Feminism and Doris Wishman

Doris Wishman was the infamous prolific sexploitation filmmaker from 1960s through the early 2000s completing thirty independent films and being one of the only women filmmakers in the industry, giving the “sexploitation” a unique feminist lens. Wishman is considered an anarchical filmmaker. Wishman was born in 1912 in New York City and a graduate of Hunter College’s acting department. Originally having high hopes of becoming an actress but could only land roles where she was a secretary. Frustrated by this Wishman left the acting world and settled into married life until her husband Jack Abrahms died at an early age and only after 5 months of marriage to Wishman. Overcome with grief Wishman turned to film to envelop her time. She states that she found “the challenge I was looking for” in directing and producing.

Her films centered around such themes as nudity, voyeurism, corruption, and violence often with the female protagonist being the perpetrator towards the male characters. She also explored “camp science fiction” in her film Nude on the Moon where astronauts encounter a race of nude women on the moon in a feminist colony. The flick was heavily censored and banned in New York State. This is reoccurring theme Wishman would struggle with within her other films.

Feminist film culture is no stranger to the female body, films such as Taking Our Bodies Back BY MARGARET LAZARUS, RENNER WUNDERLICH AND JOAN FINK show us the woman’s body in a clinical sense and show women the power of being comfortable in the human female body. Wishman uses the male gaze to her advantage and while showing problematic storylines which never lose the grasp on the autonomy of the woman through the male gaze. Wishman’s filmmaking was different from other sexploitation films because Wishman incorporated a plot, concrete storyline, and a lyrical narrative by her female and male characters. While her feminist filmmaking would soon fall mostly into portraits of females, she incorporates analytical filmmaking styles using found footage.

Filmmaking provided a monetary challenge and Wishman took to using handheld cameras to cut down budget constraints while adding to her “camp” esthetic. She was often quoted as saying that she felt she could have provided much better movies had she had more money to pour into the production.

Wishman was ahead of her time including the first transgender and transexuals into her narrative films. Early as 1978 Wishman made this her film Let Me Die a Woman. Today, transgender individuals are still very rarely seen on film. In USC Annenberg’s yearly analysis of the most popular films show that even in 2019, transgender individuals are still the most under-represented minority in films showing only four transgender characters with a run time of two minutes or less of screen time and only in minor and inconsequential roles in over 600 films.

To take a closer look at her work, I’ve watched four films from different decades in her career spanning from the most recent Satan Was a Lady (2001) to A Night to Dismember (1983), Let me Die a Woman (1978) to finally her initial debut, Hideout in the Sun (1960). In 2001 Wishman redid her 1975 feature Satan was a Lady by reimagining the film in her late 80s. She was 89 years old at the time of the re-release and the tone is allegedly softer than her original version. This comes after a nearly 20-year break from her filmmaking career. The film focuses on Cleo Irane (Honey Lauren) who is a stripper and makes extra money by blackmailing her rich clientele. Cleo wants more from life but cannot seem to get from under the lifestyle she is leading, and this causes her in turn to blackmail her richest client in order to make ends meet but ends up falling in love with her richest customer’s son (Glyn Styler). The film ends with Cleo’s demise.

The scene I would like to analyze comes from the movie Satan Was a Lady. During the second watching of Satan Was a Lady I noticed many religious elements changed around through the lens of a woman and her Eve archetype most commonly associated with sexually experienced women throughout history but especially post the “Free Love” revolution in the 1960s in which is when Doris Wishman first began her career. While a reoccurring theme for Wishman is her appeal for sexual freedom being explored throughout her films in Satan was a Lady there is a reversal to take back self-autonomy of Cleo’s sexual authority. In the scene 11 minutes and 34 seconds into the movie Cleo is backstage dressing from working her shift at the local club. We see Cleo partially dressed and dancing for herself seductively in front of a mirror. The performance is for no one in particular and reminds me of a similar scene in Varda’s Cleo from 5 to 7 where the maincharacter Cleo dances seductively down a staircase while no is around. I find it interestesting that both main character’s in these two films share the same name. There is a cut to a Lou Reed character playing drums and then a stripper also in the act of performance. The difference between Cleo’s and the unnamed dancer is the static POV shot. When we watch the unnamed dancer the camera action is bouncy and irregular and gives the feeling as if we are watching from a male client’s perspective. The stability in the dressing room shot gives us more access to the inner workings of the main protagonist, Cleo. There is also a distinct lack of enthusiasm on the unnamed dancer's face. The scene then changes back to the interior of the dressing room where Cleo is shown continuing the action of her performance in the mirror and through her reflection, we see that there is indeed a smile inhabiting her face. Cleo reaches in towards the mirror and gives her reflection a kiss indicating self-love that would normally be reserved for characters with more self-respect, here however Wishman consciously chose to show a woman who uses sex as a bargaining chip and as a resourceful way to make ends meet as one with self-respect. It is here when the central drama of the scene unfolds as a man with a tough demeanor walks in without knocking to which Cleo immediately stops her performance and reaches to control her bodily appearance by grabbing a shirt and pressing it tightly to her chest, indicating that although she is a stripper, her body is not for the male gaze without consent. Cleo admonishes the male for not knocking while he stands amid the doorway in a James Dean-esque way. His overall appearance minus the shaved head is reminiscent of the character style that James Dean plays in Rebel Without a Cause. The unnamed man asks why Cleo is hiding and that he comes to the club, Gasolina to see her every night. The shot then changes to a close-up of Cleo’s face as she gives a nearly inaudible sarcastic retort. The unnamed man becomes defensive, and this is shown through her POV as he enters further into the doorway and crosses his arms in front of his chest. The unnamed man admonishes Cleo while also bragging about his work ethic saying that he spent years eating only one meal a day to save up and open the club. We now know that this is Cleo’s boss at Gasolina. Cleo’s boss then begins to raise his voice while pounding on his chest stating that the club and its entire contents belong to him including the unions to which Cleo belongs. Cleo’s boss then enters into the chamber fully and makes a statement relating to the size of his penis as he inches closer into the frame in an extreme close up violating our terms of space as the viewer and giving us the details that he is also violating Cleo’s space. The shot backs up as Cleo responds for the first time in 2 minutes saying that she knows exactly what her boss is referring to and slaps him away. Her boss now taken aback returns with a creepy sleazy response of liking the way she says no to him and tells her that she is smart. Cleo responds with a more clear and direct statement telling her boss to leave and the physical act of pushing him towards the door, in which her boss slightly stumbles and then proceeds to return to the angled shot with his arms outstretched and palms up showing that he means no harm. He reminds her that she is part of his union in which he is going to get more leave of absence and then slaps her bottom. At this provocation, Cleo raises her voice and forcefully makes the man exit the room before slamming the door behind her. The final shot is a pan of her expression towards the mirror where she began the scene lovingly dancing to herself.

This central theme of justification of a man’s presence in the sphere of women and sexuality versus a woman’s place in the attraction towards her own body is central in many of Wishman’s films. It is a struggle of finding a place where women can be both promiscuous but also have full autonomy over the self and how she is portrayed. While the film does not have a happy ending it is Cleo struggle to remain autonomous that gives the film is feeling of mise-en-scene throughout. In a fascinating interview on Late Night with Conan O’Brien Wishman was interviewed alongside Roger Ebert whom she asks why he had not chosen her latest release as a top film. Flustered, Ebert retorts that the only reason why someone would watch [it] would be to see porn star Chesty Morgan naked, however, in Wishman’s film she appears fully clothed to which Wishman responded “Well… I’m sorry you’re frustrated!” summing up something so key and pinnacle about her filmmaking and her refusal to cater to the male gaze’s patriarchal wishes.

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