Untitled memo

The only reason I’m not giving a five stars is that I’m doing gender studies now and this film feels no more and no less than an average lecture I have. It makes me laugh, it makes me cry. It makes me happy, it makes me sad. It inspires me. And it has a specific historical context. The discussion is only applicable to a specific social formation. And I’m not rating my lectures.

It’s about playing with gender. But that really only makes sense under the framework of gender binarism. Watching halfway, I was thinking i wish i could pass as victor/ victoria does. But in a more trans-inclusive world, the very notion of passing would not exist. When there is a plurality of genders rather than just two (industrial) or three (contemporary western) or a handful (some traditional/ tribal societies in the pacifics or elsewhere), gender could be just a minor feature that might be visible but nobody would care.

Maybe it was just it was too cold in the cinema, that I laughed the loudest when the person said something like good for you you have heat in your room. There are many techniques used to make the film fun. Some of them might be found inappropriate in today’s context. That’s understandable. Many of the basic assumptions of the film are not applicable to today’s world.

good music, good stage performances on screen. It is more of a musical comedy than doing any actual challenges after all.

It’s also highly androcentric, i’m not gonna elaborate on that. Just think about the ending bit, which admittedly made me smile and cried at the same time. That part makes the whole film look like some sort of utilising victoria as a tool to help fulfill that male character’s dream, to do the clichéd drag thing. I mean, it is a good ending for a film, but how good really is it for this one? And also, basically all the other characters in this film are males, very normative and ‘normal’ ones, except that stereotypical super jealousy girl, who doesn’t even have a personality rather than being jealous.