FEMINIST IDEAS
IN FILM MONA LISA SMILE
A Thesis
Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for
The Strata One Degree
LAELATI CAHYANI
NIM. 104026000958
ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT
LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY
STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY “SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH”
JAKARTA
2009
FEMINIST IDEAS
IN FILM MONA LISA SMILE
A Thesis
Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty
In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for
The Strata One Degree
LAELATI CAHYANI
NIM. 104026000958
ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT
LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY
STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY “SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH”
JAKARTA
2009
APPROVEMENT
FEMINIST IDEAS
IN FILM MONA LISA SMILE
A Thesis
Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty
In Partial Fulfillment of the RequirementS for
The Strata One Degree
LAELATI CAHYANI
104026000958
Approved by:
Advisor
Elve Oktafiyani, M. Hum
Nip. 150 317 725
ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT
LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY
STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY “SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH”
JAKARTA
2009
LEGALIZATION
i
ABSTRACT
Laelati Cahyani. Feminist Ideas in Film Mona Lisa Smile. Thesis. Jakarta: State
Islamic University (UIN) Jakarta, 2009.
This analysis aims to know what kind of intimidations experienced by main
character and how the main character shows the feminism ideas in her fighting
against the intimidations she experienced in Mona Lisa Smile film by analyzing the
evidences from the dialogues in the film, her acts, and her statements. To get the
feminist value the writer uses Descriptive-Qualitative analysis as the method to
analyze the relationship between the main character and feminism theory.
In this analysis, the writer finds out that there are many intimidations
experienced by the main female character, Katherine Watson. She is a teacher at
Wellesley College in Massachusetts, United States. At Wellesley College, the
knowledge that most of her students aspire for is a wonderful husband and they do
not care of pursuing any kind of professions. She is very surprised about that and she
wants to make a change to women at Wellesley College. As a woman and a teacher,
she is very concerned with education. She comes to Wellesley with her new
perspective. Unfortunately, it makes her gets disrespectful treatments from people
around her in Wellesley. However, she takes the intimidation experiences as her
motivation to make positive changes at Wellesley College and to open the young
women’s minds at Wellesley College. According to liberal feminism, that for equal
rights for women within the framework of the liberal state, arguing that the
theoretical basis on which this state is built is sound but that the rights and privileges
it confers must be extended to women to give them equal citizenship with men. Those
things were done by Katherine Watson in Mona Lisa Smile film. In her every class,
she tries to encourage her students to create a new perspective. And she uses her art
teachings to tell her opinion to her students that they need not to conform to
stereotypes of women to become housewives and mother. To finish, it can be
concluded that Katherine’s efforts to open the young women’s minds at Wellesley
College shows feminist ideas.
ii
A thesis entitled “Feminist ideas in Film Mona Lisa Smile have been defended
before the Letters and Humanities Faculty’s Examination Committee on February
2009. The thesis has already been accepted as a partial fulfillment of the requirement
for the degree of Letters Scholar.
Jakarta, February 19, 2009
Examination Committee
Chair Person,
Secretary,
Dr. H. M. Farkhan, M.Pd.
NIP. 150 299 480
Drs. A. Saefuddin, M.Pd.
NIP. 150 261 902
Members:
Examiner I
Examiner II
Dr. Frans Sayogie, M.Pd.
NIP.150 299 481
Inayatul Chusna, M.Hum
NIP. 150 331 233
iii
DECLARATION
I hereby declare that this submission is her own work and that, to the best of
her knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by
another person nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the
award of any other degree or diploma of the university or other institute of higher
learning, except where due acknowledgement has been made in the text.
Jakarta, February 19, 2009
Laelati Cahyani
iv
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
First of all, the writer would like to thanks to Allah SWT, Lord of the universe
and the day after. Thank you God for always helping her, and guiding her in every
step that she makes and in living her life. Peace and blessing be upon our prophet
Muhammad SAW and all of his friends and followers.
The writer would like to express her gratitude to her parents. Thank you so
much for your financial support, prayers, hope, and all the contributions. And special
thanks to her mom. Thank you mom for bringing her into this world and taking care
of her patiently and affectionately since the writer was a child. Yo ur advices and
rebukes give her strength in living this life. You are her biggest motivator in this
world. Thank you for always being there for her.
The writer also wants to thank to her brother and sisters for supporting the
writer in finishing her thesis. Thank you so much for her brother, Teguh, for picking
her up anytime and anywhere, and being so handy; for her sisters, Selly and Nadia,
for cheering her up and becoming so patient in listening to all her stories and
grievances.
The writer cannot fail to mention her advisor Elve Oktafiyani, M. Hum, For
her guidance and contribution in finishing this thesis for being patient in giving her
advice to finish this thesis.
The writer wish to say gratitude to the following persons:
1. Dr. H. Abdul Chair, M.A the Dean of English Letters Department State Islamic
University “Syarif Hidayatullah” Jakarta.
2. Dr. H. Muhammad Farkhan M.Pd the head of English Letters Department.
3. Drs. A. Saefuddin, M.Pd. the secretary of English Letters Department.
4. All lecturers of English Letters Department for teaching her during her study at
State Islamic University.
v
5. Miss Rosida Erowati for guiding and helping her finishes this thesis. Thank you
for your time, patience and kindness. Thank you for never getting tired of
teaching her and giving her advice.
6. All her best friends: Yanti, for her support, sharing, discussion and friendship for
all this time; Nia, Woro, and Velma for her time in sharing and discussion.
Darma, Noe, Amel, and Kiki thanks to fill her days with smile and laughter.
7. All her friends in C class that the writer cannot mention one by one. Thank you to
fill her college days with smile and laughter.
8. All her friends at UIN Syarif Hidayatullah that the writer cannot mention one by
one. Thank you for being so kind to her for all this time.
May Allah bless us. Finally, the writer realizes that this thesis is far from
being perfect. Accordingly, the writer hopes any suggestion and criticism for this
thesis.
Jakarta, February 19, 2009
Writer
vi
TABLE OF CONTENT
ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................
i
APPROVEMENT ...........................................................................................
ii
LEGALIZATION ........................................................................................... iii
DECLARATION ............................................................................................ iv
ACKNOWLEDGMENT .................................................................................
v
TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................................................................ vii
LIST OF APPENDIXES .................................................................................
ix
CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION ...................................................................
1
A. Background of the Study .......................................................................
1
B. Focus of the Research ............................................................................
4
C. Questions of the Research .....................................................................
5
D. Significance of the Research ..................................................................
5
E. The Objective of the Research ...............................................................
5
F. Research Methodology ..........................................................................
6
1. Method of the Research ....................................................................
6
2. Data Analysis ..................................................................................
6
3. Research Instrument ........................................................................
6
4. Analysis Unit ...................................................................................
7
CHAPTER II. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ........................................
8
A. Feminism ..............................................................................................
8
B. Feminist Theory ....................................................................................
14
C. History of Feminism ..............................................................................
16
1. First Wave Feminism .......................................................................
16
2. Second Wave Feminism ..................................................................
17
vii
3. Third Wave Feminism ....................................................................
19
CHAPTER III. RESEARCH FINDINGS ......................................................
21
A. The intimidations experienced by Katherine Watson related to women
role in film Mona Lisa Smile ..................................................................
21
B. Katherine and Feminist Ideas .................................................................
27
CHAPTER IV: CONCLUSION .....................................................................
42
A. Conclusion ............................................................................................
42
B. Suggestion .............................................................................................
44
BIBLIOGRAPHY ...........................................................................................
45
APPENDIXES .................................................................................................
47
viii
LIST OF APPENDIXES
1. The DVD Cover of Movie “Mona Lisa Smile”
2. Summary of Movie “Mona Lisa Smile”
3. The Script of Movie “Mona Lisa Smile”
4. The Picture of Movie “Mona Lisa Smile”
ix
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
A. Background of the Study
In the early times women have been uniquely viewed as a creative source of
human life. Historically, however, they have been considered not only intellectually
inferior to men but also a major source of temptation and evil.1 Throughout most of
history, women generally have had fewer legal rights and career opportunities than
men have. In many nation women are not fully equals under the law: they do not have
the same rights to make a contract, the same right of association, mobility, and
religious liberty2.
Women in the world are lack of support for fundamental functions of human
life. They are less well noticed than men, less healthy, and more vulnerable to
physical violence and sexual abuse. They are likely much less than a man that has to
be literate, and still less likely to have professional or technical education. They must
attend hard work place, they face greater obstacles including intimidation from family
or spouse, sex discrimination, and sexual harassment in the workplace-all, frequently,
without effective legal recourse3.
1
http://www.ywca.org/site/pp.asp?c=djISI6PIKpG&b=295706. accessed on September 28.2008
Women’s History of America Presented by Women’s International Center.http://www.
wic.org/misc/history.htm. Accessed on September 28.2008
3
Nossbaum, Martha C. Women and Human Development the Capabilities Approach.
Cambridge University Press. United States. 2000
2
1
2
In the past, women are considered as second-class citizens, and not permitted
to own property, maintain wages, sign a contract, vote or even hold an opinion to be
independent from their husbands. The resulting stereotype that "a woman's place is in
the home" has largely determined the ways in which women have expressed
themselves. Although some developments have freed women for roles other than
motherhood, the cultural pressure for women to become wives and mothers still
prevents many talented women from finishing college or pursuing careers.4
Traditionally a middle-class girl in Western culture tended to learn from her
mother's example such as cooking, cleaning, and caring for children, were the
behavior expected from her when she grew up. Tests made in the 1960s showed that
the scholastic achievement of girls was higher in the early grades than in high school.
The major reason given was that the girls own expectations declined because neither
their families nor their teachers expected them to prepare for a future other than that
of marriage and mother.
The stereotype of women in western culture especially in 1950s is wife and
mother. Being a wife and mother were regarded as women's most significant
professions. This condition often inspires the film industry to produce film which is
related to women culture especially in 1950s. That is what Mike Newell wants to
describe throughout the film of Mona Lisa Smile. It is a film about women’s
awareness of education. It is a 2003 American film that was produced by Revolution
Studios and Columbia Pictures, directed by Mike Newell, and starring Julia Roberts,
4
http://www.ywca.org/site/pp.asp?c=djISI6PIKpG&b=295706. accessed on September 28.2008
3
Maggie Gyllenhaal, Kirsten Dunst, and Julia Stiles. The title refers to the Mona Lisa,
the famous painting by Leonardo da Vinci, and the song of the same name, originally
performed by Nat King Cole, which was covered by Seal for the film. The film is a
loose adaptation of The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, a novel by Muriel Spark, and the
title refers to that text.
Mona Lisa Smile is a story of a woman, who happened to be living in
the early 1950s. Katherine Watson (Julia Roberts) is a Berkeley graduate
who arrives at Wellesley College, a conservative women's private liberal arts college
in Massachusetts, United States, to teach Art History. Initially her students try to
outsmart their teacher, which is a little surprising for her, however she does not let
them know about it. But she is very surprised when she knows the knowledge that
most of her students get at Wellesley and they aspire for is a wonderful husband, and
they do not care of pursuing any kind of professions. Because of that she wants to
make a difference to women at Wellesley College.
As a teacher and a woman, Katherine tries to open her student’s minds
through her teaching. She encourages her students to do whatever they want with
their lives. She always makes a difference and gives something new in her syllabus.
She uses her art teachings to tell her opinion to her students at Wellesley College that
they need not to conform to stereotypes of women to become housewives and
mothers. She gives suggest to her students that they can do two things at the same
time, such as having higher education and a family. She does that by supporting one
4
of her students to apply to a law school. She thinks that they can be leaders in the
future.
Her ideas and ways of teaching are contrary to the methods deemed
acceptable by the school's directors, conservative women who believe firmly that
Katherine should not use her class to express her point of views and she should stick
only to teach art. Katherine is being intimidated. She is warned that she could be fired
if she continues to interact with students as she has been doing.
Although Katherine has been warned about her teaching that is not suitable
with the syllabus, that has been stated by the school, but she still uses her principle in
teaching at Wellesley. She feels that the young women at Wellesley College have the
right to pursue higher education and career. She believes that women need to be
changed if they want to achieve better futures.
This film shows Katherine’s persistence and fighting in making changes at
Wellesley, although she has to face many intimidations that come from people around
her there that dislike what she does. These show the feminist ideas in Katherine’s
character. That is why the writer wants to analyze this film by using feminist theory.
B. Focus of the Research
Based on the background of the study above, this research is focused on
extrinsic elements. The writer tries to analyze what intimidations experienced by
main character and how the main character in Mona Lisa Smile film shows feminist
ideas in the era of 1950’s.
5
C. Research Question
The questions in this research are:
1. What intimidations were experienced by Katherine Watson related to women
role in Mona Lisa Smile film?
2. How does Katherine Watson show feminist ideas in her fighting against the
intimidations she experienced in Mona Lisa Smile film?
D. Significance of the Research
This research aims to share the widest perception of women condition in
1950s as second class citizen and correlate the literary work to the progress of women
movement liberation. Moreover, it can give enlightenment to the other researchers in
exploring feminist ideas by using feminist theory developed by Betty Freidan.
E. The Objective of the Research
The objectives of this research are:
1. To understand what intimidations were experienced by Katherine Watson
related to women role in Mona Lisa Smile film.
2. To understand how Katherine Watson shows feminist ideas in her fighting
against the intimidations she experienced in Mona Lisa Smile film.
6
F. Research Methodology
In the research methodology, there are some important aspects such as
method, technique of data analysis, data analysis, and analysis unit.
1. Method of the Research
To strengthen the research questions and significant of the research, the
method that is used in this research is qualitative method. According to Bogdan &
Taylor in Moleong (2004:3) qualitative methodologies refer to research procedures
which produce descriptive data: people’s own written or spoken words and
observable behavior. This method describes and analyzes feminist ideas in film
“Mona Lisa Smile”.
2. Data Analysis
In this research, the data that is collected qualitatively analyzed. In this
analysis, the writer explains the data in this film by analyzing the main character in
Mona Lisa Smile film by using Feminist theory.
3. Research Instrument
The instrument that is used in this research is the writer herself. The writer
tries to get qualitative data about what intimidations experienced by the main
characters related to women role in Mona Lisa Smile film and how the main character
shows feminist ideas in her fighting against the intimidations she experienced in
Mona Lisa Smile film by watching the film, understanding the story, collecting the
7
data and classifying the main character in Mona Lisa Smile film itself. Furthermore,
the writer relates the existing text with the feminist theory.
4. Analysis Unit
Analysis unit that is used in this research is Mona Lisa Smile film. Mona Lisa
Smile is a 2003 American film that was produced by Revolution Studios and
Columbia Pictures, directed by Mike Newell, written by Lawrence Konner and Mark
Rosenthal.
5. Place and Time
This research is executed on the ninth semester of 2008 - 2009 academic years
at English Letters Department of State Islamic University of Syarif Hidayatullah
Jakarta
CHAPTER II
THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
A. Feminism
Feminism is the belief in the right of women to have political, social, and
economic equality with men. The word feminism originated from the French word
feminisme in the nineteenth century, either as a medical term to describe the
feminization of male body, or to describe women with masculine traits5. It is a
discourse that involves various movements, theories, and philosophies which are
concerned with the issue of gender difference, advocate equality for women, and
campaign for women's rights and interests. When it was used in the United States in
the early part of the twentieth century it was only used to refer to one group of
women: ‘namely that group which asserted the uniqueness of women, the mystical
experience of motherhood and women’s special purity’ (Jaggar 1983: 5). It soon
became understood to denote a political stance of someone committed to changing
the social position of women. Since then the term has taken on the sense of one who
believes that women are subjugated because of their sex and that women deserve at
least formal equality in the eyes of the law.
5
Jane Pilcher and Imelda Imelda, Fifty Key Concepts in Gender Studies.(Trown Br Idge,
Wiltshire: The Cromwell Press Ltd,. 2004),
8
9
Feminism concerns themselves with women’s inferior position in society and
with discrimination encountered by women because of their sex6. Furthermore, one
could argue that all feminists call for changes in the social, economic, political or
cultural order, to reduce and eventually overcome this discrimination against women.
And these lead women to a feminist movement.
According to Soenarjati Djajanegara the aim of feminist movement is “(…)
meningkatkan kedudukan dan derajat perempuan agar sama atau sejajar dengan
kedudukan serta derajat laki-laki.” Thus it is clear that the feminism’s aim is to have
equal right and position between women and men. The main objective of feminism is
to encourage the idea that women and men are totally different in biology but have
the same position and rights.7
In the early nineteenth century, feminist movement demanded in the law,
economic and social field. They considered the political right was not needed. In
economic, feminist demanded property right. Before marriage, the property belonged
to their father and their husband. After the women get married, it automatically
becomes the property of their husbands. Furthermore, almost working fields were
limited of women. In social life, demand was to get the same opportunity in education
as men.8 In the past men wanted the women to be good housewife who manage
household and family. As a result they could only spend their lives in domestic.
6
Jane Freedman, Concept in The Social Sciences Feminism .(Buckingham: Open University
Press, 2001), p. 1
7
Soenarjati Djajanegara, Kritik Sastra feminis, (Jakarta: Gramedia Pustaka Utama. 2003), p.4
8
Ibid, h p.6
10
The feminist movement of the nineteenth century had several different
streams of thought within it. Olive Banks (1981), writing of the British and American
scene, separated three groups; the evangelical, the Enlightenment and the
communitarian socialist traditions9. Each grouping had its roots in the late eighteenth
century. The evangelical feminists drew their inspiration from their religious beliefs
(Quakers, Unitarians, and other non-conformists) and were focused on the social
issues of the day. Their feminism was closely related to campaigns to abolish slavery,
introduce temperance, and attack prostitution, pornography and immorality. The
second group of feminism identified by Banks (1981) drew inspiration from the
Enlightenment which swept intellectual circles Europe in the late eighteenth century.
John Stuart and Mary Wollstonecraft were the central figures in this tradition. They
emphasized the importance of rational thought, evidence, and the theoretical ideas of
the rights, autonomy and individualism. The communitarian socialist tradition grew
out of the French Saint-Simonian movement, and then added Marxist ideas in the
later part of the century. Among those who were inspired by socialism are those
Banks calls Utopians, who anted communal living, free love and pooled childrearing.
In addition, according to Concept in the social sciences feminism by Jane
freedman there are basic version of this categorization would divide feminisms and
feminists into three loose groups: liberal feminists, Marxist or socialist feminism, and
9
Amanda Coffey and Sara Delamont, Feminism and the Classroom Teacher; Research, Praxis
and Pedagogy,
11
radical feminism. Liberal feminism (equal opportunities), draws on the diversity of
liberal thought dominant in Western society since the Enlightenment, and affirms that
women’s subordinate social position can be addressed by existing political processes
under democracy. For liberals the key battle is access to education; following Mary
Wollstonecraft, it is argued that if men and women are educated equally, then it
follows that they will get equal access to society. In addition, liberal feminists would
be more likely to accept in limited terms that women and men might well be suited to
the separate spheres of home and workplace and simply lobby for greater recognition
of housework and caring (the wages for housework debate in the 1970s emerged
largely from this position).
Socialist or Marxist feminism (for Further discussion of the differences and
similarities, see Whelehan 1995) links changes in women’s social conditions with the
overthrow of industrial capitalism and changing relations of the worker to the means
of production. For them, revolution is the only answer, although as time has gone on
socialist feminists have become more cynical about the prospect of a socialist
revolution effecting a change in the lives of women, given the tenacious ideological
grip of the current meanings of gender differences. Nonetheless, socialist/Marxist
feminists are always mindful of the way society is riven by class and race distinctions
as well as those of gender and that it is more useful to consider oppression as multipronged and inter related rather than arguing that one form is more destructive than
others.
12
This assumption that men as part of the problem should be part of the solution
was a theme in early radical feminism, even though radical feminism is usually
associated in the popular consciousness with separatism and man-hating. Radical
feminists see men’s domination of women, as the result of the system of patriarchy,
which is independent of all other social structures-that is, is it not a product of
capitalism. Radical feminists, particularly in the USA, emerged largely from new left
and civil rights political groupings. Their politics was broadly radical left, but they
become hugely disenchanted with the male-dominated power play witnessed in leftwing radical groupings and formed the Women’s Liberation Movement in order to
allow a space for the consideration of women’s oppression outside of the confines of
male-oriented knowledge and politics. Their conviction that women-centered politics
could only be devised in a women-only space led to a policy of separatism, at least at
the level of policy –making and meetings. This politics of radicalism, while drawing
political lessons from the new left and civil right movements, wanted a political
formation freed from the taint of maleness and therefore espoused leaderless
groupings, job-sharing and structurelesness- well beyond the parameters of
contemporary democracy. Many of their aspirations have been ridiculed or
misunderstood by others and radical feminists are all too often sent up as dungarees,
man-hating lesbians, totally obsessed with the politically correct, partly because of
the way in which they wanted to shape their own movement was intended to reflect
their rejection of anything that smacked of the male political imperative.
13
Feminist groupings have always contained representations from women of
color, working class women and lesbians/bisexual women; yet many became
increasingly disenchanted by the ways in which their involvement in the movement
rendered their own identities and concerns invisible, despite the rhetoric of reflecting
the peeds of all women.
The historical development of feminist (especially in Britain and the USA) is
commonly divided into several key periods, some characterized by a relative absence
of feminist thought and mobilization, and others by the sustained growth both of
feminist criticism and of activism with a high public profile. 10 The earlier period
(dating from at least the mid to late nineteenth century up until about the 1920s),
became “first wave” feminism. In turn, the resurgent feminist analyses and activism
dating from the 1960s became ‘second wave’ feminism.
The different feminist positions that have been articulated since the 1970s
have generated different research agendas for education (Weiner 1994). However,
both first-wave and second-wave feminism have been concerned with the education
and intellectual development and opportunities for women, along with tackling
violence against women and children raising the status of women’s and children’s
health, and ensuring that female voices and experiences are treated seriously.
10
Jane Pilcher and Imelda Imelda (2004), op. cit.
14
B. Feminist Theory
Feminist theory is the extension of feminism into theoretical, or philosophical
ground.11 Feminist theory aims to understand the nature of inequality and focuses on
gender politics, power relations and sexuality. While generally providing a critique of
social relations, much of feminist theory also focuses on analyzing gender inequality
and the promotion of women's rights, interests, and issues. Themes explored in
feminism include discrimination, stereotyping, objectification (especially sexual
objectification), oppression, and patriarchy.
Feminist theory emerged from these feminist movements. Feminist theory is
based on a series of assumptions. First, it assumes that men and women have different
experiences; that the world is not the same for men and women. Some women think
the experiences of women should be identical to the experiences of men. Secondly,
feminist theory assumes that women’s oppression is not a subset of some other social
relationship.12
Feminist theory assumes that women’s oppression is a unique constellation of
social problems and has to be understood in itself, and not as a subset of class or any
other structure. So feminist theory assumes that the oppression of women is part of
the way the structure of the world is organized, and that one task of feminist theory is
to explain about how and why this structure evolved.
11
http://www.istheory.yorku.ca/Feminism.htm, accessed on January 2, 2009.
Alison M. Jaggar and Paula S. Rothenberg, Feminist Frameworks Alternative Theoretical
Accounts of the Relations between Women and Men Third Edition, (New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc,
1995), p. 81
12
15
Feminist theory names this structure “patriarchy,” and assumes that a
historical force that has a material and psychological base. Patriarchy is the system in
which men have more power than women have, and have more access to whatever
society esteems. What society esteems obviously various from culture to culture; but
if you look at the spheres of power, you will find that all who have it are male.13 This
is a long-term historical fact rooted in real things. It is not question of bad attitudes; it
is not a historical accident - there are real advantages to men in retaining control over
women.
Feminist theory has several purposes. The first is to understand the power
differential between men and women. Secondly, the purpose is to understand
women’s oppression-how it evolved, how it changes over times, how it is related to
other forms of oppression, and finally, how to change our oppression. A third purpose
of feminist theory is to overcome oppression. Feminist theory is the foundation of
action and there is no pretense that theory can be neutral.
Within feminist theory is a commitment to charge oppressive structures and to
connect abstract ideas with concrete problems for political action. It is senseless to
study the situation of women without a concomitant commitment to do something
about it. The theorist has to draw out the consequence of the theory and use life
experience as a part of her basis for understanding, for feeding into the development
of theory.
13
Ibid. h. 82
16
C. History of Feminism
1. First Wave Feminism
First-wave feminism refers to a period of feminist activity during the
nineteenth century and early twentieth century in the United Kingdom and the United
States14. First wave feminism movements that were concerned (although not
exclusively) with gaining equal rights for women, particularly the right of suffrage.
In particular, the French Revolution of 1798 is often identified as the arena in
which the first concerted demands for women’s right were made. Moreover, it was an
important influence on Mary Wollstonecraft, whose Vindication of the rights of
Women, published in Britain in 1792, is widely recognized as the first substantial and
systematic feminist treatise15. Certainly, A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792)
presents many of the questions that have concerned later feminist cultural theorists:
question about women’s relation to (the dominant) culture, to power, to discourse, to
identity, to lived experience, to cultural production and to representation.16
According to Wollstonecraft in the book Feminist Thought by Rosemary
Putnam Tong, she said that until century ago, women still lived in the darkness, they
are helpless because they are still under controlled by men. Nowadays women have
the right to work and build their own career. It shows that women have the right to
14
First wave feminism. accessed on October 16, 2008. wikipedia the free encyclopedia,
http://en. wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_feminism
15
Jane Pilcher and Imelda Whelehan (2004), op. cit.
16
Sue Thornham, Cultural studies in practice: Theory feminist and Cultural Studies Stories
Unsettled Relations, (New York: Oxford University Press Inc, 2000), p.?
17
get a higher education and to live in their own or being independent person. So in
first wave feminism focused upon absolute rights such as suffrage.
2. Second Wave Feminism
Second wave feminism is a term used to describe a new period of feminist
collective political activism and militancy, which emerged in the late 1960s. The
concept of “wave” of feminism was itself only applied in the late 1960s and early
1970s and therefore its application to a previous era of female activism tells us a great
deal about the dawning second wave.
Whereas the first wave lobbied for women’s enfranchisement via the vote and
access to the professions as well as the right to own property, the second wave
feminist talked in terms of ‘liberation’ from the oppressiveness of a patriarchally
defined society. Equality had not been achieved by enfranchisement and so it was
time to reflect on life beyond the public sphere17. So second-wave feminism refers to
the resurgence of feminism activity in the late 1960s and 1970s, when protest again
centered around women’s inequality, although this time not only in terms of women’s
lack of equal political rights but in the areas of family, sexuality and work.
The movement encouraged women to understand aspects of their own
personal lives as deeply politicized, and reflective of a sexist structure of power.
Liberal feminism’s second stage, we saw, seek equality of opportunity; though in
17
Jane Pilcher and Imelda Whelehan (2004), op. cit.
18
practice that can mean parity, at various levels, with men18. So Second-wave
feminism was largely concerned with other issues of equality, such as the end to
discrimination.
In the book of American History it is told that during the 1950s and 1960s
increasing numbers of married women entered the labor force, but in 1963, the
average working women earned only 63 percent of what a man made. In that year, a
women author, Betty Friedan, published The Feminine Mystique, an explosive
critique of middle-class patterns that helped millions of women articulate a pervasive
sense of discontent. Arguing that women often had no outlets for expression other
than “finding a husband and bearing children,” Friedan encouraged readers to seek
new roles and responsibilities, to seek their own personal and professional identities
rather than have them defined by the outside, male-dominated society.
Such a system causes women to completely lose their identity in that of their
family. Friedan specifically locates this system among post-World War II middleclass suburban communities. At the same time, America's post-war economic boom
had led to the development of new technologies that were supposed to make
household work less difficult, but that often had the result of making women's work
less meaningful and valuable.
18
Judith Evans, Feminist Theory Today: An Introduction to Second Wave Feminism, (London:
Sage Publication, 1995), p. 47
19
Women themselves took measure to improve their lot. In 1966, 28
professional women, including Betty Friedan, established the National Organization
for Women (NOW) to take action brings American women into full participation in
the mainstream of American society now. NOW and similar organizations helped
make women increasingly aware of their limited opportunities and strengthened their
resolve to increase them. 19
3. Third Wave Feminism
The Third-wave of feminism began in the early 1990s. The movement arose
as responses to perceived failures of the second-wave. It was also a response to the
backlash against initiatives and movements created by the second-wave. Third-wave
feminism seeks to challenge or avoid what it deems the second wave's "essentialist"
definitions of femininity, which (according to them) over-emphasized the experiences
of upper middle class white women. A post-structuralist interpretation of gender and
sexuality is central too much of the third wave's ideology. Third wave feminists often
focus on "micropolitics," and challenged the second wave's paradigm as to what is, or
is not, good for females.
The history of Third Wave feminism predates this and begins in the mid
1980s. This focus on the intersection between race and gender remained prominent
through the Hill-Thomas hearings, but began to shift with the Freedom Ride 1992.
This drive to register voters in poor minority communities was surrounded with
19
p.225
An Outline of American History. United States: United states Department of State, 1994.
20
rhetoric that focused on rallying young feminists. For many, the rallying of the young
is the emphasis that has stuck within third wave feminism.
From all concept of feminist ideas, the writer uses feminist theory developed
by Betty Friedan in second wave feminism in analyzing Mona Lisa smile film. The
reason why the writer uses this theory is because it talks about the liberal feminism
that seeks the right equality in social life, though in practice that can mean parity, at
various levels, with men. Beside that, the condition in that film also appropriate with
the condition of American women in 1953 who seek rights in education, career and a
family.
CHAPTER III
RESEARCH FINDINGS
A. The intimidations experienced by Katherine Watson related to women role
in film Mona Lisa Smile
Mona Lisa smile tells about a woman lecturer at Wellesley College, a
University that prepares women to manage household and teaches how to become
good housewives to their husband. The title of Mona Lisa smile in this film suggests
similar situation of the main character in Mona Lisa Smile film that always smiles,
although in fact a pile of dilemma destroy her. This condition has a similarity with the
famous painting of Leonardo Da Vinci titled Mona Lisa smile. Even though Mona
Lisa’s lip is adorned with smile but there is a deep sadness implied in her eyes20.
In this chapter, the writer discusses Katherine Watson as a main character in
Mona Lisa Smile film. As a main character, Katherine Watson is described as a
beautiful woman (see the picture 1 and 2). Although her costume and make up is not
really conspicuous among women at Wellesley College but her beauty is admitted by
Giselle Levy, one of her students in Wellesley. This is showed in Giselle’s attempt to
show Katherine’s appearance. See the quotation below.
20
Santi, Jika Anda mengira bahwa film ini akan berkisah tentang karya pelukis ternama
Leonardo Da Vinci, maka Anda salah. Accessed on November 16, 2008 http://majalahopini.
wordpress.com/2008/10/20/resensi-film-monalisa-smile/.. 20.34 pm
21
22
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
:
:
:
:
:
Do I look a little bit like her?
Like who?
Katherine Watson.
You mean, "crap is art"?
I think she's fabulous.
In the dialogue above, Giselle praise Katherine’s appearance. She even tries to
look like her although her friends do not agree with her and insult Katherine.
However she keeps defending her opinion by imitating Katherine’s appearance in
front of mirror (See picture 3). It shows that Katherine is a beautiful woman and it
admitted by one of her students, Giselle.
In this film Katherine Watson is also described as an educated woman. It is
shown when she studies at UCLA graduate school.
Katherine
Connie
: And I got to go to graduate school.
: UCLA, right?
Katherine is not only an educated woman but she is also a woman who is
aware about education especially for women. That is why she becomes teacher in
Oakland State senior high school. Her awareness about education is also shown when
she wants to teach at Wellesley College.
In the opening of this film, Katherine is also depicted as a persistent woman.
It is narrated that Katherine has wanted to teach at Wellesley College all her life. She
pursues it until she gets it. Here is the quotation narrated by her student, Betty:
All her life she had wanted to teach at Wellesley College. So when a position
opened in the Art History department. She pursued it single-mindedly until
she was hire, It was whispered that Katherine Watson a first-year teacher
from Oakland State. Made up in brain what she lacked in pedigree. Which
was why this bohemian from California. Was on her way to the most
conservative college in the nation.
23
From the narration above, we can see that it is very difficult to get a position
at Wellesley College but Katherine tries so hard to get that position. She pursues it
until she is hired. And her effort is not useless. She gets the position as an Art History
teacher.
In this film Katherine’s appearance is narrated and visualized as a perfect
woman. However that condition does not avoid Katherine from accepting
intimidations from people around her in Wellesley. The first disrespectful treatment
she experienced is when she teaches her class. Initially her students try to outsmart
her. All of her students have already mastered all the material in syllabus that she will
teach. Her face is very pale at that time (see the picture no 4). And then her students
disregard her by leaving the class although the class is not finished yet (see the
picture 5). This situation makes Katherine fells insecure.
Katherine
Susan
Giselle
Katherine
Betty
: Could someone please get...? Thank you.
By a show of hands only how many of you have read the
entire text?
: And the suggested supplements.
: Long way from Oakland State?
: Well, you girls do prepare.
: If you've nothing else for us, we could go to independent
study.
Katherine also gets disrespectful treatment from one of her student, Betty
when she warns Betty’s attendance in her class. She wants her students discipline in
her class. Katherine does not give looseness attendance to her students that get
married.
24
Betty
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
: Well, thank God I didn't miss the paint-by-numbers lecture. I
was on my honeymoon and then I had to set up house. What
does she expect?
: Attendance.
: Most of the faculty turns their heads when the married
students miss a class or two.
: Then why not get married as freshmen? That way you could
graduate without actually ever stepping foot on campus.
: Don't disregard our traditions just because you're subversive.
: Don't disrespect this class just because you're married.
: Don't disrespect me just because you're not.
: Come to class, do the works or I'll fail you.
: If you fail me, there will be consequences
From dialogue above, Katherine wants her students discipline in her class. But
Betty uses the college’s policy to refuse Katherine’s rules in her class. Katherine is
very angry and she tries to ridicule the students. But Katherine’s opinion about the
college’s policy for married students gets disrespectful treatment by Betty. Katherine
gets the hard protest by Betty. She assumes Katherine disregard the rules that
established by the college that give looseness attendance to their student have get
married. She also assumes that she disregard the college’s policy because she is not
married. She also thinks that Katherine is subversive that wants to change the
tradition that they hold in Wellesley College.
Katherine’s opinion about a marriage is what offends some of her students
and this makes her look like an unorthodox, subversive, and a liberal woman
according to the standards of that time. Betty thinks that Katherine brings a negative
inspiration for the Wellesley girls because she applies a modern way of teaching and
suggests a new idealism about how to be a woman; therefore she tries to find a way to
get rid of her.
25
Married Wellesley girls have become quite adept at balancing obligations.
One hears such comments as: "I baste the chicken with one hand and outline
the paper with the other.” While our mothers were called to work for Lady
Liberty. It is our duty, nay, obligation to reclaim our place in the home
bearing the children that will carry our traditions into the future. One must
pause to consider why Miss Katherine Watson instructor in the Art History
department has decided to declare war on the holy sacrament of marriage.
Her subversive and political teachings encourage our Wellesley girls to reject
the roles they were born to fill.
Seeing from the quotation above, Betty assumes that Katherine is one of
woman that confronts a marriage. It makes Katherine feels angry. She feels that it is a
slander because she never encourages her students to reject the roles that they believe,
although she is not marriage. She just assumes that every relationship is not always to
be ended with marriage. Because she thinks marriage is not the one purpose of her
life. There are many options beside marriage and caring family such as having higher
education and career.
Giselle
The students
Giselle
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
She got engaged over Christmas!
Congratulations!
I'm sorry to blab.
It's just so romantic. How fantastic!
We split up.
What?
We split up. Well, that was fast. Well, not every
relationship is meant for marriage.
In her professional life at Wellesley, Katherine gets intimidation from
President Carr, the head Master of Wellesley College. Katherine is warned that her
contract in college will be finished if she continues to interact with the students
outside the subject as she has been doing for all this time.
26
President Carr : I have been getting some calls about your teaching
methods, Katherine. They are a little unorthodox for
Wellesley. We are traditionalists, Katherine.
Katherine
: Yes, I noticed.
President Carr : So if you would like to stay here.
Katherine
: Is that a question?
President Carr : More a discussion.
Katherine
: About my staying here?
President Carr : You'll have your formal review in May. Until then a little
less modern art.
President Carr : Happy holidays.
Katherine
: And to you
From the dialog above we can assume that the faculty cannot accept
Katherine’s modern methods of teaching in her class at Wellesley because they are
still traditional. And they think Katherine’s way of teaching is unorthodox for
Wellesley. She must stop the way of her teaching such as give a new material beyond
the lecturer and give her lesson out of class. She must follow the rules established.
So, they warn Katherine that she could be if she still continues to teach the student
with her own way, she will be fired. Although she gets complaint from boards of
Wellesley about her ways in teach and she will be fired if she does not follow the
rules established. But she defends her idealism to teaching the students with her own
way.
However, Katherine takes all the intimidations as a motivation to make
positive changes at Wellesley College. She wants to change the mindset of her
students that still hold the tradition established by the college. Katherine sees
teaching art history as an opportunity to open the girls’ minds, enabling them to see
all the possibilities that life has to offer beside marriage and family. Her efforts to
27
open the young women’s minds at Wellesley College represent feminist ideas. Those
will be discussed in the next discussion.
B. Katherine and Feminist Ideas
One of the aims of Feminist Criticism is to expose patriarchal premises and
resulting prejudices. It also aims to identify and oppose the various ways women are
excluded, suppressed and exploited.21 In other words, women should not have
opportunities in all sectors for example in politics, economy, education and social
life. The stereotype of women that "a woman's place is in the home" has largely
determined the ways in which women have expressed themselves.
The movement of feminism focuses on removing the self-awareness of
women about their under developed position in society. It is important because most
women, who live in a patriarchal society, do not aware that they are opposed by
patriarchy. In addition, women have been stereotyped too many times, and the film
Mona Lisa Smile is a good example in recognizing those stereotypes.
Mona Lisa Smile sets at Wellesley College in the early 1950s (see the picture
no 6 and 7). The purpose of the film is to construct the viewer’s perspective and to
transform the world in which Katherine lives. This film shows how women are
labeled to certain stereotype and are not suggest doing two things at the same times,
such as having career and family.
21
Using feminist criticism on the movie Mona Lisa Smile. http://pant0mime.wordpress.com/
2007/03/18/using-feminist-criticism-on-the-movie-mona-lisa-smile/. Accessed on November 12, 2008.
28
The main character in this film is Katherine Watson. She has landed her
dream job at Wellesley Girls College and her chance to influence the best female
minds in the USA. She is very surprised when she knows the knowledge that most of
her students at Wellesley aspire for is a wonderful husband and they do not care of
pursuing any kind of professions. Because of that she wants to change the mindset the
girls that have established by College. It is shown in the beginning of the film when
she comes for the first time to Wellesley. Katherine wants to teach at Wellesley
College, a conservative woman’s private liberal art college in Massachusetts, United
States. She becomes an Art History teacher at Wellesley College. She comes to the
Wellesley College to make a different, as narrated by Betty.
Katherine Watson didn't come to Wellesley to fit in. She came to Wellesley
because she wanted to make a difference.
From the explanation above, Katherine wants to make change the point of
view of Wellesley Board of school and the students about women rules to conform to
stereotype of women to become housewives and mother. Because she thinks that
women have the same right and position in society. They have right to pursuing their
goal beside marriage.
Moreover, Katherine’s desire to make a change at Wellesley can also be seen
when she meets Professor Will. When Katherine goes to a bar to get some drinks, she
meets with Professor Will there. He says that Katherine is a progressive woman who
has forwards thinking. Beside that, he also says that Katherine comes to Wellesley to
set the young women free from the old tradition.
29
Will
Katherine
Will
Katherine
Will
Katherine
: Yeah, they say you're progressive, a forward thinker. Are you?
: There are a lot of labels here. I have noticed. Right family,
right school, right art, right way of thinking.
: Well, saves the effort on thinking for yourself.
: How do you expect to ever make a difference if everything is a
joke?
: Oh, Katherine Watson comes to Wellesley to set us all free?
Come on.
: Thank you for the drink.
From that dialogue, we can see that the college has the standard mindset about
right family, right school, and right art at the time. That is why she want to change the
girls mindset about new perspectives in life beside the standard mindset that
established by the college. She shows it clearly in every chance that she has from the
ways she teaches her students and her thought. That is why almost everyone in
Wellesley knows about her personality that is progressive and her mission to make a
change. On the other hand, her seriousness about what she believes is offended by
will’s statement that assumes that thing just as a joke.
Like it has been discussed before, Katherine Watson has gotten some
intimidation from people around her such as her students, board of Wellesley
College, etc. However, she is successful in using those intimidations to motivate her
to think positively.
When Katherine gets disrespectful treatments at the first time she teaches her
class, she tries to survive at Wellesley College by her idealism. She never gives up on
that condition. In every occasion in her class she tries to encourage her students to
30
think forward and progressive in their life. She thinks that they have an opportunity to
do whatever they want in their life.
Depart from intimidation that Katherine accepts, it becomes a motivation for
her to make a difference at Wellesley College. She finds a way to solve her problem
by herself. She does not look for any helps or reference from anyone. So, on her
second day in class she makes a change. She makes a new material syllabus beyond
the lecture. One of the realizations of that attempt is to change the point of view of
her students at Wellesley College. It can be assumed from the quotation below:
Betty
Katherine
Susan
Katherine
The girls
Katherine
:
:
:
:
What is that?
You tell me. Carcass by Soutine. .
It's not on the syllabus.
No, it's not. Is it any good? Come on, ladies. There's no wrong
answer.
: There's also no textbook……………..
: Telling you what to think. It's not that easy, is it?
From the explanation above, we can see that Katherine uses the new material
to teach her students. She is well prepared to teach art which material is not in the
textbook, such as Chaim Soutine's Carcass of Beef. She wants to introduce to the girls
at Wellesley about new art beyond the lecturer. Beside that she encourages the girls to
tell what they think about the art and create new perspective.
Katherine
: Could you go back to the Soutine, please Just look at it again.
Look beyond the paint. Let us try to open our minds to a new
idea.
31
From the quotation above, Katherine tries to give some new painting in her
syllabus. The purpose is to ask the girls to think in a new perspective. She wants her
students to give opinion and create new ideas.
Her persistent to make her students to think in a new perspective it shown
when she encourages her students to study in the different place expect the class (see
the picture no 8).
The student
Katherine
The student
Katherine
:
:
:
:
Which way?
Let me just see here. I'm not sure.
Where are we supposed to go?
I think it's here. Come this way. We're almost there. Joe.
Hello.
We can see from the dialogue, she is also innovative in her teaching. She
gives her lesson out of class that is never been done by any teachers in Wellesley
before. It proves that learning process is not limited by place or time. She wants to
give a new atmosphere to her student because she thinks they should not study at the
same place such as class. She also encourages her students to see a new painting by
Jackson Pollack (see the picture no 9 and 10).
Giselle Levy
Joan
Connie
The student
Katherine
: That's Jackson Pollock.
: In a word.
: I was getting used to the idea of dead, maggoty meat being
art, now this.
: Please don't tell me we have to write a paper about it.
: Do me a favor. Do yourselves a favor. Stop talking and look.
You're not required to write a paper. You're not even
required to like it. You are required to consider it. That's
your only assignment today. When you're done, you may
leave.
32
From the dialogue above, Katherine teaches a modern art, she uses painting of
Jackson Pollack which material is not on their syllabus. She tries to ask the students
to create new idea from the painting of Jackson Pollack. Katherine also gives her
students freedom to say what they think in her subject.
In traditional society, women do not have opportunity to get higher education,
or to have a certain job. Even though women have education, usually it is only just
for supporting her part as a wife and a mother.22
According to Rosemary Putnam Thong, society must give an education to all
women, just like men, because all human being have an equal right to get an
opportunity to expand the capacity of their intellectual activity and morality, so they
can become a personhood. The feminist uses education to free themselves as people
who are able to achieve the happiness and pleasure fulfillment. With education,
women can get a job that she really likes and can show herself, her ability and her
capacity.23
Katherine wants to liberate her students from a very conservative tradition.
One of the realizations of her effort to change the mindset her students is shown when
Katherine calls Joan to her office out of Wellesley College. She calls Joan because
Joan gets C in the task that is given by her. She wants to give a chance to Joan to
revise her paper.
22
Soenarjati Djajanegara, Kritik Sastra feminis, (Jakarta: Gramedia Pustaka Utama. 2003)
Rosemary Putnam Tong, Feminist thought: Pengantar paling komprehensif kepada aliran
utama pemikiran feminist, (Jogyakarta: Jalasutra., 1998)
23
33
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Watson
Joan
Katherine
: Yes, you do, but a very busy one.
: And it says here that you're pre-law. What law school are you
gonna go to?
: I hadn't thought about that. After I graduate, I'm getting
married.
: And then?
: And then I'll be married.
: You can do both. Just for fun, if you could go to any law
school, which would it be?
: Yale.
: Yale.
: They keep five slots open for women, one unofficially for a
Wellesley girl.
: But you haven't really thought about it.
As we see from the quotation above, Katherine uses that occasion to
encourage Joan to apply for a law school, something that Joan did not even consider.
However Joan does not take the opportunity to apply the law school because after her
finishing from Wellesley she chooses to get married. But Katherine tries to suggest
Joan to take the opportunity because she assumes that women can also do two things
at the same time, like having higher education and a family.
Katherine tries to register Joan in the Yale school. Tommy Joan’s boyfriend
appreciates to Katherine about what she does to Joan but him objectionable about
that. He thinks if they got married it is difficult to ask Joan to get dinner at five
o’clock if she school in Yale.
Tommy
Katherine
Tommy
Katherine
Tommy
: No, nothing official Yet. I meant, I got into Penn. Grad school.
: Congratulations. What about Yale?
: Yale? Oh, you mean Joanie. Yeah. How about that, huh? She is
some girl.
: She's terrific.
: Yeah. Just the fact that she got in. I mean, she will always have
that.
34
Katherine
Tommy
Thanks to you. Miss Watson, you've been real swell to her. We
both appreciate it.
: I'm sorry. "The fact that she got in," what does that mean?
: Well, she'll be in Philadelphia with me. Well, that's an awful
long commute to get dinner on the table by five o’clock.
Although Tommy does not agree about what she does with Joan, her
persistent to encourage Joan accepts in Yale University it is not stoppable. It is shown
when Joan was accepted in Yale University. Katherine comes to Joan’s house to tell
her about the law school that Katherine offers to Joan although Joan refuses. As the
quotation below:
Katherine : Seven law schools within minutes of Philadelphia.
You can study and get dinner on the table by five o’clock. .
Joan
: It's too late.
Katherine : No. Some accept late admissions. I was upset at first. Joan, the
guests. When Tommy told me that he got accepted to Penn, I
thought "Her fate is sealed. How can she throw it all away?" I
realized you won't have to. You could bake your cake and eat it
too. It’s wonderful
From the explanation above, Katherine tries to motivate Joan to accept the law
school in Yale. And Katherine also tries to convince her that she actually can do both
having education and get dinner at five o’clock with Tommy. But Joan decided not to
go to Yale University because she chooses to get married and become a housewife.
Joan
: We're married. We eloped over the weekend. Turned out he was
petrified of a big ceremony so we did a sort of spur-of-themoment thing very romantic. Look.
Katherine : It's beautiful.
Joan
: It was my choice not to go. He would have supported it.
Katherine : But you do not have to choose.
Joan
: No, I have to. I want a home, a family. It is not something I'll
sacrifice.
Katherine : No one is asking you to sacrifice that, Joan. I just want you to
understand that you can do both.
35
Joan
: Think I'll wake up one day and regret not being a lawyer? Yes,
I'm afraid that you will. Not as much as I'd regret not having a
family. Not being there to raise them. I know exactly what I'm
doing, and it doesn't make me any less smart. This must seem
terrible to you.
Katherine : I didn't say that.
From the explanation above, we can say that Katherine always suggests
women to develop themselves before and after marriage. She thinks that Joan has the
right to get knowledge as high as possible. And she wants to open Joan’s mind that
women do not have to choose between school and marriage. For her marriage is not
prevention to someone to pursue their goal. Although Joan decides to choose
marriage compared with continuing her study, she keeps trying to convince Joan to
get both education and family.
According to Betty Friedan who published The Feminine Mystique, an
explosive critique of middle-class patterns that helped millions of women articulates a
pervasive sense of discontent, women often had no outlets for expression other than
“finding a husband and bearing children.” Friedan encouraged readers to seek new
roles and responsibilities, to seek their own personal and professional identities rather
than have them defined by the outside, male-dominated society.
It is also what Katherine does to her students. She wants to encourage the
students to seek their own personal and show their capability in society although she
gets disrespectful treatments from an article written by her student, Betty. She never
encourages her students to reject the roles that they believe. She only wants to the
girls there is another option beside marriage.
36
In one occasion, Katherine shows her students the portrait of women at that
time. In the class, she shows some slides of article in newspaper (see the picture no
11). That article shows women who become wives after graduating from senior high
school. She uses that article as a satire for her students. She wants to open her
students’ eyes that they have the same right with men. As quote below:
Katherine : What will the future scholars see when they study us?
A portrait of women today? There you are, ladies.
The perfect likeness of a Wellesley graduate.
Magna cum laude, doing exactly what she was trained to do.
Slide. A Rhodes scholar.
I wonder if she recites Chaucer while she presses her
husband's shirts.
Slide. Now, you physics majors can calculate the mass and
volume of every meat loaf you make.
Slide. A girdle to set you free.
What does that mean? I give up. You win.
The smartest women in the country. I didn't realize that
by demanding excellence. I would be challenging.
From the quotation, we can see that Katherine is sarcastic with the
graduated students of Wellesley. She regrets that the best graduates from Wellesley
only become good wives. She tries to encourage the students to open their minds that
women actually have same abilities as men have. However, for all this time it is not
explored and being underestimated by men. In addition, Katherine thinks that they do
not value it either. Besides that, she is also disappointed with the young women at
Wellesley College that only think about how to become a good wife. They are not
willing to continue their study and pursuing their goal.
37
Katherine hopes that women at Wellesley College can become a leader or
become successful women not only good wives for men. But, she cannot find one
woman who did as she wished for. She is also disappointed with the school, which
only educates the students to become good wives.
Katherine : To hell with Wellesley. I'm done. Goddamn it! It's brilliant,
really a perfect ruse. A finishing school disguised as a college.
They got me.
Wills
: What do you expect?
Katherine : More More. I thought it was a place for tomorrow's leaders, not
their wives.
From the quotation above, she is very angry with Wellesley. She feels cheated
with that college, they disguised as a college to prepare her students to become good
wife to their husband. We can learn that Katherine is hoping more from the girls at
Wellesley College. She encourages her students to actualize themselves in public. She
thinks that women do not always have to become the stereotyped women whose place
is at home, but they can be a next leader if they want. Because she believes that
Wellesley College has the best and brightest female students who have the capability
of becoming next generation's leaders.
Katherine’s effort to stimulate her students’ mind about their true identity is
shown when she talks with her students out of class. She shows a Van Gough’s
painting to them (see the picture no 14).
Joan
Katherine
: Sunflowers. Vincent van Gogh 1888.
: He painted what he felt, not what he saw. People didn't
understand. To them, it seemed childlike and crude. It took
years for him to recognize his actual technique to see the way
his brush strokes seemed to make the night sky move. Yet, he
38
Giselle
Katherine
:
:
Susan
Katherine
:
:
Connie
:
Giselle
Katherine
:
:
Betty
:
never sold a painting in his lifetime. This is his self-portrait.
There's no camouflage, no romance, Honesty. Now, years
later, where is he?
Famous?
So famous, in fact, that everybody has a reproduction. There
are post cards. We have the calendar. With the ability to
reproduce art, it is available to the masses. No one needs to
own a van Gogh original.
We do in the Newport house but it's small, tiny
They can paint their own. Van Gogh in a box ladies. The
newest form of mass-distributed art: Paint by numbers.
"Now everyone can be van Gogh. It's so easy. Just follow the
simple instructions...and in minutes, you're on your way to
being an artist.
"Van Gogh by numbers?
Ironic, isn't it? Look at what we have done to the man who
refused to conform his ideals to popular taste. Who refused to
compromise his integrity. We have put him in a tiny box and
asked you to copy him. So the choice is yours, ladies. You can
conform to what other people expect or you can...
I know be ourselves.
From the dialogue, we can see that Katherine wants to persuade her student to
change their perception. He gives an example of Van Gough’s painting. She explains
to them that Van Gough actually a truly genius painter but no one honors him or his
painting just because he uses his original idea in painting that is not same with most
of others painters. And he refuses to change it. He still persists to keep his own idea.
Finally years later, people realize his genius and honor him. This is what Katherine
wants her students to do. She does not want them to become like what people want
them to be like, a stereotype of ideal wives. They deserve to be what they want to be
and be themselves, not following the stereotype of women existed in society.
39
Katherine has given a new subject for her students, the subjects that open her
students’ minds to pursue their goal. Nevertheless, Katherine also gets subject from
her students.
Joan : You stand in class and tell us to look beyond the image, but you don't.
To you, a housewife is someone who sold her soul for a center hall
colonial. She has no depth, no intellect, no interests. You're the one
who said I could do anything I wanted. This is what I want.
In Joan’s statement, she knows that to become a housewife is not also a bad
option. To become housewife is not also obsolescent and not progressive. Women
value cannot be decided only from their profession. The important thing is the
decision that they make is what they want, without any compulsion from anyone.
Katherine’s confession about her willingness to make a different and open up
the girl’s minds at Wellesley College is shown when she writes a letter to Betty.
Dear Betty:
I came to Wellesley because I wanted to make a difference. But to change for
others
Seeing from the explanation above, Katherine comes at Wellesley to make a
change by opening the young women’s mind at Wellesley College. She hopes to the
young women at Wellesley College that they can fight for pursuing their goal beside
marriage. She opens her student’s minds uses her ways of teaching. She wants to
liberate them from the old traditions that they hold at Wellesley such as the way of
thinking about the right art, family, school, and thinking. And she wants to compel all
her students to see the world through new eyes. She wants to open her students’
40
minds to see all the possibilities that life has to offer that is not just marriage and
family.
By the end of the film, Katherine is able to make her students realize on how
they should plan their own lives. It is shown when Betty Warren, who has been
turned down by her mother after her failure in marriage, seeks help from her teacher,
Katherine, when she decides to file for a divorce.
Betty’s mother : Elizabeth, I don't see Spencer.
Betty
: Excuse me, Mother. Miss Watson, can you help me
get in touch with your friend in Greenwich Village?
Betty’s mother : What do you need in Greenwich Village?
Betty
: An apartment. I filed for a divorce this morning. And since
we know I'm not welcome at your house. You remember
Giselle Levy? What did you call her? "A New York kike."
That's it. Well, we're going to be roommates.
Katherine
: Greenwich Village?
Betty
: Yeah, for a while. Then, who knows? Maybe law school
Yale, even. Well I wouldn't want to come up against you in
any court anywhere. Maybe I can drop by next year? Keep
you on your toes. You will be here? Miss Watson?
From the quotation above, we can see that Katherine has made a change by
opening up Betty’s mind about women roles that they have right and equal
opportunity in social life as men have. Betty decides to divorce with her husband and
move to an apartment. She also decides to continue her study to Yale University and
take law as her major.
Her success in opening the young women’s minds at Wellesley College is not
included in film’s story, but it was told through a narration of her student, Betty, in
the end of the film.
41
My teacher Katherine Watson lived by her own definition and would not
compromise that. Not even for Wellesley. I dedicate this, my last editorial to
an extraordinary woman who lived by example and compelled us all to see the
world through new eyes. By the time you read this, she will be sailing to
Europe where I know she will find new walls to break down and new ideas to
replace them with. Hold it, everybody. I have heard her called a quitter for
leaving an aimless wanderer. But not all who wander are aimless. Especially
not those who seek truth beyond tradition. beyond definition, beyond the
image.
We can see that Katherine has opened her student’s minds, enabled them to
see all the possibilities that life has to offer beside only think of marriage and family.
Katherine wants to liberate her students from the very conservative tradition and
make them to be brave to say that they want their own lives. Katherine wants to prove
to her student that they have an equal right to get an opportunity to get whatever they
want in their life. Beside that, she also encourages her students to pursue their goal.
Her attempts to make positive changes of the girls’ minds at Wellesley
College show that Katherine represents feminist ideas. We can see from what she
thinks. She wants to change the girls’ mindset about new perspective in life. She
wants to use her knowledge to put her opinion to the young women at Wellesley
College, that they need not to conform to stereotypes of women made by society, or
the roles made for them by society that women were born to become housewife and
mother. Katherine tries to struggle for the girls’ rights for having higher education,
and not only staying at home and becoming good wives. Katherine thinks that they
have a chance to be whatever they want. She feels that women can do more things in
life than solely adopt the roles of wives and mothers.
CHAPTER IV
CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION
A. Conclusion
In this research, the writer analyzes about Feminism that not only depends on
women in patriarchal but also women who break tradition controlled by patriarchal
and make changes toward women that are still controlled by men. Mona Lisa Smile
film sets at Wellesley College in the early 1950s. The writer finds that this film
reflects the condition of American women in early 50s. In 1950, women are
considered as second-class citizens. With declining, a stereotype that "a woman's
place is in the home" is always felt by women in the world even up to that time.
Beside that, this film also reflects the women conditions at that time that still hold the
tradition controlled by patriarchal. Being a wife and mother were regarded as
women's most significant professions. But the main character in this film, Katherine
Watson, does not represent one of them. She even tries to change it. And this is what
she does when she teaches at Wellesley College.
Katherine Watson (Julia Roberts), the main character in Mona Lisa Smile
film, is a Berkeley graduate who arrives at the women’s college, Wellesley, to teach
Art History. Unfortunately, she gets some disrespectful treatments from people
around her in Wellesley College. Initially her students try to outsmart her, which is a
little surprising for her, however she does not let them know about it. Depart from all
42
43
intimidations from people around her in Wellesley College, she makes positive
changes. But what really frustrates her is the knowledge that most of her students at
Wellesley aspire for is a wonderful husband and they do not care of pursuing any
kind of professions. Women at Wellesley College are under controlled by men.
Women do not have the same right to pursue their goal. And Katherine tries to break
that tradition. She survives in Wellesley College with her idealism to change the
mindset of the student’s minds. In every occasion in her class she tries to make the
students realize by giving a new material beyond the lecture to encourage the girls to
think a new perspective in life. She makes the students realize that they have rights to
show up their capability in public as men have. She also suggests her students that
they can do two things in the same time such as having family and their goal.
From all explanation above, we can see that Katherine is a progressive woman
that is trapped in an environment that still holds an old tradition at Wellesley College.
Her new perspective in making women equal to men, especially in education, makes
her faces some intimidations from people there. However, she takes all the
intimidations as a motivation for her to change her students’ minds. And all of her
efforts are not useless. She finally made it. She is successful in making her students
realize that they can have higher education and family in the same time. All of her
persistence and fighting in making changes at Wellesley shows feminist ideas, so it
can be concluded that the main character in this film represents the feminist ideas.
44
B. Suggestion
Firstly, in analyzing film or literary work, the writer should use the right
theory or approach in order to have the right comprehension of the film or literary
work itself. In this occasion, writer uses feminism theory in analyzing Mona Lisa
Smile film, but it is possible for the other researches to use another theory or approach
in analyzing this film. The other researchers who want to analyze this film can also
use some aspects in film that are not used by writer, such as character and
characterization to get a broader comprehension of the film.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Alison M. Jaggar and Paula S. Rothenberg, Feminist Frameworks Alternative
Theoretical Accounts of the Relations between Women and Men Third Edition,
( New York: McGraw-Hill, Inc, 1995)
Amanda Coffey and Sara Delamont, Feminism and the Classroom Teacher;
Research, Praxis and Pedagogy,
Anonymous, An Outline of American History. United States: United states
Department of State, 1994
Anonymous, Using feminist criticism on the movie Mona Lisa Smile.
http://pant0mime.wordpress.com/2007/03/18/using-feminist-criticism-on-themovie-mona-lisa-smile. accessed on November 12, 2008
Anonymous, Women’s History of America Presented by Women’s International
Center. http://www.wic.org/misc/history.htm. Accessed on September 28.2008
Bogdan and Taylor, Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods. A WileyInterscience Publication. United States of America. 1975
http://www.chowk.com/articles/12266. accessed on November 12 2008. 20.23 pm
http://www.ywca.org/site/pp.asp?c=djISI6PIKpG&b=295706.
September 28 2008.
Accessed
on
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_feminism. Accessed on October 16 2008.
http://majalahopini.wordpress.com/2008/10/20/resensi-film-monalisa-smile/.
Accessed on November 2008. 20.34 pm
Jane Pilcher and Imelda Imelda, Fifity Key Concepts in Gender Studies. (Trown Br
Idge, Wiltshire: The Cromwell Press Ltd,. 2004)
Jane Freedman, Concept in the Social Sciences Feminism. (Buckingham: Open
University Press, 2001)
Jonathan Crowther , Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary; vol 5, (1995).
45
46
Judith Evans, Feminist Theory Today: An Introduction to Second Wave Feminism,
(London: Sage Publication, 1995)
Nossbaum, Martha C. Women and Human Development the Capabilities Approach.
Cambridge University Press. United States. 2000
Rosemary Putnam Tong, Feminist thought: Pengantar paling komprehensif kepada
aliran utama pemikiran feminist, ( Jogyakarta: Jalasutra., 1998)
Soenarjati Djajanegara, Kritik Sastra feminis, (Jakarta: Gramedia Pustaka Utama.
2003)
Sue Thornham, Cultural studies in practice: Theory feminist and Cultural Studies
Stories Unsettled Relations, (New York: Oxford University Press Inc, 2000)
Appendix 1
The DVD Cover of Movie “ Mona Lisa Smile”
Appendix 2
Summary of Movie “Mona Lisa Smile”
“Mona Lisa Smile” strives to be an emotion filled story about women’s roles during
the 1950’s or the era of Eisenhower, but the outcome is a flimsy uneven film.
Katherine Watson (Julia Roberts) is an independent woman that has just landed a job
as art history professor at the renowned Wellesley College during the mid-1950’s.
The college is an all-women school that nurtures perfection and skilful academics.
However, the school is run by its alumni and believes that women should receive an
education, but after getting married, they should do nothing but be a housewife. This
is where Katherine and the college’s opposing values clash. Her class is may up of
many students, but the film only focuses on a selected few. The first is Joan (Julia
Stiles), who has recently gotten engaged, but Katherine urges her to pursue her dream
of continuing her education at Yale Law School on top of being a housewife. Connie
(Ginnifer Goodwin) is the underachiever that is looking for love and Giselle sees sex
as natural (Maggie Gyllenhaal) by even having flings with her Italian professor Bill
Dunbar (Dominic West). On the other hand, Dunbar is intrigued by Katherine and
begins to try and break her mold. The antagonist for Katherine more than the school
itself is the snickering Betty Warren (Kirsten Dunst), who is a prodigy of the school
that believes since she has recently married class is secondary. The art taught in the
class comes into play as a parallel to the characters’ conflicts, in which the title of the
film refers to looking past the paint of the famous Mona Lisa painting.
Appendix 3
The Script of Movie “MONA LISA SMILE”
All her life she had wanted to teach at Wellesley College. So when a position opened
in the Art History department. She pursued it single-mindedly until she was hired. It
was whispered that Katherine Watson a first-year teacher from Oakland State made
up in brains what she lacked in pedigree, which was why this bohemian from
California was on her way to the most conservative college in the nation.
The woman 1
Katherine
Katherine
The man
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
Excuse me, please.
Oh, sorry.
Excuse me. Excuse me. The bus?
Keep walking, ma'am.
Thank you.
But Katherine Watson didn't come to Wellesley to fit in. She came to Wellesley
because she wanted to make a difference.
Professor Dunbar
Violet
Professor Dunbar
Violet
:
:
:
:
President Carr
Joan
President Carr
Joan
:
:
:
:
President Carr
:
The woman 2
:
Katherine
Nancy
:
:
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
:
:
:
:
Violet.
My favorite Italian professor. Nice summer?
Terrific, thanks. Who's that over there?
Where? Oh, Katherine Watson. New teacher Art History. I'm
dying to meet her.
Who knocks at the Door of Learning?
I am every woman.
What do you seek?
To awaken my spirit through hard work and dedicate my life to
knowledge.
Then you are welcome. All women who seek to follow you can
enter here. I now declare the academic year begun.
A shame you didn't come yesterday. It's so quiet before the girls
arrive. Just a few rules. No holes in the walls. No pets, no loud
noises, no radio or hi-fi after on weekdays on weekends no hot
plates and no male visitors Anything wrong?
I don't think I can go a year without a hot plate.
Don't you just love chintz? And look They match Sweet, right?
Your room's here. My room is just across the way and Amanda
Armstrong's down the other end.
You grew up here?
My whole life. You'll meet my parents when they come to visit.
They visit?
Regularly.
Katherine
Nancy
Amanda
Katherine
The students
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Giselle
Katherine
Giselle
Katherine
Susan
Susan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Giselle
Betty
Katherine
: What do you teach?
: Speech, elocution and poise. Dinners are communal, so I'll
handle that. But breakfast and lunch, you're on your own. So we
each get our own shelf. I'll make your label this evening. I don't
need to tell you, everything on our individual shelves is
sacrosanct. I just knew when we met we'd be instant friends.
: Be careful. They can smell fear.
: Good morning.
: Good morning.
: Thank you. This is History of Art We'll be following Dr.
Staunton's syllabus. Any questions so far?
: Your name?
: Why don't you go first?
: Connie Baker.
: Katherine Watson. Nice to meet you.
: Dr. Watson, I presume.
: Not yet. And you are?
: Giselle Levy.
: Giselle. If someone could get the...
: Susan Delacorte.
: Thank you, Susan Delacorte.
: From the beginning, man has always had the impulse to create
art. Can anyone tell me what this is?
: Wounded Bison, Altamira, Spain about 15.000 S.M. Joan
Brandwyn.
: Very good, Joan. Despite the age of these, they are technically
sophisticated because ……
: The shading and the thickness of the lines moving over the
bison's hump. Is that right?
: Yes, that's exactly right. Next slide. This is probably less
familiar. It was discovered by archeologists...
: In Lascaux, France. Dates back to1879. 10.000 S.M Singled out
because of flowing lines depicting the movement of the animal.
: Impressive. Name?
: Herd of Horses.
: I meant yours.
: We call her Flicka.
: Elizabeth Warren. They call me Betty.
: Very good. Betty is also correct. Just because something is
ancient doesn't mean that it is primitive. For example. Next slide,
please.
Susan
Dr. Staunton
: Mycerinus and His Queen 24 S.M It's a funerary statue of the
pharaoh and queen originally intended to preserve the pharaoh's
ka Soul.
: Have any of you taken Art History before?
: No.
: Let's go on. Slide.
: Seated Scribe. Egypt 2400 S.M Peasant Couple Plowing.
Sixteenth century B.C. Egypt.
: Snake Goddess. Minoan B.C. Fresco. Minoan 1600 S.M Funeral
Mask. Mycenaean.
: Could someone please get...? Thank you.
: By a show of hands only how many of you have read the entire
text?
: And the suggested supplements.
: Long way from Oakland State?
: Well, you girls do prepare.
: If you've nothing else for us, we could go to independent study.
: Ac...
: I was in California once. How do you get work done with all that
sunshine?
: We tan in class.
: Really?
: No.
: You know, not everybody wanted you. I'm not naming any
names. These jobs usually go quickly. Ex-students, friends of,
you know the right people. The person they wanted took a job at
Brown, and no one else was available. So here you are. You can
go in now. Good luck.
: Your first class left a lot to be desired, Miss Watson. And I'm
curious about the subject of your dissertation. You suggest,
"Picasso will do for the century. What Michelangelo did for the
Renaissance," unquote. In terms of influencing movements. So
these canvases that they're turning out these days with paint
dripped and splotched on them. They’re as worthy of our
attention as Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel?
: I'm not comparing them.
: Have you ever seen the Sistine Chapel, Miss Watson?
: Actually stood there? I've never been to Europe. I can assure all
of you this is the place. I want to be more than anything.
: Better discipline next class, Miss Watson.
Paul
Katherine
: Hello.
: It's me.
Katherine
The students
Katherine
The student 1
The student 2
Katherine
Katherine
Susan
Giselle
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
The woman 3
Katherine
The woman 3
Katherine
The woman 3
Dr. Staunton
Katherine
Dr. Staunton
Katherine
Paul
The woman 4
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Paul
:
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
:
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
:
:
:
:
:
Amanda
:
Katherine
Nancy
:
:
Amanda
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
:
:
:
:
Amanda
Katherine
:
:
Amanda
:
Katherine
Amanda
:
:
Nancy
Amanda
Nancy
Amanda
Katherine
Amanda
Betty
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Hey!
Collect from Katherine Watson. Will you accept?
Yeah, sure, of course I will. Hey, is everything okay?
Yeah.
Tough, huh?
Well, how are the classes? Snobs, right? I hate to say I told you
so..
You don't have to. I can't really talk right now. I'll write you
tonight.
So you got a fella?
He's... He's there, I'm here.
Long distance. Torture.
I know.
Come. Come in and sit down. When Lenny left for the South
Pacific, it nearly broke my heart. We wrote every day until He
was a great man. I'm sorry. It was a hundred years ago. I'm
babbling. I love Lucy. Even if she is a communist. The only
thing red about Lucy is her hair. And even that's fake.
Dessy said it. Winchell wrote it. Amanda Armstrong. I see you
survived.
Katherine Watson. Just barely.
Oh, good. You've met. Katherine's taken the third bedroom. How
about a little dinner before What's My Line?
How about a little drink?
Her companion died in May.
Companion?
You know, companion. Josephine Burns. Taught biology here
for years.
You'll love it here, Katherine.
You'll see. I already do. Honestly, it's beautiful. It's perfect,
really.
Well, don't fool yourself. They have claws underneath their
white gloves.
Who?
The alumnae, their offspring, the faculty. You name it. Watch
out for yourself. Too much independence frightens them.
Will you please stop?
Oh, a word of advice.
Don't let those girls
Know that they got to you.
They didn't.
Good for you. You almost convinced me.
What is that?
Katherine
Susan
Katherine
Betty
Connie
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Katherine
Susan
Betty
Connie
Betty
Katherine
Connie
Betty
Katherine
Susan
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Giselle
Betty
Katherine
Connie
: You tell me. Carcass by Soutine.
: It's not on the syllabus.
: No, it's not. Is it any good? Come on, ladies There's no wrong
answer. There's also no textbook telling you what to think.
It's not that easy, is it?
: All right. No. It's not good. In fact, I wouldn't even call it art. It's
grotesque.
: Is there a rule against grotesque art?
: I think there's something aggressive about it and erotic.
: To you, everything is erotic.
: Everything is erotic.
: Girls.
: Aren't there standards?
: Of course. Otherwise a tacky velvet painting could be equated to
a Rembrandt.
: My Uncle Ferdie has two tacky velvet paintings. He loves those
clowns.
: There are standards, technique, composition, color, even subject.
So if you're suggesting that rotted side of meat is art much less
good art, then what are we going to learn?.
: Just that. You have outlined our new syllabus, Betty. Thank you.
What is art? What makes it good or bad? And who decides? Next
slide, please.
Twenty-five years ago someone thought this was brilliant.
: I can see that.
: Who?
: My mother. I painted it for her birthday. Next slide. This is my
mom. Is it art?
: It's a snapshot.
: If I told you Ansel Adams had taken it, would that make a
difference?
: Art isn't art until someone says it is.
: It's art!
: The right people.
: Who are they?
: Betty Warren! We're lucky we have one right here.
: Screw you.
: Could you go back to the Soutine, please? Just look at it again.
Look beyond the paint. Let us try to open our minds to a new
idea. All right, back to chapter three. Has anyone read it? Okay.
: "When your courses are set, and a dream boat you've met have a
real cigarette. Have a Camel." I've got my courses, I've got my
Camel
Giselle
Connie
Betty
Connie
Betty
:
:
:
:
:
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Connie
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Connie
Giselle
:
:
Connie
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Betty
Connie
Joan
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
cigarette. Where is my dream boat? Giselle, where is my dream
boat?
Betty's cousin isn't good enough?
I haven't met him.
Don't encourage her. He's only escorting. Connie as a favor.
Why are you like this?
I didn't mean that. I'm just under so much pressure with the
wedding. Do you realize November is three weeks from now?
Oh, honey. Don't have it.
Don't come.
Here. Here.
I'm working on table seating now, so I can just erase your name.
Can I see it?
No.
Let me look. I can't look for a second?
You want to see where Bill is sitting.
No. That is over. Right?
Right? Giselle, right?
Damn it. Do I look a little bit like her?
Like who?
Katherine Watson.
You mean, "crap is art"?
I think she's fabulous.
Well, no man wanted her.
She isn't dead. She's at least Oh, no. No.
I guess she never wanted children.
For your information, Katherine Watson had to take this job to
escape from California.
Please.
She had a torrid affair with a Hollywood movie star. She came
here to get away.
That's ridiculous. Who was it?
I don't know.
Who was it, Giselle? Don't be a pimple! Tell me!
It's ridiculous.
Tell me. No, it's not. You know. You know something. Tell me.
It's William Holden.
Fantastic!
I know.
Who is it?
William Holden.
I know. I know. I'm late. I'm Abject pleading, apologies,
forgiveness.
Tommy
The woman 4
The Woman 5
Joan
The woman 5
Giselle
Betty
Connie
Betty
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Joan
Giselle
Joan
Connie
Joan
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
Betty
Connie
Joan
Betty
Giselle
: Is she giving you any trouble? If these girls can't get back on
time, know what I say? Lock them out.
: Come on. Out! I'm going to lock the door. Out!
: Bedtime, ladies. Bedtime. Let's go. Bedtime.
: Hey, Betty.
: The Quiet time, ladies.
: Women like Katherine Watson don't get married because they
choose not to.
: No woman chooses to live without a home, unless she's
sleeping with her Italian professor.
: You are so critical.
: I am not.
: Of course you are. You're your mother's daughter. It's a classic
Electra complex. I don't blame you. I mean who wouldn't want to
murder your mother? Hey. How's the Harvard sweetheart?
: Got an extra ciggie?
: Did you do his homework?
: Of course.
: Want to do mine?
: No.
: This isn't what I think it is. Is it?
: Where'd you get it?
: From the school nurse.
: It's against the law.
: Oh, honey. It's a girl's best friend.
: A certain kind of girl.
: Meet the last virgin bride.
: Spencer is a gentleman.
: And even gentlemen have dicks.
: Maybe I'll get one.
: What? A dick?
: Don't be stupid, Connie.
: Someone, somewhere, someday might be interested. Just in case.
Just in case, I'll be prepared.
: Was that necessary?
: I was taught it's best to speak honestly.
: Okay. You're a bitch.
Narrated by Betty : We recently learned that Amanda Armstrong our nurse, has been
distributing contraception to Wellesley girls. This revelation is
disturbing to an institution that prides itself on propriety.
Nancy
Katherine
Violet
Nancy
Katherine
Violet
Nancy
Will
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Nancy
Violet
Katherine
Nancy
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Nancy
Professor Dunbar
Nancy
Betty’s mother
Waiter
Betty’s mother
Betty’s mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
Betty’s mother
: Go, go, go! Go, go! It's been going on since the late 's. Whoever
wins is first to marry!
: Do the girls take it literally?
: Only the girl with the winning hoop. Oh, look, it's Phyllis Nayor!
: Good for her. It gets me every time.
: Why the buggies?
: They've got their man.
: They're wishing for their babies.
: Have you seen this?
: What is it?
: It's a front-page attack on Amanda Armstrong. Betty Warren
wrote it.
: "By providing contraception on demand, our school nurse is little
more than a cheerleader for promiscuity." Wow.
: Oh, they're not going to dump her in a lake!
: I'm coming, Phyllis!
: Have you seen this?
: I wouldn't worry. Betty's just a young girl flexing her muscles.
: So was Lizzie Borden, and her mother wasn't president of the
alumnae association. Would somebody get that girl a towel!
: That's her mother?
: Apple, tree.
: Is Amanda going to get into trouble?
: Amanda needs to start minding her p's and q's.
: The trick to surviving Wellesley is never getting noticed. Ciao,
Mona Lisa.
: The big war hero. He thinks he's something special. He sleeps
with his students.
: The gold is fine. The napkin rings are vulgar. The glassware
should be trimmed with gold. The little sugar boxes, gold and
white, filled with chocolate. No candlesticks. Freesia instead of
daisies.
: Wise choice, madam.
: No baby's breath.
: You already had your fitting?
: We're on our way. Here's the seating chart and Spencer's list of
groomsmen. Oh, I almost forgot. I spoke to him about reading
the
poem. He'd rather not. I said all right.
: Excuse us for a second, Joan.
: A good wife lets her husband think that everything's his idea
even when it's not. I don't care if he reads it. You will in
retrospect. Now, why don't you see if you Can’t nudge the idea
into his head.
Amanda
President Carr
Amanda
President Carr
Amanda
President Carr
Amanda
President Carr
Nancy
The students
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
The students
Nancy
:
:
:
:
:
I have been here now for twenty one years, Jocelyn.
I remember you as a student.
Twenty-four, if you count that. So why the theatrics?
We cannot appear to promote sexual promiscuity.
Okay. It's about appearances, then? No. All right, all right. All
right. Well, I promise not to appear to be sympathetic,
progressive or what did Mrs. Warren call it? "Liberal." Scout's
honor.
: I spent the better part of Friday afternoon convincing the
alumnae that your record was impeccable that you would no
longer provide contraceptive devices and you'd make a public
statement to that effect.
: I'm not willing to make a public statement.
: It doesn't matter, Amanda. They're letting you go. It's out of my
hands.
: And this champagne cup is in the wrong place. And up and
down. And up and Katherine. Good evening, Miss Watson.
: Good evening, Miss Watson.
: Join us.
: No.
: Good night, Miss Watson.
: Good night, Miss Watson.
: And down. Very nice. Very nice.
Professor Dunbar : Hey. Heard about Amanda. I'm sorry.
Katherine
: She seemed all right about it. I wouldn't be. They don't give you
too many chances around here.
Professor Dunbar ; Oh, that depends how much they hate you to begin with.
Can I buy you a drink? Or are you here for dinner?
Katherine
: How long do the marriage lectures take?
Professor Dunbar : Get this woman a booth.
Nancy
Giselle
Connie
: Your husband is at a crossroads in his career. He's competing for
promotion against two rivals, Smith and Jones. To get the edge,
you have wisely decided to invite the boss and his wife to a
dinner. You've carefully planned your meal set your table and
arranged for a babysitter.
: Oh, we have babies!
: Yes, and I have twins!
Nancy
Betty
Giselle
: Then, surprise. It's and your husband's called to say that Smith,
Jones and their wives have been invited at the boss's request.
Ever the Wellesley girl you keep your cool and understand that
the boss is probably testing you as much as your husband. What
next? Yes?
: File for divorce?
: That's very funny. But the thing is, it's not a joke. A few years
from now your sole responsibility will be taking care of your
husband and children. You may all be here for an easy A but the
grade that matters the most is the one he gives you, not me.
: You'll need to Whatever you do don't put the boss's wife next to
your husband.
: Why not?
: She's screwing him.
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Giselle
Nancy
Giselle
Professor Dunbar :
Katherine
:
Professor Dunbar :
Katherine
:
Professor Dunbar :
Katherine
Amanda
Katherine
Amanda
Katherine
Is that where you learned to speak Italian? In Italy?
Yeah. Have you got a boyfriend?
Yes.
You know, if you were mine, I'd never let you go.
I wouldn't have asked your permission.
Yeah, they say you're progressive. A forward thinker. Are you?
There are a lot of labels here l have noticed. Right family, right
school, right art, right way of thinking.
Well, saves the effort on thinking for yourself.
How do you expect to ever make a difference if everything is a
joke?
Oh, Katherine Watson comes to Wellesley to set us all free?
Come on.
Thank you for the drink.
No, no. Wait. I was teasing. They have their own way of doing
things here. You've just gotta find a way to work with them. We
all had to.
: I'm sorry.
: Five years ago, they'd have slapped my wrist. But now there's a
committee for the protection of everything.
: They think you're dangerous?
: Oh, no, darling. No. Subversive. It's gotten to the point where
you don't know who is protecting whom from what. Or should
that be "from whom"? Well, whom gives a damn anyway?
They're doing me a favor really.
: Will you be all right?
Amanda
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Betty
Joan
: Better than that. I should really have left when Josephine died.
Nothing left to love here anymore. So
: Hello? Miss Watson?
: Yes. I'm back here.
: I've never been to this part of campus before. Where are we?
: No man's land. So to speak. Come on in.
: What's all this?
: Different things different days. People who inspire me, artists I
admire, editorials I don't. So you came to see me.
: You gave me a C.
: I'm kind.
: The assignment was to write about Bruegel. That was I did that.
: No, what you did was copy Strauss.
: I was referencing an expert.
: If I wanted to know what he thought, I'd buy his book.
: Miss Watson, with all due respect...
: Bruegel was a storyteller. Find the stories. Break them down into
smaller pieces. You might actually enjoy it.
: You're giving me another chance?
: So it seems.
: Is that my file?
: What's it say? Well, let's see. Straight A's.
: Until now.
: President of the poetry society, captain of the debate team, cocaptain of the tennis club, founder of the horticulture league.
: I sound like a pompous ass.
: Yes, you do, but a very busy one. And it says here that you're
pre-law. What law school are you gonna go to?
: I hadn't thought about that. After I graduate, I'm getting married.
: And then?
: And then I'll be married.
: You can do both. Just for fun, if you could go to any law school,
which would it be?
: Yale.
: Yale
: They keep five slots open for women, one unofficially for a
Wellesley girl.
: But you haven't really thought about it.
: Wake up, Joanie, wake up. Wake up. Okay, don't get up. Don't
hear what I have to say about Tommy and Spencer looking at an
engagement ring for you.
: You're sure?
Betty
Joan
Betty
Katherine
: That's everything we always wanted, huh? We'll be best friends,
and our husbands will be best friends and we'll have houses
together and we'll have babies together and they'll be best
friends. You're going to be Mrs. Tommy Donegal.
: When?
: I'll get the scoop tomorrow. You go back to sleep.
Katherine
Joan
: The first part of the exam will consist of two pairs of slides.
Please identify each of the slides by name, period and date. Then
compare and contrast them. You will have minutes for each pair.
Then you will write a word essay describing the stylistic
differences between Raphael and van Eyck. Eyes forward, Miss
Delacorte.
You have forty minutes. Good luck.
: Excuse me. Governor. Another shot, please.
: This way, please. Thank you.
: Excuse me.
: This is quite the event. I'm surprised I was invited.
: Well, look around you.
: Who wasn't?
: You ever hear the expression "Keeping up with the Joneses"?
: Of course.
: Mr. And Mrs. Gordon Jones. The actual, historical family
they invented the phrase about.
: Good to know.
: That's him!
Spencer
The man
Betty
The woman
Spencer
:
:
:
:
:
Nancy
: We're together. Table nineteen. Good. Holy God! The governor
is right behind you. Don't turn around.
: Great band.
: Violet.
: Yes?
: Would you mind if I go here?
: Not at all.
: Over here. Thank you.
: Great band.
: Great band. Hi, Katherine.
: Hi, Professor Dunbar.
The man
The man
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Violet
Professor Dunbar
Violet
Professor Dunbar
Violet
Professor Dunbar
Violet
Professor Dunbar
The student
Thank you.
Good to see you.
Thank you very much.
A beautiful dress.
Hi, we're so glad you came.
Nancy
: I'm getting a Manhattan. Like anything?
Katherine
: No, thank you.
Professor Dunbar : I'll take a Jack and ginger.
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
: He's making his move. I knew he'd go for her.
: She's too old for him.
: She's too smart for him. Hold that
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Giselle
Katherine
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
They're playing our song.
What?
They're playing our song.
I heard you.
Hi.
Hi, Giselle.
Ladies' choice?
Sure. Excuse me.
Photographer
Spencer
Betty
Spencer
Photographer
Betty
Photographer
Spencer
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Ladies, gentlemen! Quiet!
What's this about the poem you wanted me to read?
It was your idea, remember?
I never said that.
Ready? Excellent.
Well, I wrote this down, just in case you forgot. It's my favorite.
Smile.
Now, Betty, I tried to think of a million ways to tell you how I
feel.
But instead I refer to your favorite poem.
Connie
Joan
Giselle
Joan
Connie
:
:
:
:
:
Good catch.
You said it.
He's a morsel.
Miss Watson!
He's a favor. Remember?
Joan
: Come on. Miss Watson, I want you to meet Tommy. Tommy,
come here for a second.
: You are so beautiful.
: This is Katherine Watson.
: Oh, wow! In the flesh. She has not shut up about you.
: Oh, stop.
: You know what I'm saying? I do. You did something to impress
her.
: Well, it seems you did too.
Tommy
Joan
Tommy
Joan
Tommy
Katherine
Nancy
Waiter
Nancy
Charlie
: You make these especially well.
: Thank you.
: I had a fell a Lenny. You remind me of him so much. He had this
funny little thing where his two front teeth they overlapped. He
is dead. South Pacific.
: My parents say my future is right on the horizon.
: Tell them the horizon is an imaginary line that recedes as you
approach it.
: I think I'll go back to my seat.
: I had a really nice time. Thank you.
: Connie. Is this the brushoff?
: No. I thought you were, you know done with me.
: Why would you think that?
: Betty said that you. I don't wanna take advantage. I know that
this was some favor.
: She did me the favor, not you. Come on, dance with me.
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
Giselle
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
: You ready?
: Do you wanna know something funny? Lenny's not dead. Not
technically. He...He's got married. He's got a wife and kids and a
mortgage. It was all supposed to be mine, except for the wife.
And you. You don't look a thing like him. You ugly bartender.
: Stop it.
: You couldn't shine his shoes.
: I'm sorry.
: It wasn't supposed to turn out like this.
: I know it.
: It wasn't supposed to turn out like this.
The student
Katherine
The student
Katherine
Joe
:
:
:
:
:
Charlie
Connie
Katherine
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
She's too good for you.
Maybe you're right.
I'm too good for you too. But I have lower expectations.
I thought we settled this last spring.
So then we probably shouldn't have slept together over the
summer.
Professor Dunbar : Stop.
Which way?
Let me just see here. I'm not sure.
Where are we supposed to go?
I think it's here. Come this way. We're almost there. Joe. Hello.
Hi. How are you?
Katherine
Joe
Giselle
Joan
Connie
Connie
Great. Thank you so much for this. You're a pal.
It's a pleasure. Your timing is perfect. There it is.
That's Jackson Pollock.
In a word.
I was getting used to the idea of dead, maggoty meat being art,
now this.
: Please don't tell me we have to write a paper about it.
: Do me a favor. Do yourselves a favor. Stop talking and look.
You're not required to write a paper. You're not even required to
like it. You are required to consider it. That's your only
assignment today. When you're done, you may leave.
: Thank God Betty isn't here.
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
:
:
:
:
:
:
Where did you come from?
Mars.
What a coincidence.
Tom Donegal came by to see Joan. So I hopped a ride.
Why?
So I could do this.
President Carr
Katherine
President Carr
Katherine
President Carr
Katherine
President Carr
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
President Carr
:
:
President Carr
Katherine
President Carr
Katherine
President Carr
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Woman
Katherine
The student
:
:
:
:
Katherine.
Yes
Have you got a minute?
Of course.
Walk with me. You going home for the holidays? No. Too far?
Too expensive.
But I've never had a New England Christmas, so Our weather
hasn't scared you away?
I love it here.
Do you? I've been getting some calls about your teaching
methods, Katherine. They're a little unorthodox for Wellesley.
We are traditionalists, Katherine. Katherine : Yes, I noticed.
So if you'd like to stay here
Is that a question?
More a discussion.
About my staying here?
You'll have your formal review in May. Until then a little less
modern art. Happy holidays.
And to you.
Afternoon.
Oh, hi...
I hope you get that ring! Bye, girls, see you next year. Have a
safe trip.
The student
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
Tommy
Joan
Betty
Spencer
Betty
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Tommy
Betty
Spencer
Betty
Spencer
Tommy
Spencer
Betty
: So, what's the big hush-hush secret? Are we gonna hear the
pitter-patter of little Spencers?
: Tommy Stop. They'll tell us when they're ready. Are you ready?
Is she the cutest? You are the cutest. Come here, you.
: Spencer's been made junior partner. It is about time. And it's a
significant raise too!
: Betty!
: What?
: I can say that, can't I? To Tommy and Joan? Well, it is. So
maybe a family isn't far behind. Let's take our coffee in the
sitting room, shall we?
: I'll help.
: Keep them closed.
: All right. Beautiful! You've got everything you've ever dreamed
of.
: You will too.
: I've got a secret to tell you. You swear you won't gab to anyone?
I got accepted early to Yale Law School.
: To what?! Why?! You don't want to be a lawyer.
: Maybe I do.
: You won't switch cold creams without asking me, but you
applied to school?
: On a lark. We never thought I'd get in.
; Who's "we"?
: Miss Watson. She practically filled out my application for me.
: You've got to be kidding me! What right does she have? You're
getting married!
: First of all, there's no ring on this finger. Second, I can do both. I
can.
: How does Tommy feel about this?
: He doesn't know. No one does.
: Not even her?
: No one.
: Joanie! Betty!
: You are this close to getting everything you ever wanted. And
this close to losing it.
: I just got a call. They need me in New York tomorrow.
: Joan and Tommy are here. Can't you leave in the morning?
: Then I'd miss the meeting. Sorry, guys. We take a rain check?
: Sure, buddy.
: We'll see you in the new year. Happy and merry. I'll call you in
the morning.
: Coffee?
Nancy
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Katherine
: Guess who has an early Christmas present? Oh, my! How can
you live like this?
: Like what?
: We'll just wait for you to tidy up a bit.
: In this lifetime?
: It’ll never happen.
: Come here, beautiful.
: What are you doing here?
: You still like it here?
: I do. I like getting to know the girls. Most of the time. And the
weather.
: Yeah, the weather's nice.
: Are you freezing?
: Yeah.
: Your lips are a little blue.
: I like them that way.
: Why didn't you bring a coat?
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
Giselle
Professor Dunbar
Giselle
Giselle
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Nancy
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Katherine
Paul
Bill.
Giselle, what are you doing here?
Freezing.
Look, it's over. I can't see you anymore. I can't.
I know.
Really.
I just want to talk to you for a minute.
Come on.
: Oh, I missed you. You're beautiful. Life without you just isn't
life.
And I don't want to go through lifenot living. Do you?
Katherine
: No.
Paul
: I love you so much I would move to this elitist icebox if you
want me to. Make an honest man out of me.
Giselle
: Miss Watson? Hi. I didn't know you were here.
Katherine
: hi Giselle Levy, Bill Dunbar, this is this is my Paul
Paul
: Fiancé As of about a minute and a half ago. Paul Moore.
Giselle
: God. Congratulations!
Professor Dunbar : Your fiancé?
Giselle
: You must be thrilled.
Professor Dunbar : I don't think she's caught her breath yet.
Katherine
: I haven't.
Paul
: Well, sit down. We'll have a toast.
Professor Dunbar : We'd love to. We're in a hurry. But that's really great.
Congratulations, old man.
Giselle
: Congratulations. Merry Christmas.
Professor Dunbar : Come on, let's...
Giselle
: Best of tidings to you both. Bye.
Katherine
: No, Paul. Nancy'll have a heart attack. She has these rules.
Paul
: Come on.
Katherine
: No.
Paul
: Why?
Katherine
: I said no. I'm not comfortable. I'll make up the convertible sofa.
Paul
: What are you doing? You're not kidding? I just came miles to see
you. I'm sleeping down here by myself? Stop. Stop. Stop for a
second. Tell me what the hell's going on.
Katherine
: I don't know. I feel like everything is getting away from me. We
haven't actually, literally looked at each other for three months
and now you're here, and I have this ring on my finger.
Paul
: Which makes you uncomfortable too? The last time I checked,
we weren't on this track.
Paul
: When was the last time you checked?
Katherine
: Will...
Paul
: My name is Paul.
Katherine
: I'm not saying no to you.
Paul
: No, you're not saying anything. You never really do.
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Joan
Katherine
Giselle
Katherine
: If you need me for anything else, my number's on the
refrigerator. I feel so guilty leaving you alone after...
: I'm fine. I have lots of research to do.
: That's right. Throw yourself into work. I'll be back on the end.
See you next year 1954
: Sunflowers. Vincent van Gogh 1888.
: He painted what he felt, not what he saw. People didn't
understand. To them, it seemed childlike and crude. It took years
for them to recognize his actual technique to see the way his
brush strokes seemed to make the night sky move. Yet, he never
sold a painting in his lifetime. This is his self-portrait. There's no
camouflage, no romance. Honesty. Now, years later, where is
he?
: Famous?
: So famous, in fact, that everybody has a reproduction. There are
post cards. We have the calendar. With the ability to reproduce
art, it is available to the masses. No one needs to own a van
Gogh original.
Susan
Katherine
Connie
Giselle
Katherine
Betty
Connie
Betty
Katherine
Connie
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
: We do. In the Newport house. But it's small. Tiny,
: They can paint their own. Van Gogh in a box, ladies. The newest
form of mass-distributed art: Paint by numbers.
: "Now everyone can be van Gogh. It's so easy. Just follow the
simple instructions and in minutes, you're on your way to being
an artist.
: "Van Gogh by numbers
: Ironic, isn't it? Look at what we have done to the man who
refused to conform his ideals to popular taste. Who refused to
compromise his integrity. We have put him in a tiny box and
asked you to copy him. So the choice is yours, ladies. You can
conform to what other people expect or you can...
: I know. Be ourselves.
: You're a sight for sore eyes.
: I would've been on time but, silly me, I thought class was in the
classroom.
: Glad you could join us, Mrs. Jones. We thought we'd lost you.
: There's an unwritten rule for marry...
: Don't bother.
: Since your wedding, you've missed six classes, a paper and your
midterm.
: Well, thank God I didn't miss the paint-by-numbers lecture. I
was on my honeymoon and then I had to set up house. What
does she expect?
: Attendance.
: Most of the faculty turns their heads when the married students
miss a class or two.
: Then why not get married as freshmen? That way you could
graduate without actually ever stepping foot on campus.
: Don't disregard our traditions just because you're subversive.
: Don't disrespect this class just because you're married.
: Don't disrespect me just because you're not.
: Come to class, do the works or I'll fail you.
: If you fail me, there will be consequences.
: Are you threatening me?
: I'm educating you.
: That's my job.
: Miss Watson! Miss Watson!
: What's this?
: Every year, the ARBs nominate a member of the faculty to be
our guest.
: The what?
Joan
Joan
Connie
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Giselle
Joan
Giselle
Katherine
Joan
Betty
Susan
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Susan
Giselle
Katherine
Giselle
Susan
Giselle
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Giselle
Joan
Giselle
The students
Giselle
: You'll see. Come by tonight at five o’clock: .
: Adam's Ribs. A very secret society. Wait here.
: First, the oath. Please raise both hands. Do you swear not to
repeat what you see, hear or smell tonight?
: Smell?
: Keep your hands up! Yes, smell.
: I do.
: It'll only burn for a second.
: Go on.
: And now that you've taken the oath, we get to ask you whatever
we want.
: Oh, is that how it works?
: And you have to answer.
: Who invited her?
: You're in time for truth or consequences.
: I go first. Why aren't you married?
: Well that’s poisonous. I'm not married because I’m not. I was
engaged to Patrick Watts. Everybody called him Leo, and I never
knew why. He was the first person that I ever danced with or
smoked with, got incredibly drunk with and. Well, a lot of first
things. We were eighteen and getting married 1941, Christmas
of. Then Pearl Harbor happened and everything changed.
Everybody changed. And by June, he was sent overseas.
: Did he come back?
: Yes.
: Was he changed?
: They both were. I'm sorry.
: Your parents?
: Yeah. After the war they didn't know each other anymore, didn't
like each other. He left. He got a whole new family.
: Divorce.
: What? Yeah. First on my block. That's a city block.
: People change. Things happen. It's the same with me and Leo.
He went off and married someone else. And I got to go to
graduate school.
: UCLA, right? Which is in Hollywood?
: It's close.
: Anyway, aren't you goanna tell everybody about, you know your
big news?
: What are you talking about?
: She got engaged over Christmas!
: Congratulations!
: I'm sorry to blab. It's just so romantic.
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
:
:
:
:
Betty
:
Katherine
:
Connie
Joan
Katherine
Connie
Susan
Joan
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Betty
Katherine
Betty
Joan
Betty
:
:
:
:
:
Joan
Betty
:
:
Katherine
:
Betty
:
How fantastic!
We split up.
What?
We split up. Well, that was fast. Well, not every relationship is
meant for marriage.
Some are strictly affairs? Bill Dunbar. He'd be an affair. Let's
talk about that, Miss Watson. You don't believe in withholding,
do you?
No. I do, however, believe in manners. But for you, I'll make an
exception. That's what we're supposed to do for married students.
Right, Betty? Professor Dunbar and I are not having an affair.
Did you have one with William Holden?
She asked about Bill Dunbar.
How did you hear that?
Oh, it is true! Betty, I told you.
Won't you regret never marrying?
There's still time.
I guess I assume that I will at some point. I'm not gonna plan my
life around it.
Neither should we.
I didn't say that.
You did to Joan. That's what she told me.
What are you saying?
She knew you and Tommy were getting engaged. And she
practically filled out your application.
I didn't say that.
She's been accepted. Now she just has to figure out a way to tell
Tommy.
Why don't you do it? You're good at butting into people's
business.
Funny, that's what they say about you.
Betty
Spencer
Louise
Betty
:
:
:
:
Spencer, do I look all right?
Yeah, fine. I don't have a lot of time. Speed it up. Mr. Grouchy.
All right, here we go again.
All right, go ahead, Louise.
Betty
: Married Wellesley girls have become quite adept at balancing
obligations. One hears such comments as: "I baste the chicken
with one hand and outline the paper with the other.” While our
mothers were called to work for Lady Liberty. It is our duty,
nay; obligation to reclaim our place in the home bearing the
children that will carry our traditions into the future. One must
pause to consider why Miss Katherine Watson instructor in the
Art History department has decided to declare war on the holy
sacrament of marriage. Her subversive and political teachings
encourage our Wellesley girls to reject the roles they were born
to fill.
Katherine
Connie
Katherine
Katherine
President Carr
Katherine
: Thank you. Slide. Contemporary art.
: That's just an advertisement.
: Quiet! Today you just listen. What will the future scholars see
when they study us? A portrait of women today? There you are,
ladies. The perfect likeness of a Wellesley graduate. Magna cum
laude, doing exactly what she was trained to do Slide. A Rhodes
scholar. I wonder if she recites Chaucer while she presses her
husband's shirts. Slide. Now, you physics majors can calculate
the mass and volume of every meat loaf you make. Slide. A
girdle to set you free. What does that mean? What does that
mean? What does it mean? I give up. You win. The smartest
women in the country. I didn't realize that by demanding
excellence I would be challenging what did it say? What did it
say? "The roles you were born to fill." Is that right? The roles
you were born to fill? It's my mistake. Class dismissed.
: These girls Are you proud, President Carr?
: Yes, actually, I am.
: Well, you should be, I guess. Half of them are married. The other
half, give it a month or so. It's really only a matter of time.
They're biding time until somebody proposes!
President Carr
: A hundred years ago, it was inconceivable for a woman to be a
college graduate. Perhaps you should look back to see how far
we've come.
Katherine
: I'm sorry, from where I sit, it's just a different kind of corset.
President Carr
: Well, we can all use a little support.
Katherine
: Oh, like Amanda Armstrong?
President Carr
: She broke the law!
Katherine
: According to Betty Warren.
President Carr
: According to the state of Massachusetts.
Katherine
: To hell with Wellesley. I'm done. Goddamn it! It's brilliant,
really. A perfect ruse. A finishing school disguised as a college.
They got me.
Professor Dunbar : What do you expect?
Katherine
: More. More. I thought it was a place for tomorrow's leaders, not
their wives.
Professor Dunbar : Calm down, please.
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
:
Professor Dunbar :
Professor Dunbar :
Katherine
:
No, I will not!
I've got more minutes. Meet me in my office. Meet me!
How you feeling?
Stupid. Deceived. Really, really angry.
Change takes time, you know? You gotta let them catch up with
you.
Katherine, this place needs you. I don't know how the hell they
let you in, but I'm sure glad they did.
The things I said to President Carr. She'll never let me back in.
She's a pretty good egg.
What things? Don't worry. Time will heal it. Unless, of course,
you want to go back to California and that fiancée ?of yours.
We're not engaged. Thanks. Sorry I interrupted your class.
Professor Dunbar : Katherine! I wanted to give you this. It was for Christmas, and
Then I met your man, so I. The Sistine Chapel, David, Venus de
Milo, and Mona Lisa.
Katherine
: Thank you.
Katherine
: This is gonna be a three-in-one shot. Ready? You didn't even try.
This game is probably a no-no in the Better Homes and
Gardens.Not that I have ever been in the better homes and
gardens. Have you?
Professor Dunbar : No. No, I'm just an old soldier. They don't invite us.
Katherine
: What do they say about them though?
Professor Dunbar : Old soldiers never die. We just...
Katherine
: They just become philandering Italian professors. That was
below the belt. That was unkind.
Professor Dunbar : Deeply unkind.
Professor Dunbar : You know, I don't know how I feel about being a rebound.
Katherine
: I'll leave.
Professor Dunbar : No, you don't have to do that. I'll get used to it. What are you
doing?
Katherine
: Getting dressed. I had fun, and I'm not looking for anything
serious.
Professor Dunbar : Why don't you come down here and we can discuss it.
Katherine
: But as long as we're doing whatever it is that we're doing..
Professor Dunbar : Which we did pretty well, don't you think?
Katherine
: No students. I'm serious. I don't want to teach a class wondering
why a girl is wearing my perfume.
Professor Dunbar : Katherine, l...
Katherine
: I need your word.
Professor Dunbar : All right, you have my word. Okay. Now can we change the
subject? Talk about something a little more interesting? Like
breakfast. You know, I make a mean blueberry pancake.
Katherine
: I just put that shoe on. I don't think I know you well enough for
breakfast.
Professor Dunbar : I don't know about that.
Katherine
: So how does a guy get to know you better? Well, let me...
Professor Dunbar : That's a good idea.
Katherine
: Is that a battle wound you have? I'm a sucker for war stories in
Romance languages.
Professor Dunbar : Well, that's pretty easy. Yeah?
Professor Dunbar : I was in a village... called San Remo...the Krauts pounded us
hard me & Stan you remember Stan? We were the only two left
from our platoon. We heard a distant cry coming from an
abandoned shed. When night fell...
The students
: A trap it was?
Professor Dunbar : Remember invert your nouns and your verbs.
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Waiter
Connie
Miss Stone
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Teacher
The girl
Betty
: Hungry?
: Famished. Don't say we can live on love. That's how I missed
breakfast. What's the matter? What's the matter?
: Phillip and Vanessa McIntyre. Parents of a friend.
: You wanna say a quick hello?
: No! No, I'll be trapped. Damn it!
: Could you seat us in the bar?
: We're only serving in the front part of the restaurant this
afternoon.
: Miss! Miss Stone. This has been the most romantic weekend I
may ever have. Ever and all that's standing between right now
and perfection are the McIntyre over there. Now, with the
competition out there, a girl's got to be able to move a few
mountains every once in a while. I could use all the help I could
get.
: Come this way.
: I fixed it. No more Mclntyres.
: Thank you. Thank you. Let's not talk about this.
: All right.
: Hold your breath and turn. Don't forget to smile. Arms up. Move
together. Faster, Fran! When you surface, smile.
: Come on, Connie!
: How about we have a girls' luncheon this weekend?
Susan
Giselle
Betty
Joan
Giselle
Joan
Connie
Joan
Susan
Betty
Connie
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Connie
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Betty
:
Giselle
:
Betty
:
Giselle
Connie
Betty
Connie
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
:
:
:
:
:
:
Just us.
Where's Spencer?
Away.
I'm free.
I'm busy.
What are you doing?
She's dating a psychoanalyst.
Oh, really?
Who's married? Giselle! Sorry, it slipped.
Are you in, Connie?
I'll check with Charlie.
Who?
Charlie Stewart. Your cousin.
You're kidding?
We spent last weekend at the Cape. A little hideaway he knew
about.
Operative word, "hide." Men take women to the Cape in the
winter when they're embarrassed. He's using you.
He's not using you if you want to go. Come here. Don't listen to
her.
I love you, and I swear I'm not saying this to hurt you. Charlie's
promised to Deb McIntyre. She wears his pin. Giselle, you know
it's true.
I don't know anything about a pin.
McIntyre? Are her parents named Phillip and Vanessa?
You know them?
Only from a distance.
Good morning.
Good morning.
Goodbye.
Good morning.
Okay, wait. No, we have an audience. Don't look.
No, I don't...
No. Stop it. Put me down. Put me down. You're not coming in
this house. You are not coming in this house. No. Bye. Good
morning.
Good morning.
Go away. Go away.
How can you date a man like that?
What if you're wrong about him?
What if I'm not?
Coffee's cold.
Teacher
Professor Dunbar
Katherine
Professor Dunbar
:
:
:
:
Row! Ride the plank! Row!
Are your ears burning?
I think the feet go first when they set the stake on fire.
"What do you say, Edward? Should we have her back? "She's got
rather nice legs."
Katherine
: Who's to say I wanna come back?
Professor Dunbar : What leave me here with all these girls?
Connie
Nancy
Giselle
Connie
Giselle
:
:
:
:
:
Miranda
Charlie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Charlie
:
Charlie
Betty
Connie
:
:
:
Betty
:
Connie
:
Betty
Connie
:
:
Singer
Tommy
Katherine
:
:
:
You'd think someone would notice empty trays.
You are good. You remind me of myself when I was your age.
Cheers.
He's positively vomititious, Giselle.
Don't be so sentimental, Connie. It was a fling. It's fine. It was
nothing.
Hi! Pleasure to meet you.
Would you excuse me? I'll be right back.
Connie! Connie! Excuse me. Sorry. Connie! Charlie.
It's been a while.
Yeah. How are you?
I'm fine, thank you. You? Deb?
Pardon?
Deb. Your girlfriend. With the very large. With the very large
teeth.
With the very large teeth. Oh, did you think I didn't know?
Connie. Deb and I broke it off last summer. That's Miranda. We
started seeing each other when you stopped returning my calls or
answering any of my letters.
Okay, maybe I should go.
Have you seen Spencer?
But I did see Charlie Stewart. And he told me that he and Deb
broke up last summer. And you told me they were together when
he invited me to the Cape.
Oh, Connie. I don't keep track of his dates. They've been onagain, off-again for the past few years.
No no no, apparently they've been off-again for a while. For
quite a while.
So?
So you made me believe that he was hiding me. Either way why
couldn't you let me be happy? Betty.
And we switch.
Wonder teacher.
Tommy. How's Harvard?
Tommy
Katherine
Tommy
Katherine
Tommy
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Tommy
:
:
Katherine
Tommy
:
:
Singer
Tommy
Betty
:
:
:
Tommy
:
Betty
:
Betty’s mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Betty
Betty’s mother
Joan
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Oh, not too bad. Not too bad. Congratulate me.
You set a date?
No, nothing official Yet. I meant, I got into Penn. Grad school.
Congratulations. What about Yale?
Yale? Oh, you mean Joanie. Yeah. How about that, huh? She is
some girl.
She's terrific.
Yeah. Just the fact that she got in. I mean, she will always have
that.
Thanks to you. Miss Watson, you've been real swell to her. We
both appreciate it.
I'm sorry. "The fact that she got in," what does that mean?
Well, she'll be in Philadelphia with me. Well, that's an awful
long commute to get dinner on the table by five o’clock.
And we switch.
Thank you.
Excuse me. Excuse me. Have you seen Spencer? I can't find him
anywhere.
Actually, Spencer asked me to take you home. He has this
meeting...
In New York. Thank you.
Honey, what are you doing here?
I'm staying the night.
Spencer won't mind?.
Spencer won't notice. He is in New York again. Working.
He is working hard for both of you.
Do not lie for him, Mother. He does it so well for himself.
You're going to turn around, go home fix your face and wait for
your husband. This is the bargain you made, Elizabeth. We all
did.
: So you're not gonna let me stay in my own house?
: Spencer's house is your house now. Believe me, it's for your own
good.
: Miss Watson. Come in.
: Seven law schools within minutes of Philadelphia. You can
study and get dinner on the table by 5 o’clock .
: It's too late.
: No. Some accept late admissions. I was upset at first. Joan, the
guests. When Tommy told me that he got accepted to Penn, I
thought "Her fate is sealed. How can she throw it all away?" I
realized you won't have to. You could bake your cake and eat it
too. It’s wonderful
We're married. We eloped over the weekend. Turned out he was
petrified of a big ceremony so we did a sort of spur-of-themoment thing very romantic. Look.
It's beautiful.
It was my choice. Not to go. He would have supported it.
But you don't have to choose.
No, I have to. I want a home, I want a family. It's not something
I'll sacrifice.
No one's asking you to sacrifice that, Joan. I just want you to
understand that you can do both.
do you think I'll wake up one day and regret not being a lawyer?
Yes, I'm afraid that you will. Not as much as I'd regret not
having a family. Not being there to raise them. I know exactly
what I'm doing, and it doesn't make me any less smart. This must
seem terrible to you.
I didn't say that. I………..
Sure you did. You always do. You stand in class and tell us to
look beyond the image, but you don't. To you, a housewife is
someone who sold her soul for a center hall colonial. She has no
depth, no intellect, no interests. You're the one who said I could
do anything I wanted. This is what I want.
Congratulations. Be happy.
Joan
:
Katherine
Joan
Katherine
Joan
:
:
:
:
Katherine
:
Joan
Katherine
:
:
Katherine
Joan
:
:
Katherine
:
The man7
: Sometimes I think you say these things to provoke me. Does
your father know that you speak this way?
: Does your wife know you're here?
: Where might I find Charlie Stewart?
: Charlie Stewart? C 1744 But it's too late. You'll have to leave.
: All right.
: You can't go up there!
: What is going on here? There's no women allowed in the dorms!
: Can you please not interrupt me? Connie! What are you doing
here?
: Well, I saw...I saw Big Teeth with Kevin Tawil looking pretty
cozy, and I thought that maybe Maybe you two weren't...
: Dating?
: Yes. Thank you.
: Hey, no girls in the dorm.
: I know I have made mistakes a ton. But I never make them
twice.
: And?
Giselle
Connie
Teacher
Connie
Teacher
The students
Charlie
Connie
Charlie
Connie
The students
Connie
Joan
Connie
Giselle
Connie
Joan
Giselle
Joan
Giselle
Betty
Joan
Betty
Joan
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Connie
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Betty’s Mother
President Carr
Dr. Staunton
The woman
The woman
Betty’s Mother
Katherine
Stanley
: And it was perfect. Romantic. We stayed up all night talking.
: You're late. What happened to Sunday brunch? We stayed up all
night too. Not talking.
: The psychoanalyst? Again
: Divine exhaustion. He's married.
: He's not married like you and Tommy.
: What does that mean?
: It means he and his wife don't speak the same language.
: Spelled S-E-X. Does he pay you? For sex? At the rate you're
going, you could make a fortune.
: Betty.
: Everyone thinks so. Do you know what they say? They say
you're a whore. Once they've all sampled you, they'll toss you
aside like a used rag.
: Betty, stop now.
: The men you love don't want you. Your father doesn't want you.
: I'm gonna meet you downstairs.
: Professor Dunbar.
: Betty, that's enough.
: Everybody knows that you hide outside his house. It must be
torturous running after a man who doesn't care about you. who's
in love with someone else, who hates you. He hates you!
: Betty.
: And it hurts! No! Get off me! Quiet! Oh, God. He doesn't want
me.
: Okay.
: He doesn't sleep with me. He...
: I know
: I say no. I mean, it's not fair to her. She's not happy.
: Don't forget about her outburst. Oh, that's right. Dr. Staunton,
will you tell the alumnae the figures you have?
: Enrollment for her class next year is the highest the department's
had. Ever.
: She'd have to promise to turn in her lesson plans.
: In advance. And they'll need to be approved.
: She'll never agree to that.
: Bill, the brochures for Europe arrived. Surprise! Sir, I'm so sorry!
Who are you?
: I'm Stanley Sher a friend of Bill's. We were in the war together.
Okay you must be Katherine.
Katherine
Stanley
Katherine
Stanley
Katherine
Stanley
:
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Stanley
Katherine
Stanley
Katherine
Stanley
:
:
:
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:
:
Dunbar
Katherine
Dunbar
Katherine
Dunbar
Katherine
Dunbar
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
Katherine
Dunbar
:
:
Katherine
Dunbar
:
:
Katherine
Dunbar
Katherine
Dunbar
:
:
:
:
I am.
He told me you were a looker, but...
I'll wait for you downstairs, Stanley.
Okey-dokey.
So you and Bill were in the war together?
Yep. Now he's some fancy teacher and I'm in air conditioning.
Forget the A-bomb. Freon. It's gonna change the good old U.S.
Of A. Open the entire West to development. I'm based in El
Paso.
Oh, thank you.
And cheers.
Well, you've come a long way from San Remo.
Yes, sir. That in California?
Italy. Where you two were stationed.
Italy? Well, somebody's been pulling your long leg.We were
stationed at the Army Language Institute on Long Island. Closest
we ever got to Italy was the baked ziti at Mama Leone's. I don't
think Bill'sever been to Europe. I sure as hell haven't. Cheers.
Katherine! You okay?
I met Stan. Hell of a nice guy.
Yeah.
What a talker.
Yeah. We go back a long way.
All the way to Long Island. Secret's out. What an incredible lie.
I spoke the language, I had the uniform, people just assumed
things.
I didn't correct them. I guess I should've done.
I guess you should've done.
Katherine, look, I'm sorry, okay? I made a mistake. Just give me
a chance to straighten things out, okay?
Why couldn't you just be honest?
You don't make it easy. You're so perfect, you. It's impossible to
be honest with you.
I for you, it is.
Well, it's not just me, Katherine. Joan failed you too, right?
That's an awful thing to say.
I know, but it's the truth. If you want honesty, I can be real
honest.
You didn't come to Wellesley to help people find their way. I
think you came to help people find your way.
Betty’s mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
Betty
Mother
Betty
Betty’s mother
Betty
: I'm not accustomed to hunting you down. Elizabeth, look at me,
please. I've spoken with Mrs. Jones. There will be no divorce.
There's always a period of adjustment. I've assured her that you
will try for a year.
: Look at this, Mother.
: Spencer will try as well. According to her, he's really very upset.
You should call him.
: She's smiling. Is she happy?
: The important thing is not to tell anyone.
: She looks happy. So, what does it matter?
: Don't wash your dirty laundry in public.
: Let me tell you something. Not everything is as it seems.
Professor Carr
: Dear Miss Watson:
It is with great pleasure that we invite you to return as an
instructor. In the Art History department for the academic year.
We do wish to make clear, however, that this invitation is
absolutely conditional upon the following: Please, Nora, may we
continue?
Number one: You will teach only the syllabus as outlined by the
department chair. Number two: All lesson plans must be
submitted at the beginning of every term for approval and
revision. Number three: You shall not provide counsel beyond
your own subject.for any student at any time. And finally: That
you will agree to maintain a strictly professional relationship
with all members of the faculty.
Violet
Katherine
President Carr
: Good evening, Katherine.
: Hi, Violet.
: Assuming you accept the conditions, we look forward to your
continuing to be a part of our Wellesley tradition.
: Nice party. I didn't realize.
: It was a surprise.
: William H. Taft. What does the letter H stand for?
: Howard. Howard.
: Yes! Howard.
: Oh, it doesn't matter. The important thing is that you'll be back
next year. Hopefully living here.
: Well, I haven't really thought about that. They just told me today.
: Well, there's still plenty of time. You should be celebrating.
: You're right. You're right. Let's celebrate. Let's go upstairs and
get gussied up and go out dancing.
Katherine
Nancy
The television
Nancy
The television
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
Katherine
Nancy
The television
Katherine
Nancy
Joan
:
:
:
:
:
Silly, it's after Strike It Rich is on.
Life isn't about Strike It Rich.
It's a school night.
So what?
So I don't want to go. I'm happy here. It's back on. Do you feel
good about music Oh, isn't he handsome? Watch with me.
: "You talked me into it," says this oldie. What's the title of this
one?
: "You Made Me Love You.
: "You Made Me Love..." "You Made Me Love You."
The student
: You get all that from looking at paint on a canvas and it's her
facial expression. Her eye that makes you thinks that. I think that
makes it interesting.
: The context that it comes from affects the way we view it. I think
it provokes us because it provoked the painter. And in turn, he's
kind of sending that message to us. Whether or not it's a good
painting cannot be subjective.
: I feel like I'm missing something.
Connie
Joan
: It was Joan's idea.
: How else will you remember us?
Violet
Katherine
Violet
: They've invited you back.
: Do you think they made a mistake?
: I do.
Betty’s mother
Betty
: Elizabeth, I don't see Spencer.
: Excuse me, Mother. Miss Watson, can you help me get in touch
with your friend in Greenwich Village?
: What do you need in Greenwich Village?
: An apartment. I filed for a divorce this morning. And since we
know I'm not welcome at your house. You remember Giselle
Levy? What did you call her? "A New York kike." That's it.
Well, we're going to be roommates.
: Hi You ready?
: Yeah.
: You okay?
: Greenwich Village?
: Yeah. For a while. Then, who knows? Maybe law school. Yale,
even. Well I wouldn't want to come up against you in any court
anywhere. Maybe I can drop by next year? Keep you on your
toes. You will be here? Miss Watson?
Giselle
Betty’s mother
Betty
Giselle
Betty
Giselle
Katherine
Betty
Dear Betty
: I came to Wellesley because I wanted to make a difference. But
to change for others...
Betty
: Is to lie to yourself. My teacher, Katherine Watson, lived by her
own definition and would not compromise that. Not even for
Wellesley. I dedicate this, my last editorial to an extraordinary
woman who lived by example and compelled us all to see the
world through new eyes. By the time you read this, she'll be
sailing to Europe where I know she'll find new walls to break
down and new ideas to replace them with.
: Hold it, everybody.
: I've heard her called a quitter for leaving an aimless wanderer.
But not all who wander are aimless. Especially not those who
seek truth beyond tradition, beyond definition beyond the image.
The student
Betty
Driver
Betty
Giselle
Television
:
:
:
:
Get the hell out of the way!
I'll never forget you.
Betty! Betty!
What about after this war, Lee? Well, this job belongs to some
soldier. When he comes back he can have it.- Oh, that's swell.
Appendix 4
The Pictures of Film “Mona Lisa Smile”
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3
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