Violence is not the solution | April Monthly Top
If the Batman Slapping Robin meme has long been in pop culture, Will Smith just made history at the Academy Awards with his macho intervention to defend his wife against a more or less inspired joke by resorting to violence. In light of recent events and after rediscovering a video in which Will shows a kid how fake slapping is done in movies to make it look real, his gesture at the Oscars can be viewed from the perspective of an actor who stood out for his performance in blockbusters such as Men In Black, Independence Day and Bad Boys, which glorify aggression and divide the characters into good and bad. The Golden Age of Hollywood and the history of cinema, in general, have validated face slapping through various justifications, including gratuitous ones, reproducing the values, fantasies and power relations existing in society at that time. The power of insult, whether happening publicly as in the case of Chris Rock or in private, generates a series of negative emotions meant to humiliate the aggressed, portraying them as a weak, vulnerable and docile individual, subordinate to the autonomous, who plays the role of the aggressor, the one who takes the initiative and acts accordingly. Under the disclaimer that violence is not the solution, I used this opportunity to revisit some memorable face slaps in the history of cinema.
Film critic and programmer, she collaborates with various international film festivals. Her writing has appeared in publications such as Senses of Cinema, Kinoscope, Indiewire, Film Comment, Vague Visages and Desistfilm. In Spanish she has written for Caimán Cuadernos de Cine and in Romanian she collaborates with FILM magazine. Programmer and coordinator of Tenerife Shorts.
