Female Gaze, Boyish Bodies – Masculinity in Classic Hollywood Cinema Cover Image

Kobiece spojrzenia, chłopięce ciała – męskość w klasycznym kinie Hollywood
Female Gaze, Boyish Bodies – Masculinity in Classic Hollywood Cinema

Author(s): Patrycja Włodek
Subject(s): Fine Arts / Performing Arts, Photography, Visual Arts, Film / Cinema / Cinematography
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego
Keywords: masculinity in classic Hollywood Cinema; “non-masculine”; male body

Summary/Abstract: The concept of masculinity in classic Hollywood Cinema was as strong and strict as in culture itself. As was the division between what is masculine and non-masculine – rooted not only in stories told on screen, but also in cinematic ways in which those stories were told (lighting, camera angles etc.). According to long-standing classic Hollywood rules only femininity could be eroticised – never masculinity. Therefore, as Laura Mulvey insists, popular cinema was designed for a straight male viewer and for his point of view. However, as is widely known, there was (and is) a number of male stars, especially those that entered Hollywood since the ‘50s, that were defined either mostly, or also by their sexuality. Article shows that widening of the category of “non-masculine” (that in that period included women, boys, homosexuals and non-white males) made it possible also for male bodies to be shown and perceived as sexual spectacles.

  • Issue Year: 2015
  • Issue No: 14 (21)
  • Page Range: 30-43
  • Page Count: 14
  • Language: Polish