Sex and the Cinema

Popular culture – “a site where youth are invested, where identities are worked out, performed and negotiated and where new futures are written for better or for worse” (Pearce, 2006).

This quote was taken from an article by Sharyn Pearce who suggests that the popular film series, ‘American Pie’, a frivolous, gross-out, comedy franchise, is designed to appeal to teenage male audiences and provides lessons for young males in their understanding about life, sex and romance (Pearce, 2006). These typical teen movies follow a particular formula that identifies specifically with young men, and the fact that Hollywood and the big movie studios keep churning them out and that they attract a mass market should interest educators and other professionals as they seek to address aspects of sex education and sexual identities in contexts less formal than a narrow school curriculum. Pearce, is one of number of commentators and authors like Mimi Ito, Henry Jenkins, and Henry Giroux, who contribute to our understanding of how popular culture is shaping young people’s identities and as relevant contexts where they can learn about the world.

The first American Pie movie hit the screens back in 1999 making over 100 million dollars at the box office, and since the conclusion of the American Pie trilogy, featuring the courtship and marriage of the main characters, the American Pie name has gone on to be used as an entity like the National Lampoon series with another four direct-to-dvd spin-offs being made with the latest being The Book of Love released in December 2009 (Wikipedia, 2010). The original film focuses on four boys who make a pact to lose their virginity before their high school graduation, and most people will remember the famous scene where Jim, the main protagonist, is caught masturbating with a pie after previously being told that third base feels like ‘warm apple pie’ (Wikipedia, 2010)

Teen movies saturate the market, and no wonder with recent statistics showing that 8 to 18 year olds spend an average of more than seven and a half hours a day, seven days a week on media, including TV, video, music, internet and social networking (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). So it comes as no surprise that media conglomerates target this audience ruthlessly. Teens are affluent, without responsibilities, have plenty of time to kill, make up a large percentage of the movie going population and hence that ‘teen presence’ is what sells a motion picture (Dixon, as cited in Pearce, 2006).

Pearce follows the journey of these ‘teenpics’, from their beginnings back in the 1950’s with the popular formula espousing the typical rite of passage of the white, heterosexual, college-bound boy (Pearce, 2006). Hollywood soon cottoned on that these teen movies, with low production costs and low profile actors, were the perfect conduit for the mass consumption of not only the text, but the ideology as well (Pearce, 2006). This ideology relates to maintaining the status quo of the sexuality of youth – that is society, tries to manage and regulate this aspect. Hollywood takes on its share of this by making these movies quite sanitised and sugar coated. Also in play is the ‘moral panic’ (Dezuanni, 2010) with regard to adolescent sexuality, and how many people are of the belief that this needs to be controlled in light of the constant media reports and concerns over teen pregnancy, sexual abuse, and the transmission of STDs and HIV/AIDS (Ashcraft, 2003).

A proliferation of sex education programs have failed to have much impact on students’ changing their behaviours and a more effective alternative might lie in mainstream film (Ashcroft, 2003; Pearce, 2006). Film is “a powerful teaching machine that intentionally tries to influence the production of meaning, subject positions, identities and experience” (Giroux, as cited in Pearce, 2006). The importance here is the fact that film by its very nature of presenting the whole narrative complete with how characters and situations are positioned and the ideologies as well, presents a much richer teaching and learning experience that for example of song or a TV sitcom (Pearce, 2006).

In focusing on the 3rd movie, American Pie: The Wedding, Pearce (2006) notes that even though the film has the usual gross humour and sex gags, it actually promotes traditional family values. The central young male, Jim, after finding his sexual identity through the first two movies, is at a time in his life when he is ready to settle down, marry and start a family just like his dad. The scenes with his dad, although embarrassing, support a traditional patriarchal role and this father-son bond is an important element guiding boys “to become like their heterosexual, middle class fathers” (Pearce, 2006). There is no nudity, no penises, no sex scenes or close ups, but this movie is about sex, different though from the 50’s movies and the gendered stereotypes, because men and women are on equal footing here, with the young males shown that “female desire matters and that sex in not merely for personal gratification” (Pearce, 2006).

So while these films perpetuate the traditional norms of the stereotypical, white, heterosexual young male, they are ranked by adolescents as one of the top sources of information on sex and sexuality (Brown & Keller; Kaiser Family Foundation, as cited in Ashcraft, 2003). “Students encounter these texts as pedagogical material and important sites for learning”, and as Ashcraft (2003) suggests, these popular sites provide opportunities for educators to use in programs where students can discuss and challenge the traditional discourses around sexuality and the ways in which they are positioned differently.

The best quote in this article by Pearce (2006) comes from Kenneth Kidd as he observes that “adolescent male vulnerability-turned-triumph is the standard theme of teen films, where the horny, awkward boy stumbles through close encounters with the opposite sex”.

How timely and Just released – The Virginity Hit
“The story starts in standard sex comedy fashion – four friends make an agreement that each time one of them loses their virginity, they take a hit from a ceremonial bong and recount the experience with the others” (Cinema Blend, n.d.).

Surveys show young people want MORE sex education!  The Sex Education Show, filling a real need for discussion, information and real education on real life issues that are not addressed in school.

References
Ashcraft, C. (2003). Adolescent ambiguities in American Pie: Popular culture as a resource for sex education. Youth & Society 35(1). Retrieved September 10, 2010, from Proquest Database.

Cinema Blend. (n.d.) The Virginity Hit – review. Retrieved September 13, 2010, from http://www.cinemablend.com/reviews/The-Virginity-Hit-4834.html

Dezuanni, M. (2010). CLN647 Youth popular culture and texts: Lecture 7 [Lecture Notes]. Retrieved August 30, 2010, from
http://blackboard.qut.edu.au/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab_tab_group_id=_2_1&url=%2Fwebapps%2Fblackboard%2Fexecute%2Flauncher%3Ftype%3DCourse%26id%3D_64558_1%26url%3D

Kaiser Family Foundation. (2010). Generation M2: Media in the lives of 8- to 18-year-olds. Retrieved September 14, 2010, from http://www.kff.org/entmedia/upload/8010.pdf

Pearce, S. (2006). Sex and the cinema: what American Pie teaches the young. Sex Education 6(4). Retrieved September 9, 2010, from Proquest Database.

Wikipedia. (2010). American pie (film). Retrieved September 14, 2010, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Pie_(film)