Eroticism, Postfeminist Melancholia and the Cross-Generational Romance
In: Sexual Politics of Desire and Belonging
Author:
Diane Negra
Diane Negra
Search for other papers by Diane Negra in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Search for other papers by Diane Negra in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Purchase instant access (PDF download and unlimited online access):
This essay analyses the similarities between three recent films (P.S., Birth and The Door in the Floor, all 2004) that link a midlife melancholic female protagonist to an unruly eroticism. The films’ suspicions that new postfeminist rhetorics of age may disenfranchise women rather than empower them are articulated through the shared plot device of the cross-generational romance. Strikingly, all three films address themselves to topical postfeminist concerns but modulate these concerns so as to interrogate the matrimonial, maternalist cornerstones of postfeminist culture and place a stress on the prospect of female psychological autonomy.