I hadn’t
seen Chasing Amy before, but I’ve been recommended it countless times, and it
comes up in almost every search for bisexuality and film that I’ve done, so I
felt like I’d better cover it. If I’m completely honest, it was probably Ben
Affleck that was putting me off seeing the film for such a long time, but I
have to say, I was pleasantly surprised.
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| Source: http://moviescreenshots.blogspot.co.uk/ |
Director: Kevin
Smith
Stars: Ben
Affleck, Jason Lee, Joey Lauren Adams
Language:
English
Length: 133min
Ratings: UK
18, USA 18 (I would imagine this is for swearing and descriptions of sex –
there aren’t any graphic sex scenes in the movie)
Bisexual
Characters: Alyssa Jones
Description:
Holden McNeil (Ben Affleck) is part of a successful comic book
writing duo with his best friend Banky (Jason lee). His world is turned upside
down when he meets Alyssa (Joey Lauren Adams), also a comic book writer who is
his perfect woman in every way – except for the fact that she only dates women.
The pair forms a close friendship, which eventually becomes a sexual
relationship, and he is perfectly happy until Holden discovers a few things
about Alyssa’s past which he doesn’t know how to handle.
Overall Thoughts
As I said,
this film was a pleasant surprise. I’m aware that it is (loosely) part of a series
by the director which includes Clerks,
Mallrats and Dogma so there are in-jokes and aspects of that ‘universe’ crossing
over into this movie – however, I hadn’t seen any of those films (I think I
will now, though!) and it stood up by itself no problem. It might help to have
a cursory knowledge of who Jay and Silent Bob are, though.
Though this
film was funny and came from a very liberal attitude, I’d put a warning in
there for homophobic language, which is fairly constant throughout the film. It’s
grating at first, but I was so pleased to see that at one point a character
actually challenges the use of these words, and actually throughout the movie
ignorant and homophobic attitudes are consistently dealt with and subverted in
a patient but firm manner. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a movie do that in a
non-patronising way before, which was awesome.
Presentation of Bisexuality
(spoilers)
My biggest
fear coming into this film was (based on brief descriptions I’d read) that it
would be about a straight guy who falls in love with a lesbian and manages to ‘turn’
her. Actually it was a lot more complicated than that, and a lot more thought
provoking.
From a
purely bisexual point of view, I have never related to any character in a film
as much as I do Alyssa. She initially states (and demonstrates) that she is a
lesbian, and is extremely confused/frustrated/hesitant about her feelings for
Holden, because her attraction to him throws her whole world into upheaval. I
think this is definitely something many bisexuals go through – I know that I
personally identified as a lesbian when I was younger largely because I didn’t
want to confuse anybody or cause confrontation by having to explain the entire
ins and outs of my sexuality. I remember feeling embarrassed and almost ashamed
about my attraction to the opposite sex at times, and it’s wonderful to see
those feelings reflected here. I am completely in love with the explanation she
gives for eventually allowing herself to be with Holden:
I'm not with you because of what
family, society, life tried to instil in me from day one. The way the world is,
how seldom it is that you meet that one person who just gets you - it's so rare… to cut oneself off from finding that
person, to immediately halve your options by eliminating the possibility of
finding that one person within your own gender, that just seemed stupid to me.
So I didn't. But then you came along. You, the one least likely. I mean, you
were a guy.
And while I was falling for you I
put a ceiling on that, because you were a
guy. Until I remembered why I opened the door to women in the first place: to
not limit the likelihood of finding that one person who'd compliment me so
completely. So here we are. I was thorough when I looked for you. And I feel
justified lying in your arms, 'cause I got here on my own terms, and I have no question
there was some place I didn't look. And for me that makes all the difference.
Alyssa is a
pretty cool chick all round; from a feminist angle, she is confident in her
sexuality and refuses to apologise for her promiscuous past, even when her
partner tries to make her feel guilty. She does make mistakes, she isn’t
perfect, but she does everything on her own terms.
Perhaps
because of the director’s previous work, Chasing
Amy seems to have a mostly male, heterosexual audience, and the story is
told from the perspective of a white, heterosexual man – the crux of the story
being his inability to handle his girlfriend’s sexually adventurous past. This
is definitely something faced by the bisexual community when they approach new
relationships. Same sex partners may worry you will ‘turn back’, opposite sex
partners may (in my experience) worry that they are not sexually exciting or
fulfilling enough.
In Conclusion…
While this
movie wasn’t at all PC or a perfect example of a sex positive movie, it was
better than most, as well as being funny, warm, well written and well-acted.
Favourite
line:
Maybe you knew early on that your track was from point A to B, but
unlike you I was not given a fucking map at birth, so I tried it all!
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