83. Good Vibrations &...

Lyrics

I, I love the colorful clothes she wears
And the way the sunlight plays upon her hair
I hear the sound of a gentle word
On the wind that lifts her perfume through the air

I'm pickin' up good vibrations
She's giving me excitations
I'm pickin' up good vibrations (Oom bop, bop, good vibrations)
She's giving me excitations(Oom bop, bop, excitations)
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop)
She's giving me excitations(Oom bop, bop, excitations)
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop)
She's giving me excitations (Oom bop, bop, excitations)

Close my eyes
She's somehow closer now
Softly smile, I know she must be kind
When I look in her eyes
She goes with me to a blossom world

I'm pickin' up good vibrations
She's giving me excitations
I'm pickin' up good vibrations (Oom bop, bop, good vibrations)
She's giving me excitations (Oom bop, bop, excitations)
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop)
She's giving me excitations (Oom bop, bop, excitations)
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop)
She's giving me excitations (Oom bop, bop, excitations)

(Ah)
(Ah my my what elation)
I don't know where but she sends me there
(Ah my, my, what a sensation)
(Ah my, my, what elations)
(Ah my, my, what)

Gotta keep those lovin' good vibrations
A happenin' with her
Gotta keep those lovin' good vibrations
A happenin' with her
Gotta keep those lovin' good vibrations
A happenin'

Ah
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop, I'm pickin' up good vibrations)
She's giving me excitations (Oom bop, bop, excitations)
Good good good good vibrations (Oom bop, bop)
She's na, na 

Na, na, na, na, na
Na, na, na
Na, na, na, na, na
Na, na, na
Do, do, do, do, do,
Do, do, do
Do, do, do, do, do,
Do, do, do

I understand that this was a very important and influential pop song, I just don't get it. I have this problem with other Beach Boys songs too, but I find most of them to be at least slightly enjoyable. I don't like this song at all. It's also very hard to link a movie to it, so I chose one about the invention of the vibrator.

The Movie: Hysteria (Tanya Wexler, 2011)

In a previous post I wrote about Amelia. I was one of the few people to like that movie. It was not very surprising though. I do enjoy these middlebrow biographical movies about pioneering inventors and explorers. So I also enjoyed Hysteria which is. by all accounts, a better movie than Amelia. Having said that, it is just about the least subversive movie possible about a subversive invention. For a movie about the invention of the vibrator it is also unbelievably prudish, only talking about sexual activities in euphemisms, complete with the giggling we usually associate with 12-year old kids when they hear something they shouldn't. To some extent the movie should be lauded for this. Considering it takes place in the 19th century, it could be argued that the movie at times successfully adopts, and adapts to, the mindset of that time and its people. If a progressive 19th century artist could make a movie about the invention of the vibrator, it would probably resemble this quite strongly. But a progressive person in the 19th century is a conservative one in the 21st, and the movie does at times play like it wants to appeal too much to everybody, even to those 'modern' conservatives who do not all think highly of all the changes brought on by the sexual revolutions of the 19th and 20th century. 

As such, while the movie very compellingly and entertainingly depicts how progressive doctor Mortimer Granville (Hugh Dancy) comes to invent the vibrator together with the eccentric Edmund St. John Smythe (Rupert Everett, who is having a shitload of fun in the role) it focuses a bit too much on that. The movie is more interested in how Smythe and Granville might profit from their invention, and be helped by it, than in the societal changes brought about by their invention. It's certainly not like they are not discussed, but the movie could have done much more with it. Especially because the movie, at least, at the beginning pretends to be interested in the importance science can have for society, especially for those who are not very well of. The movie begins after all with  a scene in which Mortimer quits a hospital because his boss there, not believing in germs, does not wash his hands, nor does he disinfect the wounds of a poor old woman. Furthermore as the proud British movie it is, it constantly name drops revolutionary British scientist and thinkers, without ever returning to their ideas again. The movie wants desperately to be nothing more than light entertainment, and it works very well as such. But this material could have been even more interesting, if the movie had a bit more guts, and was a bit more critical, or subversive, or tried to link these ideas to the modern world. 

The movie also could have given the women in the movie more agency. After all, the fact that it gave women more agency over their lives is the reason the vibrator is such an important invention. At times the movie plays as if someone only wanted to make a movie about the vibrator, because it allowed to make one of those 'delightfully' prudish movies full of shamefully giggling ladies, not because anyone really cared about the vibrator. The movie would also be better if it gave the women more agency, that would mean that Maggie Gyllenhaal would have a bigger role and that's always a good thing. Her character is also the best realized one. She is a feminist who fights for women's rights to vote, but understands that those rights are meaningless until the majority of  the Britsh people (both men and women) have food, clothes, a home and education.So she runs a settlement home and needs a doctor. The movie quite predictably leads to a romance between Gyllenhaal and Dancy, which still works, because both the actors and their characters are charming and kind. It's a pleasure to watch both of them. Dancy especially is quite surprisingly good. I had heard of him before, and after searching IMDB found out I had seen several movies in which he had a substantial role, but I had never actually noticed him. I probably won't in the future either, but this role seems perfect for him.