남성역할의 문화적 기대 가르치기: 스필버그의 <후크>

Teaching Cultural Expectations of Masculine Roles: Spielberg’s Hook

This study aims to demonstrate why Steven Spielberg’s Hook (1991) is a film for fathers who want to reclaim their “inner child” and recover their father figure, and how we can use it against the cultural expectations of masculine roles in the modern world. Hook is a postmodern retelling of Peter Pan (1904) that focuses on the protagonist, a workaholic yuppie, who must overcome his failure as a father. The film reflects Spielberg’s childhood anger at his father for having neglected him because of work, and his ironic conflict in adulthood as he becomes more like his father. This theme is expanded to include the identities of contemporary American middle-age working men, as husbands and fathers. Hook explores how men struggle to fulfill cultural expectations of stereotypical masculine roles. Peter Banning, the main character, is an overworking businessman and failed father. He learns to become a more sensitive and caring father/father figure through his fantasy journey of becoming Peter Pan, his childhood identity. Hook deals with the transformation of the protagonist’s male identity into the more nurturing role, by moralizing about workaholism and reclaiming the inner child, using 1980-90s American pop psychology.