Me and my friends have made a “short film” last Saturday. It is a sequel to another “short film” that we called “Hey Jacob, Bring Over Some Ice Cream”.
A Feminist Postmodern Dialectic of Marxist Phenomenology of “Cheese and Crackers”
As an English major in my final semester, I can give my completely unbiased and educated analysis of “Cheese and Crackers.” The previous film (“Ice Cream”) is clearly about desiring something that is difficult to attain, the elusive ice cream. Gila Monster’s film debut is poignant, if jejune (a formidable attempt for a first time director). “Cheese and Crackers” covers a similar theme, and yet the least of the main character’s worries is the attaining of the metaphorical (or perhaps metaphysical) “Cheese and Crackers.” He can easily GET the cheese, but he is trying to CUT the cheese throughout the whole film. The cheese will not yield to Leslie’s desires, making it more desireable than the ice cream ever will be.
The crackers themselves are barely touched upon, as they are quite easy to attain and use. The crackers would be more than happy to part with Leslie alone, to Saltine bliss. But, clearly, the crackers come second (even in the title) to Leslie’s… hunger. The crackers, as mentioned before, are too easy and the cheese is completely unyielding. This is where the filmmaker’s sexist (although masterful) vision comes through.
The cheese and crackers represent the character’s vision of woman. While the ice cream was a brief fling, he even gives up his finger (possible castration complex- psychoanlysis is inherently sexist) for the “cheese” of his dreams. The cheese and crackers, when finally united, are a source of orgasmic desire for Leslie, but after he is finished with them he does not dwell on them… the film ends. Thusly, after Leslie gets his “hunger” sated he leaves the “cheese and crackers” without a thought.
I hope that future filmgoers will forgive the brilliant Gila Monster and James for their sexism, as their vision is still a vividly filmed masterpiece.
Interestingly, and since he asked, GAP’s first two paragraphs aren’t exactly the kind of post-modernist “gender” and “power” obsessed tripe in the vein of much recent academic criticism, but is pretty close to more historical criticism about characters’ motivations and so forth, although it is silly.