THE INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF REAL GENIUS, part 4
Welcome to Trans Tuesday! Today we’re going to see what it means to self-actualize, talk about self-hating trans people, and touch your heart as we wrap up with THE INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF REAL GENIUS, part 4!
PART 1, with much needed context about writer PJ Torokvei and the time this movie was written and filmed in.
PART 2, where we talk characters and begin discussion of the movie proper, which establishes how its particular allegory works.
PART 3, where you really get to see some of the genius (pun probably intended, let’s be honest) stuff the allegory is telling you!
46:04 – Despite not being understood by his parents, Mitch wants to go home because when he came the closest he’s ever been to being happy, he got yelled at for it and saw a man get made fun of for wearing makeup.
He’s scared. He just wants to go back to the way things were, when he had no idea you could be anything other than what society told you that you were, because this way is difficult and painful.
Remember Neo in the first Matrix? “Why is this happening to me? What’d I do? I’m nobody. I didn’t do anything. I’m going to die.” Nobody asks to be trans, it’s foisted upon us by genetics or fate or the universe or whatever deities you believe in.
And again, can’t tell you how many trans people go through that. Why did I have to be trans? I don’t want to be trans! This is scary and hard and society will hate me. Why can’t I just be “normal?”
47:15 – Mitch’s call was recorded by ultra conformo Kent, and he’s publicly humiliated for being a man who has feelings. His mom tells him he has to be “her little soldier” and his dad says he hopes nobody “saw him crying.” It’s toxic masculinity allllll over.
JUST GO CONFORM AND BE A MAN, MITCH. SUCK IT UP. STOP HAVING FEELINGS AND BEING ANYTHING OTHER THAN WHAT SOCIETY SAYS A MAN CAN BE.
48:27 – Chris catches Mitch packing to leave, and tells him that if he does he’ll “miss the fun.” If Mitch gives up on accepting his true self, he will never find the trans joy that exists on the other side.
48:40 – Mitch says he needed Chris’ help and all Chris wanted to do was party. Chris says he was just trying to help him relax (about society’s cis binary rules, so he can fully explore his true identity). And it worked! Jordan came in and a gender nonconforming woman was the answer to relieving his dysphoria.
48:55 – Mitch thought Pacific Tech would be different, but it’s the same as high school. They’re both social hierarchies with Mitch at the bottom for not conforming. Even when pretending to be a cis guy, I was bullied and shunned through all of school and childhood.
Because even in that costume I didn’t know how to wear, playing a part I didn’t know how to play, trying to be someone I wasn’t… I wasn’t who society said a man was, someone I could never be. And the bullies see that, and use it against you.
49:10 – Chris explains how he used to be just like Mitch, and his mother dressed him the same way. Chris had all the same “male” expectations laid upon him by the cis people in his life.
49:24 – One night Chris had a vision – Hollyfeld. In the closet. And he talked to him, and found out Hollyfeld used to be where Chris is now. But he buckled under the pressure, because there was nothing more to his life than what society expected of him.
Hollyfeld didn’t see that there was more to life than living up to society’s false expectations. And that by doing so he was hurting other people (like him, other trans people) because he kept himself in the closet.
And this is what changed Chris, and why he transitioned and is the person he is now. He didn’t want to end up that way. And Chris tells Mitch he’s going to end up the same way if he doesn’t wake up and choose a better life. I fuckin’ told you Hollyfeld was Mitch’s future self!
Also please note I don’t think this movie is saying that if you’re trans you have to come out. As a trans woman in the 80s, PJ was intimately aware of how dangerous and difficult it can be.
But this is also acknowledging that the more of us who stay in the closet, the less of us it appears there are. Which means less people see us, learn about us, are inspired by us to come out for themselves. And the more of us that come out can increase societal acceptance.
It’s definitely a double-edged sword. Coming out puts us in danger, but staying in the closet makes the entire trans community’s advancement more difficult. No one must come out, but for those of us who it’s (relatively) safe for, we do have some obligation to each other. Matrix Reloaded deals with this as one of the big themes it tackles.
But I also think this is PJ working through the issue herself, trying to convince herself to come out. She knew it would not only help her, but other trans people. But society doesn’t let coming out be something that exists only on our own terms, does it?
It would take her another two decades to get there. But get there she did.
54:24 – Susan: “Can you hammer a six inch spike through a board with your penis?” Chris: “Not right now.” Okay, listen. Listen. He was just hitting on her, and she asks him if his penis is all manly and he replies… no?! His response is funny, and sometimes a joke is just a joke, but this is the second joke about how this apparent cis man, who is into ladies (as PJ was!) either does not have a penis, or does not have one that functions the way you’d expect (hey, HRT definitely does that). I’M JUST SAYING.
55:09 – Hathaway says Chris is no longer of any use to him, and he won’t allow him to graduate. Chris says he’ll go to the dean and tell him about his work on the laser, which should merit a degree on its own. Hathaway reminds him… “who’s he going to believe, you or me?” And note the wording when Chris said he could pass Hathaway’s class. “Even if you pass, you don’t pass.”
The cis white man in charge is telling Chris he controls his future, and even if he passed (as a cis woman) he wouldn’t pass, meaning Hathaway would out him. And as a reminder, back when this movie was written and made, passing as cis and disappearing into the woodwork (“woodworking”) was required to transition! See MISGENDERING AND PASSING and TRANSMEDICALISM.
Who will society believe, the weirdo non-conformist who says they’re a woman despite having apparent mismatched secondary sexual characteristics, or the entire cis white man-led history saying we are all defined by our genitals at birth? See TRANS HISTORY for discussion on the presumed cisgenderness throughout all of history, and the problems it causes us in the present.
57:48 – During his plans to get back at Hathaway, Chris pretends to be conforming to gain Hathaway’s trust and acceptance. This is different than him throwing away the popcorn, because he’s not actually trying to appease anyone here. It’s a ruse.
58:05 – You can see he’s still got signs of his true self there with the slippers. He’s letting Hathaway know he can play the game if he has to, but his spirit and will can’t be crushed.
58:36 – As Chris and Mitch work on not being entirely shunned by society, Hollyfeld is still there behind them, looming in the closet, reminding them of what awaits them if they actually conform and reject their truth.
1:00:28 – Mitch is dreaming… about being shoved in a mailbox (again) by men who are mad he won’t conform. The closer we get to actualizing, the scarier it gets to think about how the people in our lives are going to react.
From the letter we discussed in part 1, we know PJ clearly had these same well-founded fears. Which absolutely, devastatingly came to pass the second she came out.
1:02:00 – They meet Hollyfeld, who’s been watching them. He’s used his skills to enter a contest over a million times, but it’s not breaking the rules. “They set up the rules, and I’ve come to realize I have certain materialistic needs.”
Going back to PJ’s letter again, it’s bullshit to have to “live as a woman” by society’s rigid definition of what that is, just to access the medical care we need. Or to pretend to be attracted to men when you’re not. But if that’s what we have to do to fool them into thinking we’re conformos who’ll uphold the gender binary, we’ll do it.
Us having to conform to crap like that just to get the care we need has some bad bad consequences, which we’ll get to shortly.
1:02:32 – Hollyfeld, for no real reason, says Mitch is going to grow five inches in the next year. Which makes no sense until you remember that earlier Chris made a joke about how of course Mitch wasn’t looking for Hollyfeld’s clothes in the closet…
…because Hollyfeld was much bigger and they wouldn’t fit. If Mitch stays on this path, in a year he will have grown into the man in the closet. I TOLD YOU HOLLYFELD WAS MITCH’S FUTURE. Ahem.
1:03:05 – Let us just pretend Sherry did not say she was waiting three years (since Mitch was TWELVE??) to be “old enough” to try and seduce? HE IS FIFTEEN NOW great googly moogly. This is… very very cringe. I’m gonna presume one of the other writers was responsible for that mega-problematic moment.
But note that Sherry, the only other woman besides Jordan in the movie, wants Mitch. She previously liked Chris and all the other “smart people” in the vast minority, the metaphor for trans people. Remember this for when we get to the end.
1:04:29 – Mitch didn’t want to sex her up. So he goes to… Jordan? Who he does want to sex up but she is 19 and he is 15 yiiiiiikes more cringe.
The point, though, is that here Mitch is more comfortable with a gender non-conforming woman. He’s more comfortable with her now than he’s ever been. Again, remember this when we get to the end. Is this kiss, like every kiss in all Matrix movies, one of self-acceptance? Maybe!
1:05:13 – As they’re leaving the lab, one of the other students working on the laser says “Let’s go, girls.” Another asks what he means by that, and he says “it’s a figure of speech.” Is it? IS IT THOUGH?
Because while “guys” and “dude,” words for men, have certainly become standard for applying to people of all genders in our patriarchal society (see TRANS REP IN MEDIA 2024 for more on that), the reverse is never true.
Nobody, least of all a cis man, says “let’s go girls” to a room of other cis men. Unless, perhaps, they’re gay. Queer. Or unless, perhaps, they’re not cis men but trans women. I’M JUST SAYING.
1:05:53 – Kent, again, directly sabotages other trans people for his own personal gain. Self-hating trans people are the worst.
1:14:14 – As soon as Hathaway surprisingly gets what he wants from Chris, Kent is of no use to him and is abandoned. The bigots don’t care about you, you damn pick-me fools. They will abandon you the second you are of no use to furthering their goals.
Help leopards, get your face eaten.
1:15:13 – Chris: “Let’s get a burger.” Sometimes a burger is just a burger… buuuuuut also in the scene with the pool party in the auditorium, back at 40:28, I told you to put a pin in that note. Do you remember it? Chris told one of the women to not eat something because it would make her breasts bigger.
What was she about to eat? Say it with me, babes:
A BURGER.
Weird thing for an apparent cis man to do now if it’s gonna make boobs grow, isn’t it? Sure seems like this is Chris helping Mitch start HRT!
I’M JUST SAYING.
1:16:10 – Lazlo appears. Chris: “I’m so glad you came out.” CAME. OUT. Lazlo, Mitch’s future, is on his way out of the closet! Chris: “Want a hamburger?” Hey, you’re out of the closet, time to grow some boobs, yeah? Come on! It’s right there!
1:17:05 – Chris and Mitch have conformed and helped Hathaway achieve the goals that will bring him more power and wealth. Hollyfeld lets them know that it’s going to be used to hurt other people, just like his conforming and forcing himself into the closet was used to hurt others.
By getting Hathaway’s approval, they have aided him in hurting others in the future. That was something they never intended. They’d been thinking only about making life easier for themselves.
By conforming to what society wants (“living as a woman” for a year before you can get access to care, pretending to be attracted to men), even to get something we need, we are hurting others. Because that reinforces that it’s the way it should be done.
And then other trans people who need access to that care will have to go through the same thing, and it could (and likely will) hurt them, too.
And I don’t think this is saying trans people back in the 80s shouldn’t have done what they needed to do to get the medical care they needed. The point is that the system itself is harmful and needs to change. We shouldn’t have to hurt others to help ourselves.
1:20:35 – Kent gets a literal “come to Jesus” moment, which is remarkable when you remember all the Christianity allusions in the names of Chris, Mitch, Jordan, and Hollyfeld. They are literally bringing him closer to them, as in – away from being a self-hating trans person and toward accepting himself, and breaking his support of the false cis binary matrix of society!
1:21:01 – Even Kent the conformo is surprised to learn that working to help the system, in order to get its rewards, has hurt others. He didn’t realize that just doing what was asked of him could affect others.
1:23:-47 – When they get the fake IDs, Chris: “Mine looks like him, and his looks like me.” Another nod for you that, hey, they’re alike. They’re both trans people. And Mitch is moving closer to Chris, transitioning and being an out trans person.
All the subterfuge with the plane and the laser is a metaphor for Mitch and Chris finding a way to change the system so nobody gets hurt.
1:31:28 – Kent, waking up to his own transness, doesn’t know what’s wrong with him, and is looking for answers… and is reading about schizophrenia. I’ll remind you again that being trans used to be classified as a mental illness and you should read up on TRANSMEDICALISM (and WPATH version 1) for more on that bullshit.
That was the prevailing thought among the medical field at the time this movie was made and released, and how fucking sad is it that if you wondered if you might be trans, this is where you’d look for answers? It’s terrible but also do you see how trans this is?
1:32:05 – We see mega-conformo Kent is wearing a dickie. Even his conforming wasn’t the true him, it was literally a costume he put on because it’s what was expected of him!
Again, the false binary cis status quo also hurts cis people and forces you to wear a costume and perform your gender a certain way. It’s toxic masculinity again. It’s “boys don’t cry.” It’s “men can only display anger and lust.” It’s “women have narrow shoulders and thin waists and shaved legs.” And on and on.
But as a self-hating trans person, someone who hid their own transness and became a vocal transphobe and oppressed trans people to show how “not trans they really were,” this shows you Kent is dropping the costume he felt he had to wear, and the role he had to play. He has moved closer to self-actualized and out trans people like Chris!
He’s told by “Jesus” to wait by Hathaway’s house for a sign. With “moving toward Christianity” being the metaphor for moving toward transness, what do you think that means? We’ll get there soon!
1:33:50 – Confirming what I surmised about Gene before, here’s your proof that he is in fact trans like Chris and Mitch, as evidenced by their matching bunny slippers. They do not conform in the same way. Gene may only show a little of it now, but it’s there. An egg, perhaps finally beginning to crack.
1:37:28 – Kent gets his first taste of what’s to come, as he is now in proximity to… the thing that inconveniences Hathaway. Do you remember what the popcorn was a metaphor for? Transness. He eats a piece! He’s accepting himself!
1:38:29 – …and it carries him right to Chris and Mitch. Accepting your transness carries you to community with other trans people! Look how Mitch and Chris were worried about him as he approached the house, and then helped him when he needed it. And he’s happy to see them!
As soon as Kent cast off the false shell of the person he was pretending to be, even if he hadn’t yet figured out who he is, they were there to literally pick him up and help carry the weight. Just like Chris did for Mitch when they first met (not literally in that case, tho).
1:40:06 – Hollyfeld returns. Look at him. By helping others not conform, it’s helped him break out of his own conformity and performance of the cis binary. Mitch’s future is now one of nonconformity. Mitch will transition, and find joy. He will be out of the closet and free.
1:41:34 – Hollyfeld says it’s “getting weird around here.” Chris: “Absolutely.” Jordan: “I didn’t notice.” Mitch: “I like it.” Jordan didn’t notice because she’s always been “weird.” Chris has embraced it. And so have Mitch and Hollyfeld.
And here’s why I told you to pay attention to the two women. My read is that Jordan is representative of Mitch’s first steps to figuring out who he is: gender nonconformity. And he is with her now. He is a gender nonconforming woman.
We know Sherry, the arch feminine (in this movie) always moved toward the fully out and self-accepted trans person. She wanted Chris, and she wanted Mitch but he wasn’t ready.
But Hollyfeld, Mitch’s future, is. And that’s why Sherry is now with Hollyfeld here at the end! Mitch’s future is attaining full self-actualization as the trans woman he truly is.
I do not believe the movie is saying you’re not a woman if you’re not high femme. I think it was just made in the ‘80s and uses broad archetypes of girly-girls and tomboys to make its point about where Mitch got to, how he got there and where he’ll end up, by staying out of the closet.
1:41:38 – Look at the happiness that accepting trans joy brings to everyone when we don’t let the “inconvenience” of our existence to cis society be more important than living our lives as our authentic selves.
1:42:32 – Look at all the popcorn around the house. I’ve said it a million times and I’ll say it again, the more of us that come out, the more of us that see what’s possible, that trans joy exists, and believe we can do it too. Hathaway covers his nose so he doesn’t have to smell it.
TOO BAD. SMELL OUR HOT BUTTERY TRANSNESS, BIGOTS.
We’re not going anywhere.
Remember that PJ was deeply closeted when this was written. It would be twenty years before she felt she could come out to the world, and once she did it seemingly cost her her career and quite possibly her life.
I see Real Genius almost as PJ’s message not to just every other trans person out there, but to herself. She was examining what being trans meant to her, to the world, and trying to figure out what to do about it. Even the title is a metaphor for it, because if really smart people (geniuses) are the movie’s metaphor for trans people, the title is Real Transness.
Hey, I’m trans. It’s real. Trans people are real. It’s time to be me.
I’m so so glad she finally got to a point where she felt able to be herself.
Reject conformity. Reject the cisgender binary matrix. Find and be your true self. And fix the system so nobody else gets hurt along the way. This is the way to joy. For all of us.
This is the message in Real Genius. Self-acceptance. Help those who come after. Make the world better for everyone. It’s beautiful.
Thank you, PJ, for your heart and courage, for your humor and your real genius.
And for paving the way for trans women screenwriters like me.
Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
tillysbridges@gmail.com