Sofia Coppola is a female screenwrtier, film director, actress, and producer. (Wikipedia) She got her start in Hollywood with help from her father, who directed blockbusters such as The Outsiders and The Godfather Saga. Coppola is recognized as being a visually stylish director, incorporating the aesthetic beauty of nature and many scenes with no dialogue in her movies. One of her first directed films was The Virgin Suicides. The Virgin Suicides won her many awards nationwide and showcased her talent as a filmmaker.
The Virgin Suicides movie is an adaption of the book written by Jeffrey Eugenides. It centers around five sisters who live in a home with very strict, traditional parents. The father of the household is overprotective, and becomes even more so when the youngest of his daughters commits suicide. The mother is kind of a pushover, and agrees with all her husband's decisions. This situation is similar to "gynocriticism." "'Gynocriticism' (..) involves a seperate female way of thinking, and a recognition that women's experience has been effectively silenced by a masculine culture." (Author/Auteur, 95) In fact, the girls' parents and community are so dominating that they feel that suicide is their only way to escape.
Coppola uses beautiful imagery to display the setting of the event, and utilizes the third person perspective as a tool to expose each character's role in an unbiased way. By the end of the film, the viewer is able to sympathize with just about every person. Another key element of the movie is the soundtrack. Coppola uses the song "Playground Love" by Air throughout every montage. The song has a very eerie feel, which lingers in your head even after the credits are done rolling. Even today, whenever I hear "Playground Love", I'm reminded of this movie.
I always thought my parents were strict, but after watching this film, I realized that I didn't have it so bad afterall. A part of the movie that always stayed with me *spoiler alert* was the scene when Lux (Kirsten Dunst), the middle child, kills herself after a boy (Josh Hartnett) takes her virginity and breaks her heart. "It may not be the intent of a filmmaker to teach audiences anything, but that does not mean that lessons are not learned." (Hooks, 2) I'm sure many parents, as well as many teenage boys, would change the way they treat the women in their lives differently after watching the potential consequences of their actions.
The Virgin Suicides won Coppola many awards and had mostly positive reviews. "There's a melancholy sweetness here, a gentle humor that speaks to the angst and awkwardness of girls turning into women, and the awe of boys watching the transformation from afar." (The Philadelphia Inquirer, Metacrtic) The subject matter of the movie is very dark, and Coppola mentions in an interview that its inspired from her experiences as a young girl. She said in an interview that in many movies about high school romance, the portrayals of teenagers aren't very accurate. "At that age, everything seems like a huge deal, but of course that changes when you get older. How does that relate to Virgin Suicides? There's something about being a teenager that's so sincere. Everything is more epic, like your first crush." (Coppola)
Humm, Maggie. Author/Auteur: Feminist Literary Theory and Feminist Film. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 1997.
Hooks, Bell. Making Movie Magic.
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