From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies - Softcover

Haskell, Molly

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226318850 ISBN 13: 9780226318851

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 1987

Synopsis

For this edition of her classic study of the feminine role in film, Molly Haskell has written a new chapter addressing recent developments in the appearance and perception of women in the movies.

"An incisive, exceedingly thoughtful look at the distorted lens through which Hollywood has historically viewed women. It is a valuable contribution not just of film criticism but to a society in which the vital role of women is just beginning to emerge."—Christian Science Monitor

"Haskell is interested in women—how they are used in movies, how they use movies, and how the parts they play function as projections and verifications of our myths about women's lot and woman's psyche and even, lately, women's lib."—Jane Kramer, Village Voice

"In examining the goddesses worshipped by an entire nation, Molly Haskell reveals a good deal about our national character and our most cherished sexual myths. . . . Concerned with the deeply ingrained belief of women's inferiority, she analyzes movies as a social product as well as a social arbiter, and she effectively demonstrates how women are encouraged to impose limitations on themselves by fashioning those selves after flickering shadows in a darkened auditorium—sexual creatures who possess neither ability nor ambition beyond their bodies. . . . Both as an examination of film and as sociology, From Reverence to Rape is excellent."—Harriet Kriegel, The Nation

About this title

About the Author

Molly Haskell has written for many publications, including the Village Voice, New York Times, Ms., Saturday Review, and Vogue. She is the author, most recently, of My Brother My Sister: A Story of Transformation.

From the Back Cover

'From Reverence to Rape is an incisive, exceedingly thoughtful look at the distorted lens through which Hollywood has historically viewed women. It is a valuable contribution not just to film criticism but to a society in which the vital role of women is just beginning to emerge.' - Christian Science Monitor

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

In no more than one out of a thousand movies was a woman allowed to sacrifice love for career rather than the other way around. Yet, in real life, the stars did it all the time, either by choice or by default-the result of devoting so much time and energy to a career and of achieving such fame that marriage suffered and the home fell apart. Even with allowances made for the general instability of Hollywood, the nature and number of these breakups suggest that no man could stand being overshadowed by a successful wife. The male ego was sacred; the woman's was presumed nonexistent. And yet, what was the "star" but a woman supremely driven to survive, a barely clothed ego on display for all the world to see.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 1987
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226318850
• ISBN 13: 9780226318851
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 444