When it comes to genre, we tend to think in strictly binary terms. There are, after all, the symbolic comedy and tragedy masks of the ancient Greek theater. Then there are the archetypal comic and tragic plays of William Shakespeare. And now, there are the much-debated comedy and drama award categories at the Golden Globes.
A bit of context: On Monday, Todd Haynes’ May December was nominated for Best Motion Picture and Best Actress in the Musical or Comedy categories at this award season’s Globes—and Twitter’s film fans remain in a state of total uproar about it. “May December nominated for ‘musical’ and ‘comedy’ when it’s the only film I sobbed during this entire year,” read one popular tweet. “May December being placed in Comedy at the Globes is baffling btw,” read another. And a third: “You’ll sing, you’ll dance, you’ll laugh—it’s this year’s biggest comedy musical about sexual abuse and mental illness: May December.”
Charles Melton as Joe Yoo with Natalie Portman as Elizabeth Berry in May December.
François Duhamel/Courtesy of Netflix
Others chimed in claiming that, yes, May December is a comedy. “‘May December is not a comedy’ Oh really then explain this,” one person wrote next to a video of the film’s now-infamous, melodramatic hot dog line. Another wrote, “This May December discourse is really weird. People not reading the movie as a comedy in any way, simply because it’s a story about abuse is making [me] genuinely concerned about media literacy.”
In short, May December is perplexing people. Is it a comedy? Is it a drama? Was it actually funny? Was it morally wrong to laugh at the hot dog line because of its serious context?
Or, maybe, we’re asking the wrong questions. What if May December is, in fact, designed to be a reminder that we should all be rethinking the rigid binary of genre that we prescribe to films altogether?
Julianne Moore as Gracie Atherton-Yoo and Natalie Portman as Elizabeth Berry in May December.
Francois Duhamel/Courtesy of Netflix
Inspired by the true story of Mary Kay Letourneau, May December follows Gracie (Julianne Moore), a teacher who has a “romance” with her 13-year-old student, Joe (Charles Melton), and, after a stint in prison, marries him. When Elizabeth (Natalie Portman), an actress preparing to play Gracie, arrives to spend time with the woman who inspired her character, Joe and Gracie’s relationship begins to unravel.
This is subject matter that no one would expect to be funny. But what Haynes does with it is where it gets really interesting.
Instead of sticking to the genre binary and either making us feel bad for the characters (tragedy) or making us laugh at them (comedy), his approach is more complex—and ultimately, far more interesting in its ambiguity. As Vulture’s review explains, “[May December] designed to pull you in multiple directions at once, and it uses emotional disassociation to its advantage: It makes you feel one thing, and then makes you wonder if you should be feeling something entirely different instead.” (You may also recognize this quote from the film’s trailer.) The reviewer goes on to describe both “cackling” at the film and, later, wanting to take a shower.
And that is exactly how Haynes wants us to feel—discombobulated, confused, and most importantly, doubting our own reactions to what we’ve just watched. He does it by playing with our genre expectations, using melodrama to lend bursts of humor to intensely dramatic, even painful situations.
“May December, Charles Melton as Joe. Cr. François Duhamel / Courtesy of Netflix”
François Duhamel / Courtesy of
The much-discussed hot dog moment is a perfect example. As Barry Levitt notes in another piece for The Daily Beast, the melodramatic moment is both hilarious and an ominous reminder of Gracie’s problematic need for control.
Another moment that captures the complex genre play at work comes later in the film. While smoking a joint with his son, Joe begins to reflect on his relationship. “I can’t tell if we’re connecting or if I’m creating a bad memory for you in real time,” he says. It’s simultaneously hilarious and heartbreaking—a tragic moment of human vulnerability and, undeniably, a very funny delivery.
As Melton himself explained to GQ, Joe is “having a breakdown and forming words for the first time, the questions he’s never had the chance to ask himself.” And although he didn’t intend the moment to be funny, he understands the impulse to laugh. “You can’t play the comedy,” he said. “Tragedy can be comedic sometimes, because it’s easier to laugh in the face of tragedy than it is to cry in that moment. The body reacts before the mind can process.”
For Haynes, this emotional discombobulation—the laughter followed by visceral horror—is the point. “The response to May December, so far, has made me feel like people want to be—are there to be—confused and disturbed and uncertain about what they think about movies again. And I love that, because that’s always what movies should do to you,” he told Vulture. “They should put you in a place you’ve never been before. You’re scratching your head and you want to talk about it afterwards and you want to revisit it and you want to laugh, but then you’re also really moved by the event. There are all these conflicting feelings going on. That’s what cinema is to me.”
We want to be told how to feel. We want total moral clarity. We want to leave the cinema knowing we reacted the right way. We want to know: should we laugh or should we cry? Haynes refuses to tell us—and May December is all the more interesting for it.
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