By Emma Holbrook
The naked female body is one of the most broadcasted and sought-after images in existence: exploited in order to sell everything, from newspapers to hamburgers, and is absurdly more visible than its male counterpart. But it is also one of the world’s most censored images, for rarely – if ever – is this nudity coupled with female desire and agency in media depictions. Women are brought up on the notion that their naked body is simultaneously a source of desire and a token of shame, and nothing has been more of a startling reinforcement of this idea than the recent celebrity nude photo hack.
Although it did provoke a comforting level of outrage, certain reactions to the hack and its existence in the first place indicates how the media has raised particular factions of men to believe that the female body is something they are entitled to. That a woman’s own body can be used as a weapon against her. The oversaturation of essentially faceless female nudity in film, television and advertising has lead to a terrifying level of dissociation amongst these men, who are using this sex crime as a means of punishing women for having agency. Had it been their wives, mothers, sisters or daughters who had been sexually violated in such a way, perhaps they would not have been so quick to celebrate. And yet, they can’t extend the same level of human decency to all women, who have been objectified by the media for decades.
Even in the 21st century, the objectification of women in film is staggering. Revolutionary pieces of cinema such as American Pie treat male sexuality with a great deal of importance, whilst the women are seen purely as a means to an end. In contrast, the narrow cinematic idea of female sexuality still manages to objectify the women it claims to focus upon. Even outside of the heterosexual sphere, cinema is still permeated by the male gaze: for instance, Black Swan’s sex scene between Natalie Portman and Mila Kunis thoroughly reinforces the notion of the lesbian spectacle depicted purely for male pleasure. There has certainly never been a lack of women having sex on screen: it is their agency that is under censure.
Censorship and the MPAA’s rating system is indicative of Hollywood’s utter terror at the prospect of depicting a woman actively enjoying her own sexuality. For instance, 2010’s Blue Valentine was given an NC-17 rating purely for depicting Ryan Gosling’s character performing oral sex upon his wife. So logically, does this mean that R-rated films such as Pulp Fiction and A Clockwork Orange, which are rife with a disturbing level of gratuitous violence, are less offensive than a scene of consensual sex.
Television has always been streets ahead of its silver screen counterparts. Sex and the City, despite its multitude of issues, was a revolutionary celebration of female sexuality that allowed shows like the Netflix revelation Orange is the New Black to explore the sexuality of women of all sexual orientations.
Gone Girl, essentially a film all about one woman’s manipulation of the patriarchy, depicts the same sexual act between Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike that was deemed so offensive in Blue Valentine, but this time, the MPAA gave it a much less restrictive R-rating. The act of reframing female sexuality, not only in cinema but also in the wider world, will not happen overnight, but one thing is clear: the idea of a woman who is allowed to openly explore her sexuality and desire, without condemnation, should not seem as radical as it currently is.
http://www.concrete-online.co.uk/feminism-film-censorship-female-sexuality/
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