Featured Research: Denial of LGBT Heroism in Hollywood Film
Dr Christopher Pullen, Senior Lecturer in Media Studies at the Media School, Bournemouth University, has published a fascinating research paper which investigates the denial of heroism for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender characters in Hollywood film.
Dr Pullen’s original paper was presented at the 41st Anniversary Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association in Montreal Canada, and an extended version is being published this year by Taylor and Francis in Continuum: Journal of Media and Cultural Studies (vol 25, issue 3), titled ‘Heroic Gay Characters in Popular Film: Tragic Determination, and the Everyday’. This work represents a relatively pioneering area of research interest, extending discussions concerning sexual diversity, and identity within the media.
From the analysis of modern popular film, the paper suggests that LGBT characters are problematic for mainstream audiences, as they are often featured as victimised and troubled heroes rather than integrated and useful heroes.
Dr Pullen summarises: “My main point is that heroism is denied on many levels for lesbians, gays, bisexuals and transgender characters, even when they are war heroes, and innovators of modern technology, as was the case of Alan Turing”.
He explains: “I cite the recent film ‘Enigma’, in relation to Turing, which is about breaking the enigma code in the Second World War. In this, Alan Turing’s identity is reinvented as a fictional character, who is heterosexual. Alan Turing broke the enigma code, and this resulted in breaking the Nazi war effort, and contributed to the triumph of the Allies. Turing was unashamed of his gay identity and his research was based not only on code breaking, but also on trying to see if the ‘spirit’ could live on after death, inspired by his love for a male school friend who died early in life. Alan Turing was also punished after the war, when he was tried for being homosexual, and it is alleged that this led him to suicide”.
Dr Pullen’s analysis also considers other feature films such as ‘Milk’ and ‘Pedro’: “Harvey Milk and Pedro Zamora are attributed not only with attesting the utopian values of good citizenship, and offer evidence of Foucault’s concept of ‘care of the self’ where individuals sacrifice themselves for the benefit of a civilised society and humanity, but are also represented as powerful icons of liberty, and transgressive politics’
His analysis questions whether ‘in a progressing cinematic world, where the icon of the sacrificial gay self may be considered as forefront in blockbuster texts like ‘Brokeback Mountain’, and potentially seen as a replacement for the subordinated and othered gay character which endured through Hollywood history, are these representations stimulations of reassurance or revolution’.
Dr Pullen concludes that such gay characters are ‘stereotyped, as tragic heroes, rather than useful heroes’. This analysis is linked back to Vladimir Propp’s conceptual ideas, which are subdivided to not-so-useful ‘victim heroes’ and role model ‘seeker-heroes’.
The author’s position on this is “that it is problematic, yet at the same time attractively foundational”.
