News broke last week that, after he put himself forward to write the upcoming adaptation of Fifty Shades of Grey, Brett Easton Ellis has failed to make the shortlist of screenwriters for the film. Ellis, ever as outspoken and as controversial as his works, announced his interest numerous times via Twitter, casting his ideal actors and even going so far as denouncing openly homosexual Matt Bomer as 'too gay' for the role of Christian Grey. Now, he's definitely off the film with four other writers announced as those in the frontrunning, one of whom wrote Cars 2... And, controversy aside, I can't be alone in thinking that Universal has missed a trick here.
When it was first announced, via his own Twitter page, that he wished to write the film, I was a little surprised. After all, this is a world-renowned and exceptionally popular author wanting to adapt what is arguably, one of the worst-written books ever to hit the bestseller lists. But the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like a great idea. For all its terrible prose, ridiculous catchphrases and questionable sexual politics, Fifty Shades of Grey has the potential to be a dark exploration of issues surrounding Christian's more extreme sexuality and the psychology behind it. The book itself and its two sequels don't really delve into these issues beyond repeatedly reminding us that erstwhile heroine, Anastasia Steele, is the only person capable of making him feel love. Before Ana, Christian is simply an incredibly rich, really really ridiculously good-looking executive with a penchant for violence to specific pieces of music back in his pristine and state-of-the-art apartment. Sound familiar?
To anyone who has read American Psycho, and if you haven't you should rectify this immediately, Christian Grey has a lot of similarities with its central character, the murderous Patrick Bateman (something which Ellis himself has noted). Basically, Christian is a slightly crapper version of Bateman with all the hallmarks that make everyone's favourite American psychopath so interesting; Christian's just a bit less... stabby. For those not in the know, Bateman is a classic symbol of 80s excess; he has to have the latest gadget, be wearing the latest fashions and God help you if you have a better business card than him. Because alongside the extensive critiques of fashion or music albums, he also has quite the talent for sadistic violence, ranging from impulsive killing to torture, rape and mutilation. Granted, Christian never goes this far (or maybe he does, he has a Red Room of Pain after all), but the need for violence in both characters' lives is very much there. Ellis, having created Bateman, naturally has a way in to Christian's psychology and could create a fantastic, three-dimensional character that James fails to fully create.
One of the key themes that could have been explored in an Ellis adaptation is that of the main characters' masculinity and the way their anxieties become manifested in very similar ways. Violence is a key theme of both books and is used by both men to assert control over the environment and the people around them, intrinsically linked to the assertion of their manliness. Patrick Bateman is a man seemingly with everything and prides himself as such, often commenting directly to the reader on the history of his favourite pair of trainers or other such commodities in his possession. Likewise, Christian Grey has got commodities coming out of his ears and relaxes by taking out his boat, driving his sports car or flying his helicopter. Stereotypically masculine, and ever so slightly phallic, possessions are used by Christian to demonstrate not only his wealth, but also the control he has over his environment. These commodities are the aspects over which both men can control, but people are very different and, despite Ana's lack of animation, she's still a remarkably unpredictable factor in Christian's life. The violence committed against humans either consensually or with a rusty coathanger, therefore, becomes an attempt to seize the control both men believe to have lost.
For all the publicity surrounding Fifty Shades and the BDSM aspect of the sex scenes, there isn't a whole lot of the stuff in the novel; it's mostly talking about it with the unsigned contract, light bondage and a bit of spanking (A spanking! A spanking!). The focus is placed upon Christian's need for this kind of lifestyle because he has never really had 'vanilla' sex before. It's all been about him being in control, in power and maintaining that power over the female submissives he has in his possession. When he meets Ana, she (mostly) refuses to be controlled and begins to challenge his dominance. He doesn't like it and retaliates in other, incredibly sexist, ways by buying out the company she works for or dictating what contraception she should be using. Sexually, he maintains his control only through virtue of Ana being about as sexually experienced as a piece of cotton wool. When he does get violent, in the case of the spanking scene at the end of the first book, she runs away from him because she sees just how much he needs that violent control. Inflicting violence on another person is, psychologically, what he needs to get himself off. The same can be said of Bateman though his satisfaction is found not sexually, but in socially gaining over his peers. His entire world is built on him being the best, having the best things and sleeping with the best women. When that's taken away from him, he's lost and the violent aspect of his personality appears to take back the control he believes to have lost from those he feels are superior to him. He kills Paul Owen because Paul is the more successful and popular executive and his torturing and subsequent murder of Christie the prostitute is all about demonstrating his sexual and physical prowess.
Patrick Bateman is built upon these masculine-centered insecurities and when everything is taken away from him, he becomes increasingly more violent in order to assert himself. Much is made in Fifty Shades of Christian's self-confidence issues; he doesn't understand why Ana loves him for example (I don't either, but that's another point entirely) and struggles with this concept. I've had a conversation where an acquaintance tried to assert that Christian Grey doesn't have any issues with his masculinity and instead, the BDSM aspect was all about his 'desire to be loved'. Firstly, vomit. Secondly, he introduces his penis to Ana as the 'most cherished' part of his anatomy so if that isn't symbolic of 'issues with masculinity', I should probably hand back my English Literature degree and give up now. Christian needs to be in control, whether it's freeing his constant erection from his fashionable grey sweatpants, dominating his lover in the bedroom with variety of sex toys or 'protecting' Ana by beating the crap out any guy who comes near her.
What this comparison, I hope, demonstrates is that Ellis is actually quite perfect for writing the role of Christian Grey - he understands this character, he's written him, albeit in his extremity, before. Whether or not Ellis could adequately create the character of Ana Steele is another matter and would be a far trickier job seeing as she's suffers from a distinct lack of dimension. But if Hollywood were brave enough to see a Brett Easton Ellis adaptation of E.L. James' bonkbuster, I think we'd be looking at a very interesting, extremely dark take on a relationship that has a huge amount of potential to be interesting. And then I would say David Fincher or David Cronenburg to direct please because what this book needs is totally ripping apart and putting back together again with two people who know how to create a darkly compelling story.
- Becky
P.S. I'm sorry I've gone into a little depth here, I know Fifty Shades of Grey is not an actual piece of literature and is really quite appalling. Sorry. Really sorry.
Becky's review of Fifty Shades of Grey can be found here.
You can follow Becky on Twitter here @beckygracelea
Yes, you read that title right... For the first ever Assorted Buffery book review, I'm about to assess the merits of the new fictional phenomenon currently gracing the bookshelves of most women and some men everywhere; the veritable pornocopia that is E.L. James' Fifty Shades of Grey. Badly written, badly executed and quite unintentionally hysterical, I can safely say that it's one of the most entertaining books I've read in a while.
In a short space of time, Fifty Shades has become one of the most talked about books of recent times, influencing everything from failing marriages to what classical music people want to listen to (reports are indicating that sales of pieces mentioned have shot up). Women want to find their own Christian Grey and from what I've read, most men either want to thank him or punch him in the face. So what is all the fuss about? It was originally created as Twilight fan fiction, something that is immediately horrifying, and all the hallmarks are still there; controlling, "mercurial" hero who has a dark secret and a heroine who has no discernible personality traits and bites her lip so often that I'm honestly surprised it didn't fall off. Anastasia Steele, or Ana as she prefers, is an English Literature student about to graduate when she meets the enigmatic billionaire Christian Grey (Steele/Grey - get it? They're like totally meant to be together). Less of a plot and more of an excuse for an increasing amount of sex scenes in random locations, Ana finds herself pulled into the mysterious and controlling world of Grey as she finds herself questioning what exactly does she want from a relationship where she regularly finds herself tied to things.
So just who are Ana and Christian? Well aside from being as multi-dimensional as your standard piece of cardboard, they're actually pretty annoying. Ana, for example, clearly does not belong to the 21st century, acting like a throwback to a time when women were demure and had no worldly knowledge whatsoever. I've no problem with her being a virgin because it allows her to approach Christian's tastes with a healthy dose of WTF but what university student doesn't have a laptop in 2011? Or a mobile phone? Or an EMAIL ADDRESS? My friend's dog has an email address for crying out loud. Her inability to deal with the outside world, despite being of one of the most computer-literate generations there has ever been, makes her seem like an idiot. Meant to be an intelligent, free-thinking woman, Ana has the capacity to be a decent heroine but one glance at Mr Grey and his piercing gaze, all principles fly out of the window and she ceases to have any redeeming features. The most annoying Ana-aspect though is that she's followed at all times by her angelic, judgemental subconscious and her permanently peppy and devilish inner-goddess. Throwing in a bit of Freud 101 despite having clearly never read any psychoanalysis, James sees the subconscious and inner goddess (bleurgh) as voices of reason or passion but instead, the italicized pair unintentionally form one of the best fictional comic double-acts since Fred and George Weasley.
Then, of course, there's Christian Grey, dancer, pilot, piano player and all-round douchebag. How anyone can be this perfect is beyond me and that doesn't add to his allure, it just makes him seem all the less realistic, an untouchable set of abs in some well-fitting sweatpants. The only time his character actually appealed to me was in the various flirty emails that were sent between the pair. When he wasn't being ridiculously controlling and paternal (a scary trait in its own right), he was actually quite charming, displaying a sense of humour that's much more attractive than his conveniently messy hair. But every dark, brooding hero has to have his dark secret and it's not how he manages to say everything either "darkly" or "dryly". No, his little obsession is with BDSM. Maybe it's a personal taste thing, but I just don't understand why this man is sending thousands of women into a frenzy, wishing for their own version. I have no issue with the BDSM aspect (people can do whatever they like as long as its consensual and above board) but his Red Room of Pain sounds more like the Brown Room of Really Boring Furniture, making it about as erotic as the Antiques Roadshow. And if anyone ever spoke to me the way he speaks to Ana, all they'd see next would be the door swinging shut. But, he's like, so hot. So I guess that makes it ok.
But I'm not really that naive, I know people aren't reading this because of the characters, or the plot, or even the frankly god-awful prose; they're reading it for the sex scenes. Ranging from your standard "vanilla sex" (her words, not mine) to riding crops and insertable silver balls, we get sex in a boat house, in the shower, on the desk but not, as Ana mournfully observes, on the piano. Because attempting to play Für Elise with your arse must be, like, the sexiest thing ever. Despite the author's best efforts and the considerable stamina of her characters, none of this was particularly erotic, mainly due to the way in which James describes everything. I find it difficult to take anything like this seriously when the narrator consistently refers to her genitals as "down there" or "my sex" because you would think thesaurus.com offers a little more. Also, how many times can a person "shatter into tiny pieces" every orgasm before their molecular structure starts to have issues? Women are not made of china, thank you very much. Then there's Christian's sex talk which is consistently hilarious. Take for example, this little beauty: "I don't make love. I like to fuck... hard". At this point, I was laughing so hard, I had to walk away from the book for five minutes just to recover and Ana's exclamation of "Orgasm! Another one!" brought tears to my eyes.
The book isn't all sex and inadvertent hilarity though and, if you think about it, it is actually quite disturbing. That people think that this relationship is romantic, one that is based on the woman being entirely submissive, not only sexually, but socially, is very worrying. James gives us the entire contract that is held between the two of them and details the conditions set by Christian which include dictating how much Ana eats and how she dresses. I'm determined to not get involved in the debate around the sexual politics of this novel because they are so horrendously awful, it'll just result in my typing angry capitals of RAGE across the screen. But, to put it briefly, the relationship between the two of them is not good; he's controlling, manipulative and scarily aware of her monthly bodily functions. He infantilises her throughout the book, "admonishing" her about everything from not eating to drinking too much, forces her to drive a different car and what contraception to use. Granted, she gets points for not giving into him easily on everything, but she's not about to win any awards for Best New Feminist Icon.
With Fifty Shades of Grey, I know it's supposed to be entertainment and it definitely can't be taken seriously, but it won't stop me being a little angry at the portrayal of Christian and Ana yet despite the terrible prose, dubious sexual politics and woeful characterisation, I was completely hooked. I read the entire book in one sitting and will shortly be obtaining the next two in the trilogy, a fact of which I am a little ashamed. I don't care about the characters, I find the entire thing about as erotic as stamp-collecting and it is so badly written, I spend half the time laughing at it. Nevertheless, I want to read on, I want to know what happens. At one point, Ana thinks that "perhaps in the morning, this might not read like a bad joke" and I thought the exact same thing about this book, but it still does, it's still awful. All that being said, I can't deny I enjoyed it. It's bloody hilarious and all credit to E.L. James because she actually got people to buy this crap by the bulkload. And I can't argue with that.
Now if you will excuse me, I need to stop my inner goddess from tango-ing out the window.
- Becky
You can find more ramblings from Becky here http://beckygracelea.blogspot.com
Or you can follow her on Twitter @beckygracelea
Patrick Bateman is built upon these masculine-centered insecurities and when everything is taken away from him, he becomes increasingly more violent in order to assert himself. Much is made in Fifty Shades of Christian's self-confidence issues; he doesn't understand why Ana loves him for example (I don't either, but that's another point entirely) and struggles with this concept. I've had a conversation where an acquaintance tried to assert that Christian Grey doesn't have any issues with his masculinity and instead, the BDSM aspect was all about his 'desire to be loved'. Firstly, vomit. Secondly, he introduces his penis to Ana as the 'most cherished' part of his anatomy so if that isn't symbolic of 'issues with masculinity', I should probably hand back my English Literature degree and give up now. Christian needs to be in control, whether it's freeing his constant erection from his fashionable grey sweatpants, dominating his lover in the bedroom with variety of sex toys or 'protecting' Ana by beating the crap out any guy who comes near her. 
