Never Again
Haven't we all said that? Usually the morning after the night before. James Bond had it right though, 'Never Say Never Again' (1983).
Ed Jerse - divorced, drunk, tattooed. If movies and TV are any kind of reflection of American culture it seems getting a tattoo is the thing to do to mark some significant moment in life. I'll go with the scene in 'Starship Troopers' (1997) as my reference, but there could be countless others.
It's a question I've pondered endlessly - just how much do TV and movies reflect the culture that produced them? Without doubt, a text is the product of the culture and time in which it is produced.
What makes it fascinating, as a non-American, is the accepted view of the West Coast as more liberal than the East yet it still produces 'Dirty Harry' and 'Die Hard' (1988). The thing that really bothers me about 'Die Hard', which is up there in my greatest movies list, is Al Powell. It's that scene at the end when Al pulls his gun and shoots the bad guy. There is a definite sense that in so doing he has again become a proper cop. Probably, even a real man! There is nothing quite so phallic as pulling out one's weapon and unloading as the American love of the gun.
Factoring in Al's being an African American only complicates the whole situation so we'll not go there. I'll never get back to 'Never Again' if I do.
But ask yourself, how many times do we see Mulder, the man who's entire life is devoted to finding the truth of extraterrestrial presence here on earth, pull out his weapon and shoot his load when confronted with the very thing he seeks?
No doubt he must get excited!
What is so infinitely fascinating about 'Never Again', an episode in which Scully takes a night off, is the way in which she handles her predicament. She doesn't shoot her load! She talks to Ed and he 'disarms' himself, literally thrusting his arm into the furnace he was about to throw Scully into.
Even in capitulation, the male must perform a version of his prime directive.
Mulder doesn't come out of this episode looking good. He treats Scully abysmally. Exerting his patriarchy. As bad as Mulder appears, and he clearly takes Scully for granted, yet he doesn't treat her as waste. Ed disposes of female bodies like so much garbage. Once they cease to serve a purpose or have become annoying to him, they are waste products to be thrown in the incinerator.
Al Powell must prove his manhood by unloading himself and Ed proves his manhood, if only to himself, by utterly destroying the female.
If TV and movies do indeed reflect their culture, the American male is a danger to the American female even more profoundly than boringly ordinary misogyny.
Men fear women for their power to emasculate. This is normal. Women seen as little more than trash, to be used, abused and discarded in a cardboard box and a fire, is a reality women must live with because they must live with the the male who fears them.
Ed Jerse - divorced, drunk, tattooed. If movies and TV are any kind of reflection of American culture it seems getting a tattoo is the thing to do to mark some significant moment in life. I'll go with the scene in 'Starship Troopers' (1997) as my reference, but there could be countless others.
It's a question I've pondered endlessly - just how much do TV and movies reflect the culture that produced them? Without doubt, a text is the product of the culture and time in which it is produced.
What makes it fascinating, as a non-American, is the accepted view of the West Coast as more liberal than the East yet it still produces 'Dirty Harry' and 'Die Hard' (1988). The thing that really bothers me about 'Die Hard', which is up there in my greatest movies list, is Al Powell. It's that scene at the end when Al pulls his gun and shoots the bad guy. There is a definite sense that in so doing he has again become a proper cop. Probably, even a real man! There is nothing quite so phallic as pulling out one's weapon and unloading as the American love of the gun.
Factoring in Al's being an African American only complicates the whole situation so we'll not go there. I'll never get back to 'Never Again' if I do.
But ask yourself, how many times do we see Mulder, the man who's entire life is devoted to finding the truth of extraterrestrial presence here on earth, pull out his weapon and shoot his load when confronted with the very thing he seeks?
No doubt he must get excited!
What is so infinitely fascinating about 'Never Again', an episode in which Scully takes a night off, is the way in which she handles her predicament. She doesn't shoot her load! She talks to Ed and he 'disarms' himself, literally thrusting his arm into the furnace he was about to throw Scully into.
Even in capitulation, the male must perform a version of his prime directive.
Mulder doesn't come out of this episode looking good. He treats Scully abysmally. Exerting his patriarchy. As bad as Mulder appears, and he clearly takes Scully for granted, yet he doesn't treat her as waste. Ed disposes of female bodies like so much garbage. Once they cease to serve a purpose or have become annoying to him, they are waste products to be thrown in the incinerator.
Al Powell must prove his manhood by unloading himself and Ed proves his manhood, if only to himself, by utterly destroying the female.
If TV and movies do indeed reflect their culture, the American male is a danger to the American female even more profoundly than boringly ordinary misogyny.
Men fear women for their power to emasculate. This is normal. Women seen as little more than trash, to be used, abused and discarded in a cardboard box and a fire, is a reality women must live with because they must live with the the male who fears them.
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