Throughout the life span of the United States, from its infancy after the Revolution to the present, people have asked, “What is an American?” This question goes far beyond asking who is a citizen or who resides in this land. No, it asks what the identity of an American is? Through popular, art, film, and literature, the American image is defined as being based on embracing our individual identities.
Movies are a perfect way to express the image of America. Movies are the mixture of art, music, and literature, containing words like a book, sounds like music, and images like art. This trinity of expression helps illustrate the picture of the individual. The western genre of film is a perfect example of this. The old west was a place that was dangerous and uncompromising. The land was lawless and criminals and bandits grew from it. Only those who were fit could survive its harsh nature. The frontier was said to be a place where a man could have a clean slate. The Dollar Trilogy starring Clint Eastwood illustrates this point. Clint Eastwood stars as The Man with No Name. In each movie the other characters refer to him by different names. In The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly the character is called Blondie by Tuco, another main character. The story is about three men: Blondie, the bounty hunter, Eagle Eyes, and the criminal, Tuco; these characters are the good, the bad, and the ugly mentioned in the title of the film. The film takes place in the old west at the time of the Civil War. Confederate gold had been buried in a grave, in the movie Tuco learns where the graveyard is while Blondie figures out the name of the grave it’s in. Tuco and Blondie have to work together to find the gold, even though they hate each other. Eagle Eye learn...
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...the individuality of the American image that is the foundation of our nation. It is through these explanations that this idea of the American image can be put forth. It will be the foundation of the American image in the future.
Works Cited
Baum, L Frank. The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Chicago: George M Hill, 1900. Print.
The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. Dir. Sergio Leone. Perf. Clint Eastwood, Lee Van Cleef, Eli
Wallach. United Artist, 1966. DVD.
O’Keefe, Georgia. Black Iris 3. 1926.
Scott Joplin. Maple Leaf Rag. Connorized and Aeolian Uni-Record, 1917. Piano roll.
Taylor, Quentin. “Money and Politics in the Land of Oz.” The Independent Review: The Independent Institute 9.3 (2005): n. page. Web. 19 May 2010.
Thompson, Hunter. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream. New York City: Random House, 1971. Print
Bernstein, Matthew. “The Classical Hollywood Western Par Excellence.” Film Analysis: A Norton Reader. Eds. Jeffrey Geiger and R.L. Rutsky. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2nd edition, 2013. 298-318.
Director Jim Jarmusch’s film Deadman displays many of the accepted conventions for Western genre films, but manipulated in such a way as to create a revisionist, rather than a classical, western. The most obvious example of this manipulation are the characterizations of the hero, William Blake, and his Native American partner, Nobody. Blake is an awkward easterner who travels westward unaware of the different rules governing western life, instead of the rugged, knowledgeable outdoorsman who “does what he has to do” to defend justice and honor. Nobody’s character is unusually independent, educated, and kind towards Blake, instead of the traditional Western genre’s violent, unintelligent Indian.
Somewhere out in the Old West wind kicks up dust off a lone road through a lawless town, a road once dominated by men with gun belts attached at the hip, boots upon their feet and spurs that clanged as they traversed the dusty road. The gunslinger hero, a man with a violent past and present, a man who eventually would succumb to the progress of the frontier, he is the embodiment of the values of freedom and the land the he defends with his gun. Inseparable is the iconography of the West in the imagination of Americans, the figure of the gunslinger is part of this iconography, his law was through the gun and his boots with spurs signaled his arrival, commanding order by way of violent intentions. The Western also had other iconic figures that populated the Old West, the lawman, in contrast to the gunslinger, had a different weapon to yield, the law. In the frontier, his belief in law and order as well as knowledge and education, brought civility to the untamed frontier. The Western was and still is the “essential American film genre, the cornerstone of American identity.” (Holtz p. 111) There is a strong link between America’s past and the Western film genre, documenting and reflecting the nations changes through conflict in the construction of an expanding nation. Taking the genres classical conventions, such as the gunslinger, and interpret them into the ideology of America. Thus The Western’s classical gunslinger, the personification of America’s violent past to protect the freedoms of a nation, the Modernist takes the familiar convention and buries him to signify that societies attitude has change towards the use of diplomacy, by way of outmoding the gunslinger in favor of the lawman, taming the frontier with civility.
Cave, Damien. "What Does It Mean to Be American?" The New York Times. The New York Times, 2014. Web. 04 Sept. 2016.
As Ethan rides towards his brother’s homestead, he is greeted by awestruck stares. He rides with the brutal desert behind him, sun glaring at his eyes while his brother’s family is framed in shadow of their own home. A hopeful tune plays in the background as he approaches. In this opening scene of The Searchers John Ford establishes Ethan—played by none other than John Wayne—as the rugged individualist, the one who tames the wilderness. This cowboy is integral to the “Myth of the United States,” he is the one who tames the savage wilderness its residents (Durham). However as the film unfolds, Ford explores Ethan’s tortured psyche, his motivations, his neuroticism, even the Indians and their motivations in order to deconstruct deconstructing the myth in order to show that the cowboy is a relic of the Old West.
Stephanie Coontz’s, David Brook’s, and Margaret Atwood all discuss American cultural myths in their respective essays “The Way We Wish We Were,” “One Nation, Slightly Divisible,” and “A Letter to America.” All three authors elaborate on specific cultural myths, whether it is about an ideal family, an ideal lifestyle, or an ideal country as a whole. As a result of analyzing the three texts, it is clear that the authors critique Americas image in their own was. As well as elaborate on why the realistic view of the United States is being squelched by major cultural myths.
A more modern outlook on the film recognizes the film's flaws but gives it, it’s credit as the last fully realized work of one of the most important directors in American cinema history. Ford understood that an audience's recollections of older, less complex Westerns would add a layer of expressiveness to the viewing experience. The black-and-white structure helps him achieve this. Ford’s decision to shoot the film in black and white in 1962 produced a dark, anachronistic look, while the unconcealed soundstage effects of the film’s opening scene reinforced Ford’s vision of a wilderness, interiored Western frontier. Just as Ford intended, many of the flashback scenes are masked in darkness, whereas the frame tale is immersed in light. This con...
In the 1930's Native Americans and women were viewed as inferior races. The films produced during the early part of the 20th century, particularly those starring John Wayne reflected these societal attitudes. The portrayal of minorities in Stagecoach and Fort Apache clearly reflect the views of society at that time. The depiction of the West is similar to that which is found in old history textbooks, em...
What makes an American an American? Is it the accent, the clothing, the fact that you
Thompson, Hunter. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream. Illus. Ralph Steadman. 2nd ed. United States: Vintage Books, 1971. Print.
What does it mean to be an American? To me, what it means to be American is to Pledge Allegiance to your country, to proudly boast that you live in a country that has a justification for existence, to be given opportunity. Although there are many definitions of what it means to be an American, does being an American really just mean being successful in society? The point of this essay is to describe the different meanings and my feelings of what it is to be “American”.
Any generic film hero is a model of their community and culture. They help to clearly define and outline the community’s values and cultural conflicts by embodying prime characteristics in their persona. The western hero, like Ethan in The Searchers, is always a figure for civilization amongst the savagery of the wild west. By portraying the roles of a civilization, the hero ...
The United States as a country has always been an entity unique amongst the world’s myriad of nations: a conglomeration of cultures, ethnic groups and religious backgrounds from around the planet, all fused together to yield something entirely new. Since its very inception, those who dwell within its borders have attempted to ascertain the makeup of the American identity, in order to pin down how exactly one can come to be considered as an American themselves. This is inherently quite a subjective issue, but the conversation primarily boils down to three core factors that make the American people who they are: a dedication to preserving the natural rights of every human being, a belief in the importance of the individual in deciding their own
Few Hollywood film makers have captured America’s Wild West history as depicted in the movies, Rio Bravo and El Dorado. Most Western movies had fairly simple but very similar plots, including personal conflicts, land rights, crimes and of course, failed romances that typically led to drinking more alcoholic beverages than could respectfully be consumed by any one person, as they attempted to drown their sorrows away. The 1958 Rio Bravo and 1967 El Dorado Western movies directed by Howard Hawks, and starring John Wayne have a similar theme and plot. They tell the story of a sheriff and three of his deputies, as they stand alone against adversity in the name of the law. Western movies like these two have forever left a memorable and lasting impressions in the memory of every viewer, with its gunfighters, action filled saloons and sardonic showdowns all in the name of masculinity, revenge and unlawful aggressive behavior. Featuring some of the most famous backdrops in the world ranging from the rustic Red Rock Mountains of Monument Valley in Utah, to the jagged snow capped Mountain tops of the Teton Range in Wyoming, gun-slinging cowboys out in search of mischief and most often at their own misfortune traveled far and wide, seeking one dangerous encounter after another, and unfortunately, ending in their own demise.
The development of the Western genre originally had its beginnings in biographies of frontiersmen and novels written about the western frontier in the late 1800’s based on myth and Manifest Destiny. When the film industry decided to turn its lenses onto the cowboy in 1903 with The Great Train Robbery there was a plethora of literature on the subject both in non-fiction and fiction. The Western also found roots in the ‘Wild West’ stage productions and rodeos of the time. Within the early areas of American literature and stage productions the legend and fear of the west being a savage untamed wilderness was set in the minds of the American people. The productions and rodeos added action and frivolity to the Western film genre.