News & Politics - Abortion on television/movies discussion.

rose parade · 01-11-2008, 04:06 PM

Quote:

On screen, the 'A' word means controversy

With a teen pregnancy at the centre of its plot, the new comedy Juno could have become part of the American abortion debate.

But as Montreal-born director Jason Reitman told Reuters recently, he figures the film's sense of humour helped prevent that from happening.

"If we had made it as a straight drama, people would emotionally take sides and not listen," he said. "But because of the humour, people start enjoying the film for its story."

And, of course, a film like Juno or Waitress or 2007's other, bigger, pregnancy comedy, box-office hit Knocked Up would have been short films indeed were the central characters to have terminated their pregnancies.

They also wouldn't have been very funny. But funny isn't the only reason movie makers are writing around abortion - and in most cases, avoiding the word altogether - these days. It's just too contentious, particularly south of the border. (OP note: this is a Canadian article.)

As for more serious fare, it seems dramatic possibilities are greatest when the procedure is depicted back when it was still illegal: 1999's Cider House Rules, based on the John Irving novel, 2004's Vera Drake and this year's Romanian film Four Months, Three Weeks, Two Daysare all examples. American History X filmmaker Tony Kaye spent 15 years making Lake of Fire, but his 2006 foray into the debate is in the form of a documentary.

It's a far cry from two of the most memorable teen films of the 1980s, Dirty Dancing and Fast Times at Ridgemont High, which both depict the procedure in what were almost secondary plots.

“Fast Times at Ridgemont High, a comedy no less, a woman has a very casual abortion, it lasts for like a scene and a half," says Robert Thompson, founding director of the Bleier Centre for Television and Popular Culture at Syracuse University.

"Just has it and nothing is thought of it. There's no good, bad or anything. She's a main character in a raucous comedy."

The small screen has changed too, in two decades. In the 1980s, ground-breaking shows like St. Elsewhere, Law & Order and China Beach - with one episode where guest star Ricki Lake plays a character looking back at a botched abortion - seemed to tackle the issue almost seasonally.

"It was almost required for any kind of show that had some kind of a serious pretension," says Thompson.

In the 1990s a main character on the Fox drama Party of Five was to have an abortion, but as co-creator Christopher Keyser told the New York Times earlier this year, the network balked for fear of upsetting sponsors. The character had a miscarriage instead, a convenient plot twist when pregnancy is to be explored, but not committed to.

During the first season of Grey's Anatomy, Sandra Oh's character decided to have an abortion when she found herself pregnant, but ended up losing the baby in an ectopic pregnancy and later - in a departure for the dour Christina Yang - mourns the loss with loud, relentless sobbing.

Otherwise, an accidental pregnancy on television is much like the movies: Friends' Rachel (played by Jennifer Aniston) decided immediately she would have the baby; in the more textured Sex and the City, Miranda (played by Cynthia Nixon) came close but changed her mind at the abortion clinic. That her friend Charlotte (played by Kristen Davis) longed to be a mother helped inform her decision.

Networks are staying away, says Thompson, because they just don't want to put up with the boycotts. At the same time, he says, they are all much more accepting of violence, or coarse language, or sex, than they were 20 years ago.

"Of all of the things, virtually every category of subject, we are more open and frank about now," says Thompson, "except abortion."

In 27 years of overseeing Degrassi productions, Epitome Pictures CEO and show creator Linda Schuyler has seen teen pregnancies portrayed with a number of outcomes. She has dealt with abortion on the show three times, each proving controversial not in Canada but the U.S.

In a late 1980s episode of Degrassi High, the show ended up having to cut a different, less explicit ending to air on PBS: Two sisters would be seen facing an abortion picket line, not, as in the Canadian version, looking back on the picketers as they were about to enter the clinic.

Three years ago, when Degrassi: Next Generation did another abortion-themed episode, American network The N refused to air it. Network executives said they would have made a different decision if, after the abortion, the character showed remorse, said Schuyler.

"It wasn't about her having remorse," she said. "It was about her having made that decision."

That episode did air in the U.S., later, without fanfare when the controversy died down.

Both scenarios serve as a reminder that though much of our art and culture are shared, Canadian and American sensitivities are very different. Polls show Americans are almost evenly divided on the issue of a woman's right to choose, whereas Canadians are more weighted to the pro abortion side. There seems to be a small-l liberal acceptance to productions, she says, though violence seems to be a bigger deal than in the U.S.

In the end, Schuyler says Degrassi has simply made it a priority to show teenagers all the angles of life's many dilemmas without taking sides.

"It's not my job to say to people 'these are the choices you should be making,'" says Schuyler. "It's our job to say 'here's a whole bunch of choices in life, young people, make your choices from an informed decision.'"

source

Thoughts? This article is a little old, but I thought it was very interesting!

elisheva · 01-13-2008, 10:43 AM

I liked that Juno actually presented it as an option that was considered, unlike Knocked Up where it was kind of instantly dismissed (but Knocked Up anyway I knew I was watching for comedy, not for politics, given the general kind of....sketchiness with how it portrayed women). I don't think we should vilify women who choose to terminate their pregnancy, especially not such young women as are depicted in stuff like Juno and Degrassi. I mean, I understand it's a controversial topic, and ambivalent feelings are almost inevitable, but it seems a little ridiculous to me that an American network wouldn't even show it unless they got to specify the reaction/judgment given on the show. I guess that's a hint that American culture is much more conservative in some ways than Canadian?

**sunnykerr** · 01-15-2008, 07:10 PM

I honestly don't understand what the big controversy is about a fictional story depicting a woman of any age, social status or circumstances, debating whether or not to have an abortion. Especially when it's an unexpected/possibly unwanted pregnancy.

I say that fully understanding the reasons why abortion itself is controversial. I also say it without in any way, shape or form assuming that people on either side of the issue can be boiled down to simplistic platitudes about either one.

But we've seen people murder one another; physically, emotionally and psychologically torture one another. Fictional stories depict rape, slavery, battery, pedophilia, poisonings, genocide and any manner of absolutely abhorrant behaviour all the time in movies and TV shows.

I don't personally think that a woman who chooses to have an abortion deserves to be villified. I don't think a woman who considers all of her options, including abortion, when she finds herself unexpectedly pregnant should also be villified. But, say that I did, what then would be the problem with showing that in a movie? What would be so controversial about that?

Gods Mouthpiece · 01-30-2008, 08:14 PM

Eve's bite

migamoo · 01-30-2008, 08:53 PM

Uh, what about it?


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