Some may argue that the movie The General conforms to traditional patriarchal gender roles. Annabelle Lee, the heroine, is kidnapped (albeit inadvertently) by hostile soldiers and needs the heroic exploits of her lover to rescue her. She is portrayed as submissive to her father and brother, ineffectual in plotting her own escape (such as throwing a stick of wood into the train furnace or failing to stop the engine so her lover can board it), and often exhibiting domestic inclinations ( as when she sweeps the engine with a broom).
Do you agree with this picture of Annabelle Lee -- or is it more complicated? Is Annabelle a stereotypical damsel in distress or is she a more progressive figure? Is there something about her a feminist could admire? What is this film saying about gender roles?
ReplyDeleteWhile Annabelle does seem to fit the archetype of damsel in distress, her character is more progressive than she may appear. For example, Aurora in Sleeping Beauty only gets 18 minutes of screen-time and spends most of her story unconscious. Annabelle appears alongside Johnnie for quite a bit of the film and is engaged with the plot. She also endures quite a bit of hardship. She is kidnapped and remains fairly stern faced while interacting with her captors. It is not until she is alone in her room that she lets her emotions be revealed. She gets stuffed into a bag and thrown onto a train with various other pieces of luggage tossed on top of her. But she goes along with it anyway because of the need to stop the Union soldiers from attacking the Confederates. She also gets completely soaked with water when Johnnie is trying to fill up the train and carries on anyway. Annabelle also exhibits her own intelligence. For example, she ties the rope between the trees to try and stop the oncoming steam engine. She also is able to drive the General for a bit on her own. However, Annabelle is still not immune to the stereotypes associated with her character. The men that capture her only take her because she is beautiful. Already she is being objectified and having her value determined by her physical appearance. She also needs to be rescued by Johnnie rather than escape herself, and she starts sweeping the train when there is a break in the action, suggesting she is only comfortable doing housework. Annabelle also makes several blunders such as when she sets the bridge on fire before Johnnie is back in the train. Overall, Annabelle is not the fiercest of women, but for the time, she possesses traits that distance herself from being seen as just a damsel in distress.
Buster Keaton's The General is a prime example of the silent comedy era, known for Keaton's amazing setup and execution of gags, but the movie also addresses themes such as heroism and feminism. Set in the American Civil War south, Annabelle Lee is portrayed as a typical southern belle who values a man's honor at their willingness to fight for the south. As the movie continues, however, Annabelle pokes some holes in the 'damsel in distress' stereotype that the audience assumes she is. While many of Annabelle's accomplishments are shown as a fluke adding to the gag, the actions themselves are admirable to a feminist, showing Annabelle can think and learn. In one scene, Annabelle accidently starts the train without Johnnie on it and when he catches up to her around a bend she reverses the train; the setup of the gag frames Annabelle as stupid for not realizing where Johnnie Gray is but considering the difficulty of operating a train, and the education privileges women had, Annabelle is quite smart. She figures out how to stop the train and how to reverse it without instruction, possibly representing women empowerment, supporting the women's suffragist movement around the time of the movie's production. In an earlier scene, when Annabelle is brought to the northern army headquarters, her disposition can be seen as progressive. When she's brought into the house, the generals begin to ask her questions, and even though we don't know what was said, how Annabelle holds herself contradicts how a damsel in distress would act. If Annabelle was acting as a damsel, she would be helplessly crying and begging the soldiers, but Annabelle is composed and relatively calm when responding to the soldiers. This can also feed into southern norms where women are expected to always be ladies, but the body language of Annabelle appears more defiant of the northern generals than compliant. While The General doesn't completely break all gender norms and make a grand and overt statement about gender roles, it hints that women are fully competent and capable of doing things on their own. Even though not all of Annabelle's actions were completely beneficial to her escape, none of her actions put her back in harm's way. Despite some of Annabelle's stereotypical actions she shows that she is not useless, and that a lady can do more than just clean house waiting for the men to return home, aligning with the women's suffragist movement's goals of the time period.
ReplyDeleteWhile Annabelle Lee may sporadically demonstrate historically female tendencies throughout “The General,” I do not believe such tendencies are the focus of her character nor of the film. Yes, Annabelle Lee is in need of male rescue, she does inadvertently sabotage her own escape, and she does in fact sweep, but, concurrently, she more or less defeats her testosterone-ridden kidnappers herself while her supposed hero is too occupied with misfortune of his own. Via this misfortune of Johnny Gray’s, “The General” veers from the eons-old depiction of the male gracefully and effectively saving his female-counterpart from danger. This film focuses not as much on female empowerment as I think it does instead on male disempowerment. Johnny Gray is seen as a failure, a goober, a schmuck, someone unable to screw his head on right and save the girl, something viewers naturally root for him to do. To me, Johnny Gray’s inability to save Annabelle Lee speaks volumes. One of “The General(‘s)” messages, I believe, is that not every male has it in him to easily and romantically put his ladylove out of harm’s way as is expected of him, as males were and remain seen as the prevailing gender. With that said, I do not necessarily see “The General” as a film embracing feminism as much as I see it acknowledging that males need not be uber-masculine and burly to be considered men.
ReplyDeleteIn Buster Keaton’s movie, The General, he redefined masculinity by showing that a man can be more than just a person in the military. In the beginning of the film, Keaton shows how society in the 1920s defined a man through the character of Annabelle Lee. Initially, when Johnnie goes to enlist in the army he gets rejected because he appears vulnerable to the enemy by the leader of the Southern military. Therefore when he returns back to Annabelle Lee’s home, she finds it unacceptable that Johnnie did not enlist in the army and refused to talk to him. From this moment on, Johnnie embarks on a journey that reveals qualities about him that make him a man despite the fact that he was not able to join the army. Johnnie fits the stereotypical role of a man who saves the day when he notifies the South that the Northern military is on their way, as well as rescues Annabelle Lee from captivity. Contrary to the seemingly stereotypical role he plays by saving the day, Gray is actually an ordinary man who faces the obstacles that come his way. An example is when he enters the Northern territory and almost gets caught taking back his train multiple times. While Gray could have just given up, he was persistent as he was determined to get back to the South safely with Annabelle Lee. Additionally, the way he reacted to the factors going against, such as the fact that he and Annabelle Lee were outnumbered when fighting the enemies on their train and barely having any defense was powerful. As in this situation Johnnie stayed focused on his end goals. Through Johnnie’s willpower and determination he redefines what it means to be a man. This was verified by his acceptance into the military. The military was the ultimate meaning of manhood and by Johnnie being accepted into it because of his own unique qualities, rather than societal expectations, he redefined manhood in his society.
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ReplyDeleteAnnabelle is a typical damsel in distress that has been presented in history over and over again. From the very beginning of the movie she establishes herself as someone who can’t make a decision for herself – rather she relies upon the men in her life (her father and brother.) She allows them to make the decisions about her romantic life by telling her that Johnny is a disgrace because he didn’t enlist, which in history is similar to a father marrying off his daughter to who he saw fit. In addition to this, the fact that she requires him to be in uniform shows a typical passive damsel: a role in the military is equal to status, and is an indication that she thinks he would be better at protecting her. In addition, Annabelle requires Johnny to come rescue her, and it seems like she doesn’t even fully accept him until the end when he is recognized as a hero. She allows societal norms and expectations to determine who she loves, which is far from progressive behavior. Annabelle is intelligent because she is able to stop and reverse the train to allow Johnny to get on, and operating a train is something that most common people can’t do. In fact, Johnny is turned away from enlisting because he was more useful as a train engineer, so Annabelle figuring it out on her own shows that she is not a completely lost cause. She may be a stereotypical damsel in distress in a lot of ways, but she is also able to apply herself and problem solve which is something that most damsels lack.
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