Lars and the Real Girl, a 2007 film which takes up the topics of alternative desire and societal reaction to such intimacy raises important questions about tolerance of sexual difference and the establishment of sexual identity. Lars, the film’s protagonist, who is clearly alienated from the heterosexual matrix as the film begins, jumps headlong into the realm of marginalized queerness as he orders an “anatomically correct” sex doll and proceeds to christen her Bianca, introducing her to his community as his perfectly normal, and thoroughly alive, girlfriend. Nevertheless, with the prodding of the local mental health professional Doctor Dagner, the community accepts his notion Bianca is alive. Though this exercise of tolerance presents an indictment to societal systems which harshly prevent any legitimization of transgressions of normal sexual conduct and desires, the film ultimately fails to explore the possibility of a world in which heteronormativity is not idealized as the norm Doctor Dagner’s treatment of Lars opens for exploration. Though this squandered opportunity prevents the film from presenting enterprising argumentation for the normalization alternative sexualities and desires, queerness colors the film from start to finish, presenting the progressive, though less ambitious, assertion that queer desire and identification has the right to exist despite its deviation from norms and cannot be eradicated despite its marginalization.
Though he does not have a same sex partner or practice a condemned sex act as the film begins, Lars can be rightfully designated as queer due to the expansive nature of the classification, which Sedgwick claims identifies anyone whose personality traits, procreative choice, enjoyment of power in sexual relations, and other aspects of sexual identity do not perfectly correlate with their biological sex or resist organization into a “seamless and univocal whole”(Sedgwick 8). Lars’ inability to socialize, asexuality, and avoidance of physical contact prevent the characterization of him as a heterosexual and effeminize him by suggesting he is passive by nature. This inconsistent sexual identity reveals the life Lars leads within his garage apartment situated on the margins of the heterosexual family home of Karin and Gus is securely outside the realm of heteronormativity long before he purchases a sex doll and proceeds to date her.
Lars’ queerness is put into sharper relief by his friend’s and family’s concerns for his lack of sexuality and sociability as the film begins, which reveal a clear privileging of heteronormativity within the community. The moment in which Mrs. Gruners assaults Lars with questions concerning his sexuality as they exit church effectively illustrates this privileging, as her initial query as to why he does not have a girlfriend reveals that heterosexual desire is the assumed sexuality, and thus the norm. Though she later asks if he is gay in a friendly manner, claiming she knows all about “the gays,” her simplification of queerness implicit within this reductive categorization shows she and other members of the community probably do not possess a nuanced respect of and understanding for alternative forms of desire and non-heteronormative identifications. Furthermore, her act of giving Lars a flower, an item traditionally associated with man’s pursuit of women, to pass along to someone special suggests it would certainly be preferable if that special someone was a woman and attempts to push Lars into the masculine gender role of the aggressor of romance. Lars’ rejection of this role is clearly evidenced by his immediate disposal of the flower when Margo, a potential heterosexual love interest, speaks to him. Gus and Karin’s absolute joy when they initially believe the formerly reclusive Lars is hosting a live female visitor further evidences the community’s investment in heteronormativity, while their horror upon realizing his new girlfriend is a sex doll, and subsequent conclusion he is demented, reveals that though his relative asexuality was concerning, the act of loving a doll is much more abhorrent.
Despite this initial horror at Lars’ new queerness, which incites a heightened level of concern, likely due to its status as an “offense against the regularity of a natural function,” Gus, Karin, and Lars’ larger community are able to play along with Lars’ delusion(). The community’s acceptance of Lars’ delusion is conceived by Doctor Dagmar, a medical professional with an enlightened approach to the treatment of abnormal behavior. Rather than diagnosing Lars with a mental illness, Dagmar classifies his alternative desire for Bianca and faulty perceptions of her nature as a delusion, externalizing his queerness rather than classifying this intimacy as the defining factor of Lars’ identity or a force “at the root of all his actions because it was their insidious and indefinitely active principle; written all over his face and body it was a secret that always gave itself away”( 43). Accordingly, Dagmar asserts the best course of action is to allow Lars the opportunity to work out his delusion on his own terms rather than attempting to undertake Gus’ injunction to “fix him” by placing him in a institution or intervening medically, actions which by nature present such alternative desires as both the determinant factor of identity and undesirable. Dagmar’s medical advice, which asserts the right for queerness to exist and be respected within the community, is rooted in her conclusion Lars’ feelings for Bianca are indeed “real” and are not a hazard to himself or others. The legitimization of queerness implicit within her refusal to marginalize Lars’ delusion directly attacks the privileging of heteronormativity within the community.
As Dagmar attempts to stifle the impulse of Gus, Karin, and the larger community to aggressively eradicate Lars’ queerness, her progressive plan creates a potential for the overturn of traditional power dynamics. Within The History of Sexuality, Foucault explores the power systems which have led to the simultaneous visibility and condemnation of queerness within modern culture, pinpointing the identification of individuals by their respective sexualities as vital to the creation of definitive roles of the sexual transgressor and enforcer of norms, divisions which lead to the marginalization of sexualities deemed abnormal. As Doctor Dagmar attempts to avert the definition of Lars exclusively by his queerness and condemnation of his sexual identity, she acts to prevent characterization of him as a sexual transgressor subject to the community’s enforcement of norms and hopelessly entangled within the “perpetual spirals of power and pleasure” which form as “the pleasure that comes of exercising a power that questions, monitors, watches, spies, searches out, palpates, brings to light; and on the other hand, the pleasure that kindles at having to evade this power, flee from it, fool it, or travesty it” ( Foucault 45). As the breakdown of this power dynamic detaches the acts of condemning sexual practices and evading these judgments from pleasure, true embracement of Dr. Dagmar’s directions leads to the expiration of the need for a normalized sexuality on which to base this power dynamic. Consequently, in the wake of Dr. Dagmar’s plan, Lars’ community appears ripe for a complete destabilization of sexual hierarchy or the establishment of a space that reflects “not just a safe zone for queer sex but the changed possibilities of identity, intelligibility, publics, culture, and sex that appear when the heterosexual couple is no longer the reference or privileged example of sexual culture”(548). Nevertheless, the film fails to displace heteronormativity as a normative force, and thus capitalize on this opportunity to fully explore the queer possibility its premise presents.
Though the community partially legitimizes Lars’ queerness by accepting his delusion, momentarily abdicating the role of enforcer of sexual norms, it never wholly embraces the sentiment Lars’ sexual identity is normal and equal to heteronormative identifications. First and foremost, the community’s act of treating Bianca as a live girl arises somewhat grudgingly from the only available medical recommendation to dispel delusion rather than an embracement of the principle queerness does not deserve to be an object of derision implicit within Doctor Dagmar’s counsel, and, therefore, is principally an act to eventually expel Lars’ queerness rather than embrace his atypical desire. This bastardization of Doctor Dagmar’s intent becomes apparent as Gus and Karin present their conundrum to their friends and coworkers, cracking jokes and reveling in the shock of the relationship. In these moments, there does not seem to be any challenge to the community to accept Lars’ desire as normal or real, but simply humor him in order to most effectively work through the unfortunate situation. Moreover, as Lars’ desire for Bianca escalates, the community reclaims the role of the enforcer of norms by finding Bianca employment, taking her to recreational activities, and even electing her to the school board, actions which humanize the doll, and thus passively attempt to push Lars into the world of human heterosexual relationships they privilege. Though the community undeniably forms an attachment to Bianca, an embodiment of the queerness they are attempting to eradicate, there is a level of mockery within these relationships preventing true and progressive identification with the queerness she represents, as her placement on the school board shows that her integration into the community is integrally tied to the comedy and novelty of the situation. Though Dagmar’s intent laid out in her instructions to Karin and Gus is a progressive step toward the destabilization of the community’s heteronormativity sensibilities, the community does not seems to possess the desire or humanity to evaluate their prejudices and assumptions exposed as the film begins.
The opportunity the film has to portray a world in which “the heterosexual couple is no longer the reference or privileged example of sexual culture” is further undermined by the film’s allocation of a heteronormative perspective to viewers. Just as the community assumes Lars identifies as heteronormative before the emergence of Bianca, the film assumes its audience cannot identify with queerness, as viewers scarcely inhabit the perspective of Lars, and are only afforded this level of identification in the moments in which he is exhibiting heterosexual or masculine behaviors. As the film begins, the audience first views Lars through a window and the cover of his baby blanket, an image which creates multiple layers of separation between him and the viewer. Soon after, viewers inhabit the gaze of Karen, a woman whose marriage and pregnancy make her a fitting representation of normalized and fertile heterosexuality, and Lars’ social queerness during their exchange likely reassures audiences that Karen’s gaze is the viewpoint with which they can identify. The audience is not prompted to identify with Lars until viewers nearly inhabit his gaze, watching the action from a viewpoint just beyond Lars shoulders, as he views Margo from the vending machine room, pulling up a chair in order to so, in a moment which reveals his growing intrigue with this human girl and the world of heterosexuality her undying affection offers. Soon after, viewers look upon Margo from Lars’ unadulterated perspective as she interacts with her current boyfriend. This moment once again reveals a growing affection for Margo, and, furthermore, a momentary embodiment of a more typically masculine gender role, as Lars firmly shakes her boyfriend’s hand in a manner that can be viewed as an assertive disclosure of masculinity. Though Bianca is Lars’ love interest for the majority of the film, viewers only see her from Lars’ perspective late in the work’s progression as he questions Gus about the transition into manhood, a moment in which Bianca’s escalating sickness and Lars’ simultaneous increased intrigue with Margo reveal he is slowly embracing the heterosexual desire privileged by the community and the assumed heterosexual audience. This progression is further signified by the fact that we only see Bianca from Lars’ perspective as he looks upon her through a window, a layer of separation which signifies he is quickly becoming alienated from the abnormal sexuality the doll embodies in a manner similar to the separation of the audience from Lars generated at the film’s beginning. Thus, the manipulation of gaze within the film does not challenge viewers to identify with Lars’ queerness, an act vital to any earnest attempt to displace heteronormativity as the norm within the film, but rather encourages heteronormative identification by directing the audience to identify with the apparent progression to heteronormativity Lars is undergoing with the community’s aid.
Despite the impending transformation suggested by the film, Lars’ queerness perseveres. Though Lars’ act of killing Bianca, and thus actively dispelling his own queer delusion, in order to pursue Margo, the human love interest championed by his community from the film’s beginning, undoubtedly displays an embracement of heterosexuality and momentary embodiment of a masculine gender role, he never forms a coherent sexual identity, the hallmark of heteronormativity, due to his failure to completely embrace masculinity. On the day of Bianca’s funeral, he pays tribute to her by wearing her sweater, and this instance, which is not Lars’ first display of a fondness of drag within the film, asserts he still has effeminate tendencies. This effeminate characterization is solidified during his final exchange with Margo, as his lack of sexual assertiveness, a trait he also consistently displays over the film’s course through a lack of significant physical intimacy with Bianca, is signaled by his choice to invite her on a walk rather go in for a kiss, an action which traditionally serves as the final scene signifying the beginning of a relationship in films truly championing heteronormativity. Furthermore, the absence of this defining kiss, coupled with the fact this final exchange between Lars and Margo occurs in a graveyard, a thoroughly infertile atmosphere, suggests the pair’s relationship, though heterosexual in nature, may never escalate into a fertile bond of the likes of Gus and Karin’s relationship, a connection which embodies the heteronormative principles privileged by the community.
Lars and the Real Girl fails to fully capitalize on the possibilities Doctor Dagmar’s suggestions present, which generate the potential to disrupt sexual power dynamics and displace heteronormativity as a privileged and assumed identify. Nevertheless, Lars’ queerness, which is never normalized by the community, does survive an atmosphere which is hostile to its difference, powerfully asserting its “realness” or legitimacy. In this regard, the film itself takes on a queer structure, as there is no progression toward a preferable, or even merely definitive, end result within the work key to the Hollywood formula of romances. Though the film constructs a seemingly positive progression toward heteronormativity through Lars’ actions and both the community’s and audiences’ relation to these actions, Lars’ progression explodes within the graveyard scene as his continued evasion of heteronormativity is displayed. He is queer when the film begins and remains queer when the film ends. Moreover, this queerness is not normalized as the film begins and remains non-normative as the graveyard scene draws to a close. This sense of stagnancy makes the film queer, questioning the legitimacy of the possibility of the normative transformation it constructs and the productivity of the heteronormative norms it resists fully displacing.
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