THE male gaze of Hollywood has shifted since its prominence in Classical Hollywood films. Going from Rear Window to post-classical films such as Blue Velvet and Moonlight, the gaze has expanded, no longer limiting itself to old stereotypical desires and sensibilities. Through its expansion, the way in which white, male, heterosexual characters drive film has changed, resulting in more diverse narrative representation.
Rear Window presents Jefferies (James Stewart) as an experienced photographer, thus legitimizing his gaze and letting the audience come to terms with his actions. He still peeps through the window of his often under-dressed neighbor and peruses the others as if he were flipping through channels on a television, but because of his profession his gaze has an added sense of permissibility. The film insists he is not simply spying, he is learning and appreciating. In the end his gaze gains extra justification, as it helps solve a criminal case, and the numerous invasions of privacy are forgotten. Rear Window presents the male gaze as justified and correct, with the simple caveat that the peeping tom must own a professional camera.
Post-classical films such as Blue Velvet begin to challenge this notion of a justified gaze. It initially provides the same setup, with Jeffrey (Kyle MacLachlan) sneaking into Dorothy’s (Isabella Rossellini) apartment to potentially solve a mystery. As he looks through the shutters of the closet, his newfound peepshow devolves into a shocking display of fetish and sexual abuse. Soon Jeffrey finds himself whisked away from his quaint notions of the American suburbs and shoved into the reality of their seedy underbellies. Instead of glorifying the outcome of the male gaze, Blue Velvet shows the horrifying results it can produce. Jeffrey’s gaze ultimately rips away his sheltered life and stomps on his innocence. The world will never be the same for him. All because he wanted to get a quick peek.
Moonlight then shatters the traditional notions of the male gaze. Instead of the gaze being provided by a straight and white lead, the main character, Chiron (Alex R. Hibbert, Ashton Sanders, and Trevante Rhodes), is gay and black. Unlike Jefferies and Jeffrey, Chiron does not gaze out from a position of power or authority. An innumerable amount of pain and trauma mark his younger years. His home life is nearly nonexistent. He has few real friends in the world. Chiron’s gaze is one of hope and searching for belonging. Not only is Moonlight different for prominently showcasing a homosexual relationship in a feature film, but also because it depicts a male character using his gaze from a position of incredible weakness.
Since the rules of Classical Hollywood started to be attenuated in the late 1960s, the male gaze has shifted, resulting in a change in how male characters drive stories. How a film presents the gaze to the audience controls how much power a character has. Jefferies’ gaze in Rear Window presents him as an expert, allowing him to act with impunity. However, Jeffrey’s gaze in Blue Velvet does not result in the same level of sanitized success, instead offering a tale of how the traditional male power and sexual fantasies can go horribly wrong. And then Moonlight uses its gaze to give light to a marginalized group and offer a fresh new perspective. As time has passed, the notion of a male gaze (and others) has obviously persisted due to the medium itself, but it has also been subverted to tell stories from new and inventive perspectives.
