Pornografia

Reaction Paper #1: Reflections on Gender and Sexuality
University of Saskatchewan
Psy 227.3
Prof. Todd Morrison








Mini Essay #1: Portrayal Of Mental Illness and Disability in Soldier's Girl
On its most basic level, the film, Soldier's Girl, is a love story, but the movie is ridden with subtext and multiple themes surrounding transgressive sexuality. Based on a true story, themovie attempts to capture the audience's sympathies for a young couple in the thralls of romance and caught somewhere between the boundaries of heterosexuality and homosexuality. Though maybe not entirely explicit in its presentation, the role of mental illness, intellectual disability, and drug and alcohol abuse is inseparably interwoven with the film's main themes. At times, the portrayal ofmental health problems among the film's main characters facilitates the viewer's emotional connectedness to the story. However, if the intention of the film is to illuminate the inherent problems with homophobic attitudes and condemnation of transsexuals in our society, then the portrayal of mental illness and disability are to the film's detriment by effectively hindering the viewer's personalidentification with the characters.
Barry Winchell, a young soldier who falls in love with Calpurnia Addams (a pre-op transsexual) has a learning disability. On one hand, his disability encourages the audience to sympathize with him. As with any good protagonist, Barry has his own “character flaw”. This makes it challenging for him to complete his military coursework, but at the same time makesthe viewers anticipate his success. Additionally, the portrayal of his learning disability evokes the audience's feelings of acceptance and empathy for his growing relationship with Calpernia. For example, the audience is shown Calpernia's kindhearted nature during the scene where she helps Barry edit a letter he is writing to his family. On the other hand, Barry's disability also serves todistance him from the viewer. In a sense, it turns his character into an “other”, someone distinctly different from the non-intellectually challenged typical audience member, thereby subtly reinforcing a stereotype that only atypical or intellectually imparied individuals would fall in love with “someone like Calpernia”.
Justin Fisher, Barry's roommate in the army, is also distinctly separated fromthe average person since Fisher struggles with mental illness. In the film, Fisher indicates that he has ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder) and potentially some OCD (Obsessive Compuslive Disorder) as well. Also problematic, is his overuse of medication, suggested early in the film when Fisher rushes to hide his medications from the bathroom cabinet when Barry moves into his room.Those who watch the film, can therefore view Fisher's hostility towards Barry as a result of mental illness and/or drug abuse rather than as direct acts of homosexual discrimination. This serves to distance the audience members from the characters in the movie by implying that one of sound mental health wouldn't overtly engage in such strong prejudice and homophobic attitudes.
Alcohol abuse isalso common among the soldiers, and when underage Calvin Glover murders Barry, he is undoubtedly under the influence of alcohol. In one sense, the film may be beneficial in warning the audience of some of the negative consequences associated with alcohol abuse include fighting, and even murder. However, this draws attention away from the harmful effects of the soldiers' pre-existing homosexualprejudices. In the end, Barry's death seems more a consequence of Fisher's psychosis combined with the effects of alcohol on the ever eager-to-please Calvin Glover. The subtext suggests that the murder of an innocent man, merely for engaging in a transsexual relationship (whether determined to be homosexual or merely “alternative”) happened due to mental illness and substance abuse problems....