What a hallowed genre Obsessed is a member of! Right up there with such psycho stalker greats as Play Misty For Me, Fatal Attraction, and The Hand that Rocks the Cradle. Why the persistence of this cinematic archetype? Why don't we ever see psychotic male stalkers beyond Sleeping with the Enemy? Where's Fatal Attraction where a man is screaming, begging not to be ignored?
My theory has always been that we see these stories played out again and again because they're somewhat of a male fantasy. Think about Play Misty For Me, Fatal Attraction, Obsessed, or even the real B-movie variations like Swimfan, The Temp,and The Crush. There's something very flattering and erotic about a woman who can't get enough of you -- a plot point exploited pretty heavily in Play Misty andFatal Attraction, since both male protagonists really set their stalkers off by ... sleeping with them. If Fatal Dan and Misty Dave had just taken Alex and Evelyn out for a nice dinner and a movie, no sex, would any butcher knives have been wielded? I guess so, given the chaste plotline of Obsessed: just flirting is enough to drive Ali Larter over the edge.
If a man stalks a woman, the stories are based less around sex than pure fear. (As in Fear, starring Reese Witherspoon and Mark Wahlberg!) Sleeping with the Enemyis about abuse and possession, not about being unable to get enough of Julia Roberts. I think there's also a puritanical element at work -- the female heroine must be abused to be sympathetic. If she was sexually free, she would be asking to be stalked because she had slept with the wrong guy. She should be more choosy, and not succumb to a one night stand.
Obviously there are several gender stereotypes and sexual attitudes at work in the "psycho stalker" genre. If we had more female filmmakers, would we see Fatal Attraction remade with a male stalker, and female protagonist? Would it have the same hint of the erotic, the suggestion of obsessive desire? My gut says that it's just not a conceit that a woman would want to explore, that they find stalkers more frightening or annoying than flattering. But I realize that's really a very sexist assumption, as I know men too who have been stalked, and they found it to be frightening and annoying. Obsession isn't sexy or flattering no matter what the gender dynamic is.
Maybe the entire sub-genre just needs to go the way of the dodo as it's just not flattering to either gender, or a genre that's full of surprises. I mean ... "violent devotion," as a central plot point, doesn't exactly lend itself to pleasant surprises or happy endings, does it?
How about DeNiro in "the Fan"? Sort of a major actor in a major film at the time about this sort of issue you sorta forgot about.
ReplyDeleteI didn't forget "The Fan" and while it's certainly an example of a male stalker, it isn't exactly the same kind of dynamic. The stalker obsesses about the player as a symbol of what's going wrong in his life -- not as something of erotic interest.
ReplyDeleteIt would have been a better and more memorable movie if it had taken that path, frankly.
You're overlooking one major feature of female stalker films--the male lead who sleeps with the stalker usually already has a wife or girlfriend (who is typically intelligent, well grounded and beautiful in a natural, not overly made up way). The stalking that follows the thrilling but brief sexual encounter often comes across as the man's punishment for infidelity ("that'll teach you to jeopardize a great relationship for a fling with some nut you don't even know!") Yes, there is an element of male fantasy in the female stalker genre, but as is often the case with popular entertainment, it has its conservative, even puritanical side too. The reason why fewer women than you might expect object to female stalker movies is that they tend to identify more with the sexy but sane wives and girlfriends than the deranged female stalkers.
ReplyDeleteThe notion that any movies with stalkers in them are somehow insulting to either gender sounds like someone is trying way too hard on a college paper. Should we get rid of serial killer movies because they unfairly portray people? You could say that about pretty much any genre.
ReplyDeleteThere's a pretty big difference between serial killer movies and the "Fatal Attraction" sub-genre. Serial killer movies can range from slasher horror to police thrillers. There's a lot more range and interest. There are different places to take it, and lots of twists.
ReplyDeleteThe "psycho bitch from hell" story relies pretty heavily on what is a pretty misogynist viewpoint. There's only one or two ways it can go ... the death of the stalker, or the triumph of the stalker in destroying or taking the life of whoever it is she is obsessed with.
Even if you mix up the gender dynamic, there's not a whole lot of life you can breathe into the genre. Adding a sympathetic stalker turns it into a different kind of movie altogether.