Page 149 - Decoding Culture

142 D E C O D I N G C U L TURE

account of scopophilia, pleasurable looking, the voyeuristic satis­
faction derived from observing a seemingly private world from a
position of separation from it. The other (a rather different sense of
'look' is involved here) she conceptualizes in terms drawn from
Lacan, trading on the resemblance of the cinema screen to the
mirror in which the infant first encounters the subjective '1'. Here
the spectator's pleasure is that of narcissistic ego identification
with the imaged figure. These two sources of pleasure are in ten­
sion in as much as the former separates the subject from on-screen
object while the latter requires the subject to identify with that
object. Furthermore, although looking produces pleasure in itself,
when sexual difference is introduced what is actually seen may
become threatening - woman as representation is encountered as
both a source of voyeuristic pleasure and a threat of castration.
This can be seen in more detail in the way in which activity and
passivity have been mapped on to male and female in film repre­
sentation. The female figure is construed as spectacle in classic
Hollywood, coded in terms of 'to-be-looked-at-ness', typically halt­
ing narrative action to facilitate the spectator's visually based erotic
gratification. The active male spectator looks upon the passive
female object. Meanwhile, in the narrative itself, the spectator finds
an ego-ideal, an active, controlling male protagonist with whom he
can identify, a figure who carries the look of the spectator into the
world of the film. But there still remains a problem with the female
figure. 'She also connotes something that the look continually cir­
cles around but disavows: her lack of a penis, implying a threat of
castration and hence unpleasure' (ibid: 13). Thus, for all her pre­
sentation as erotic spectacle, the image of woman threatens the
male unconscious with castration anxiety. Two main responses are
possible. One involves investigation, demystification and punish­
ment of the threatening figure, a strategy found in many film
narratives which, thereby, neutralize the castration threat. The

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