Lovely & Amazing Film Review

Lovely and Amazing is a film about a Caucasian mother with two adult daughters and one adopted pre-teen daughter who is African American. Each female deals with their own personal insecurities throughout the film. The mother, in an effort to feel younger and more attractive, gets a liposuction which nearly risks her life. She looks to the doctor to feel beautiful and wanted, but he does not reciprocate her advances. The daughter who is an actress does not feel beautiful because she continually finds herself in the supporting role next to the beautiful lead actress. She is insecure in that she feels that she is not sexy or seductive enough and looks to a male actor’s sexual advances as a validation of her beauty.

The married daughter wants to pursue a career in making crafts, but her husband is not supportive since they are only losing money with her hobby. Feeling unsupported by her husband, she gets a job at a one hour photo development store where she gains attention from her 17 year old boss and they become intimate. Instead of looking for attention and comfort from her husband, she maintains a relationship with her boss only to end up in jail for rape. Annie, in an effort to be like her adopted family, has troubles adjusting to all the differences that they have. She even goes to the extreme of straightening her hair without consent.
This film deals with a lot of body image issues that we have discussed throughout the course from cosmetic surgery to what is beautiful. I did like the film because it constantly had you wondering what they were going to deal with next. If it wasn’t one thing, it was always another and you just were hoping that it would all work out in the end. I did feel that the movie didn’t really end. It left you to make up your own conclusions of what became of them. That is my only problem; I felt I needed a conclusion.

In the beginning of the film, I felt the married daughter was rude and she was neglecting the adopted daughter when she was taking care of her because her mother was in the hospital. The part where they say that she doesn’t need sunscreen bugged me because her skin still needs to be protected. It was like instead of putting her in the Big/Little Sister program, I felt that they should have educated themselves about raising a black child. They should have put some braids and grease in her hair and she probably wouldn’t have felt the need to straighten her hair because it was a mess. Black and white are complete opposites, but there are similarities like moisturizing and protecting skin from UV rays.

The other issues in the film were surrounded around males. Each of the other women looked for men to validate them. It was just sad to see. The married woman’s situation was the worst because she just needed to have a civil conversation with her husband without the presence of their child. She was clearly unhappy with the lack of attention from her husband, and the first person to acknowledge her she grab held and didn’t let go. I could probably talk about these issues forever because it just bothers me so much. The low self-esteem of this family was just hereditary. Their insecurities were just so extreme.

Mona Lisa Smile Film Review

Mona Lisa Smile was about Katherine Watson who goes to teach at an all girl’s college, Wellesley College that is known for its academics. She goes in believing that this is an institution made to promote education and fulfilling a career. She is shocked to find out that this is merely a finishing school masked as a university. The girls are there only to find a husband. They are there for their MRS rather than a BA. Ms. Watson continues to promote education instead of overlooking those who are planning a wedding. Betty, one of the students who gets married, protests all of Ms. Watson’s efforts. In the end, they all respect Ms. Watson for defying the system and promoting women to be more than just wives and mothers.

The central thesis of the film is that women offer more than just being a housewife. We cannot continue to live passively while the men in our lives play the active roles. Women have more to offer and neglecting their potential is only detrimental to everyone involved. This film relates to the course readings in that The Feminine Mystique: “The Problem that Has No Name” talked of women not being considered feminine if they attained higher education or a career. How housewives have this problem called, “the housewife’s syndrome” where they can’t explain why they feel so sad and unfulfilled with life because they are constantly maintaining their family’s lives.

I liked this movie because it was about a piece of time that I really didn’t know much about. It was like watching history, but it was entertaining. It made you laugh, made you sad, and it made you feel inspired as a woman. The story also determined beauty by confidence and self-assurance of oneself. Ms. Watson was seen as more attractive to the male teacher than his students because of her confidence in herself. You can tell that she knew her worth and set standards of how she wanted to be treated rather than being used like the students. She was surer of herself and it made her more attractive.

The female students were determining their self-worth by getting married because the school and society were glorifying marriage and excusing absences for engaged and married students. They were putting the male’s needs before their own and Ms. Watson let them know that they should not feel valuable only from the love of a man. This was a big body image issue for the girls because they did not have self-esteem but it was only attained by the attention of a male. They were devaluing themselves and their potential.

Blog 8: "The Beauty Myth"

The end of the beauty myth doesn't give me closure at all. This is predominantly due to the fact that you can say things like love yourself and everything else will follow suit, but in the end you cannot change everybody. Women will still be judged by beauty standards and will have to work twice as hard to gain the same respect as that of any man. In every situation, the media comments on what the woman is wearing or how she looks whether than what she stands for or what she has accomplished. Her beauty is always more publicized than what she did. Its sad but true. I personally have had people look at me like I'm a phenomenon because I do well in school. "But you're pretty?" still hurts me to hear uttered from anyone's mouth. Why can't I be both? Why can't I care about my appearance and still do well in my academics without people thinking she just got there because of her looks? I work hard to gain that respect and hopefully change people's minds about the intelligence of a beautiful woman by being an example. I can only hope it changes some day. I want it to be where women are both seen and heard equally because right now women are acknowledged just for their visual images.

Images from the before and after of the Fox tv series "The Swan" where they took contestants who were considered "ugly" and used plastic surgery, hair extentions, makeup, and new clothes to give them makeovers so that they could feel "beautiful"

Wolf's work is much more wordy and a little cryptic in its message at times. Valenti is much more direct, to the point, and in your face about it. I would much rather read Valenti's work because I feel that I can relate more with it and it was much more understandable. Valenti uses examples that are more prevalent in the media while Wolf's examples are court cases that went bad. I feel that Valenti's examples are better because these are the type of images that are constantly being presented on television such as the Swan and commercials seen on television. Pretty much everyone watches tv so I could relate more to the images and recall moments. They both present the same message, but Wolf does it in a round about way. They both talk about eating and dieting, how women are discussed about their beauty only to silence them, and what women go through to attain beauty. You can also feel anger in both of their writings. Valenti just uses harsher words to express it.



The essay that I felt was most interesting from the Body Outlaws text was, "The Butt: Its Politics, Its Profanity, Its Power." When I first read the title, I was instantly interested. I myself, posess a big butt and I have a love hate relationship with it. I felt that I could really relate to the essay and it gave me a little knowledge about why it is so much associated with black women. Even though, nowadays its more associated with women like J.Lo (Hispanic) and Kim Kardashian (Armenian). It was interesting to hear some of the trials and tribulations of one's behind from someone else. I could relate to the fact that going shopping for pants and skirts can be limiting with larger assets than most. Nothing fits right and I've destroyed many pairs of jeans because of the friction between my thighs. It also grows when you least expect it. I just felt really understanding to this piece. It was almost as if it was written just for me. I often found myself saying, "I know!"

Blog 7: "Eating Disorders"

An eating disorder is a condition that affects an individual's eating habits. It may be that one may not eat or one may overeat. It is an emotional disorder that appears as an irrational craving for or avoidance of food. It involves a lot of mental aspects that effect the victim of an eating disorder.

The influence of fashion, film, media, and diet industries have greatly influenced the notions of beauty and have effected the rise in eating disorders. Many women look to celebrities as their ideal. Celebrities have to maintain a standard for their body so that they may continue to work. If a celebrity's body changes, their work changes. A plus size celebrity can lose weight, get praise for it, and maintain a job,even gain more work, but if a celebrity becomes plus size they become ridiculed and it is harder for them to maintain a job. Celebrities and the media make it look so easy to be thin and beautiful. As regular women and men, we are constantly presented this standard of beauty and comparing ourselves to them because we are also seeing them as beautiful and what we want to be. Celebrities pin it all on eating healthy and exercise, so when someone is not thin and beautiful then it is assumed that they are not trying hard enough. Only a small portion of people can actually attain this ideal body image through health and exercise and many result to disordered eating habits. Often these issues are swept under the rug, but it is a real issue that needs to be answered. I don't think that the entertainment industry is the cause, but it is an influence.

Food and diet addiction has become a preoccupation with the American society because so many people have become overweight. In America, food is so accessible and its everywhere so we just eat. You eat to live, to comfort, to socialize, to overall just enjoy. Diet pills and the new IT diet are constantly being advertised and publicized because everyone is looking for the easy way out but the way that they are eating has become a lifestyle. Changing a way of life is a lot harder than people might think which is why diets don't work. The easy way out never works unless the lifestyle changes. Its hard to stop eating the way you did before because you need food to survive. I have also heard that diet pills don't work because the body gets used to them after a while. Diet pills are also dangerous. Not too long ago, it was reported that Hydroxycut killed some nineteen year old boy and was taken off the market. You really don't know what you are putting into your body and it could be harmful to you. All you know is that it makes you lose weight, but I doubt anyone looks at what it truly does to make you lose that weight.

There is a preoccupation with food. It is given good and bad media images. When it comes down to one's appearance, it is given a bad image. When it comes to enjoyment and satisfaction, it gets a good image. There is a constant battle of food's image.

I don't think that society can be reintegrated until there is a realness put back to the media. Images of celebrities should not be retouched to portray impossible images. I think there should be a move to real body images publicized instead of thin, emaciated bodies. Nicole Richie is a prime example of the influence of the media. In the picture on the left, she was actually bigger when she first came on the hollywood scene. She still denies that the picture on the right was due to an eating disorder and claims it was due to stress and how she deals with her emotions. Many victims of eating disorders also mention the same reasons behind their eating habits.

Blog 6: "Cosmetic Surgery"

Cosmetic surgery was originally used for patients, most often men, who were disabled by war or industrial accidents. Cosmetic surgery has become centered around women because many women equate their attractiveness to their character. Women constantly feel judged based on their appearance. Women are taught to maintain a feminine beauty as to not be seen as less than. This social standard for women to maintain their beauty has made women obsessed with physical appearance.

Personally, I think that cosmetic surgery just perpetuates unattainable beauty standards. Much of cosmetic surgery is to attain an Anglo-Saxon appearance as mentioned by Debra Gimlin. As an African American woman, I like my ethnic features. I think they are beautiful and I would not change anything about it. Changing your face to look like one type of people is boring and I like the differences of faces. Cosmetic surgery loses that appreciation of your historical background and that is sad to me that you would want to look otherwise. To define what is beautiful is really hard to say. There are so many different oppinions, but personally I do not believe their is one type of beauty.

I would not get cosmetic surgery unless it was something vital to my health. I am not willing to risk my health in order to be someone else's version of beauty. There are too many fake doctors acting like real doctors who are trying to make a buck and too many bad reactions to cosmetic surgery for me to agree. I think that I am beautiful the way that I am. I actually look forward to growing old and getting to see what I will look like later in life. I think that my mother and grandmother are beautiful the way they are. I just look forward to looking older and when I see older people with face lifts, I think it makes them look older.

I do feel that people take the option of cosmetic surgery too lightly. To me it all seems really superficial at the end of the day. I just want everybody to accept themselves as they are. If the whole world made a change tomorrow to reveal the truth of what everyone looks like, I do not think that cosmetic surgery would be on such a rise. The media helps a lot with the rise of cosmetic surgery but it makes you wonder what the world would be like without photoshop. I guess if it is everyday you have trouble looking in the mirror at yourself and contemplating worse options than cosmetic surgery.

I think it is a vain and shallow culture because to say that cosmetic surgery improves your looks or self-image is still vain and shallow. The fact that when you don't feel beautiful because of your body and that changes your whole personality is very shallow. If someone doesn't like you because of the way you look then they are shallow, so if you don't then I would say the same for you. I don't mean to be rude or judgmental for those who participate in cosmetic surgery because at the end of the day, who am I to judge because I do not know your situation. The only time I would not see it as shallow and vain would be if it was something like a scar being removed, laser hair removal, or the original use of cosmetic surgery. Something like that is the only real justification for cosmetic surgery. I don't really think of that as cosmetic surgery though, I guess because its less invasive and dangerous.

Paper 1 Part 2

I believe every child has seen some Disney movie or knows of one or about one. Disney movies are always typical of the beautiful princess who is saved by some handsome young stranger and they live happily ever after. The female is often the passive character while the male hero is always the active participant saving the damsel in distress from the ugly villain. I believe this is due to the fact that, “Women are mere “beauties” in men’s culture so that culture can be kept male (Wolf 59).” If the villain is male, he wants the beautiful princess, but if the villain is female, she is jealous and ugly. Every woman is drawn to be beautiful unless she is viewed as the evil and mean villain made to thwart the princess at finding true love with the handsome young male.
The first Disney movie that I wanted to analyze was the classic story of Cinderella. She was the beautiful stepsister but you couldn’t tell under all the dirt and cinders on her face from cleaning after her evil stepmother and two ugly stepsisters. They even went to the extent of mentioning that the villains were ugly as to make the decision for you. Cinderella is the young blonde Caucasian ideal of beauty. One of her stepsisters is a red head and the other is a brunette. They both have larger noses and bigger eyes than that of Cinderella. Disney perpetuates an ideal of what is beautiful and what is not just by the drawing of the characters.
At the end of the story, Cinderella of course goes to the ball and the prince locks eyes and they instantly fall in love. Love at first sight is a common theme of Disney movies. Her two stepsisters end up getting shafted in the end because they don’t even find love at the ball. I’m sure there were other well off suitors at the ball other than the prince, but they are deemed mean and unlovable by a male counterpart. They must stay at home with their stepmother and lose their maid. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that Cinderella should have stayed the maid instead of living in a castle with many maids. I’m just saying that the stepsisters need some love too.
The story of Snow White is another story of a wicked stepmother who treats her stepdaughter as the maid. The queen is considered beautiful and the fairest of them all, until her stepdaughter grows up and the queen grows old. The queen also looks a lot like Sleeping Beauty’s nemesis which is a little suspicious since they had the same sleeping issue, but that is beside the point.
It’s Disney’s interpretation of beauty as being young. The queen used to be the fairest, but someone younger will come and take your place. It also sends a message of how important beauty is. The queen put a hit out on Snow White because she was prettier than her. It all sounds a little extreme when you say it aloud. What always confused me about the story is why the queen had all this magic, but didn’t just make herself prettier than Snow White. She made herself this frail and wrinkled old lady. I don’t understand why she couldn’t do the opposite if it was such a problem.
I think it is interesting how all of the princesses have a lot of the same facial features. It is continually big eyes, big lips, hourglass shape, and a little nose. Jasmine is the only one who is of a different race. The rest of the princesses are Caucasian and Ariel has a little bit of a tan probably because she lives in the ocean by the beach. The only real differences are their hair color and length.
I’m still waiting for the day where the male is in distress and must be saved by the princess but as Wolf says, “A beautiful heroine is a contradiction in terms, since heroism is about individuality, interesting and ever changing, while “beauty” is generic, boring, and inert (59).” I’m sure that the drawing of the heroine would not be the popular Disney princesses. I remember watching Mulan, and she never gets the same coverage or credit as the others. Even Pocahontas doesn’t get the call for the photo. There are probably others that just don’t get the same recognition. I know that I have never seen the Disney movie of Sleeping Beauty but I know of her because she is in the photo with the other princesses. I wonder if they were not considered beautiful enough.

Paper 1 Part 1

Stereotypes are oversimplified standardized images of a person or a group of people. It is classifying people or a group of people because of social ideas or images. They put people into boxes and make people, who believe them, seem ignorant and simple-minded. Every group of people has some kind of stereotype associated with them. It is like the old saying, “One bad apple ruins the bunch.” They ignore the fact that everyone is different even though they may be classified into a group.
People are often stereotyped into categories because of media images or from others own personal experience. Often on talk shows, you will hear people say, “I believe that this group of people is like this because that is the only image that I see of them.” Many times, I think this come from a confirmation bias rather than an actual experience. They may have a preconceived notion about a person or a group of people then when they meet a person who is categorized as that group they only look for the confirmation of their biases even though there are other factors that may be against their stereotype.
Personally, I do not believe that I have ever felt the need to conform to a stereotypical image. As an African American female, I actually do not like the perpetuation of stereotypical images. I will make sure to not portray stereotypes in public. I feel uncomfortable eating fried chicken and/or watermelon in public. Sometimes I will avoid eating the food just because of the stereotype associated with it. I remember watching the Wendy Williams Show, and she actually mentioned that she said she would never eat fried chicken on television as a man was showing her how to make KFC’s secret recipe.
I can recall times when I felt that others felt that I should conform to the stereotype that African American females are loud, ghetto, and sassy. This kind of stereotype is much like the stereotype of what is considered feminine in that women are allowed a mind or a body but not both (Wolf 59). It is as if everyone must remain in a role and no role can be rearranged or mixed. I was always the girl who went to a predominantly white school, but lived in a predominantly black neighborhood. So, it was like I got the pressure to conform to the stereotype in different ways.
In school, it was as if they wanted me to be louder and more aggressive while I’m just trying to be me. I’m a real laid back girl with a soft voice unless you make me mad. There were a couple of other black girls in the school and one in particular used to drive me nuts because she would conform to the stereotype. I and another black girl who lived in my neighborhood used to talk about how much we had a problem with it because it wasn’t genuine and it was an over exaggerated black stereotype.
She lived in the suburbs and would say ghetto this and ghetto that and it was as if she expected me to act the same way. I really don’t even like the use of the word ghetto because I feel that the word is used too loosely. It is hard to describe the situation, but it would just drive me insane. I’m just glad that I had someone who could relate with me. I guess she could justify that it was just her personality in some way, but something about it seemed like a front and it is not surprising that another girl that lived in what was considered a “ghetto” neighborhood felt the same way.
Then when I was home with my friends in my neighborhood, I would often hear that I talk white. I would ask what talking white is and I could never get a straight answer. It was as if they were saying that I was not black enough for them. It was as if they were saying I talked to proper and educated as if talking black was not using proper English and uneducated. It hurt me to hear black people talk about themselves in such a way because to say that would mean the opposite also. This way of thinking would also bug me since African Americans have been stereotyped and judged for so many years and to see them perpetuate the stereotype on themselves just hurts me.
I learned a lot from these experiences. It only makes me work harder to portray another kind of image for the African American female. I hope that others will see me and get a changed idea of what an African American female does and acts like. I want people to see another version so that there will be a more positive stereotype or better yet a negation of the previous stereotype. I like to think that I am a body outlaw due to the fact that Ophira Edut defines them as, “In a world that still tries to assume our identities, we rebel with an outward expression of self. Our passion of truth, in all its messy complexity, compels us to visibly defy easy categories and sweeping labels, even if they were created from within. We rush to show the world who we are rather than allow it to paint us as one-dimensional characters (xxiii – xxiv).”

Tyra had a really good show about racial perceptions. A must watch:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGNyjsAumuU