4 - History of Stereotypes in Film

Written by by Shannon Robertson, Kayla Douglas and Zack Mahrouse.

Stereotyping Homosexuals in Film: The Celluloid Closet by Rob Epstein and Jeffery Friedman

How most of us learn about others is through three factors: one being what we see for ourselves, as in what we can see with our own eyes about others; the second one being the opposite of that, which is what other people tell us; the third being our culture (films, books, plays etc.). The two films watched, The Celluloid Closet and Reel Injun, demonstrate that stereotypes in films are shown to be extremely harmful to society because people use it in learning about people.

To understand stereotypes, it is important to make the comparison between social types and stereotypes. Social types are the people who live by the rules of society. Stereotypes apply to people who are not considered the “norm” and are not included in the rules of society. The biggest difference being is that social types are a choice, whereas stereotypes are forced upon you. Iconography plays into stereotypes and is shown in our culture by classifying populations as stereotypes and makes it easy to identify people. This, in turn shows the use of hegemony in film. Hegemony is demonstrated by using stereotypes the group in power is able to decided what “the norm” is and what is and not accepted. “The norm” is what impacted marginal groups (minorities), and made them thirsty for recognition.

In the film we are exposed to the three different stereotypes that gay and lesbians were given, which were the “sissy”, the “victim”, and the “villain”. The sissy was a more feminine male, used as comedy relief. The “victim” was the gay character that was depicted as miserable, lonely and pathetic, which was supposed to make the audience pity them and which usually resulted in their deaths at the end of the films. Finally, there was the “villain” who was to demonstrate that people who are gay or lesbian have something wrong with them and portrayed as people that have no feelings. The “villain” was shown through the example of the films Dracula and Rebecca. Harvey Fierstein states that even though the “sissy” was negative, he just wanted any kind of recognition, kind of like the idea of; no publicity is bad publicity. These roles show how most of us learn about others, making it clear that film culture plays a big part in how people view others. These roles also demonstrated iconography, where people are able to put gays and lesbians in boxes and identify them based of off these three roles shown in the film. Various other stereotypes that gays and lesbians face were mentioned such as the “butch dyke”, “lesbian vampire”, and “sadistic queer” to name a few.

The film exposes that at the root of these roles and stereotypes is, hegemony. The prime example being the Hays code, which allowed censorship and restrictions and is the reason why a lot of the homosexuality in films for a long time was “seen between the line”. Hegemony allowed the people in power, so white heterosexual males, to decide what the “norm” was and in turn exclude homosexuals. This film went up to the year 1995, which means it wasn’t that long ago, but we have made great advances from that year to present time. In todays day and age there is greater freedom and platforms for homosexuals to decide how they want to be presented and viewed.

http://www.unfoundation.org/features/lgbt-rights.html

Native American Stereotypes: Reel Injun by Neil Diamond

            Reel Injun is a Canadian feature-length documentary film, made in 2009, by filmmakers Catherine Bainbridge, Neil Diamond and Jeremiah Hayes with goal of understanding how the myth of the Injun has influenced the world's understanding and misunderstanding of the Natives threw cinema.

Throughout the one hour and a half length film, Reel Injun traces the evolution of cinema's depiction of Native people from the silent film era to today. They take a look at the Hollywood Indian by exploring the portrayal of Native Americans through a hundred years of cinema. The film is separated into multiple parts including: The Savage Injun, A Good Injun, Is A Dead Injun, The Groovy Injun and finally The Renaissance in order to offer the viewers a better understanding of the categories and the evolution of the picture of the Native American that was seen by America. Like in The Celluloid Closet, the portrayal of homosexuals and the Indians in cinema are categorized in negative ways. In the film viewed in class, gays in cinema were categorized into three main categories: the sissy, the killer and the one who always dies at the end. Similarly, in Reel Injun, Indians are categorized as savages and inhuman and as the ones who always die.

Throughout the film, we meet with many celebrities including: Clint Eastwood, Robbie Robertson and Wes Studi, who discuss the evolution of the image of Indians in Western films. We also meet with regular Indians themselves who express the voice of their people through their own eyes and how it has affected them as individuals, a group and a society. Very early in the film, one important manner that is brought to light is that the portrayal of Indians in film is driven by the American people themselves who line up at cinemas to watch movies about cowboys in the West killing and murdering “savage” Indians.

In later years, dressing and pretending to be Indian was seen as the new “cool” but the population’s knowledge of the Indian lifestyle was only known through films, where the Indian lifestyle was altered in order to fit the Hollywood picture. Soon after, many American filmmakers attempted to make films solely about Indians and how they lived today but they were depicting the Indians of the 1800’s with stereotypical thoughts. Although their goal was to soften the Indian image in Hollywood, the films were not an accurate portrayal of Indians. Throughout the documentary, the filmmakers bring the audience on a journey across America to some of cinema's most iconic landscapes, including Monument Valley, the setting for Hollywood's greatest Westerns, and the Black Hills of South Dakota, home to Crazy Horse. Reel Injun also explored the stereotype of the Drunken Indian as Native Americans in the United States have historically had extreme difficulty with the use of alcohol. Many scenes in the movie are clips from dozens of classic and present Hollywood films about the depiction of the Native people to prove the concept of the negative portrayal in cinema since the first ever film was created. Indians themselves voiced the consequences their family has suffered by the depiction of Indians in Hollywood through countless interviews.

Documentary films and ourselves

Documentary films can be used as a tool to educate the public and for self reflection. Both films discuss the topic of stereotypes; what they are, how they are presented by Hollywood and their consequences. While viewing these films we begin to understand the impact that stereotypes can have on the general population and on members of the group being shown. Through these films, we learn about our own understanding and knowledge on the issues presented. For example, a native American will already know much about how they are stereotyped because they live it, while a non-native American may not. It allows us to look at an issue from many different perspectives. It may also make us more critical when watching movies in the future. Questions such as: "Do these stereotypes still occur in film?" and  "What about stereotypical figures such as the sissy?" come to mind after viewing these films. After watching these documentaries, we may pay more attention to how a group is being presented and why. As well, we may reflect on our own lives and consider if we have ever imposed these stereotypes onto someone and become more conscious of it. Many people have prejudices towards groups that they have learned from their culture and may be unaware of it.

A study was conducted in 1999 by staff members in the Department of Psychology at Harvard University where Asian women were asked to take a difficult math test. Prior to the test, these women took a short questionnaire, half highlighting the fact that they were Asian and the other half that they were women. Those who had been reminded of their Asian heritage performed better than those who had been reminded of the fact that they were female. I found this study interesting because, as these documentaries had spoken about, it show’s how negative or positive stereotypes affect those in the group. While recognizing that these stereotypes and negative images about women continue to be shown in films, I believe there are now more positive female role models now and I find that I am more influenced by them than the negative. To me, this representation helps to combat the negative ones. 

https://sish.fiu.edu/initiatives/advance-grant/products/2-shih_pittinsky_ambady_identitysaliencequantitativeperf1999.pdf

www.simplypsychology.org/katz-braly.html

Both films were able to successfully present evidence to their proposed stereotypes by showing many clips of films on the issues. This allowed the audience to see evidence of these stereotypes in films and gave them a chance to react to them. Commentary by professional film critics and people of the group in question were useful to get a better understanding of the issue at whole. However, for a more personal point of view, the film makers could have interviewed a few individuals from the group that were not film critics. This would have demonstrated how the general public and those outside the film industry understood about the portrayal of their own group. The celluloid closet had more interpretation from these professionals, which makes the film more subjective. In contrast, Neil Diamond chose to make no comment and let the audience interpret by themselves. For example, he goes to the summer camp Bominay where the camp goers dance, wear tribal paint and even sing songs about Crazy horse but even the counsel, David Teufner, admits to only know what he has seen in the films. As he watches these young boys’ pretend to be native in an inaccurate way, but does not make a comment, instead moves on in the film and leaves the viewer to form an opinion.

              From the perspective of Kayla and Shannon: I am personally not homosexual or a native American, therefore watching these films helped me understand better what the realities of these groups are. I found that I did not have very much knowledge of these issues and so it opened by eye’s and reminded me that we should be more critical when watching a film. Simply watching a film and accepting everything that is, how the characters are, may contribute to stereotypes and questioning what we watch is a way to avoid this.

From Zach's personal perspective: Watching “The Celluloid Closet” from a guy’s perspective, although I don't condone it, I was able to understand the issue at hand because the gay stereotypes in film are mostly created from men. When watching movies in cinemas that have a gay character, I can sometimes see the unease of some people in the audience. Although I don’t think the issue is a prominent anymore and is getting better, the issue is still present and we should not ignore that.

The use of stereotypes in film

Through these two films we have seen different way’s that stereotypes are used to portray certain groups in film throughout history. In The Celluloid Closet, we saw how homosexuals were first under represented in film, then later stereotyped as the “sissy”, the “victim”, and the “villain”. Reel Injun spoke about the way that native American’s have been stereotyped in film in the last decade. Watching films that bring light to the consequences of these stereotypes and raise an awareness about them. Even though the use of obvious stereotypes is less nowadays, it is still occurring in cinema and on television.