the end called "The Road Back." Such a grand example could easily be found, say, in The Lord of the Rings where it is a literal road back to the shire. The literal road back leads our four dear hobbits back to their homeland. Whether the book version or the movie version (because The Scouring of the Shire chapter is not in the movie), the shire is (or is eventually) a proper home for three of the four again. Sam, Merry, and Pippin, despite their wild adventures, can find home in this place. Frodo, on the other hand, does not belong in this world anymore. Bilbo, also, in The Hobbit can be said to have gone on the road back to the shire and he lives comfortably there for a long time after his adventures outside of his home.

One reason I think it is very easy for Bella to not go on the road back is because she doesn't really go on a road to the vampire world. To be quite fair, I read an article recently comparing the Harry Potter and Twilight franchises and stating that one obvious advantage Harry Potter has over Twilight is the fantasy world. Comparisons aside, there really isn't a lot of definition over the vampire world. Vampires are described, sure, but there isn't a lot of fantasy involved and Bella isn't really transported into a whole new environment, unlike in Harry Potter where Harry is constantly learning the crazy differences between the muggle and wizarding worlds. But, like I said, this is comparison aside. The world of Twilight is very normal and, honestly, not very interesting. I like my mortality most of the time, however, and unlike Bella, I feel as if I can achieve things in a mortal life, as if I do belong here, even when it's uncomfortable, awkward, or stunted, which it often it.

Even on The Road Back, however, there really is no going back, especially because The Road Back is not the last stop. There is still "Resurrection" and "Return with the Elixir." To be quite honest, Twilight follows this Hero's Journey outline well in the end. Bella clearly goes under a resurrection when she is transformed and boy oh boy, does superstar model and wicked talented vampire!Bella have an elixir. The road back isn't about returning to an old life as much as it is returning to an old home as a new person. There is no spontaneous "Happily Ever After" and then fade to black, because we are always growing beyond the end, which is clear in the last sections of the journey. I think the problem here with Twilight is that it assumes a happily ever after and there is an eternity where neither Bella nor Edward nor the other Cullens will ever grow. It is as Rosalie says in Eclipse, how they are frozen in time.

So while it is easy to say other literary characters such as Bilbo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin return to their old lives, it is also wrong. They all return to their old homes as completely changed persons/hobbits, leading their old lives into new realms. That is their resurrection (well, if we're ignoring The Scouring of the Shire, which could be cited as the real zone off a resurrection) - upon their return, they resurrect their old lives with new spirits and lessons.

Even in Harry Potter, as much as we may criticize the Epilogue of Deathly Hallows, it does prove interesting to observe what happens after the final battle, what happens after Harry goes back. Not to his old life as a wizard stuck in the muggle world, no, but back to being a generally normal kind of life, but after some very abnormal experiences. We see Harry as a new person, as a father and husband and man changed by his adolescent ordeals. It is important to understand this, even if its execution leaves something to be desired (I mean, Albus Severus? Really? Poor kid, poor poor kid...), because we see Harry resurrected into his future self. This is kind of a double resurrection though, as only a chapter earlier did Harry undergo a semi-literal resurrection after Voldemort supposedly kills him but he doesn't actually die and has that beautiful conversation with Dumbledore in "King's Cross." Oh how I love that chapter. But that resurrection is a figurative one as he comes back not so different than he was beforehand - he still has a battle to fight and he has not really gone on the road back yet; he hasn't finished his job just yet, but he's nearly there.

I think the reason Breaking Dawn split fans was that it presented a shitty conclusion to a mildly interesting premise. Bella gets to live in both the ordinary and fantasy world in the end, which is not right and downright selfish of Stephanie Meyer to grant her protagonist that. She gets to have a child, something to propel her forward, as well as remain in the fantasy world forever. It's gross and one of the many reasons I absolutely hate the introduction of "teethbaby" (aka Reneesme or however it's spelled). The debate between Team Jacob and Team Edward, the debate between life as it should be and life as it is (as Bella phrases it in the movie), is destroyed in the final chapter as totally irrelevant, which is appalling to me.

But Eclipse gets credit as probably the most interesting installment in the franchise. Bella and Edward, though still Mary Sues and lacking personality to the point of painfulness, have grown as a couple and are not totally disgusting when they're together (as a perpetually single girl surrounded by her perpetually dating friends, I know the difference between a sickening couple and a couple who has grown into their affection for each other, which sometimes takes a really long time and sometimes no time at all, but my personal life aside...). While the action is still horrible, the dialogue cheesy, and most of the characters pointless or annoying, there is something appealing in the actual story of Eclipse. I don't like what Bella chooses, and I hate how it turns out thanks to that atrocious author, but I relish the decision that has to be made and the options and the weight of it all. I can respect Bella's choice for one reason: namely the way she phrases it as how life "IS" rather than how life "SHOULD BE." That is such a mature and great phrasing that I can forgive her other nonsense about not fitting into a normal world, which, though understandable, just makes me dislike her more and more because it never feels like she deserves that special world. She never earns her keep, to me, which makes her such a dull character. But that aside, I have to give it to the three leads, their acting was totally watchable and occasionally, OCCASIONALLY, engrossing. Mostly, though, I live for Charlie, because he gets the only good dialogue in any of the movies.

I still can't stand Twilight for the many reasons I have brought up in the past and will bring up in the future, but I respect the movies more than the books. It helps that it would be even stupider to describe on film CONSTANTLY Edward's beauty and perfection. Actually, it's quite tamped down in this installment, which I liked a lot. On some occasions, I could almost even spot a personality. Granted, when he said things like how he'd let Bella go if he chose Jacob, I also felt like he was thinking to himself "...and then I'd kill myself." But I might blame that on the Eclipse 8-bit game of AWESOME where I know there's at least one scenario where Edward dies of a broken heart. Regardless, I feel as if some of the major flaws in the books are fixed in the movies. But the story is still rather crappy, so there's really no fixing that, no matter how many unintentionally interesting premises come into play.

For instance, I wonder to myself if Stephanie Meyer actually caught that Jasper had filled the same shoes as Riley once. I know the film noticed it, but it wasn't particularly direct, though clear to any intelligent moviegoer (which, I think it is safe to say, many Eclipse viewers cannot claim upon their viewing of the film. NOT THAT THEY ARE STUPID PEOPLE, but fangirls will be fangirls and when you are drooling over your fave hunks, you are not paying attention to plot details). I have no faith in Stephanie Meyer's writing abilities though, to be quite honest, and I feel that it may have been an unintentional thing. She MAY have realized it later, but I'll be a wee bit surprised if she had intended such a connection.

All in all, I can say that there were parts of Eclipse I genuinely liked (more than Twilight, where the only elements I liked for real were the vampire baseball and the soundtrack/score... and New Moon, where the only elements I liked were nothing). It was still bad overall, but I can understand the appeal more than ever. But then, that's me. Sexy vampire romance? Eh, not my thing exactly. Topics that raise a question that every fantasy story tackles in one way or another? I'm totally sold. That's what Eclipse has going for it, in my opinion, and that is where Eclipse surpasses the previous two films (not that it's too hard to do that).

I could go on for ages about the "ordinary world" and the "special/fantasy world" and the Hero's Journey and fantasy stories at large, but I'll hold onto that for another time because this post is long enough.

The Cultural Importance of Harry Potter and the Lack Thereof of the Twilight Saga.

I've never been a Twilight fan and I doubt I ever will be. This is unlike my initial distaste for Harry Potter when it first exploded onto the scene, because I've actually read parts of Twilight, I've seen the movies, and I still can't stand it. After I watched the second Harry Potter movie, I actually quite liked it and decided to give the books a shot and fell in love.

But the main thing that bothers me about Twilight is the fan culture, and I'm not talking about the rabid Taylor Lautner/RPattz fans. I'm talking about some of the major differences between the tiny generational divide of my age group, which grew up with Harry Potter, and the tween/teens now, who are growing up with Twilight.

The Harry Potter craze brought us fans who invented a musical genre, who helped kick off a renewed interest in reading and writing, and brought the famed sport of the books to life. Whereas the Twilight fans seem only capable of adorning their rooms with as much memorabilia as they can hunt down. Thanks to Harry Potter, I decided that I had wanted to be a writer, I actually ran a freakin' Harry Potter website for eight months (while having been a member of said site for nearly four years now), I downloaded albums of wizardrock (The Remus Lupins! Draco and the Malfoys!), and I have the guidebook to Quidditch because my school added a Quidditch team and I hope to bother to join soon enough.

It doesn't matter that, in my opinion, the Harry Potter books are much more well-written than the Twilight books (not sure I'd call them masterpieces, but they introduce interesting themes, well-rounded characters, and tell a classic, fascinating story) - what really matters to me in the debate of Twilight versus Harry Potter is the fandom. The question: What do these books contribute to the world?

Honestly, what can we say Twilight has contributed to the world? Heightened expectations in women of their perfect men that create FML stories like this one. Not to mention what a creepy-ass "guy" Edward Cullen is and how it's disappointing to see women of all ages wishing they had a man like him. Twilight has also spawned totally crazed fans that frighten me to death far more than the most rabid Harry Potter fan.

Sure, it's easy to say this now, three years after the final Harry Potter book was released and now that the storm has calmed, but even in my tween years, when I was one of those crazy Harry Potter fans, I was not adopting Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, or Tom Felton as my future lovers. Nor was I wishing that I could meet a man like Harry Potter. Why was that? Oh, because Harry isn't perfect - he's human, so to speak. A young man who spends paragraphs yelling because his hormones are out of whack and with a hero complex to shame... someone else with a huge hero's complex. J.K. Rowling treats her characters with enough respect to make them real.

Stephanie Meyer, however, has created Edward Cullen as a complete object. He is a dreamboat of perfection, of riches and chivalry and beauty. Bella is not much different with her Mary Sue flaw of clumsiness and beautiful individuality that attracts EVERYONE. Of course Harry gets attention; he's famous! What's Bella's excuse? And she hates it (whereas there is that beautiful moment in the sixth Harry Potter movie where Harry says defensively to Hermione, "but I AM the chosen one" and receives a thunk on the head), can't stand being who she is, is never comfortable with herself.

What kind of lessons can anyone take away from a story about a girl who has caring parents, is popular with girls and boys, beauty, and a bright life ahead of her but cannot be happy with any of it unless she has her man. It's worse than a Disney Princess! At least Jasmine gets pissed at Aladdin for lying to her, but Bella mopes and cries and tries to kill herself when Edward isn't around.

Harry Potter, on the other hand, teaches lessons of appreciating all those things in your life. Harry would be nothing without the strength of his friends, mentors, and everyone in his life. Harry is happy with himself most of the time - though being famous is hard work and he isn't pleased to be an orphan, even when he lives under the tyrannical rule of his aunt and uncle, he doesn't complain about it, merely makes the best of it with his wit and knowledge that life goes on. Seriously, we start off the first book with Harry pleased to look forward to going to a different school than his cousin so he could develop his own life. Even the much-hated epilogue of the final book provides that message: life goes on and it's worth living.

Twilight? Nothing's worth living for except hunky vampires and immortality.

Lessons aside, I've already listed the other cultural implications Harry Potter brought along. It has spawned so many excited and participatory fans that it is incredible. I met Harry and the Potters - I bought one of their freakin' T-shirts. I've dreamed of remaking the Harry Potter movies one day (though I doubt I'd bother nor would I probably be let to; it'll be too soon and the movies, for all their faults with continuity aren't bad). Harry Potter inspired me to do great things. I doubt Twilight could ever encourage such spirits. Musical genre? Collegiate sport? Literacy? Well, considering that Twilight is written the way that I wrote when I was thirteen...

Sure, I'm mean to Twilight, I'm hard on its fans. I can't blame people for liking the series; I'm sure that the right readers enjoy such tales. But there is nothing beneficial to take away from the books, and that they have succeeded Harry Potter as the "it" books is depressing because it is such a huge step down.

Oh popular culture. How interesting you are and how much I hate you until the Twilight movies are all made and freakin' over with.

...btws, rant was inspired by this interesting post over on incontention.com.