Applying Mulvey's 'Male Gaze' Theory - Bad Teacher: Car Wash Scene

The 2011 comedy film 'Bad Teacher', directed by Jake Kasdan; follows the narrative of "a lazy, incompetent middle school teacher who hates her job, her students, and her co-workers is forced to return to teaching to make enough money for breast implants after her wealthy fiancé dumps her." (IMDB, 2019). In this sequence, we see the character 'Elizabeth Halsey', played by Cameron Diaz host a car wash with her students in order to raise money for charity (although her intentions are to keep the money to herself and use it to get a boob job). This sequence applies Mulvey's 'male gaze' theory to extreme visible lengths, due to the sexualisation of the character throughout.

The scene begins with an establishing shot of a student outside the school holding up a carwash sign, however, we also see cars driving straight past the students sign. I believe that Kasdan used this short lengthed shot to reinforce the idea that people were not interested in a car wash, however this changes in the upcoming shots. We see Elizabeths car pull on to the school's carpark, with her car door opening using her legs to push the door open, this instantly enforces Mulvey's male gaze theory as "a multiplicity of viewing positions and a multiplicity of relationships to the object in view, including sexual objects"(Bolter, 1999). We also hear non-diegetic rock music play in the background as she sticks her leg out of the car, emphasising the idea that she's rebelling against the professional stereotype of a teacher and furthermore implying the disruption (in a good way) she holds within the car wash scene. 

Following these introductory shots, we see a montage of reaction shots from prominently males watching Elizabeth washing the cars. The male gaze theory is solidified within these reaction shots, with a fellow male student saying "holy shit" starting off, we also see men take off their sunglasses and smiling watching Elizabeth. The shots of Elizabeth following this are all shot in slow motion, which allows the audience to gather pleasure, as they can look for a longer period of time "In their traditional exhibitionist role women are simultaneously looked at and displayed, with their appearance coded for strong visual and erotic impact so that they can be said to connote to-be-looked-at-ness.” (Mulvey, 1989). The scene abruptly ends with a police driver crashing into another car, not watching the road but instead, watching Elizabeth - reinforcing the male gaze and adding comedic value to the film, as the stereotype of a police officer has been reverted, due to not following the law, and driving away after crashing; i.e a Hit and Run.

Bibliography:

Bolter, Jay David; Grusin, Richard (1999), "Networks of remediation", in Bolter, Jay David; Grusin, Richard, Remediation understanding new media, Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, pp. 64–87

IMDB (Accessed on 2nd January 2019), [online] "Bad Teacher - 2011", https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1284575/

Mulvey, Laura (1989) “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema.” Film Theory and Criticism :

Introductory Readings. Eds. Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen. New York: Oxford UP,

1989, pg 19.