Mustang - The SSL REview
Mustang
I found this movie on Amazon and knew nothing about it when I started watching. I wasn't expecting all that much because I'd previously picked out and watched a few clunkers. It was absolutely lovely though. I recommend highly. It's the story of 5 sisters in a small village in Turkey, and follows them as their lives change. That's all I'm going to say because I don't want to give away too much of the plot. I will have to give you a particular plot point, but it's super early in the movie so it won't ruin too much. If you want to watch this movie, though, I'd say go watch it and then come back and read this. Other than that, this will be a pretty simple SSL Review.
The SSL Review Review
A quick summary of an SSL Review for newbies. An SSL Review is a critique of depictions or discussions of female masturbation, female orgasm, or the clit. I only review those scenes - not the movie as a whole (unless I feel like talking about more), and I focus mostly on the realism of the depiction/discussion and also how it fits into a larger cultural discussion of female orgasm and sexuality. As you will see, the scene in question from Mustang is a bit of a stretch to fit into my criteria, but I thought it was worth a review.
Check all the SSL Review movies HERE and TV SSL Reviews HERE.
Masturbating on Boys' Necks
Like I said above, I'm going to try and not get too into the details of the plot and spoil everything, but I'll need to give you a little background on the scene in question. On the last day of school five sisters (roughly from young preteen age to older teen) decide to walk home with a group of boys from their school instead of take the bus. It's a nice day, so they want to enjoy it. They all go into a lake on the way home and play chicken with the girls on the boys shoulders trying to knock each other off. They walk through an apple orchard, take some apples and get run off by the owner. They have an absolutely splendid time.
When they get home, they are laughing and happy, but their grandmother is not. She is in conservative garb, and we are reminded that these girls are in a small, conservative town in rural Turkey. She starts yelling at them and taking them oldest to youngest into a room to beat them in punishment while the other girls bang on the door telling her to stop and asking her what they've done. They tell her they only took a few apples from the orchard.
The grandmother finally tells them that they were seen "Rubbing up against boys necks. Rubbing your parts on boys neck."
The girls try to tell her it was just a game, but she says there is no such game, telling them, "You're disgusting! My granddaughters pleasuring themselves on boys necks!"
So, the movie goes on from there, and although that incident is important to the movie, that's the last the neck pleasuring situation was ever discussed.
My Thoughts on the Neck Pleasuring Situation
To start, I'm cool with pleasuring one's self by grinding on a dude's neck. You do you. However, the girls were clearly not actually doing that. They were actually just playing chicken in a lake. So, there is a discussion of 'pleasuring one's self" (i.e. masturbation) here even though it was a false accusation, and I think that's worth a few words on this blog because it says something about how our world views female sexuality, masturbation, and pleasure.
I think the first thing that caught my attention here was that the groin area touching the boys' necks was enough for a woman in this town to accuse the girls of basically masturbating. Although it's a really prudish, paranoid accusation, it makes physical sense, and I have to say, I appreciate that aspect. The way the vast, vast majority of women masturbate to orgasm (Check out The Hite Report stats on this) is by either grinding their crotch against something or grinding something (a hand for instance) against their crotch. So, I actually like that this movie quite accurately focuses female pleasure in the outer vulva area and not, as is often the case - in penetration of the vagina. I mean science, media, jokes, sex education are constantly centering depictions and discussions of female pleasure and orgasm on intercourse instead of where it should be - on the outer clitoral/vuvla area (because women orgasm from stimulation of the outer clit just as men orgasm from stimulation of the outer penis. Women do not seem to orgasm from stimulation inside the vagina).
All that to say, I think it is important to note that the instincts these older women had about what a girl might do to pleasure herself (rub her junk up against something) is spot on even though these are very conservative old women in a sexually conservative culture. I mean, I think that sexual penetration strictly for reproduction is the hallmark of conservative sexuality in lots of cultures. It necessarily involves male orgasm, but has no interest in nor is any good for female orgasm. Yet, here these old ladies are recognizing that grinding your junk against something might get a gal off. Now, how do these old prudey bitches know about something like that?
They know about it because it's true. It's just plain true that rubbing against something feels sexual good -orgasmically good- because it stimulates the clit, something intercourse doesn't do necessarily. You can stimulate the clit against something during intercourse, but the clit doesn't need to have anything to do with the pushing of a penis in and out of a vagina. These bitches, I submit to you, know about it because they accidentally grinded on something once, and then did it on purpose after that, if ya catch my drift.
Although clearly I don't approve of the sexual prudery or the sexism this scene is depicting, I do like how this situation is as dire as it is because of sexual knowledge these women shouldn't actually have. I like that these old women know how lady junk actually works despite what I imagine is very little to no accurate information about the female pleasure cycle in their past. YET...we can be assured they know these things anyway, because if they did not, then they would have not seen any problems with getting girl genitals near boys' necks since that has nothing to do with the penetrative action of reproductive sexual intercourse. I like that despite our cultural mis-educations, we ladies still often figure out for ourselves in our own unique way and our own unique time how we really attain orgasmic pleasure. I love that this movie was written and directed by women, and I feel like in scenes like this one (and many others throughout) it shows.
***Now, this is a movie of a culture of which I have almost zero real-life experience, so it's possible I'm applying my own hands-on understanding of different religiously conservative cultures and maybe I shouldn't be, but I'm doing it anyway, so feel free to correct me if you think I"m missing something here.***
Vulva Rating
This movie gets 4 out of 5 vulvas. Although it doesn't happen to be positively depicting progressive female sexuality, it is depicting an idea of female orgasmic pleasure and masturbation that is physically accurate. It is a movie made by women where women discuss female sexual pleasure as centered (correctly) in the outer vuvla/clitoral area. It also, in my opinion, shines a light on the reality of women's sort of inner circle knowledge about our own sexual pleasure - even is we don't have a full or deep understanding about how our bits work and even if we don't know how to express or don't feel allowed to express our knowledge of our sexual bodies, I think to some degree we all "get" that our vulva and not our vagina is what is important to our orgasmic sexual pleasure.
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