Striking Fear in the Circuits: The Electric Feminine Body in Cyborg Films (original) (raw)

English-language science fiction films appearing from 1975 through 2015 featuring androids, robots, cyborgs, and advanced artificial intelligence offer fascinating examples of characters with "electric feminine bodies." The female subjects of these films include those who must fight a masculine-coded machine/robot/cyborg, become robots, or be fully android or cyborg-fusions themselves. For this research, I use the term "cyborg" and "cyborg films" loosely to include cinematic narratives which incorporate elements of robotics, cyberpunk, and artificial intelligence. Specifically, I apply María Goicoechea's broad definition of the term cyborg which she outlines in her article "The Posthuman Ethos in Cyberpunk Science Fiction." Goicoechea explains: The meaning of 'cyborg' has also evolved progressively to include any entity that behaves as an enhanced human, no matter if it began its "life" biologically or not (an artificial intelligence would be a cyborg since it performs functions comparable to those of a human being, and a person who increases his [or her] physical or mental power using artificial substances can also be considered a cyborg. (4) As my title suggests, I will specifically focus on cyborg films within the science fiction genre, keeping in mind a broad and inclusive definition. Additionally, the two most important theoretical frameworks that shape my explorations are Laura Mulvey's Visual and Other Pleasures and Donna Haraway's "A Manifesto for Cyborgs: Science, Technology and Socialist Feminism in the 1980s" (shortened hereafter to "Cyborg Manifesto"). Both pivotal texts employ a feminist ethos in their explorations. For example, film theorist Mulvey is best known for coining the term "male gaze," and in her groundbreaking work she charts the ways in which art, specifically culture would have it, cyborg narratives on screen seem to be steadfastly gender-coded and influenced by hardened social narratives, gender stereotypes, and cinematic tropes. Is it the case then that Haraway's metaphor is merely an example, a dream, a hope that things will change? I keep this question in mind as I explore the ways in which the cyborg of each narrative adheres to, subverts, or completely ignores Haraway's political, progressive myth of the cyborg. Additionally, as many film critics in the science fiction genre and otherwise have stressed, it is seemingly impossible, even counterproductive, to divorce the social and historical context of a film from its narrative. Thus we see the propensity of many analyses of film to offer a political context in conjunction with the social themes, the mise-en-scène of the film, and the setting and location of the narrative. This analysis will chronologically consider a specific period within the science fiction-cyborg film genre. It will begin in the 1970s with The Stepford Wives (1975) and Demon Seed (1977), in a chapter titled "The Body Hijacked: Domesticity & Body/Labor Politics, the Horror in Stepford Wives & Demon Seed." The next chapter, "Deconstructing the 'Dirtypunk' City: Constructed Femininity in Blade Runner," discusses the cyberpunk genre both in literature and film, while focusing specifically on the feminine-bodied replicants of the film. Next, the third chapter will focus on the emerging popularity of killer-cyborgs in the 1980s and 1990s in the third chapter titled "Fighting the Hard, Metal Body in Hardware." Lastly, the study will examine two films from the year 2015, Ex Machina and Mad Max: Fury Road. This chapter, entitled "She'd Rather be a Cyborg: Nuanced Gender Performance in Ex Machina and Mad Max: Fury Road," will conclude that, indeed, contemporary films, especially Fury Road, are pushing towards feminist goals that Mulvey, Haraway, and many others have promoted. Overall, this analysis