Two weeks ago Malépart-Traversy released the brilliant animated short Le clitoris. Her graduation film was Vimeo staff picked and already has a stunning 4.7M. This comes with no surprise. Watch below:
In this humorous and instructive animated documentary, find out its unrecognized anatomy and its unknown herstory.
‘Women are lucky, they get to have the only organ in the human body dedicated exclusively for pleasure’
Posted by: Playground, June 27, 2017
A clitoris that teaches you everything about the clitoris
‘Women are lucky, they get to have the only organ in the human body dedicated exclusively for pleasure’ That’s how the short film Le Clitoris by Canadian director Lori Malépart-Traversy opens. A pink, playful clitoris gives viewers an easy-to-follow explanation on everything they need to know about women’s chief pleasure organ.
It might seem a bit ridiculous, but it’s not. When it comes to female sexuality, the clitoris is probably the most reviled and forgotten organ of all. Some men don’t even know where it is. Nor, to that matter, do a lot of women.
This documentary short film takes us back to the 16th century to the origin of the clitoris’ discovery. Two doctors argue over who should get the credit for finding it first, Realdo Colombo and Gabriel Fallopius. But, my friends, the real truth is that the clitoris has always been there.
In ancient Greece, doctors associated clitoral orgasms with improved fertility. And up until the 19th century, the Catholic church actually officially approved of this kind of orgasm because, they said, it helped to relieve tension. Those were good times for the clitoris!
Screenshot from the short film
Then everything got a bit twisted: in the 19th century, doctors began to reject the clitoris, making the absurd declaration that it was a ‘useless organ’ capable only of causing mental illness in women. That is when ‘hysteria’ was invented: an alleged disorder (to which only women fell victim) with no scientific grounding. And what was the aim of such a brazen claim? To control female sexuality and deprive us of pleasure.
The short film continues on its journey through clitoral history until it reaches Sigmund Freud – another of the clitoris’ archenemies -. From out of thin air, the famed neurologist pulled another theory with no scientific basis whatsoever: he effectively declared that clitoral orgasms were childish, something for kids and adolescents. Being a man, and, therefore, lacking a clitoris of his own, he made the outrageous claim that a ‘good’, mature orgasm could only be vaginal.
Our old friend Freud had overlooked the fact that 70 per cent of women need clitoral stimulation to orgasm, and in so doing, basically sentenced most of us to year upon year of compliant, boring and deeply unsatisfying sex.
Le Clitoris, which has already been screened at several festivals, is a piece that stands out for its simplicity and extremely educational nature.
And that is precisely why, as of right now, it should be shown in all schools.
Tunde Vollenbroek from cartoonbrew.com wrote did an interview with the maker: Malépart-Traversy.
Malépart-Traversy graduated with this film from Concordia University in Canada. Within the span of just a few minutes, her animated documentary manages to demystify the scientific, psychological, and social view on the female body part throughout history. Check out our visual essay here, with comments from the director.
If you enjoy the film and want to see more independent animation like it, help spread Le Clitoris on Vimeo, Youtube, and Facebook