Surrealism as transgression

Please note that this post contains reference to challenging themes. Given the nature of the film we are studying, this is unavoidable!

Initial analysis - Like A Prayer (1989)

• Madonna is wearing a revealing dress in a church, forming a binary opposition 
• The MES of a field of burning connotative of disrespect for religion and deliberately offensive to certain audiences.
• The burning crosses could also be a reference to the Klu Klux Klan, a white supremecist, racist American group. Is this challenging and disrespecting organised religion, and criticising the issue of black oppression in America.
• The CU shot of Madanna seductively kissing the foot of Jesus is potentially blasphemous, conflating religious devotion and sexuality. It is also clearly an intertextual reference to :’age D’or
• The police station and the church are the same setting, perhaps criticising organised religion 
• Issues such as state oppression of black men in America are violently depicted
• Jesus is sexualised throughout, and is positioned as an object of sexual desire 
• The montage of shots of Madonna lying on the floor, touching her legs, and then gasping in an ECU reaction shot is connotative of masturbation, which once more is highly transgressive
• Jesus is played by a black man, challenging our preconceptions about Jesus and his identity

Exploring how themes of transgression are encoded in the ‘child murder scene’

• The use of reaction shots heightens a shocking and upsetting mode of address. The brutality of the child murder forms a binary opposition with the uncaring performance of the onlooking bourgeoisie. In fact, their facial expressions could be interpreted as frustration
• In the alarming montage that leads up to the child’s death, the recurring mid shot of the ‘father’ depicts his exaggeratedly angry expression. This hatred towards his own child is both inappropriate and shocking 
• Another mid shot encodes the harmless prank of the child, who playfully knocks something out of his father’s hands. The resulting murder is clearly an overreaction, and is designed to shock the audience 
• The murder has an animalistic quality. The initial tracking shot of father and son walking towards the mansion symbolises family and togetherness. Yet this is swiftly conflicted when we see the father ruthlessly murder the son in a close up reaction shot that evokes the killing of an animal. To further emphasise the transgressive nature of the scene, the father shoots the child’s corpse in the head, the reaction of which is demonstrating in a hideous close up 
• There is a complete cognitive dissonance encoded throughout this sequence; the reactions of the bourgeoisie and the nonchalant reaction of the child murderer present a range of conflicting ideologies 
• A striking montage depicts the violent death of a maid as she is literally blown up in a cooking accident. We cut from her violent death to a reaction mid shot of a group of middle aged bourgeoise women chatting happily, constructing a clear ideological perspective that the lives of the working class are nothing to the ruling class.

How does L’age d’or construct a coherent narrative in an unconventional way?

• The final sequence, functioning as a coda to the film as a whole, takes an abrupt change, and situates the narrative among the events of The Marquis de Sade’s scandalous pornographic novel The One Hundred and Twenty Days of Sodom. In doing so, a range of innovative cinematographic and editing techniques are used, along with the intertextuality of the reference, to construct a surprisingly coherent, yet unconventional narrative. 
• Cinematography: the length of scene is arduous, with a lack of editing forcing the audience to endure the almost torturous narrative. This is further emphasised through the MES of a figure, apparently dressed as Jesus. The actor, actually a professional Jesus impersontor creates an undeniably blasphemous mode of address that intentionally infuriates the audience. Jesus is constructed through a midshot, which, through emphaising his costume, leaves the audience in non doubt as to his origin. This deliberately provocative image is designed to construct a scandalous response.
• Additionally, the nightmarish and oppressive sound of drums, looping in an endless cycle clearly symbolises ceremony and religious practices, and in taking place in a series of long takes reinforces the ideological perspectives of fundamental and traditional religiosity.