Film Fatale: May December, Female Orientated Cinema and How Todd Haynes is Keeping the Melodrama Alive
The melodrama, like the 00s chick-flick, is a film genre that is both woman led and woman aimed that has, naturally, been heavily criticised since the birth of narrative film. The crying, the fainting, the yearning; it can be deemed garish to be so open. These actions create fluids and sounds, the women on the screen and in the cinema chair - or the sofa in their living room - have a chance to drip with emotion, to finally let it all out. Despite a harsh critical reception, the women who saw these films made up the majority of cinema goers (compared to a comparatively equal split of male and female cinema goers today) and loved melodramatic pictures - the genre dominated the box office in the 1940’s and 50’s. Stars like Barbara Stanwyck and Joan Crawford thrived with flowing tears and broken hearts, offering relatable characters and story to the female viewer.
When Stella Dallas was released in 1937, the Daily Variety wrote that the film “will smash through the emotional defence of any audience and will smash at the box office”. Starring the aforementioned Stanwyck, Stella Dallas did in fact smash at the box office, being the fifth highest grossing film in North America of that year. The story follows working class woman Stella as she struggles to bond with her daughter, Laurel. As Stella grew up in a poor mining town, she is much more accustomed to the working class lifestyle and doesn’t fit into the upper class snobbery that her rich and spoiled daughter grew up within. The theme of class differences between family generations is also a main focus in Mildred Pierce (1945) starring Joan Crawford. The melodrama genre directly touched on the subjects of the time: As the Great Depression hit America (1929 - 1939), audiences who were once loving musical numbers and novelty pictures during the 20’s now craved media that tackled the harsh reality of life.
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Jumping to the present day, we are not short of any melodramatic pictures - they’re available on every corner of the internet, from YouTube storytimes of women describing how they discovered their boyfriend was cheating to actual pornography, the women’s melodramatic film is not as necessary as it used to be for giving women that emotive relief. Anne Douglas refers to the melodrama genre as “soft-core emotional porn for women” in her 1980 essay Soft-Porn Culture, but now tears and masturbation - and often, both - are just a tap away, soft, hard or otherwise. Nevertheless, though the modern woman might not care about the titular Mildred Pierce creating her restaurant empire as much as they used to (as to get a downpayment on anything in 2023 is nearing impossible without a rich father), the melodrama has stayed alive.
Director Todd Haynes’ May December (2023) is proof of this - its seamless storytelling, memorable soundtrack, and incredible performances merges the classic qualities of the genre whilst keeping it fresh for an almost impossible to please modern day audience. Haynes being a pioneer of the modern melodrama, particularly since the release of Safe (1995) starring Jullianne Moore, the pair have kept the traditional elements of melodrama fresh in the American film mainstream, all the whilst proving the genre’s capability to disturb and engage the audience.
May December, starring Jullianne Moore (Gracie) and Natalie Portman (Elizabeth) remixes a true story with fiction - most importantly, a true crime story. Once looking after children and a hard working husband, the modern woman is now, most likely, listening to true crime podcasts on the way to work and, like all of us, showered with stories of horror, sex, and violence. Similarly to the women of the 1930’s seeking out melodrama pictures during the Great Depression, the women of today indulging in true crime is more than just morbid curiosity - as Aditi Shrikant and Renée Onque suggest in CNBC: “By learning how people end up the victim, women can keep it from happening to themselves”. In a culture of fear, where women bond online on ways to not get human trafficked, May December is a melodrama for the American women of today. Haynes purposefully bases his latest work on the disturbing true story of Mary Kay Letourneau, a teacher who raped her 12-year-old student, Vili Fualaau, left her husband and had the boy’s child whilst in prison for said abuse.
“The release of May December is perfect timing to remind viewers that it’s not just bloody thrillers that qualify as abjection - but that women’s pictures throughout history that have been hiding within the term all along.”
May December is uncanny. It has a Mulholland Drive quality of two women uncomfortably merging into one another, as Portman’s character Elizabeth is a Hollywood actress staying with Gracie and her family to learn her mannerisms and the ins and outs of the story for a film about her crime. As Elizabeth takes on Gracie’s lisp, bright pink lipstick, coastal grandma clothing and unnerving personality - the audience is faced with the questions of ethics in Hollywood, of true crime, of how we treat victims of abuse and the overwhelmingly strange nature of American culture. Particularly the scene where Joe, Gracie’s husband and man she groomed, approaches Gracie and questions the realities of their relationship. Gracie panics and shouts “It’s Graduation!”, as if the night before their children's graduation has any merit over the hell Joe has been put through. Saving face and participating in traditions holds much more importance in America.
The manipulative nature of Gracie towards the people around her creates tension that makes the viewer feel like they’re walking on eggshells - just like Joe. Menacing music plays after each shocking and/or unnerving remark, making it almost comical at times - despite the twisted story being based on truth, but Haynes doesn’t get lost in this melodramatic excess himself - he’s crafting it with a self awareness of the melodrama. It’s an almost editorial approach to the story with the hazy visuals and theatrical music, if it was any more dramatic it would be pastiche - but the director straddles the fine line between the real and otherworldly perfectly.
Lina Williams coined the term “body genres” in her 1991 essay Film Bodies: Gender, Genre, and Excess, referring to films of genres such as horror, melodrama, and pornography that are designed to elicit a physical response in the bodies of spectators. By grouping melodrama with horror and porn, we’re able to look at film in a more primal perspective, and with everyone talking about the abject, the release of May December is perfect timing to remind viewers that it’s not just bloody thrillers that qualify as abjection - but that women’s pictures throughout history that have been hiding within the term all along.
Williams writes: “Melodrama is not necessarily a drama of the victory of good over evil but rather the all important recognition of both.” in When Is Melodrama “Good”? Mega‑Melodrama and Victimhood. This question of morality is seen throughout the melodrama genre. It's a piece on victimhood. What is interesting is the final scenes of May December as Joe sobs as he watches on to his children graduating from the otherside of the fence. A simple normality Joe was never able to enjoy, as he was dragged into adulthood by Gracie. This scene is strikingly similar to the ending of Stella Dallas, as Stella looks through the fence and watches on to her daughter getting married she wasn’t invited to. Stella never got these privileges growing up - only through sacrifice was she able to escape poverty, she sobs. Joe didn’t get to escape, though, only things got worse. Fitting in with the culture's current obsession with true crime and morbid curiosity portraying a culture of fear, Joe portrays a modern hopelessness. May December is making the qualities of the women picture one that is updated. The white woman has been depicted as the victim enough in the media, and to have Joe, a young Korean-American man who has faced the manipulative wrath of not just one but two manipulative white women, is pointed.
Words: Charlotte Amy Landrum
