Frida (2002), an American biographical film, introduces Frida Kahlo, the well-known 20th-century Mexican artist, as a fascinating female protagonist who transgresses gender conformism. From the beginning of the film, Frida is presented as a controversial woman who wears men’s clothes and dances erotically with other women in an evident challenge of social expectation and gender norms, heterosexual norms. Later, the film depicts her homosexual activities while married to Diego Rivera. Although Rivera is a caring husband, he is a womanizer who cannot control or limit his sexual intercourse with other women; accordingly, he ends up sleeping with Frida’s sister. On the one hand, the film exposes us to Diego’s heterosexual male gaze parallelizing Frida’s homosexual female gaze. From the opening of the film, Frida challenges gender conformity and the heterosexual male gaze through her homosexual acts. In the following paper, I argue that Frida’s homosexuality, rejection of gender conformity, and female gaze subvert the patriarchal system and redefine the boundaries of the feminine space in the film. Moreover, the paper will discuss how the film itself through its representation of Frida contradicts and challenges standards of Hollywood film.
About the presenterAsmaa Alshehri
Asmaa Alshehri is a PhD candidate at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. Her interests include Twentieth-Century American Literature, Women’s Literature, Feminist Theories, Social Activism in Women’s Literature, and Gender and Women’s Studies.