The Gaze and The Spielberg Face: Steven Spielberg's Application of Lacan's Mirror Stage and Audience Response

Abstract

Through the theoretical framework of Jacques Lacan's “mirror stage,” this study employs statistical analysis to code the frequency with which Spielberg utilizes the “gaze” in his work to emotionally influence viewers by providing them with desirable images of the human face. This study examines if these psychologically desirable images are used with more frequency in Spielberg's successful films, thus providing quantitative support for the assertion that Spielberg “manipulates” his audience through his signature style.

Notes

Notes

1 Truffaut would later have a co-starring role in Spielberg's Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

2 Althusser specifically separates the ideological state apparatuses (ISAs), such as family, schools, and churches, from official government and political apparatuses, which he called the “repressive state apparatuses” (RSAs; Lewis, 2009).

3 It should be noted that this study uses the phrase “the gaze” in a different context than does Mulvey, whose groundbreaking work in feminist film theory used the term to identify the “male gaze,” which asserted that Hollywood cinema constructed films from a male point of view and women on screen were coded to be objectified by the “gaze” of the camera. However, her work was also influential in establishing the psychology of the audience and spectator theory, which is highly relevant to theories put forth here.

4 Though Salt does not specifically mention it by name, he is clearly referring to the auteur theory, an assumption Buckland (2008) also makes in his essay “What Does the Statistical Analysis of Film Involve?”

5 It has been a long-standing rumor in film circles that Spielberg, who was the executive producer of Poltergeist, did in fact direct the film on set instead of Tobe Hooper, who was formally credited with directing the film. Accounts differ on the veracity of this rumor, but through interviews and other biographical accounts, there seems to be a consensus that Spielberg exceeded his role as producer on set, often stepping in to “direct” while Hooper looked on (McBride, 2011).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Joseph Fortunato

Joseph Fortunato is a full-time faculty member in the School of Film, Dance and Theatre at Arizona State University and spent 15 years in the entertainment industry as a development executive and writer for TV and film. This article is based on a paper that was honored in 2013 as a “top paper” of the Visual Communication Division at the annual AEJMC Conference. Email: [email protected]