A fascinating delve into the life and work of Shere Hite and her contributions to the feminist movement, the intriguingly titled The Disappearance of Shere Hite is blessed with challenging and evocative archival material as it examines responses to her ground-breaking 1976 survey of thousands of women’s individual sexual experiences, while also detailing the modelling work she did to make ends meet while undertaking her research.
According to the film, selected for IDFA Best of Fests, The Hite Report is the 30th bestselling book of all time, but the film examines the rise and fall of Hite (and her reputation) in the US, with later reactions to her work seeing her head off on self-imposed exile to Europe, where she eventually took German nationality. While the film fully examines her work, it also offers a fascinating portrait of a vanguard feminist operating in less enlightened times.
The film opens with a news interview from 1976 with Hite responding calmly to a female news interviewer’s question about her book’s focus on masturbation. There is a snigger from behind the camera, while Hite gently tells the interviewer to take the lead.
Studying at Columbia, she needed money to makes ends meet as a student. She tells how, in 1969, she was advised to “use my looks to make a living.” She had no qualms. “Modelling allowed independence without the least personal involvement,” she says. She worked closely with acclaimed book illustrator Robert McGinnis – in a lovely bit of trivia, he reveals that she acted as the model for the Diamonds are Forever film tie-in book cover – as well as posing for Playboy.
Director Nicole Newnham (who co-directed the 2020 Oscar-nominated film Crip Camp) makes great use of extensive archival footage, and is especially adept at suggesting the mood of the 1970s and ‘80s, while the film also has a languid, almost ethereal, quality that sees the narrative flow gently rather than force a sense of dramatic imperative on what is already a captivating story. Hite’s journals are read in voiceover by executive producer Dakota Johnson, revealing the subject’s intellectual rigour and quality of self-awareness.
The film subtly examines how Hite – who died in 2020 after a long illness – faded from sight within the feminist movement, with her initial fame and acclaim peaking alongside her book, then diminishing after her less successful surveys on men and women’s ideas on love, and her move to Europe.
The film is at its best when showing archival footage of television interviews during which she was often mocked – such as an Australian interviewer who pokes fun at her anger when she walks out – while other interviews talk about her defensiveness over her methodology and findings.
On the whole, the film’s stance is uncritical of Hite, but it impressively focusses on her contradictions as well as her academic meticulousness as well as offering a fascinating insight into the challenges of being a feminist in the 1970s.
US, 2023, 116mins
Production: NBC News Studios, Sony Pictures Television, TeaTime Pictures, This Machine Filmworks
Producers: R.J. Cutler, Kimberley Ferdinando, Nicole Newnham, Molly O’Brien, Elise Pearlstein
Cinematography: Naomi Amarger, Rose Bush
Editor: Eileen Meyer
Music: Lisbeth Scott
With: Dakota Johnson (voice)
