Cuties – A Review Wishing You a Successful Adolescence

Among the tasks we each face in adolescence: we try to find our individual identity, that of a former child on the path to becoming a uniquely human person. We distance ourselves to be distinct from family expectations. Yet we often succumb to social pressures, conforming to the behaviors of some peer group instead.

In short: successful adolescence emerges from being molded to familial expectations without being submerged in societal expectations.

Even shorter: successful adolescence is the process of learning to be you.

Many of us never get there (as evidenced by so much angry ignorance being spouted against a film by people who have admittedly never watched it).

In the film Cuties, our protagonist Ami is precocious in making this adolescent transition. She is aware at an earlier age of the damage inflicted by her family’s shallow adherence to the behaviors of their faith. That faith is portrayed as being exploited in order to exploit the women at the center of Ami’s home. But this no-longer-a-child accommodates better than the adults around her the resulting neglect, dysfunction, and shaming. Her efforts even force her to endure an examination for demonic influence, after which the local clergyman pronounces the accusation as unfounded.

Meanwhile, Ami seeks acceptance through conformity to a popular group of girls at school, mastering their juvenile dance moves, then mentoring them in furthering their ambitions: to reflect in their eleven-year-old performances the highly sexualized routines she finds online. The forces of peer pressure, entertainment industries, and social media are shown as constantly pushing the envelope, expanding the horizons, encroaching the boundaries, and trespassing the sensibilities of those who have gone before. It seems clear that all the girls are unaware of the message communicated by the gestures and postures they mimic…until Ami finally understands what others see her body saying.

Spoiler alert: Ami succeeds in the primary task of adolescence. She appears to recognize the same underlying pressures in both systems pulling at her. She not only withdraws from the peer pressure, she rejects the faith-exploiting ritual in which her family engages. And in doing so, she finds an ally to support her, though this occurs a generation later than the viewer might have hoped.

But have no doubts: Ami is a catalyst. Not just in reflecting the exploitation of her family’s faith. Not just in rejecting the sources of social patterning. But in reminding the viewer that we each have the opportunity to view and experience the world as a unique individual. To do so, we must separate from what our family tells us to be. We must separate from what society tells us to be. And we must certainly separate from the opinions of those willing to judge what they will not see.

"Forgive us our trespasses...."

 

As a photographer, I have found myself on the back side of “No Trespassing” signs. Frankly, I saw them only when the landowner pointed them out. But I have also stepped a little too far down an embankment and ruined my pants while saving the camera. I have turned an ankle edging just past the sidewalk’s curb. I have looked at images I helped create, and deleted them when I found a bit more in the frame than I’d seen through the viewfinder. I have deleted images in which the subject’s expression was deemed embarrassing. I have shot dozens of exposures, trying to catch the right moment, angle, light, and pose…only to delete them all as being something less than the art I sought to capture.

And, by letting my reach exceed my grasp, choosing to explore beyond others’ boundaries, and releasing my fear just as surely as I released the shutter, I have experienced the fulfilling joy of being an artist privileged to look (occasionally) at an image that surpasses my vision, my imagination, and my abilities. But it has meant accepting that I sometimes tread onto property that has never been only mine. I cross lines into what others are sure should be only theirs. And I have paid for that privilege and accepted those consequences.

When did you last dare to try something you didn’t already know how to do? What prevents you from investing yourself into finding, fulfilling, and finding fulfillment in the unique, divine talents that have been invested in you? Who told you that you shouldn’t waste your time, risk your security, push your limits, and be your self? Where is the nearest boundary to cross? How would it feel for you to stand up, to step forth, and to walk boldly into showing the rest of us what you can do…what you can be…in fact, what you are?

Why not join me in exploring beyond the boundaries?

It's time to admit it. #WeDoToo

Many in our society participate in, profit from, and perpetuate an injustice system that results in, and seems to require the routine killing of unarmed Black men and others. The outraged reactions to that system’s policies and practices are predictable in their escalation. Given the well-documented history of these events, we must admit that those who build, maintain, and expand that system create the conditions, and provoke these violently outraged reactions. What I wish I could deny, however, is that #WeDoToo.

Those who allow this clear cause-and-effect pattern to exact its cost primarily from minority communities, they bear the responsibility for choosing to benefit from oppression and exploitation. I believe that #WeDoToo.

When they choose not to change the system, but expand it instead, they support, condone, and continue all the parts of that system. And #WeDoToo.

This involves not only the oppression of minority communities, but also the widespread consequences of protests, riots, and looting, and in this most recent cycle, deadly violence against persons. Those who refuse to pursue alternatives escalate the outrage and its tragic expressions. And #WeDoToo.

For me, an essential step in changing the predictable patterns of this system is to admit that “I” am one of “them.” When people like me participate in, profit from, and perpetuate this injustice system, I feel compelled to admit that I truly do cause, support, condone, and escalate the violently outraged reactions to it. I cannot claim that it is about what “they” do, when I know that #WeDoToo.

As emotionally charged as we can be about our entrenched enjoyments, our bountiful benefits, and our eager exploitation of power and privilege built and maintained at the expense of others, when we recognize how “they” fulfill their role in this system, it seems long-past time to admit #WeDoToo.

 

That is the foundational admission that leads to change. Not that I and you can do this or that against each other. Not that we and they do this or that against one another. But that when we imagine that others behave in a way that brings greater damage than healing, we take the courageous step of admitting #WeDoToo.

Do you recognize now not only the injustice, but the terrible danger of supporting this system? Do you want to see an end to the routine killing of unarmed Black men and others? Or do you at least want to diminish the dangers of these violently outraged reactions to the treatment of our minority communities?

They do. And I think #WeDoToo.