The female coming of age experience has long been a subject of cinematic representation, usually following similar themes of sexual and aesthetic exploration. In fact, one could argue that as a result, this coming of age can be boiled down to a few key moments that ultimately result in a character’s transition into womanhood. These moments often include a physical transformation for the female character into what an audience might find to be a more aesthetically approachable version of a woman. This also often entails the attraction of a romantic or sexual partner, signaling that the character has exited girlhood and can now be perceived as an object of sexual desire.

 

Athina Rachel Tsangari takes two wildly different approaches to the subject of the female coming of age story in her films Attenberg (2010) and The Capsule (2012). From a simple, widely realist world in Attenberg to the highly stylized world of The Capsule, the two films broach the subject of womanhood in starkly different ways. That being said, each finds that the transition to womanhood is more complicated, and in many ways inherently confining to said woman. This is compounded by the fact that each film lacks a domineering male influence, with a complete lack of men in The Capsule and the focus of Marina’s journey into womanhood being between her and Bella, with her father never quite representing a suppressive male figure as he might in other coming of age films. With these factors in mind, Tsangari puts forward in both films the argument that the process of transitioning into womanhood carries the distinct rigidity and oppression of a patriarchal society, and that said oppression will even pervade into that transition despite a lack of men. 

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Marina’s sexual exploration in Attenberg is portrayed as mainly being a compulsion she feels is necessary of her, partially due to the influence of Bella. She describes having no strong desire toward men, even explaining that her closeness with women outweighs any feelings she has toward men. Despite this, Marina still chooses to pursue a man sexually in order to complete the “ritual” of sorts of womanhood that she believes she is obligated to. “Marina is instead framed as unable to extend her body into the space canonically considered as the one that facilitates the human body’s ‘natural orientation.’ The ‘naturalness’ of such orientations is rather exposed as a fantasy, while performativity is foregrounded as a necessary condition for the re-enactment of such orientations that regulate the extensions of bodies into space; the sexual and — by extension — the wider social,” (Psaras, 142). Some of the “performativity” that Psaras discusses is portrayed in the animalistic dances and movements that Marina and Bella perform on the street. Marina is taught that her transition into womanhood is dependent on said performances, and that therefore her orientation to the “normal” social space is not dependent on her desire to be apart of it, but more so her willingness to participate in the performance. 

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Similarly, The Capsule presents the journey into womanhood as a process of aesthetic perfection. The matching outfits, many of which are revealing and contain elements like bondage, impart an otherwise missing sexuality to the characters. As the women walk in perfect lines, or wait patiently to receive their punishments from their leader, their orientation in the space of this world is one of order and subservience. 

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Where “Attenberg is ultimately all about the body’s journey across, against or in parallel with the lines of the social; the sexual, the familial, the national,” (Psaras, 143) The Capsule produces similar lines and rules, but without a known force such as the patriarchy or the national (which could be considered one in the same). There is no man present, yet the rituals of becoming women, as the film literally describes, are preordained and belittling. It becomes clear at the end of the film that even the group’s leader wishes to leave, but her role is one that she cannot escape. 

 

The compulsion to follow such rigid lines of femininity and sexuality in both films implies the presence of a patriarchy regardless of the physical presence of a domineering male character. In both cases, the process of becoming a woman seems to be an act of self-destruction for the characters, or at least a movement away from what is “natural” to them toward the “naturalness” of the society and world they live in. Ultimately, there is no prize for each of the characters as a result of their confinement to these rituals. Marina is not left more enlightened after her sexual experiences, being as they weren’t derived from an inherent desire on her part and is instead left without a father figure. The leader in The Capsule is left to carry out the rituals of guiding girls into womanhood in perpetuity, at the same time losing her own freedom. In each case the coming of age is portrayed as more of a process of obligation, more specifically an aesthetic obligation to appease a certain ideal of what is “natural.” But when these acts are taken in private, it implies that the compulsion is more of a patriarchal need that pervades any true natural needs, and one that overpowers the process of becoming a woman for each of these characters.