Popcorn Disabilities: Outer Blindness, Inner Goodness, and Wait Until Dark
The movie that proved there's no being mean to Audrey Hepburn
Welcome to this installment of Popcorn Disability, the series looking at disability through the lens of pop culture leading to the release of my book Popcorn Disabilities. This is a series exclusive to Gold Film Mavens.
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I wanted to spend this month talking about disabled characters in horror movies, and I had to include one wherein I love the actress, but not the performance. I've written several articles about "pretty disabilities," a stereotype popular to films with disabled characters wherein the female heroine has invisible disabilities--predominately deafness, blindness, or being non-verbal--that allow for the non-disabled actress to retain her beauty (or fuckability status, depending on your POV).
History has reminded disabled women that if their disability is too overt, and mars their beauty, they're doomed to die alone. Thankfully, that's slowly changing as my Chucky piece last week shows.
