All the Boys Love Mandy Lane is a suspenseful, yet promiscuous movie about a girl named Mandy Lane whom all of the boys admire. They practically throw themselves at her, and yet all they want to do is have bragging rights to say they were able to seal the deal with her. Mandy, knowing how boys feel about her, plays innocent and does not fall for their immaturity. It gets to a point where everyone who gets involved with her gets hurt. She becomes the center of attention in every scene without even knowing it. Both boys and girls cannot stop looking at her because she is beautiful, almost like she has no flaws at all. But when Mandy and a group of friends go to a ranch house and start getting picked off one by one, that is when events take a turn for the worst, which leads to an unbelievable plot twist!
In Carol Clover's article, she mentions a lot of themes such as how the victim is portrayed, a terrible place, weaponry, sexual transgressors, and the final girl aspect. These components stood out to me the most in this especially, but they are also common themes throughout a variety of slasher films. Obviously, the victim in this case would be Mandy Lane. In her article, Clover describes the victim as being beautiful and a sexually active woman. I feel as though that is a gender stereotype because when the audience sees a female as a victim, especially f she is beautiful, they assume that she is sexually active. Which in this case is false; Mandy Lane was a virgin and knew how to carry herself as a young lady. In this movie, I felt like they portrayed the male characters perfectly. They were your typical high school boys being jerks and taking advantage of the girls. There was one scene where a girl named Marlin performed oral sex on Jake, both friends of Mandy, and Jake just got what he wanted out of Marlin and did not reciprocate the act, making Marlin feel dumb and ashamed for what she had just done. She was a victim in this case too, even though she kind of brought it upon herself.
The terrible place they are at is a ranch house for a weekend getaway. It's typical that this house is literally in the middle of nowhere. There are no neighbors and practically no civilization around them. So basically it is the perfect place to kill people. When it gets dark out. that is when it is the perfect time to seize the opportunity. After Jake leaves Marlin in the barn, she's all alone, it is dark, she is begging for him to come back so she can leave because she cannot see a thing. So what happens next? The killer sees this as the perfect opportunity because he catches her all alone.
Although Clover suggests that guns are not used in slasher films, there was a small amount of time where guns came into play. I think that knives are a common weapon in these types of movies. The gun used in the movie killed three person, Jake was shot two or three times and Marlin pretty much just got her face bashed in my the gun. And Red, one of Mandy's good friends was shot in the back. Their friend Bird was slashed in the eyes with a knife and Chloe was stabbed in the stomach. A gun is definitely a more masculine weapon and a knife would be considered a more feminine weapon. I feel like a gun gets the job done, but a knife takes a lot longer and prolongs the suffering process.
There was sexual tension in almost every scene of the movie, which leads to Clover's point on sexual transgressors. This is when a couple is trying to find a place where no one will be so that they can have sex. This happens in the barn as I described above, right after performing oral sex on Jake, Marlin is killed. Same thing happens again with Red and Chloe. They think they are safe and that they got away from the killer so they share an intimate kiss with one another. I'd say about four seconds into the kiss, Red is shot by the killer. The sexual tension just leads to trouble in this movie.
The final girl aspect is when the victim is a female and she is able to escape, she comes out alive.This where the plot twist comes in because Mandy Lane is the final girl, but she is not as innocent as she has been portraying herself to be. She was the brains of the whole operation and she knew she could manipulate Emmet, the killer, because he was in love with her. Usually, the female is taking orders from the male. But, a lot of the time in this movie, the males were the victims. She schemed and had all of her friends killed; and had Emmet do the dirty work. In her article, Clover states that the final girl is usually boyish, and describes the killer as not being fully masculine, which is true because Emmet had been taking orders from Mandy this whole time.
Clover's description describes Mandy perfectly: smart, competent, sexual reluctance, etc. And she is able to get away in the end, she played off of every guy's emotion and appealed to them. She manipulated the men because she knew she had power over them, and in the end outsmarted each and every one of them.
Good job with the blog! I've actually never even heard of this movie before, but you did a good job explaining it. I can definitely see how all of these characters stood in awe of her and how she always managed to capture everyone's attention, even when not really seeking it. I found it interesting that the killer found himself taking her orders. It seems as if it would be difficult to change a killer's mind, considering once they realize what they want to do, there's no stopping them. However, if you are that good looking, I guess you can have your way! Good job!
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