David Fincher’s films reflect a thematic preoccupation with a conflict over gendered space/s. Discuss in relation to Panic Room, Fight Club, and Alien³.
David Fincher personally “shies away from the auteur label,” [Swallow, 2003:30] and indeed emerged from the film industry during a time when people no longer willingly “award an authorial primacy to the director” [McCabe,2001:36]. It was Roland Barthes who advocated the idea of ‘The Death Of The Author,’ [1977:title] but Fincher, the “fiercely individualistic, rather control conscious [artist],” [Waxman,2005:13] won’t readily accept this idea either. Fincher believes,
this notion that we’re…going to have this reverse-auteurism, that you’re going to be able to posthumously impose narrative structure on something based on momentary whim, is stupid [2003:30].
Whether Fincher agrees with auteur theory or not he seems to satisfy Andrew Sarris’ criteria in terms of what defines an auteur; technical competence, distinguishable personality, and interior meaning which arises from tension between personality and material [Stam,1999:89]. Despite Fincher not being directly involved in writing any of the films he has directed, recognising themes and preoccupations within is easy due to the personal style he imposes. “Perhaps what thematically characterises all of Fincher’s films is an unflinching glimpse into the brutal, violent soul of humanity” [Tibbetts, 2002:205]. Fincher’s portraits of humanity often centre around the existence of, and conflict over, gendered spaces, male and female, physical and mental. More often than not the material space in question is a physical manifestation of existing issues within the mental space. Fincher’s preoccupation with such spaces will be examined within this essay through his films Alien³ (1992), Fight Club (1999), and Panic Room (2002).
The idea physical spaces within Fincher’s films are reflections, or manifestations, of the mind state of characters is echoed by the director’s stylistic traits; the “trademark Fincher tone – brooding, dark” and claustrophobic, in the realm of the repressed. Swallow, in his book “Dark Eye: The Films of David Fincher” clarifies this idea best.
In each of Fincher’s movies, he takes us on a journey into realms that lie half-glimpsed off the tangent of the real world, grim domains where the gloom hides things that draw out uncomfortable emotions, scare us, dare us and force us to answer questions we’d prefer to ignore.
[2003:7,145]
Fincher’s “directorial debut,” [Tibbetts,2002:204] Alien³, and his most recent feature Panic Room, best demonstrate gendering of physical spaces, and conflict which arises from the intrusion of an opposing gender. To begin with both films are rather explicit in drawing distinctions between male and female, but, as the films continue, the lines blur.
In Alien³ the planet which Lieutenant Ellen Ripley (Sigourney Weaver) crashes on, Fiorina ‘Fury’ 161, has links to three separate, traditionally male orientated, institutions; prison, military, and the church. The prisoners are referred to as “double Y chromos”, stating they are men above everything else. The visual image created by the shaved heads and green ‘uniforms’ of the prisoners allows for a comparison with military soldiers. Alternatively, when they are dressed in their large hooded coats displaying their shaved heads a visual connection can be established between the prisoners and a brotherhood of monks, living in an isolated make-shift monastery. Dillon (Charles S. Dutton) even refers to his inmates as ‘brother’ and the group of prisoners are known collectively as “Dillon’s God Squad”. Inside the prison is cold and industrial, but conditions outside are appalling, making the seemingly endless maze of confined tunnels, vents, and corridors oddly comforting.
The prisoners find some form of peace in their secluded ‘home’ until a woman (Ripley) arrives causing unrest; unwittingly bringing danger and temptation. Ripley’s introduction to the prisoners as a collective occurs in the cafeteria, despite having shaved her head and adopted their uniform it is obvious she is ‘alien’ and a threat in their environment. She is shot from a low angle making her appear much larger than she is, and the low rumbling soundtrack which accompanies her entrance signifies an impending danger. “Ripley fears that she has brought the alien with her” [Swallow,2003:40] which the audience knows is not an unfounded fear, as Morse (Danny Webb) so eloquently puts it later in the film, “She's the one that brought the fucker.” The Alien and Ripley are inextricably linked in the film from the title sequence. Shots of the stars and outer space, ungendered, are intercut with brief shots of the Alien, evoking Laura Mulvey’s idea of the “threatening woman”, the “voyeuristic gaze” and the “deployment of the close-up shot, which almost always fragmented parts of the female form” [Hill,1998:83]. The Alien’s first kill coincides with Ripley and Doctor Clemens (Charles Dance) sleeping together, as if they both share some form of victory.
Alien³ ‘s climactic finale relies solely on closing the male space in around the female, the intruder, to trap her, and regain their dominance over the male space. While the inmates are successful in destroying the Alien, and indeed the woman, as “Fincher’s furious, purifying desire for closure…resulted in the death of Ripley,” [Mulhall,2002:101] they were unable to retain their lives, and in the end Morse is the only inmate survivor.
Panic Room is the inverse of most of Fincher’s films; it is female space intruded upon by males. Even the title establishes the idea of gendered space; ‘panic’, hysteria, states often attributed to females. The idea of mother protecting child signals an overt connection between the panic room and the ever popular filmic imagery of “an enforced return to a claustrophobic womb” [Bell-Metereau,2004:157]. The panic room is clearly gendered female, making the attempts to intrude on the space by the excessively violent males even more sinister. The film inverts the idea of an “active male gaze and a passive female image’” [Hill,1998:82] in the way Meg (Jodie Foster), and her daughter Sarah (Kristen Stewart), observe the male intruders and the “unfolding events through the panic room’s monitor screens” [Swallow,2003:173]. The audience is aligned with their female gaze. Even when Burnham (Forest Whitaker) and Raoul (Dwight Yoakam) finally occupy the female space, Meg denies them the power of the ‘male gaze’ as she disconnects the cameras, an act which bewilders the men as Raoul asks “Why didn’t we do that?”
The space itself even rebels against its male intruders. So much is made of the safety mechanisms of the thick steel door and the fact “no-one could ever get caught in it” [Swallow,2003:168] making it more shocking for the audience to see Raoul’s hand so violently jammed. The way “the criminals end up becoming victims rather than victimizers” [Bell-Metereau,2004:157] as they are: burnt, injured, killed, and left with nothing, furthers the idea the space is female, and the females are dominant in their space.
To simply say Fight Club is the epitome of a male gendered physical space is remiss; it is the culture of the Fight Clubs, and indeed the male mind space of the Narrator (Edward Norton), which are the focus of the film; the physical spaces in which fights take place are not particularly important. As in Fincher’s other films, the title sequence establishes a gendered space; the audience is quite literally placed in the male mind. A computer generated shot tracks out from the fear centre of the brain, and down the barrel of a gun shoved in the Narrator’s mouth held by Tyler Durden (Brad Pitt), who, as the audience later learns, is the Narrator’s “alter ego made manifest and free” [Swallow,2003:117] establishing the idea of conflict within himself. As so much of the film is psychological, it is important the audience be aligned with the Narrator from the beginning. The second scene is a “Remaining Men Together” meeting for testicular cancer survivors, cementing the mentally gendered space rather explicitly in the physical world.
The intrusion of the female into the male gendered space, the Narrator’s world, is a catalyst for his need to ‘meet’ Tyler, and redefine himself. Marla Singer’s (Helena Bonham Carter) initial intrusion into his is also rather overt. She walks into a ‘Remaining Men Together’ meeting; what should be an explicitly male experience. Marla also later materialises in the Narrator’s ‘cave’, replacing his ‘power animal’ during guided meditation; an indication of her intrusion into his mind space not just his physical world. The cave itself conjures images of Neanderthal man, hunting, and gathering. This strengthens the film’s idea men are “designed to be hunters [but are] in a society of gatherers” [Swallow,2003:120]. Not only ‘gatherers’ in terms of the female implication, but how lives are valued by the amount of material possessions one can gather; a life Tyler Durden strongly rails against.
The Narrator’s empty life is reflected in his condo; it so easily becomes a ‘Furni’ catalogue, and the Narrator himself says “how embarrassing, a houseful of condiments and no food”; affirmations of his consumer driven life and the lack of a woman’s (welcome) presence. Tyler’s ‘Paper Street’ house is the polar opposite of the Narrator’s condo; dirty, old, falling apart, windows boarded up, and no lock on the front door. Tyler feels no need to keep people out, or locked in. The house reflects what Tyler believes the Narrator should aspire to have, essentially nothing.
Visually, Fincher’s use of the “same palette of colours and fabrics, [suggests] the ‘sameness’ of life”. Hygienic blues and greens throughout the Narrator’s condo, his office, hotel rooms, and planes, give a distinct feeling the outside world is dead, and it is only in the “heavy darkness of Tyler Durden’s secret society” [Swallow,2003:127-28] that the Narrator comes alive.
The film’s ending brings a sense of hope as the Narrator is reunited with Marla and is ready to embark on a new phase of his life. He has triumphed over his emasculated and commodity driven life, and, as Tyler urged, he has finally “let go”. The closing image of the Narrator and Marla standing hand in hand staring out the window at the destruction caused by “Project Mayhem” leaves the audience feeling somewhat content. Of similar height and dressed almost identically; Marla in skirt and coat, the Narrator in boxer shorts and coat, they give the impression the gendered space of the male mind often requires a female mind to complement it, balance it, and equal it.
Behind Fincher’s thematic preoccupation with gendered ‘head’ spaces and the conflict they endure, lies the idea of questioning the existence, and validity of such spaces at all. In The Game, Van Orton (Michael Douglas) is forced to surrender not only his physical materialistic world where doors literally open to him, but also his mind’s perception of the world surrounding him. His fierce struggle to determine what is real, and what belongs to ‘the game’, develops into crippling paranoia which sees him shoot his brother Conrad (Sean Penn), and throw himself off a roof. In ending his films Fincher finds ways to “confound expectation” and has an uncanny ability to “turn your safe world into one of uncertainty and doubt” [Swallow,2003:111]. Fight Club’s Narrator experiences this same struggle of determining what is real, evident in the scene where Tyler confronts the Narrator in a hotel room. A succession of flashbacks in which the Narrator substitutes or eradicates Tyler, rapidly strikes out at the Narrator and the audience; everyone is left reeling as they try determine, and revalue the authenticity of the reality they have been presented with up to that point.
Within Fincher’s preoccupation with gendered spaces is inherent the idea of entrances and exits, whether they be physical doors, Alien³ , Fight Club and Panic Room, or the exits of characters, often through self sacrifice, found in all his films. This self sacrifice, often accompanied by arms outstretched, invokes images of Christ’s crucifixion. As Tyler Durden says in Fight Club “without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing.” Ripley throws herself into a lead mould to destroy the Alien spawn inside her, just as Van Orton throws himself from the roof of a building in order to save his soul in The Game. Se7en’s John Doe (Kevin Spacey) sacrifices himself in order to see his “desire to turn each sin against the sinner” fulfilled in the hope of making the world pay attention. It is only through shooting himself, and enduring pain one last time, that Fight Club’s Narrator is freed from Tyler Durden, and can tell Marla; “I’m really ok, trust me,” and have it be true. In Panic Room Burnham is left standing in the rain, arms in the air, while millions of dollars of bearer bonds whirl around him, all because he made a decision to sacrifice his own wealth and freedom to return and save Meg and Sarah.
David Fincher’s films reflect a thematic preoccupation with gendered spaces whether they be physical, mental, male, or female. His visual style has strengthened and developed throughout the five films he has directed to date. Fincher’s penchant for “visual darkness” and the claustrophobic element of his films reflect on the real world, and serve as reminders to the audience how we are constantly rubbing elbows with other people [Swallow,2003:70-71]. Perhaps he is suggesting this connection with people, no matter how invasive or destructive it may be, is all we really have in the end.
REFERENCES:
Books:
• Bell-Metereau R, 2004, ‘The How-To Manual, the Prequel & the Sequel’ in Dixon W (ed), Film & Television After 9/11, USA, Southern Illinois University Press.
• Hill J (ed), 1998, The Oxford Guide to Film Studies, New York, Oxford University Press.
• McCabe C, 2001, ‘The Revenge of the Author’ in Wexman V (ed), Film & Authorship, New Brunswick, Rutgers University Press.
• Mulhall S, 2002, On Film (Thinking in Action), London, Routledge.
• Stam R, 1999, Film Theory: an Introduction, UK, Blackwell Publishers.
• Swallow J, 2003, Dark Eye: The Films of David Fincher, New York, Reynolds & Hearn.
• Tibbetts J (ed), 2002, The Encyclopedia of Filmmakers – Volume 1, New York, Facts On File.
• Waxman S, 2005, Rebels on the Backlot: Six Maverick Directors & How They Conquered the Hollywood Studio System, USA, Harper Entertainment.
FILMOGRAPHY:
• Alien³, 1992, David FINCHER, USA, 20th Century Fox.
• Fight Club, 1999, David FINCHER, USA, 20th Century Fox.
• Panic Room, 2002, David FINCHER, USA, Columbia Pictures.
• Se7en, 1995, David FINCHER, USA, New Line Cinema.
• The Game, 1997, David FINCHER, USA, Polygram Filmed Entertainment.
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