Socratic Dialogue Homosexuality in Films of the 1960s PDF

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Informal essay, MLA format, discussing the birth of the Buddy Genre film and themes of homosexuality in films of the 1960s. ...

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Waller 1 Sarah Rose Waller Laurene DeBord-Foulk FIS 494-1001 18 Oct 2016 Socratic Dialogue: Homosexuality in Films of the 1960s The earliest known film which depicted homosexuality was a film from 1895, The Dickson Experimental Sound Film. The film reportedly shocked audiences for its unconventional male behaviour. Still, filmmakers ceased to shy away from subversion and shock-value. In the late 1920s, movie-going audiences had decreased significantly with the onset of the Great Depression. In order to attract crowds at the theatres, filmmakers reverted to controversial subject matter. The first film to depict an on-screen same sex kiss was a film called Wings, starring Clara Bow, Richard Arlen, Buddy Rodgers and Gary Cooper, a film which launched his Hollywood career. In addition to being one of the first films to show two men kissing, the film was also the first widely released film to show nudity. It went on to win the First Academy Award for Best Picture at the first annual Academy Awards in 1929, the only fully silent film to have the honour. Regardless of the daring approach that early filmmakers had challenging sexuality and moral standards, many films during Hollywood’s Golden Age tended to portray gay characters as flamboyantly stereotypical, comic relief, mentally ill, confused with transgender people, cross dressers, or even paedophiles, or minor characters with vaguely hinted at closeted tendencies, rather than comfortable and open to their lifestyle, or accepting of their sexuality. Then there’s nebulous homoeroticism that often crops up in various genres.

Waller 2 Though films of the 1950s attempted to explore the possibilities of gay subtext, films of the ‘60s truly saw a groundbreaking change in the way homosexuality was portrayed in American, and even foreign, films, mainly thanks to the gay rights movement, which skyrocketed after the turning point in LGBT history: The Stonewall Riots in 1969. The 1960s witnessed many cultural revolutions: The Civil Rights Movement, the Second-wave feminist movement, the anti-war movement, the counterculture/social revolution, the gay rights movement, etc. 1960’s cinema reflected these social changes, most notably the widespread questioning of social institutions such as Race, Class and Gender (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid; 1969, The Odd Couple; 1968, Easy Rider; 1969). Other than homosexual themes, the ‘60s marked a huge decade of buddy films (which would later pave the way for the 1970s). The Buddy Film genre not only examines the close (and mostly taboo), typically nonsexual bromance between men but it also deals with the crisis of masculinity. One, sometimes both, the male leads historically pair up with at least one female love interest to avoid criticisms of homosexual subtext, but usually these women play very minor roles or pose a threat to the male-male friendship. In Butch Cassidy, Sundance’s lover, Etta Place, engages in an open threesome with the two outlaws, who mutually share her. But in the Third Act of the film, Etta knows she must leave Butch and Sundance, because the bond between the two men is much stronger, a bond only between two men that no woman could touch. Midnight Cowboy employs a frank scrutiny of masculinity and defying one’s stereotypical gender role. The bulk of the film focuses on the relationship between Joe Buck (played by Voight) and Ratso (played by Dustin Hoffman). Though Joe takes on various female

Waller 3 lovers, he hones his ‘’craft’’ to hustling male clients, while Ratso acts as his pimp. Two swinging bachelors. Unlike the previous Buddy Films of the decade, or the films released in the same year, this takes the genre a whole step further. Generally unsuccessful in the trade, Joe and Ratso instead focus on their budding relationship outside the comedy duo that’s typical of this genre, and explore their masculinity, or lack, thereof. Society tends to encourage female bonding and frowns upon male bonding that isn’t beer, women and football. Joe and Ratso are rather androgynous males (Joe more so than Ratso) and aren’t the hot sauce drinking gun-toting cowboys that the title may suggest. Joe Buck ain’t no John Wayne. He’s an overdressed Texan who thinks he's John Wayne, but he's really presented as an androgynous interpretation of an American Pie Cowboy, which actually falls into a parody of the traditional ''cowboy''. Every man in America wanted to be John Wayne. He represented all the grossly exaggerated American ideals that supposedly was not only what the textbook definition of what a ‘’real’’ man was, but also the symbolic embodiment of Uncle Sam himself. In the film I Married a Woman (1958), George Gobel constantly tries to impress Diana Dors, who’s Dream Man is John Wayne in a cameo role. Of course, Gobel is no John Wayne, and feels pressured by society’s expectations of what a ‘’true man’’ is by internalising his non-stereotypical gender behaviour and constantly trying to change himself to uphold the unrealistic expectation. The image of the cowboy is a masculine symbol. Joe Buck sees himself as this masculine image, he thinks he’s what people want, but when he gets out to New York, he finds out that the only people interested in flamboyantly dressed male prostitutes like him are gay men. Though Ratso and Joe are not depicted as explicitly gay—in fact, their sexuality is rather ambiguous— the censorship code liberalized in the 1960s, allowing these topics to be more openly discussed

Waller 4 in film rather than vaguely alluded to. That’s not to say American audiences tolerated this change, but conversations about gender and sexuality were becoming more and more mainstream on the Big Screen than previously seen before. If it were not for films like Midnight Cowboy, perhaps we would not have seen films like Dog Day Afternoon (1975) or more recently the first openly interracial gay couple in animation.

Waller 5 Works Cited Mangin, Daniel (1989). ‘’College Course File: The History of Gays and Lesbians on Film’’. Journal of Film and Video. University of Illinois Press. 41 (3): 50–66. Benshoff, Harry M.; Griffin, Sean (2005). Queer images: A History of Gay and Lesbian Film in America. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Johanson, Mark (2012). ‘’ ‘Wings’: The Last Silent Film to Win an Oscar in 1929’’. Ibtimes.com. IBT Media Inc. ‘’History of Homosexuality in American film.’’ Wikipedia. org. Mills, Katie (2006). The Road Story and the Rebel: Moving Through Film, Fiction and Television. Southern Illinois University Carbondale Press. 131. Thomson, David (2005). ‘’ Film Studies: Gay films? Well there’s ‘Raging Bull’ and ‘The Godfather’ for starters...’’. Independent.co.uk.

Archival Images Courtesy of ‘’1960s Anti-Gay Lecture for Children.’’ Dade County, Florida. Public Domain Usage. Provided to the public by documentingreality.com. ‘’The Homosexuals.’’ 1967 CBS Reports documentary. Mike Wallace. Public Domain Usage. ‘’Boys Beware.’’1961. Sid Davis Productions. Public Domain Usage. Provided to the public by publicdomainmovies.net. ‘’Gay San Francisco as depicted by 1960s media.’’ Public Domain Usage. ‘’Opposition to the Vietnam War in the United States.’’ Public Domain Usage. Provided to the public by Iowa Public Television.

Waller 6 ‘’The Stonewall Riots Breaking the Wall of Inequality.’’ Public Domain Usage. Provided to the public by Madison Cohee....