<\/p>\n
I know I’m supposed to write about Chasing Amy<\/em> from the standpoint of media images of lesbians and lesbianism, but this particular film is hard to extend in that way.\u00a0 Writer and director Kevin Smith is hardly part of the mainstream media.\u00a0 He gained notoriety with his first film, Clerks<\/em>, which was completely independent and was noteworthy in a large part because he bucked mainstream film trends.\u00a0 Smith never shies away from subject matter major studios shun (Chasing Amy<\/em> is a case in point), uses frank, sometimes offensive dialogue, and refuses to adopt a visual directing style, instead letting the script carry the movie.\u00a0 If we wanted to look at media images of lesbianism, it would be more valuable to seek out a mainstream Hollywood movie.<\/p>\n One of the benefits to looking at this movie, though, is that it’s so much better than your average Hollywood movie and Smith’s outsider status allows him to examine issues everyone else would be afraid of.\u00a0 One great example is near the beginning when Banky starts a fight with a seemingly militant black member of a panel on minority comics.\u00a0 After the panelist shoots Binky screaming “Black rage!” it turns out the whole deal was planned to drum up controversy for his book and that the panelist is flamboyantly gay.\u00a0 This is one of the few times you’ll ever see a gay character satirizing a straight (and racial) stereotype, although movies and TV are rife with straight characters mockingly mimicking gay stereotypes.<\/p>\n The scene in the bar where Holden learns Alyssa is a lesbian is another striking image.\u00a0 After singing a seductive song he thought was aimed at him, she makes out with another woman, with no hedging about it-the camera doesn’t cut away or leave anything to the imagination.\u00a0 This is hardly Hollywood.\u00a0 What’s most interesting, though, is the way in which Holden deals with this.\u00a0 He’s not disgusted but reacts rather like he would had she started making out with a boyfriend.\u00a0 Throughout the rest of the film the other characters react to his dilemma in a similar fashion-fell in love with a lesbian?\u00a0 Poor guy.\u00a0 It’s almost as if he fell in love with a nun or a married woman-there’s no real mention of turning her, or how someday she’ll see the light and go straight, or whatever, except maybe by Banky, who has his own issues to work through.\u00a0 Throughout lesbianism and bisexuality are accepted rather matter-of-factly by almost everyone.<\/p>\n Despite this, Chasing Amy opened to a great deal of criticism from gays and lesbians.\u00a0 The main issue what the fact that Alyssa fell in love with a man at all-the complaint was that by treating lesbians so seriously on the one hand and having one fall in love with a man on the other, they cheapened it and strengthened the old notion of lesbians as just chicks who haven’t met the right guy yet.\u00a0 Personally, I don’t see that at all.\u00a0 I find no indication that Alyssa was just waiting for the right guy to some along and show her the way.\u00a0 Rather, their romance seems an illustration of how love can appear in places never sought and how difficult relationships can be in the supposedly open and honest 90s.\u00a0 The scene where Alyssa tells her friends about Holden is telling.\u00a0 As soon as they find out she’s met a guy, they’re shocked, offended and hurt.\u00a0 They react as if she’s doing this to hurt them, and they skip out on her pretty quickly once they find out she’s not exactly like them.\u00a0 Smith is not attempting to show lesbians the light and lead them to the godly path or anything.\u00a0 He is merely using the oldest theme in the book-two accidental lovers separated by cultural barrier, with guys and lesbians filling in for Capulets and Montegues.<\/p>\n It’s unfortunate that this can’t be extended to a general discussion on media portrayals of lesbians.\u00a0 The fact the Chasing Amy<\/em> was a small commercial success may be an indication of things changing, but for the most part except for indie film and very rare notable exceptions (Boys Don’t Cry<\/em>, for example), lesbians are either stereotyped or ignored.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I know I’m supposed to write about Chasing Amy from the standpoint of media images of lesbians and lesbianism, but this particular film is hard to extend in that way.\u00a0 Writer and director Kevin Smith is hardly part of the mainstream media.\u00a0 He gained notoriety with his first film, Clerks, which was completely independent and 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