American Studies Movie Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

American Studies - Movie Review Example The title of the film, as well as the term used to describe its characters, is disturbing, although it is the term that circus performers have traditionally used to refer to themselves. There is much about the film that is disturbing, and not just because it is a horror film. Joan Hawkins (1996), in her discussion of the film, treats the two most obvious identify features, disability and gender. Because identity is more complicated than that, however, I would include race, although I agree with Hawkins’ interpretations. As Douglas C. Baynton (2001) has rightly points out, â€Å"Disability has functioned historically to justify inequality for disabled people themselves, but it has also been done so for women and minority groups† (33). I would say that the characters in â€Å"Freaks† consider themselves a race of people, the membership of which depends upon their status as people with disabilities. When the freaks decide to accept the trapeze artist Cleopatra into their community, even though she is â€Å"normal,† they perform an elaborate, religious-like ceremony to commemorate it.