Metaphorical Sounds of Classical and Jazz Music in Sex Appeal

Abstract

Taiwanese filmmaker Wang Weiming’s (王維明) Sex Appeal (寒蟬效應；不能說的夏天) derives from a true story of a male professor’s rape of his female student. For the cinematizing of the story, the setting was shifted to the Graduate Institute of Musicology at National Taitung University, Taiwan. Classical and Jazz music elements in this film, therefore, serve as vivid metaphors. This article aims to analyze metaphors of classical music in Sex Appeal, decoding at least four categories of classical music metaphors: first, the classical music of Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) and Leonard Bernstein (1918-1990) when Li Renfang appears; second, Baibai and her musical instrument, the clarinet; third, Baibai’s mother and her musical instrument, the piano; and fourth, Thelonious Monk’s jazz music during Li Renfang’s rape of Baibai.