My Song (With Thanks to Laura Mulvey and Kander and Ebb / All That Jazz)

1.

In a world ordered by sexual imbalance,                                                                                               

pleasure in looking has been split between active/male and passive/female.                                     

The determining male gaze projects its phantasy onto the female figure, which is sty~~~led accordingly. 

In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at

and

displayed,

2.

with their appearance coded for strong visual impact                                                                         

so~that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at~~~-ness.                                                            

Woman displayed as sexual object is leitmotif of erotic spectacle: from pin ups to strip-tea~~~se,

from Ziegfeld to Busby Berkeley, she holds the look, plays to

and signifies

male desire. 

3.

Mainstream film neatly combined spectacle and narrative.                                                            

(Note~however, how in the musical song-and-dance numbers interrupt the flow                        

of the diegesis.) The presence of woman is an indispensable element of spectacle in normal narrative film,

yet her visual presence tends to work against the development of a

story-

line.