Download (12MB) - University of Salford Institutional Repository

the novel's protagonist Roxanne, Lucy has grown suspicious of pretty faces and is ready to
listen to her Cyrano (Osvaldo) as he opens up to her. As a result - by taking Osvaldo's words
as the 'proof of love' referred to by the French guest Mons. Guillaume ('II n'y a pas d'amour,
il n'y a que des preuves d'amour') - Lucy confirms that modern day women, without giving
up their independence (Lucy travels, smokes cannabis, and has total control of her sex life)
want to experience real feelings in their relationships again. This is indicated in Lucy's
harmonious love scene with Osvaldo, which contrasts with Niccolo's calculating and
hypocritical sexual approach from which Lucy departs in tears, feeling degraded by the
experience.
By this realistic portrayal of a young woman who achieves a sort of third way that
allows her simultaneously to avoid historical female passivity and contemporary
manifestations of sex as part of consumerism, Stealing Beauty broaches the question of
modern day womanhood as do certain other films in which the 'problem of woman as a
subject of desire and as subject to social discourses is presented' (Cowie, 1997:14). Credit
should be given to Bertolucci for dealing with such issues in a way that, on the one hand,
avoids the irritating aestheticism of Hollywood romantic comedies (e.g. The Runaway Bride,
Carry Marshall, 1999) in which, between the two presentable male protagonists who are
vying to be chosen by the female, the particularly gorgeous one, with whom the woman will
naturally end up, is also more intelligent and charming. Such artificial and idealized
narratives are bound to draw irony from non-mainstream female spectators. On the other
hand, Stealing Beauty also avoids radical feminist perspectives that often alienate male
spectators and make them feel misrepresented. In this respect, the film manages to align
viewers of both genders with the character of Osvaldo by presenting him as the embodiment
of the authenticity sought by female spectators, and by developing a cognitively and
intellectually gratifying storyline in which fragile insecure men can potentially secure
304