The Danish Girl came out in 2015, to mixed praise and criticism for its portrayal of transgender women. At the time, it was one of the few films out that portrayed any sort of positive transgender experience in the mainstream media and was produced by Focus Features. The film’s release marked a huge moment for LGBTQ representation in cinema. The film is an artistic rendering of a true story that took place in the 1920s which gives voice to the history and pervasiveness of the transgender community. While the movie has serious flaws in its attempt at representing the transgender experience, The Danish Girl bears the burden of representation as it is the first major studio film to venture into that world. However, The Danish Girl accomplishes this representation with an over-sexualized, heteronormative gaze.

 

At the beginning of the film, it is unclear if Gerda, Einar’s wife, is supporting Lili’s transition or sees it as an outlet of creative expression, suggesting that if he does not want to the ball to perform himself, “maybe he could show them someone else.” The lightheartedness with which the transition is initially approached in the film made it difficult for some people to appreciate upon release because of the gravity and world-altering changes it presents in real life. In Lili’s first interaction with a man upon her debut “performance” at the artist’s ball, Hendick Sadal suggests a myth where you eat an acorn and make a wish, you can become anyone you want for a day (30 min). Again, the film seems to be suggesting that the transgender experience is only a “phase.”

 

While the film can in this way seem reductive, it speaks to the invisibility of transgender people for the duration of history. No one is able to label the experience of Einar until the latter part of the film when Gerda and Lili meet Dr. Kurt Warnekros who confirms that other people like Lili exist. In fact, earlier in the movie there is a montage of Einar going to a series of doctors and receiving a different diagnosis at each one. It is not until the end of the film that she receives any sort of answer and even then it is not met with a label, just an acknowledgment of existence. 

 

I am not transgender and cannot identify with any part of that experience. However, there are several moments throughout the movie that I felt translated the difficulty of the transgender experience. The palpable fear that Lily faces in her first moments alone with a man was palpable on the screen and difficult to watch. Her desire to be seen, loved, and appreciated as a woman stand starkly in contrast with her fear rejection by revealing her identity as a trans woman. Lili is excited by the male gaze but scared in moments of intimacy and isolation with men.

 

Another scene that is difficult to watch as a cisgendered person is the doctor’s inability to understand Lili’s experience (minute 45). The doctor’s diagnosis that Einar is chemically imbalanced and must undergo radiation stands starkly in contrast with the scene immediately before in which Einar describes how Lily has been with him since childhood.

 

While the film represents experiences that transgender individuals often go through, the way it actually represents the transgender woman in the film is through the male gaze. Throughout the film, instead of focusing on how Lili feels during her transformation, it is focused more on how Lili looks. The persistence of the male gaze is spoken about explicitly when Lili enters the artist’s ball and feels the literal male gaze on her for the first time. She blushes and hides in the corner of the room, but from that moment on, the male gaze controls Lili and dictates her actions.

 

The male gaze of the viewer can be seen in the tucking scene. The camera slowly pans down Lili’s body, focusing on her curves and other traditionally feminine areas until it fixates on the penis, the penis being tucked, and then the way the absence of a penis appears as Lili moves.

 

The male gaze can be seen even more clearly as Lili “learns” feminity by attending a peep show. Lili watches the woman perform and mimics her actions to appear more feminine. In this scene, the sex worker herself is performing a version of femininity. As Lili mimics her, Lili becomes a reflection of performed femininity. Here the film shows viewers that femininity is all about performance and appearance. The male reflection of Einar combines with the female performer through the window to suggest to viewers that Einar truly understands femininity now. The film fails to acknowledge Lili’s knowledge of feminity or female sexuality based on six years of a sexually-healthy relationship with a woman.

The film’s male gaze simplifies feminity to heteronormative sexuality and does not discuss any type of emotional or mental learning that Lili must go through. Lili’s unhappiness is expressed only through her physical deterioration and inability to present physically as a female. When looking at Lili’s weakened physical state, Gerda says “What’s happened to you. I don’t understand.” And Lili responds with “Nor do I” (1 hour, minute 18). Never in the film does a conversation center on Lili’s mental health and the way her consciousness has changed since identifying fully as Lili.

 

While Lili’s unhappiness is presented as physical weakness, the male gaze in the movie presents her happiness through clothing and attractive physical presentation. She is happiest when she is dressed as a woman. Throughout the movie, the gaze of the camera lingers on how Lili’s skin touches fabrics, what she is wearing, and the sensual way she puts on lipstick. None of the other female characters in the film face this same simplified masculine gaze — Lili is the one who becomes obsessed with what she wears, how she looks, and how much she weighs.

The Danish Girl is a complex film that brings both positive and negative elements with it. The film seems to “check all the boxes” of a transgender experience, but the checks also seemed superficial and performative. The film is one of the first major motion pictures showing a transgender experience so it bears the burden of representation, but it was also directed by a man who fails to challenge the traditional male gaze in any way. The works to be representative but does so in an over-sexualized, heteronormative way. The Danish Girl pushed forward conversation of representation in cinema and will continue to be an important platform for pushing forward diverse stories in Hollywood.

 

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SOURCES

Diawara, Manthia (1993), Black American Cinema (New York: Routledge).

Grant, Carol. “Regressive, Reductive and Harmful: A Trans Woman’s Take On Tom Hooper’s Embarrassing ‘Danish Girl.’” IndieWire, 3 Dec. 2015, http://www.indiewire.com/.

Hooper, Tom, director. The Danish Girl. Universal Pictures, 2015.

Mulvey L. (1989) Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema. In: Visual and Other Pleasures. Language, Discourse, Society. Palgrave Macmillan, London