Abstract
The dangerous and manipulative young femmes fatales—the “daughters of postfeminism”—became prominent in different American films in the 1990s and the 2000s, such as Hard Candy (2005), Jennifer’s Body (2009), Mini’s First Time (2006), Poison Ivy (1992), Poison Ivy 2 (1996), The Babysitter (1995), and The Crush (1993). However, as this chapter shows, this type of femme fatale was already a figure in Brazilian cinema before that. In Braz Chediak’s Bonitinha mas ordinária, the main female character, the teenage Maria Cecília (Lucélia Santos), adopts a performativity of innocence, as do many other young femmes fatales, to conceal her true identity. She is a 17-year-old upper-class “innocent” and “pure” teenage girl who is first presented as a “victim of rape,” but who is actually a manipulative femme fatale: she hides behind her supposed innocence. Maria Cecília uses her social status of a grã-fina (“stuck-up woman”), as one of the male characters describes her, and her economic position—her father owns a large company—to achieve what she wants: to have sex with whomever she desires in the ways she dictates. In doing this, she turns men, including her father’s male employees, into objects to be bought for her personal use and she harasses the men she wants. Thus, through her behavior, the film suggests that there is a relationship between class exploitation (regarding sexuality) and the perception of a woman’s sexual identity, especially in terms of virginity. The latter has a different weight on a woman’s social value depending on the class from which she originates. Moreover, the film repeats patriarchal society’s view of women as good and bad that is depicted in film noir: virginity is for good women who will eventually get married and a single woman becomes bad once she loses her virginity.
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© 2014 Antônio Márcio da Silva
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da Silva, A.M. (2014). Social Class and the Virgin/Whore Dichotomy in Bonitinha mas ordinária. In: The “Femme” Fatale in Brazilian Cinema. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137399212_4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137399212_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-48570-3
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-39921-2
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