By Sarah Cummings, Staff Writer, Emerson College
Trigger warning for discussions of sexual assault/rape
“You don’t think my body looks weird?”
“Are you kidding? You’re gorgeous.”
This sounds like pretty standard dialogue. Maybe something you’d hear in a PG-13 romance, or maybe a Disney Channel Original Movie. The sexy football player notices the insecure girl, and she can’t believe that he likes her because how could anyone like someone who looks like me? But then he tells her that she is beautiful, so she starts to feel beautiful, and they have their magical first kiss in the rain, or at the school dance. We see this plot all the time.
In Trust, this exchange takes place in a motel room between fourteen year old Annie, and a 40-something-year-old she knows as Charlie.
The 2010 film Trust examines rape culture in a way that we don’t often see. The movie follows Annie as she talks to a guy she meets on a teen chat room. After a few months they decide to meet (at a public mall), and Annie sees that Charlie is twenty years older than he claimed. When she gets upset, Charlie convinces her that age doesn’t matter when you connect with someone the way they did, and that he thought she was mature enough to understand that. I think a lot of girls would be excited to hear this, as we are taught from books and movies how important it is to find a guy who thinks we are special.
Annie decides to go back to Charlie’s hotel room. Initially, when he starts trying to have sex with her, she asks him to wait. It’s clear that she’s distressed, but Charlie continues and tells her it’s okay, and eventually she stops resisting. For the majority of the rest of the movie, Annie doesn’t believe she was raped.
The social commentary in Trust was fascinating. When we talk about rape culture, we usually talk about how our society teaches men to view women. Women are often presented as objects, and we are taught to believe that women who dress or act a certain way always want sex even if they don't give consent. Or, worse, women who act or dress a certain way are ‘sluts’, and therefore aren't deserving of consent.
While all of this is extremely problematic and important, Trust focuses on how society teaches women to view themselves, and how this can add another layer to rape culture.
When Annie is at Charlie's motel, he asks her to put on lingerie he bought her. She is clearly uncomfortable in front of him that exposed, and when he asks her to sit she keeps a foot of space between them. After he tells her that she is gorgeous, she asks, “you’re not disappointed or anything?”
“You don’t think my body looks weird?”
“Are you kidding? You’re gorgeous.”
This sounds like pretty standard dialogue. Maybe something you’d hear in a PG-13 romance, or maybe a Disney Channel Original Movie. The sexy football player notices the insecure girl, and she can’t believe that he likes her because how could anyone like someone who looks like me? But then he tells her that she is beautiful, so she starts to feel beautiful, and they have their magical first kiss in the rain, or at the school dance. We see this plot all the time.
In Trust, this exchange takes place in a motel room between fourteen year old Annie, and a 40-something-year-old she knows as Charlie.
The 2010 film Trust examines rape culture in a way that we don’t often see. The movie follows Annie as she talks to a guy she meets on a teen chat room. After a few months they decide to meet (at a public mall), and Annie sees that Charlie is twenty years older than he claimed. When she gets upset, Charlie convinces her that age doesn’t matter when you connect with someone the way they did, and that he thought she was mature enough to understand that. I think a lot of girls would be excited to hear this, as we are taught from books and movies how important it is to find a guy who thinks we are special.
Annie decides to go back to Charlie’s hotel room. Initially, when he starts trying to have sex with her, she asks him to wait. It’s clear that she’s distressed, but Charlie continues and tells her it’s okay, and eventually she stops resisting. For the majority of the rest of the movie, Annie doesn’t believe she was raped.
The social commentary in Trust was fascinating. When we talk about rape culture, we usually talk about how our society teaches men to view women. Women are often presented as objects, and we are taught to believe that women who dress or act a certain way always want sex even if they don't give consent. Or, worse, women who act or dress a certain way are ‘sluts’, and therefore aren't deserving of consent.
While all of this is extremely problematic and important, Trust focuses on how society teaches women to view themselves, and how this can add another layer to rape culture.
When Annie is at Charlie's motel, he asks her to put on lingerie he bought her. She is clearly uncomfortable in front of him that exposed, and when he asks her to sit she keeps a foot of space between them. After he tells her that she is gorgeous, she asks, “you’re not disappointed or anything?”
This is a fourteen year old girl with a man more than twice her age. She was very clearly disappointed with what he turned out to look like. She doesn't seem particularly attracted to him. But still, she's insecure about how he might see her.
Later in the movie, it is revealed that Charlie had raped three other girls, the youngest being twelve, the same way he raped Annie. “They weren’t even that pretty!” Annie cries to her psychologist.
When her psychologist asks why this matters, Annie says, “because they were just like me.” It’s at this moment that Annie really realizes that Charlie raped her.
I could really understand and sympathize with Annie’s reaction. Not only because she had been through a traumatic experience, but also because this is how our culture conditions us to think.
Advertisements for women target our insecurities so we’ll buy the products they claim will make us good enough. Air brushed magazine models are what young girls have as the standard of beauty. Media generally represents one body type that most girls don’t have. And it is these women with seemingly unattainable attractiveness that play roles in movies where they claim that the sexy football player could never love them because they aren’t pretty enough. Society teaches girls to hate themselves. According to a study by the National Institute on Media and the Family, adolescents are more likely to be unhappy with their bodies if they watch more TV, movies and music videos. Another study reveals that 53% of thirteen year old American girls are "unhappy with their bodies”, and the number grows to 78% by age seventeen.
Trust adds a level of irony in placing Annie’s father work at an advertising agency. The clothing company he works with advertises with half naked attractive models, much like many clothing companies for young adults actually do. Here, Trust makes a point of our society’s absurd standards of beauty.
Later in the movie, it is revealed that Charlie had raped three other girls, the youngest being twelve, the same way he raped Annie. “They weren’t even that pretty!” Annie cries to her psychologist.
When her psychologist asks why this matters, Annie says, “because they were just like me.” It’s at this moment that Annie really realizes that Charlie raped her.
I could really understand and sympathize with Annie’s reaction. Not only because she had been through a traumatic experience, but also because this is how our culture conditions us to think.
Advertisements for women target our insecurities so we’ll buy the products they claim will make us good enough. Air brushed magazine models are what young girls have as the standard of beauty. Media generally represents one body type that most girls don’t have. And it is these women with seemingly unattainable attractiveness that play roles in movies where they claim that the sexy football player could never love them because they aren’t pretty enough. Society teaches girls to hate themselves. According to a study by the National Institute on Media and the Family, adolescents are more likely to be unhappy with their bodies if they watch more TV, movies and music videos. Another study reveals that 53% of thirteen year old American girls are "unhappy with their bodies”, and the number grows to 78% by age seventeen.
Trust adds a level of irony in placing Annie’s father work at an advertising agency. The clothing company he works with advertises with half naked attractive models, much like many clothing companies for young adults actually do. Here, Trust makes a point of our society’s absurd standards of beauty.
Beyond this, girls who aren’t insecure are often villainized. In movies and TV shows targeted at kids and teens, girls who think they are attractive or deserving of a guy are usually the antagonists. The girl who feels awkward and uncomfortable in her skin is the protagonist, and in the end she is usually validated when a guy finds her beautiful, or when she is transformed into something a guy finds beautiful. This is how girls are conditioned to see themselves: ugly until a guy loves us, vain if we aren’t insecure. All of these messages can make it easy for girls to feel that they should be grateful for any positive attention from a guy who seems nice, even if they aren’t interested.
So how could Annie not feel good after being told she is beautiful, even if the situation makes her uncomfortable? Even if she didn’t necessarily find the guy beautiful? How could she not be upset when the guy who told her she was beautiful told three other average looking girls the same thing, when girls are taught to value this sort of attention and see it as a rarity?
With how girls are conditioned to think about themselves, I can definitely understand how someone who has experienced sexual assault could get into Annie’s mindset and become unsure if they were really raped, or that they could feel that they should have enjoyed the experience. They weren’t attacked randomly in the street, they were told that they are beautiful and worthy of love. Isn’t that what we are told we should want?
Trust does a great job of never blaming Annie or insinuating that she could have stopped the rape in some way, because rape is never a victim’s fault. It does, however, shed light and shame on our media culture by showing how men can use the vulnerabilities media creates in young girls to enforce power over them.
That’s what I took away from the film, at least. I’d definitely recommend seeing Trust for yourself and joining the dialogue it creates.
So how could Annie not feel good after being told she is beautiful, even if the situation makes her uncomfortable? Even if she didn’t necessarily find the guy beautiful? How could she not be upset when the guy who told her she was beautiful told three other average looking girls the same thing, when girls are taught to value this sort of attention and see it as a rarity?
With how girls are conditioned to think about themselves, I can definitely understand how someone who has experienced sexual assault could get into Annie’s mindset and become unsure if they were really raped, or that they could feel that they should have enjoyed the experience. They weren’t attacked randomly in the street, they were told that they are beautiful and worthy of love. Isn’t that what we are told we should want?
Trust does a great job of never blaming Annie or insinuating that she could have stopped the rape in some way, because rape is never a victim’s fault. It does, however, shed light and shame on our media culture by showing how men can use the vulnerabilities media creates in young girls to enforce power over them.
That’s what I took away from the film, at least. I’d definitely recommend seeing Trust for yourself and joining the dialogue it creates.
Sarah Cummings is sophomore creative writing major from New York. She has an obsession with all things cats, an addiction to her Netflix account, a love for Disney Channel Original Movies, and a bad habit of thinking up stories much more often than she writes them down. You can find sarah on Facebook.
Images: Wikipedia, fullym.com
Images: Wikipedia, fullym.com