| Chapter Introduction: | Introduction |
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of the sex goddess’ image as one that can be read as another authentic, alternative identification of femininity for fans, one that can also be read as both empowering and feminist. As Jackie Stacey has proven through her use of reception theory and empirical research in her book Star Gazing, there are many kinds of femininities that interact with screen images of women in many different ways which are not necessarily homoerotic, but are inclusive of homoerotic identification. This book will argue more specifically for the identification of heterosexual women and gay men with the image of the sex goddess.
As mentioned previously, the sex goddess’ ambivalent position becomes even further complicated by her categorization as that of an embodiment of an abstract idea of sex, one that is almost always historically contingent upon corresponding contemporary views of women's sexuality. This categorization is additionally relevant from a film theory perspective. More specifically, a study of the sex goddess, or what has previously been referred to in feminist film theory as the excessive or hyper-feminine, can reveal modes of femininity that perhaps do not necessarily fit with many post-modern feminist and early feminist film theorists’ definitions of what appropriate femininity should be. In other words, in recouping the sex goddess as an empowering construct for hyper-feminine-identified women and gay men, can she then too begin to count as feminist?
Application to Cinema
In consideration of feminist film theory, the Lacanian idea of desire endlessly suspended is particularly applicable to the cinematic experience, as well as to the construct of the sex goddess. The sex goddess makes desire an action endlessly suspended; she is unobtainable in any real sense, and so is the desire aroused by cinema. Applied to the construct of the sex goddess, she thus becomes the ultimate cinematic aesthetic object because she functions as cinema does itself; as a never-fulfilled desire for wish fulfillment.