In the past week my film class has been looking at the idea of desire and the power it has on the way people view films. One of the articles that I had to read focused on Rudolph Valentino and his role in films during the 1920's. In one of those weird coincidences of life, Pittsburgh Filmmakers actually presented The Son of the Sheik, one of Valentino's films, in their Melwood Screening Room on Thursday. I decided that it was one of those opportunities that I couldn't miss and went to see it. I must admit I do not have much experience with silent films and I wasn't sure what to expect. While the quality of the film wasn't very good, I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed the film. The story was very similar to the romantic comedies that I love today. One reason I love the romance genre is the complex relationship between the couple. The Son of the Sheik was no exception, how can you love someone when you believe they have betrayed you.
A major focus for my film class is trying to figure out how people view films and what cues films give the viewer. One reason we read about Valentino and his films was because a major component of his films is the idea of the gaze of desire. A big aspect of the film critic's job is to discern who the film is geared towards. Most critics believe that films are geared entirely to a male audience and look to satisfy male desires. Valentino's films are an interesting counter example though. The films were geared entirely to a female spectator and most men disliked Valentino. You could see this reflected in the way they developed Yasmin and Ahmed's relationship. At first the relationship develops because Ahmed wants it to. He falls in love with her and Yasmin then follows suit. When Ahmed gets attacked by the thieves he believes Yasmin has betrayed him and he starts to hate her. He feels used and when he is subjected to her gaze of desire he feels as helpless as a woman. To regain control he takes matters into his hands and forces her back into the weaker role. What develops is a different way of looking at the idea of who occupies the dominant role in relationships in films. In the end it was an interesting look back at how people acted in the decade and the perceptions people had.
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I think you have a good idea going for you with this movie blog. Critiquing movies has layers and many facets which you can introduce. However I don't know if you have totally captured the potential of this blog. You give a great synopsis of the movie but I didn't see a lot of critique. You state at the beginning that you enjoyed the film because it reminded you of modern romantic comedies, but you don't state which ones or why. Like I said before, I think it would add a lot to the post to put more critique in it.
ReplyDelete"Most critics believe that films are geared entirely to a male audience and look to satisfy male desires." I thought this was a really interesting statement and would like to see it elaborated upon. Like, *all* films, or just certain genres?
ReplyDeleteI really liked the description of the plot of the movie. Did you look on youtube to see if maybe there was a clip you could embed in your post? That would have been pretty neat.