Crumbling rejuvenation: Archetype, embodiment and the “aging beauty myth”

Dolan, Josephine

Abstract

Mobilising Jungian formulations of the archetypal crone, this paper explores the figure of the rejuvenated, wicked witch/ evil stepmother as represented in two big budget, fantasy films, Stardust (Dir., Vaughn, 2007) and Snow White and the Huntsman (Dir., Sanders, 2012). Through the figure of the ‘crone, a link is established between Jungian psychoanalytic understandings of myth as an expression of historically and culturally specific repressions; and Mythologies, Barthes’s semiological account of depoliticised speech, and its ideological function. From this position, the films’ CGI enabled transformations from youthful beauty to aged crone are located in the feminised regulatory regime of ‘successful ageing’ as it plays into ideologies of rejuvenation and chronological decorum as they are embodied by actors and/or stars. Given that both films end with the punishing, violent disintegration of the crone into abjection and death, this paper argues that they expose three prevailing cultural anxieties that are simultaneously mythical and mythological; one, a repressed fear that rejuvenation is no more than an ideological veneer that overlays inevitable decline and mortality; two, a repressed awareness of mortality; three, the ideological effacement of ‘old age’ as being both performative and culturally produced.

Citation

Dolan, J. (2015). Crumbling rejuvenation: Archetype, embodiment and the “aging beauty myth”. In L. Hockley, & N. Fadina (Eds.), The Happiness Illusion: How the Media Sold Us a Fairytale (75-88). London & New York: Routledge

• Publication Date: Jun 25, 2015
• Deposit Date: Feb 24, 2016
• Publicly Available Date: Dec 25, 2016
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 75-88
• Book Title: The Happiness Illusion: How the Media Sold Us a Fairytale
• ISBN: 9780415728690
• Keywords: Stardust, Snow White, myth, ageing, beauty, mortality
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/832513
• Publisher URL: https://www.routledge.com/products/9780415728706
• Additional Information: Additional Information : This is an Accepted Manuscript of a book chapter published by Routledge in The Happiness Illusion: How the Media Sold Us a Fairytale on 25 June 2015, available online: https://www.routledge.com/products/9780415728706