In looking at the film Lars and the Real Girl alongside the novel Misfortune, it is impossible not to notice some similarities. There is the issue of restriction of body for one, for example, in the film, Lars (Ryan Gosling) feels physical pain at the touch of others. Rose from the novel constantly mutilates herself, chewing her fingers, because of the years of bodily abuse she has received. Another example is the need for isolation in both Lars and Rose, and to go along with this isolation, both have a srong familial love that brings them out of their isolation.
While these themes and motifs, as well as many more, are present and important to each story, I believe that there is one central theme that is similar to both, though enacted in a different way. In each story, the plot revolves around the issue of an artificial or constructed femininity. In both, this is simultaneously a simple a complex relation. However, I think the outcomes are very similar.
In Lars and the Real Girl, a lonely man with deep feelings of guilt and desire for isolation (largely over his mother dying during childbirth and a depressive father) is driven towards developing the delusion that an "anatomical love doll" that he has purchased over the internet is in fact a living person, whom he met on the internet and is now in a relationship with. This causes alarm in Lars' family as they seek psychological help for him. Eventually, the town comes to embrace Lars' delusion. Because of all the attention that Lars and "Bianca" get it becomes necessary for Lars to invent an entire back story for Bianca. This story is often vastly similar to Lars' own experience, signalling his trouble to deal with his experiences in isolation and the need to form another identity with which to empathize. Lars begins to use this artificial ideal female version of himself as a proxy for deflecting his problems around. This artificial feminine shield becomes Lars' disguise as he learns to conquer his own personal issues.
Rose's situation, while seemingly different, is quite similar. While Lars manifested this artificial identity by imbuing it onto an external object, Rose was raised with a dual identity, causing her(/him) to have two conflicting identities, both of which feel at odds to her. While Rose, categorically a male, is raised female, her masculinity is thrust upon her at the advent of her physical development and deviation from the female body.
While Rose has strong feelings of alienation towards her masculinity, especially her anatomy and the uncomfortable feelings she encounters while wearing men's clothes. We see that Rose, despite often partitioning it and ignoring it, has accepted, if not her masculinity as an embrace of identity, that she is masculine. Therefore, a good deal of the plot is devoted to Rose's acceptance of the artificially created femininity that was imposed on her from birth. As physical ideals of this, Rose takes Sarah and ,to an even greater degree, Prudence. Prudence's stolen red dress thus becomes a symbol of Rose's femininity. Always in tow and hidden.
However, at the resolution of both stories there is simultaneously a loss of these feminine ideals, as well as a profound acceptance of the wholeness of identity through a connection with the feminine sides of both Rose and Lars.
Rose's revelation comes when she is given the option to be a man who wears dresses first, and second at the sort of "fall from grace" that Prudence has had in Rose's mind. Stating that childbearing (a possible extension of femininity) has reduced Prudence to plainness and stripped her of her appeal to Rose. Rose loses her ideal of femininity at the confrontation with Prudence. However, she is able to retain a piece of it in her identity, evidenced by her request to be referred to as "she" while simultaneously fathering two children. That and the dress, of course.
Lars' acceptance of the feminine in his identity is perhaps even more dramatic. Lars, in his waning need for the external construct of Bianca, slowly allows the delusion to simply die. Lars literally kills his constructed delusion. However, when he should seem at his lowest for losing his shelter and proxy, Lars is finally able to connect with an actual person, namely Margo, the "real girl" who had been constantly after his affections. In the acceptance of another person into his life Lars actualized his stunted identity, accepting himself at the same time as Margo.
Is there a way in which Bianca, too, might be a "real girl," as opposed to a "real doll" (as in the title of the site from which she comes, which is a "real" (as in, available w/i our human reality) thing)?
ReplyDeleteAlso, just to add a piece to L's acceptance of feminine in his identity: did you notice that at B's funeral, he is wearing her sweater (the same sweater she's wearing in the photo on the coffin)? What do you make of this?
I actually did not notice that it was the same sweater, that's super funny. I did notice it had pink in it, as did the flower or pocket square he had (can't remember which). It makes a lot of sense, especially because (and this is where I have some issues with this and many other films) his need for that "feminine presence" really can't be totally assimilated into himself. I think it is supposed to be because of his guilt at "killing" his mother during birth and the "pain" that caused his father, and indirectly Gus. He really isn't able to accept that in himself (at least not yet by the end of the movie, but I suppose it is hopeful). He NEEDS Margo in the end. He isn't just reaching out to her as an actualized adult comfortable in his own personality. She is like another step along his (as you wanted to point out in class) gradual progression. She isn't the happy ending in my opinion, she is his hope for a cure all. The girl that he finds that magically solves all his problems. (This happens in lots of movies, e.g. Garden State, and can be either men or women, doesn't matter.)
ReplyDeleteMaybe that's a little bitter, but that is kinda what I was thinking. The only real down side in my opinion to a terrific movie!
Oh yeah I forgot to say, Bianca is "real" (again my opinion) only in as much as the person who is questioning her possibility is capable of imbuing her with some of, likely their own, traits and characteristics. Gus isn't able to do this sort of transference of empathy at all. The schoolboard ladies are.
ReplyDeleteNot bitter, just interesting. I wonder where his baby blanket goes at the end... (And, isn't it interesting that it's HIS (blue) blanket that also serves as a reminder of feminine presence (mother) throughout the film? what do you make of this?). Also, re Bianca's realness--is there a gendered dimension to who does and doesn't find B real? why are so many women in the film on board, and so many men skeptical? and how does this help us to think of Lars as fitting/not fitting w/ masculine identities?
ReplyDeleteNot that you have to answer these questions, but I thought, since you took the time to respond to my comments, I'd take the time to respond back.
Response? A novel concept!
ReplyDeleteI think that there are men in the community capable of seeing Bianca as "real". There are men who play along with her (like Baxter at the party), then there is also maybe a concept that some of the men view "real" in a different way. The men at Gus's work sort of idolizing her also seem to be accepting her in a way. And as far as the baby blanket, I just took that as a material representation of Lars's mom directly not via femininity in identity. Like that is LITERALLY Lars's only view of comfort from his mother.