The Constant Gardener
The Constant Gardener is a wonderful movie, and even though I’m going to complain about it, I really recommend it!
Not only does this film tell an incredible story that many of us would rather ignore (corporate greed, dehumanization of poor people of color, depths of corruption and horror in Kenya and Sudan) but the female lead character is fantastic.
I want to be friends with Tessa. She’s tenacious, resolute, compassionate and vivacious. She’s also beautiful, so it’s no surprise that she’s a sexual/romantic interest for several men in the film.
Unfortunately for these men (and eventually for Tessa) the very passion and resolve that attracts these men to Tessa is what they eventually want to squelch in her. It is her very uncontrolable-ness that makes her so desirable, but the men who care for her then want to control her. Perhaps they secretly wish that she will only be tenacious, vivacious and compassionate for them? Or only use these traits in their service?
After her murder (not a spoiler, this happens at the beginning of the film), her husband, Justin, gets caught up in whether or not she was cheating on him, not able to focus on finding out why she was killed. The mystery of her fidelity may just be too overwhelming for him to see around, but the implication is that he cannot wholeheartedly investigate her murder without knowing if she had sex with other men. And this implies that her worth is based, at least in part, on her sexual relationships. Certainly a partner’s integrity is hugely important, but women are too often valued by men based on their sexual situation (be it virgin, fertile, arousing, etc.).
This is a realistic story of gender and love relationships, and it’s just fine that the movie portrays it. What is shameful is that the film uses the mystery of Tessa’s sexual relationships to carry the plot for too long. Not only is Justin obsessed with Tessa’s fidelity, but the film invites the viewer to obsess about it as well. While it sure is compelling drama, it encourages the viewer to see Tessa primarily as a sexual object.
The reduction of such a vital and passionate person to an object for others’ possession and gratification mirrors the meta-story of the film: that greed of the powerful feeds on the acceptance that some people are not worth as much as others; that some are less than human, even expendable.
Filed under: movies on September 15th, 2008 by Anna Lisa
I don’t know, maybe it’s because infidelity has happened both to me and around me to great personal impact, but the idea of that question – that someone was honest about their conduct within a relationship – doesn’t seem inherently tied to his or her sexual objectification.
Fidelity (as it is constructed within individual relationships not as it has been traditionally mandated – and gendered – by our culture) can ultimately be about keeping promises. Broken promises are one of life’s greatest little moral questions. From my vantage, the Constant Gardener used that tight-focus question to examine larger, social issues of promises and morality much less than it depicted a woman as an object.
Which is not to say that Justin isn’t ultimately a truly pathetic character.
plot of the Constant Gardener shows up in real life:
US Tests HPV on Immigrants
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/09/15/immigrant-gardasil/