Response to "Splendor in the Grass"

Sexual Expression for the Young

Carlos

     In an age wherein a socially accepted girl is usually desexualized, women are deprived of any emotional outlets, let alone sex.  The pride of a girl is won by displaying sexual innocence; stigmas are served for those who dare to break the ethical conformity.  Yet, once capitalism expands its way into the traditional family unit and changes people』s lifestyles, the general beliefs of the multitude will face a serious challenge.

      「Splendor in the Grass」 is set in such an age of conflict and the movie presents a deeply touching story that exemplifies such a conflict.  Americans had just experienced their first sex revolution (1880-1920).  The turn-of-the-century revolution aimed at women, whose sexuality had suffered from the double standards both socially and culturally.  But at this historical moment the women of the younger generation were more likely to gain economic autonomy.  The newly developed plants and businesses provided women with optional choices whether to be a housewife or a wage-earner, while in the past being domestic was their common and only destiny.  Besides the increase in women』 opportunities to work, recreational occasions popped up that catered to the needs of the new generation.  Young people were able to court one another at school parties, nightclubs, or self-organized social activities.  The life decisions that had been monopolized by parents were now open to the youths.  Deanie and Bud came of age exactly in this period of time.  Their parents, however, belonged to an older generation in which sexual repression was still a common phenomenon, in which the school』s, as well as the parents』, supervisions kept the teenagers away from any possible sexual experiences.  Sex was something for men, not for women.  As Deanie』s mother had uttered in the film, 「Women just let the men get close and have children.  Women don』t enjoy as the men do.」  These words aptly described the obvious repression that women suffered in relation to their bodies and desires.

     Our society might hope to continue to constrain women』s bodies and construct their self-identity.  Yet while the elders try to pass their identity onto the new generation, conflicts are inevitable.  The youths are eager to initiate their sexual experiences while the age-old conventional ideology keeps on loading them with guilty feelings.  Self-contradicting, emotionally confused with inner conflicts, Deanie and Bud faced a dilemma.  To be or not to be (a good girl/desexualized), a classic Hamlet-esque ordeal tormented the two little lovers.  Even though the new wave of revolution shattered the old-time ideology eventually, sexual activity was still only tolerable within marriage.  The only way to have 『legitimate』 sex was through marrying someone.  Thus Bud would rather give up the chance to go to Yale so as to be able to marry Deanie right after high school graduation.  As for Deanie, she also would like to have an intimate relation with Bud, yet the conventional ethic confused her and even drove her mad.  Both of them suffered tragically from such a dilemma. 

     If Bud and Deanie represent the confusion that many young people are caught in, then Jeannie, Bud』s sister, serves not only as an irony on the film but also signals the changing of the society, a potent representation of the new sexual revolutionaries. As a modern revolutionary, she would no doubt encounter many trials and obstacles from all directions. Bud longed to have sex with Deanie while he did not want her sister to be open about her body.  This was a strong irony that the director had carefully plotted.  Once Deanie accept Bud』s sexual seduction, there would be no difference between Deanie and Ginny, whom Bud felt ashamed of.  Still, the film hasn』t work out the fundamental conflicts and irony of that very age for Ginny, the bold sexual pioneer, who eventually ended up in tragedy.  As it stands, the film is far from ending up with a cliché moral lesson: it』s shameful to become sexually active too early.  Rather, it is a lively record of how young people of that generation struggled with sexual oppression.  What we have gained from the past generation is not always suitable for the younger one.  But the time is changing, and so are the youths.  We may very well see a very different world soon, a world where sexual expression will no longer be a shameful thing and everyone could learn to be at ease with themselves.