Feminist Philosophy and Film: The Conditions of Sexual Violence in Marilyn Frye's Politics of Reality and Joyce Chopra's Smooth Talk

Eliminating sexual violence requires understanding where it comes from and why it happens. We must learn to detect when the grounds for violence are being built up so that we can promptly take them down. How can we improve our ability to notice the subtle practices of sexism and make them a matter of critical reflection? The aim of this paper is to show how film can enhance critical perception of the social conditions that give rise to sexual violence in particular. We do this by way of a specific example, showing how Joyce Chopra’s 1985 film Smooth Talk serves to display the complex circumstances that make sexual violence possible – thereby illustrating Frye’s philosophical insight about the interconnected mechanisms of oppression.​