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hrjSession 399: Matrons, Monsters, and Men: Beowulf (2007)
I find it amusing that, although the movie itself seems clearly aimed at a male viewership, both the panel and audience for this session are overwhelmingly female.
“Ond Hyre Seax Geteah Brad ond Brunecg”: Failing Swords and Angelina’s Heels in Robert Zemeckis’s Beowulf (KellyAnn Fitzpatrick, Univ. at Albany)
Reviews the (rather overly blatant) equation the film makes between swords and penises: the tendency of Beowulf to drop/lose swords in the face of seductive female creatures, the sexlessness of Grendel (both in the absence of genitalia and the uselessness of swords to harm him, given sword=penis), to say nothing of all the various visual juxtapositions where the naked Beowulf’s crotch is conveniently screened by a random weapon in the foreground. The first “failing sword” is the inability of Grendel to be harmed with weapons, the second is Beowulf’s failure to harm Grendel’s Mom with weapons, both by the sword passing directly through her and by his later paralysis before her. In contrast with the poem’s portrayal of the conflict between Beowulf and G’s Mom as her being unable to attack him directly, in the movie she clearly chooses to attach him with seduction rather than force (a seduction that is, in some ways, grounded in the poem’s portrayal of the struggle as a wrestling match). The third failing sword comes in the battle with the dragon, when B’s sword is two short to reach the dragon’s heart and he must take drastic action to finish the fight. In the end, the feminine power of Grendels mother triumphs, not via the overt seduction, but because she is the (implied) means by which Beowulf gains his eternal fame.
The Water Dripped from Her like “Golden Chocolate”: Mother’s Feminine Threat in Beowulf (Michelle Kustarz, Wayne State Univ.)
Looks at the larger manuscript context of the Beowulf manuscript as “stories about monsters”, and with a general thread of relating monsters and women. One of the non-Beowulf stories involves Alexander destroying a group of monstrous women. In the earliest version, the reason given is “because of their greatness”, while in later versions this is shifted to “because of their uncleanness”. The story of Judith retells the Biblical story of Judith and Holofernes, with some interesting changes. The Biblical tale emphasizes Judith’s position as a chaste and faithful widow – a detail nearly invisible in the A.S. version, which characterizes her as a brave and fearless leader. (This is taken further in Cook’s (sp?) modern translation which chooses verbiage that characterizes her as a young maiden.) [me: I’m not sure where the “monster” motif is supposed to come in here, unless Holofernes is supposed to fill the role. Or maybe this is more generally about the “transformation” of female characters?] In the various Beowulf monster interactions various of the monsters are “transformed” either from nominally female creatures (such as Grendel’s mother) or asexual creatures (such as the sea monster) into highly sexualized female seductresses. [me: ok, here’s a parallel with the point she was making about Judith.] And yet, for the sake of a PG-13 rating, the naked seductress is visually asexual, with nipples and genitalia conveniently erased by the “dripping golden water”. Tying this back to the first story, here the monster displays no “uncleanness” – it has been erased by the “translation” just as it was introduced into the first story by a later re-write. And yet the means of her defeat of Beowulf is explicitly her wielding of devouring feminine sexual power. The dragon, she portrays as again representing a “feminine” monster as an embodiment of the vagina dentate. [me: I’m not sure I buy this entirely, given that the dragon is portrayed explicitly as a “son”, but I can see some arguments.] The dragon’s defeat by penetrating the one, small vulnerable spot with a sword/phallus reiterates its essential feminine nature.
Cyborg Masculinities in Zemeckis’s Beowulf (Laurie Dietz, DePaul Univ.)
The paper takes as its theme, the explicit severing of the poem-story from the movie-story and the ways in which the movie uses the “idea” of Beowulf to comment on masculinity. Further it looks at the “cyborg” nature of motion-capture film technology to extract “essentials” of the performance that are then interpreted more freely by the director. The cyborg represents the erasure of traditional social categories, such as gender and race, to create a myth of unity. In theory, this would suggest that motion-capture performance would resist the maintenance of traditional gender categories, or at least present that as a possibility. But the actual realization in Beowulf fails to pursue this possibility, instead embodying an orgy of hypermasculinity. The motion-capture process does clearly divorce the result from the limitations of the natural, but also from the consistency of the natural (e.g., the variable hairiness of Beowulf’s chest). The topic jumps a little here, but she makes an interesting point about the movie’s Unferth representing the anti-heroic “academic” who is concerned with truth and origins and dismissive of (or unable to achieve via) traditional masculine activities and concerns.
I find it amusing that, although the movie itself seems clearly aimed at a male viewership, both the panel and audience for this session are overwhelmingly female.
“Ond Hyre Seax Geteah Brad ond Brunecg”: Failing Swords and Angelina’s Heels in Robert Zemeckis’s Beowulf (KellyAnn Fitzpatrick, Univ. at Albany)
Reviews the (rather overly blatant) equation the film makes between swords and penises: the tendency of Beowulf to drop/lose swords in the face of seductive female creatures, the sexlessness of Grendel (both in the absence of genitalia and the uselessness of swords to harm him, given sword=penis), to say nothing of all the various visual juxtapositions where the naked Beowulf’s crotch is conveniently screened by a random weapon in the foreground. The first “failing sword” is the inability of Grendel to be harmed with weapons, the second is Beowulf’s failure to harm Grendel’s Mom with weapons, both by the sword passing directly through her and by his later paralysis before her. In contrast with the poem’s portrayal of the conflict between Beowulf and G’s Mom as her being unable to attack him directly, in the movie she clearly chooses to attach him with seduction rather than force (a seduction that is, in some ways, grounded in the poem’s portrayal of the struggle as a wrestling match). The third failing sword comes in the battle with the dragon, when B’s sword is two short to reach the dragon’s heart and he must take drastic action to finish the fight. In the end, the feminine power of Grendels mother triumphs, not via the overt seduction, but because she is the (implied) means by which Beowulf gains his eternal fame.
The Water Dripped from Her like “Golden Chocolate”: Mother’s Feminine Threat in Beowulf (Michelle Kustarz, Wayne State Univ.)
Looks at the larger manuscript context of the Beowulf manuscript as “stories about monsters”, and with a general thread of relating monsters and women. One of the non-Beowulf stories involves Alexander destroying a group of monstrous women. In the earliest version, the reason given is “because of their greatness”, while in later versions this is shifted to “because of their uncleanness”. The story of Judith retells the Biblical story of Judith and Holofernes, with some interesting changes. The Biblical tale emphasizes Judith’s position as a chaste and faithful widow – a detail nearly invisible in the A.S. version, which characterizes her as a brave and fearless leader. (This is taken further in Cook’s (sp?) modern translation which chooses verbiage that characterizes her as a young maiden.) [me: I’m not sure where the “monster” motif is supposed to come in here, unless Holofernes is supposed to fill the role. Or maybe this is more generally about the “transformation” of female characters?] In the various Beowulf monster interactions various of the monsters are “transformed” either from nominally female creatures (such as Grendel’s mother) or asexual creatures (such as the sea monster) into highly sexualized female seductresses. [me: ok, here’s a parallel with the point she was making about Judith.] And yet, for the sake of a PG-13 rating, the naked seductress is visually asexual, with nipples and genitalia conveniently erased by the “dripping golden water”. Tying this back to the first story, here the monster displays no “uncleanness” – it has been erased by the “translation” just as it was introduced into the first story by a later re-write. And yet the means of her defeat of Beowulf is explicitly her wielding of devouring feminine sexual power. The dragon, she portrays as again representing a “feminine” monster as an embodiment of the vagina dentate. [me: I’m not sure I buy this entirely, given that the dragon is portrayed explicitly as a “son”, but I can see some arguments.] The dragon’s defeat by penetrating the one, small vulnerable spot with a sword/phallus reiterates its essential feminine nature.
Cyborg Masculinities in Zemeckis’s Beowulf (Laurie Dietz, DePaul Univ.)
The paper takes as its theme, the explicit severing of the poem-story from the movie-story and the ways in which the movie uses the “idea” of Beowulf to comment on masculinity. Further it looks at the “cyborg” nature of motion-capture film technology to extract “essentials” of the performance that are then interpreted more freely by the director. The cyborg represents the erasure of traditional social categories, such as gender and race, to create a myth of unity. In theory, this would suggest that motion-capture performance would resist the maintenance of traditional gender categories, or at least present that as a possibility. But the actual realization in Beowulf fails to pursue this possibility, instead embodying an orgy of hypermasculinity. The motion-capture process does clearly divorce the result from the limitations of the natural, but also from the consistency of the natural (e.g., the variable hairiness of Beowulf’s chest). The topic jumps a little here, but she makes an interesting point about the movie’s Unferth representing the anti-heroic “academic” who is concerned with truth and origins and dismissive of (or unable to achieve via) traditional masculine activities and concerns.
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Date: 2009-05-09 04:45 pm (UTC)I have to contribute the review of the 1999 Christopher Lambert movie version of Beowulf. I injured myself reading it. It made me blow cola through my nose, especially towards the end. You will find it at http://www.aboutfilm.com/movies/b/beowulf.htm.