In yesterday’s lesson within the unit, Film Genres and National Cinema, students investigated a wide range of teen films. For their blog, they were to reflect on the question:
How has teen film impacted the representation and understanding of the teenage experience over time? I was keen to reflect on this question myself, and compare my response with those of my students, especially when so much has changed and is still changing in regards to the representation of teenagers and the teenage experience in film and television.
During the lesson, I often caught myself saying “in retrospect”, and “retrospectively” in connection to reflecting on teenage experiences, as I myself no longer fall into that age bracket. I also made an effort to not come off as condescending, as I was speaking to a room of the Real McCoy about how they have and continue to be represented in popular culture. Considering many of the examples we looked at of common teen film tropes and conventions, perhaps I was showing more consideration for my audience in that 90 minute lesson than many directors and writers of teen films have demonstrated for decades. Sometimes it really is a fine line for creators to tread between establishing and utilising archetypes for the betterment of the narrative, and creating and reinforcing possibly harmful stereotypes in the real world.
When it comes to film and representation in any genre, there may come a time when what the film is representing feels compelled to replicate its glossy Hollywood clone. For example, if the teenage experience (something in the real world) is better or more easily identifiable by referring to its fictional representations (i.e. in films and television productions), real teenagers watching may feel that they should act in the ways they see reflected on the silver screen. As a result, if for example a young teenage boy is surrounded by representations of teenage characters looking to establish themselves in society as grown men by engaging in risk taking behaviours, they too may want to try what is demonstrated. A young girl seeing many preteen characters sneaking a cigarette with her friends in 1980s films may entertain the thought of doing so, and may also wonder if this behaviour was normal for those in her demographic. This link between the real imitating the exaggerated imitations of themselves is strengthened by those both older and younger learning to define real teenagers using information from fictional sources. A few students in a flash writing exercise during this lesson shared that as children they were nervous if not frightened of teenagers, as they were often depicted as aggressive, moody, and cruel to their parents and younger siblings (I too remember being weary of teenagers as a child, with their dark eyeliner, loud music, and spiky hairdos that were typical in the early 2000s). For the younger generation, this however is a learned behaviour, and while “teen angst” continues to sell fictional tales, creators should be held accountable for the impact they have on the very real group of people they are representing. While these may change as the teen film genre continues to evolve over time, here is a countdown of the five most unrealistic expectations I had as I made my way through adolescence - that shaky transition between childhood and adulthood…
5. I thought I would meet Mr. Right in high school
While it may seem naive, I grew up watching television shows like Lizzie McGuire (2001-2004), Kim Possible (2002-2007), Hannah Montana (2006-2011), and iCarly (2007-2012) to name a few, in which all female protagonists found their one true love after a (literal) series of crushes, dramatics, and emotional rollercoasters, all set on the stage of middle school and high school. In terms of film, I was fixated on the Twilight books and films, where our quiet and moody main character Bella has a near pre-quarter life crisis around her ageing (i.e. nightmares about being a grandmother on the night before her eighteenth birthday), as she “knows” she has found the person she wants to be with, not just for the rest of her life but for the rest of her unnatural existence by the age of seventeen. I too would have skipped the important milestones of growing up and learning who I was if I had met my eternal true love in high school. Now, I look back and wonder if the true happy ending for Bella would be for her to have gone to college in order to learn about who she is and what she wants before finding and committing to her “other half”, an often romanticised phrase I have much issue with, as it assumes those who are single are not yet whole.
4. I thought that every teenager was out partying
While I did my best to do my own thing despite the opinions of others, I did feel at times that I was perhaps unusually quiet and unsocialised because I wasn’t out partying every weekend like Mischa Barton’s character Marissa from The OC (2003-2007). The trope of parents being away for the weekend and the children throwing “rager” parties was so often repeated, there were points where I wondered if it was strange that I had never tried alcohol like the “teens” in films (where literally all of them were underage, as in the USA, the legal drinking age is 21). While I did not pursue this and the parties I attended were in no way shape or form “ragers” (they more like watching a movie while my friend’s mum bought us whichever sushi roll we wanted), I certainly wondered if that was what everyone else was doing (and I perhaps experienced what this generation may describe as “low-key FOMO” or a slight fear of missing out).
3. I thought that high school operated in a quasi ‘food chain’ system
As a result of teen films, and the representation of the teenage experience in popular culture, I had a skewed view regarding social hierarchy. For instance in films, the “nerds” were always bullied, and the popular kids always ruled the roost, as having people like you and/or think you are cool is the most important thing. While I did not try to be popular, I felt the weight of social invisibility and exclusion that is so often normalised for “someone like me”. As I was quiet, liked different things, and struggled with a certain degree of social anxiety, I was bullied, but in a way, I felt that this was perhaps an inevitable if not natural consequence of my mere existence. Bullying in films is often akin to hazing culture in American teen films, where almost every character except for the popular kids have to endure a level of humiliation and ridicule to grow as a character. It made it seem like a right of passage, rather than something that could be actively prevented, or something I could have sought help from adults for. When I consider bullying from the position of a teacher now, I wonder if bullying in films are representations of the real world, or if they are inspiring and actively sustaining this unhealthy social landscape.
2. I thought that I would have my whole future planned by graduation
Considering what is shown in the teen film genre, It is no surprise really that as a teenager I expected to know exactly what I wanted to do as a job by the end of Year 12. So many teen films that feature protagonists in their final year of high school show them buzzing around excitedly as they prepare for the SATs, scope out colleges located thousands of miles from their hometowns, and plan their whole lives (while spending seemingly very little time in class and actually studying). I certainly felt this pressure as a senior student, as I did not have a solid idea of what job I wanted. I simply wanted to do as well as possible, so that I could maximise the number of doors that would be open to me. While in Texas visiting my Aunty Rob, her friends who had known me since I was twelve or thirteen years old thought it was strange that I was looking at university options I could commute to from home, as it is so normal for Americans to go to colleges out of state, and for students to live in dorms. Due to much of my entertainment being Americanised, these USA specific milestones were presented to me, and weighed heavily on my mind.
1. I thought I would be “all grown up” by the age of sixteen
While the reason for adults playing teenagers in movies makes practical sense when it comes to child labour laws and restrictions in Hollywood (i.e. no need to provide a tutor / home schooling to the nineteen or twenty year old playing the fourteen year old), it did mess with my head in regards to my self image. Due to this trend, I lacked actual representation of what a teenager looked like. The “girls” in these films were perfect and beautiful and looked like ladies, while the boys looked like men (because they actually were!) Rachel McAddams was twenty-six years old when she played sixteen year old Regina George in Mean Girls (2004), and Chad Michael Murray was twenty-three while playing seventeen year old school quarterback heart throb Austin Ames in A Cinderella Story (2004). Again, while it makes logical and practical sense on a business side to cast adults in the roles of minors, watching films about “seventeen year olds” when you are eleven or twelve sets an expectation that that will be you in five or six years, and when you reach that age and are still a teen and not a grown up, there can be a weird feeling of shock, disillusionment, and lack of self acceptance. It is like you didn’t measure up somehow to what you had learned to be “normal”.
I am looking forward to continuing our class’s investigation into the teen film genre on Friday, and reading more about their thoughts and experiences with the current representation of their age group.
Videos:
WheatusOfficial. 2010, Wheatus - Teenage Dirtbag (Official Video), online video, viewed on 8 February 2023, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FC3y9llDXuM
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