- Is the film proclaiming a feminist statement or mocking people who did? If not, what is the conceptual nucleus? What is it demythologizing?
Ebert states that "...I think it belongs somewhere outside ideology, maybe in the area of contemporary myth and romance." I don't quite understand this sentence, but the film is certainly much more interesting than a speech of ideologies, the kind of speech Alice doesn't want to hear.
Scorsese's film is always about questioning, and always has so many levels of meaning. On the surface, this movie looks like a melodrama demythologizing the family value and women's social responsibility by an undefeated lady fights for her dream, but underneath this it is actually Scorsese demythologizing the whole process of women pursuing for dreams and independence. It seems to me that Scorsese is always exploring different genres and themes, while how he display his exploration is to demythologize whatever coat he is putting on.
I agree that not knowing what you want is a universal problem (Scorsese stated that it is not a feminist tract but "a human picture"). By addressing this to a widow, Scorsese is not trying to display the weakness of women, but more like to dramatize the problem, as he uses the stage of chaotic Little Italy to question whether a person can hold on to his belief while make a living (Mean Streets).
More than three reviews I've read said that Alice has always left in the care of others until her husband dies. While this sounds like a good reason of why a woman doesn't know what she wants, it is a misinterpretation. In the brilliant bathroom scene, Alice once says (in a very melodramatic way): "maybe I just felt like he was taking care of me." While back to another brilliant scene when she is sunbathing with Flo, she says: "I just like the idea of man, you know, strong and dominating." (thanks for the subtitle! Really helps a lot, I don't remember a single line from Mean Streets) Maybe in Scorsese's eyes feminism is a modern myth. There is no material power that is against women's free will, Alice is Alice since the very beginning.
In this film, Alice looks like a girl who has wandered a bit too far into Wonderland. She likes to sing and buys sexy dress while she is actually not a good singer and not that sexy. There are about four times she turns to her left and talks to the air: "you are a smart-ass kid", "It ain't Peggy Lee", whispers in Mel's cafe, etc.. It is certainly cute, but also daydreaming. She has a flat and childish fantasy of man: strong, beard, dominate. She is always self-contradictory: "I want to kill Tommy!" "He sometimes could be very mean." "No he is not mean...he is just too loud..." in the bathroom: "I don't love him! I do..." How Scorsese portrays her is cruel, but very interesting. A real woman is very interesting, honestly fool, realistic (when she says "I don't have to show off my emotion all the time", it might because she really does not have that much emotion at that point, women have the ability of being extremely anesthetic in order to solve the immediate problem), warm and undefeated. I actually don't want to use the word "undefeated", Ebert uses it, lots of critics use it. It is almost an eternal feminine charm (what we called Ying): to be undefeated, while blunt enough to make mistakes again and again. Overall the film does looks like a tender story about a woman being waking up from inside, but I can't help wondering if Scorsese has a crueler angle of viewing it.
We mentioned about the kids- adults comparison in class. The three men Alice met are traditionally masculine: Don an "ass" that prays sincerely (demythologizing religion/belief); Ben a sexy, passionate sadist (whom is almost a masochist in Mean Streets; he did the shooting gesture again in this film when Alice ignores him. Tommy also did that to Alice and David. Scorsese's suicidal obsession?); David a perfect farmer figure who punches kids. While Alice as the only female protagonist is very feminine. Compared to these adult conformists, kids in this movie are ground-breaking and intriguing. Besides Tommy and Audrey's ruleless words, Scorsese visualizes the complexity of their personalities by making Tommy blah blah blah all the time like an old lady (with some very funny feminine gestures when telling Alice the story in car), and Audrey acts like a total boy.
This film has too many things I want to talk about... Going back to that bathroom scene. As I said in class it is demythologizing "melodrama": she cries, "I don't love him...I do!" She turns her face around melodramatically, but the bathroom is too small that she knocks her head on the toilet paper box. While they are having the most serious conversation through out the movie, Vera is out there waitressing desperately. Look how much people pay in order to leave you time to be melodramatic. The sunbath scene opens up with a beautiful shot of two women's side faces. The framing and color (blue sky, sweat, white skin displays different shades under sunshine) make it looks like a postmodern painting. Suddenly it jumps to an establishing shot of them sitting on crappy chairs, saying what a nice weather/sunshine, then the next second a flurry of dust and sand comes towards them. For me this looks like a demythologization of Scorsese's blondes. He occasionally focuses the lens on woman's face, but this time is more intriguing.
Seems I haven't touched the conceptual nucleus...This film is complex! To sum up in a simple way, by demonstrating a modern The Wizard of Oz, Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore shows how far a person can go for her dream and how undefeated he/she would be. And as ironic as The Wizard of Oz, no matter how brave she is, how far she goes, the protagonist will finally come back, and all she learned from the journey is to cherish her life in Kansas. This doesn't sound like conceptual nucleus...help.
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