Before watching Oscar-winning actor Eddie Redmayne as Einar Wegener and Lili Elbe in ‘The Danish Girl’, I was admittedly skeptical. I wondered how the transformation from man to woman would play out on screen, and more importantly, how it would impact the relationship with his wife.
We are often too attuned to the concept of the ‘Male Gaze’ established in Laura Mulvey’s 1975 essay, ‘Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema’. It is a theory that suggests the male species has an inherent right to objectify women through a masculine lens, cementing a power dynamic where the male is dominant and the female is submissive.
However, Tom Hooper’s pseudo-biographical drama does the complete opposite. It presents the Female Gaze at play, a concept that is as confounding as it is refreshing. We even see Gerda tease a male sitter, Fonnesbech, into being objectified by this very perspective.
Set in 1920s Copenhagen during the Art Nouveau period, the film introduces us to Einar and Gerda Wegener (played by Alicia Vikander). Both are artists living in a home that feels like a sanctuary. Einar is famous for his landscapes, while Gerda focuses on portraits. Their love is obvious and endearing, mirroring the supposed smoothness of a successful marriage.
The shift occurs when Gerda’s model, Ulla, misses a sitting. Einar stands in, donning feminine apparel. As he touches the sheer, cream-coloured stockings and Gerda’s nightgown—masterfully selected by costume designer Paco Delgado—we witness a confounding reaction. It begins with initial shock and evolves into a full submission to Lili, his inner female persona.
Even as Einar begins to feel that Lili is his true self, the transition is fraught with self-consciousness. When he accompanies Gerda to the artists’ ball as Lili, he is constantly worried about how others perceive him. He asks if he is “pretty enough,” whispers that “people are looking,” and meticulously mimics the hand movements of women across the room.
Dressed in a sweeping dark dress that captures the 1920s ideal—a flat-chested silhouette with minimal hips—the inner struggle is palpable. Lili seems to judge Einar for clinging to his masculine identity. She fights for supremacy of the body, slowly eliminating Einar to avoid the isolation that comes from not fitting in with her female counterparts.
When the couple moves to Paris, the wardrobe shifts to warmer colours for Gerda’s art openings. This is a bold move; it signifies that Lili has fully embraced her identity and adopted clear female attitudes. She appears much happier as Lili, a woman she describes as “thoughtless” and “flighty,” who refuses to paint because it serves as a reminder of her former self.
Lili’s rejection of Einar marks her triumph, though it signals the end of Gerda’s hope of getting her husband back. This leads to the decision to undergo the first-ever male-to-female sex reassignment surgery. It was a choice that fundamentally altered their marriage and, tragically, shortened Lili’s life when complications arose.
‘The Danish Girl’ suggests that gender identity is often socially constructed through the clothes we wear. It also proves that the Female Gaze is a plausible concept that resonates with the desire to view the world through a feminine perspective, allowing a female audience to truly relate.
Watch the official trailer here:
The Danish Girl opens in cinemas on January 7, 2016 (Singapore).
This article is published as part of Couture Troopers’s January 2016 issue ‘HYBRIDITY’
