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Hello! @CBradburyRance here, I’m a Lecturer in Liberal Arts @kingsartshums and a specialist in queer cinema, taking over @StudiocanalUK today as part of #LGBTHistoryMonth 
to discuss Todd Haynes' CAROL and how it looks back at cinema history and queer (in)visibility: (thread)
to discuss Todd Haynes' CAROL and how it looks back at cinema history and queer (in)visibility: (thread)
CAROL was adapted from Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Price of Salt, which was first published in 1952 under a pseudonym. Haven’t we come a long way since then. In many ways, the 2015 film represents a milestone in the journey towards lesbian visibility.
But for a contemporary forward-looking milestone … CAROL sure does a lot of reflecting on the past! What’s that about? Let’s see.
There are all sorts of references to classical Hollywood cinema in CAROL. In one scene, the characters watch Sunset Boulevard in the projection room of a movie theatre. Visually and narratively, it also brings to maternal melodramas like Now Voyager and thrillers like Rebecca.
Set design, costume and narrative make CAROL a beautifully observed period drama. But its cinematography recalls the images and films of the 1950s, not just the plots. Made with 16mm film, it also nods visually to the New York of photographer Saul Leiter.
CAROL diffuses desire across the screen in beautiful images of misty windows … sheets of rain and saturations of city light … lingering musical themes … the revival of celluloid grain.
In the midst of “unprecedented lesbian visibility” in the 21st century, the erotic and romantic potential of CAROL is generated by tentative looks and fleeting touches … just what lesbian spectators have long been accustomed to. Reading between the lines is our forte.
Doing the looking is Therese (Rooney Mara), a budding photographer whose day job is behind the counter at a department store. The shift in vocation from set designer in the novel to photographer in the film gives the shy, unassuming Therese the tools to amplify her gaze.
Therese falls for the eponymous Carol (Cate Blanchett), the seductive older woman who invites her for lunch and then for a road trip to escape New York. But the city isn’t far behind…
As with many of Haynes’s films – think Mildred Pierce or Far from Heaven – this is a melodrama that has touches of the director’s New Queer Cinema heritage. You never quite know what you’ll get. This slow burn romance is juxtaposed with the threatening pace of a thriller.
It turns out Carol’s husband Harge has employed a private detective to follow Carol and Therese. Suddenly, looking goes from being an erotic act to something much more sinister. It resurrects a mid-20th century homophobic trope of secrecy and surveillance.
It also directly references the beginning/ending of David Lean’s 1945 film Brief Encounter. CAROL begins out of sequence, just like Lean’s film, which famously reveals the relationship between Celia Johnston and Trevor Howard to be ill-fated before it has even begun.
[sidenote: I recommend Catherine Grant’s wonderful video essay, an ode to the comparisons between these two films] https://vimeo.com/149791810
Highsmith’s novel made a lesbian happy ending possible – a landmark moment in 1952. The final sentence reads “Therese walked towards her”. CAROL gives us a happy ending too … sort of. But like in Brief Encounter, the “goodbye” sets the tone for the whole narrative.
Conclusions hover just beyond the final frame … are we looking forward or backward? It’s up to you to read between the lines.
