|
|
Tuesday, July 23, 2002
"It's Pat" Revisited
By Kevin John
"It's Pat — The Movie," an irrational enlargement of Julia
Sweeney's "Saturday Night Live" gender-cipher skit, was one of the
most well-hated films of the '90s. Directed by music-video veteran
(B-52's "Love Shack") Adam Bernstein, the film racked up five
nominations at the 16th Annual Golden Raspberry (RAZZIE) Awards (an
awards ceremony spoof for the worst film of the year) including Worst
Picture of 1995 (that dishonor went to "Showgirls," another unjustly
pooh-poohed masterpiece). Now that "Showgirls" has accrued some
estimable supporters in directors Jacques Rivette and Jim Jarmusch,
as well as previously-repulsed-if-still-somewhat-hesitant critics
Adrian Martin and Jonathan Rosenbaum (although, sniff, li'l ole me
knew its greatness on opening night), it's time to turn the tide on
this fantastic little wreck of a film.
One stubborn current in the invectives leveled against "It's Pat
— The Movie" is frustration over the fact that the film never
reveals if Pat is a man or a woman. Perhaps audiences place a higher
premium on feature-length narrative films to provide closure, whereas
television sketch comedy can effectively buck such expectations.
Nevertheless, the viewer whose pleasure absolutely depends upon
knowing Pat's sex has a surrogate in the character of Pat's neighbor,
Kyle Jacobs (Charles Rocket).
Kyle becomes so consumed with investigating Pat's sex that, with his
camera, camcorder, telescope and general intrusiveness, he's a
perfect case study of the sadistic voyeur outlined by Laura Mulvey in
her monumental essay "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema." In fact,
some of his lines sound so much like direct quotes from Mulvey's
essay that eventually we realize his investigative gaze isn't so much
about knowing Pat as it is about knowing itself. As he says to Pat in
the "Lady From Shanghai" mirror maze towards the end of the film,
"We're like two complementary pieces in the crazy jigsaw puzzle of
love; I just need to know how we fit together. By uncovering the
secret of you, I uncover the secret of myself."
In one sense, then, "It's Pat — The Movie" is Kyle's story, his
oedipal drama. There's even a rhetorical rhyming device that links
Kyle's gaze to the omnipresence of the camera (we can discuss it over
mocha chocolattas someday if you'd like, but the specifics get a
little tedious over a 500-word piece). And indeed, Kyle has the last
word in the film, speaking over the closing credits about his gender
transformation. But because he never sees his investigation to
completion, it never gets, in Mulvey's words, "counterbalanced by the
devaluation, punishment or saving of" Pat. That this fate does not
befall a character of indeterminate sex is attractive enough in a
Hollywood narrative film, even one that so seriously flopped.
Where "It's Pat — The Movie" truly leaves Kyle in the dust,
though, and, by extension, the viewer who identifies with him, is
that it dares to imagine a life for Pat outside of Kyle's gaze; his
investigation gets consistently interrupted with Pat's story. And
where Pat sparks a journey of self-discovery for Kyle, the rotten,
soul-draining specter of work sets Pat off on her/his own. But more
on that next time.
TOP
|
