Wait a second!
More handpicked essays just for you.
More handpicked essays just for you.
Classical hollywood film paradigm
Classical hollywood cinema and new hollywood cinema
Classical hollywood film paradigm
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
Recommended: Classical hollywood film paradigm
The characteristics, features and conventions of Stagecoach (John Ford, 1939) allow this film to fit directly under the title of Classical Hollywood cinema. The film uses a few main characters that the audience members get to know well and create their own feelings for. In Stagecoach, there are nine main characters that the audience gets to know well, Dallas, Ringo Kid, Buck, Hatfield, Doc Boone, Lucy Mallory, Curley, Gatewood and the lieutenant. These characters are consistent throughout the story and the audience members begin to understand them as the story develops. The story’s development consists of a single goal, the characters’ goal to make it to Lawrenceburg. The characters confront antagonists who allow each character to further develop throughout the film as they reveal their true selves to the audience members. The main characters have to endure the uncomfortable ride to Lawrenceburg, the Apache attack on the plains, the birth of Mallory’s child and the “final battle” between Ringo and the Plummers. During the uncomfortable ride to Lawrenceburg, Dallas and Ringo are developed into the outcasts of the film, who live on the edge of society and are looked down upon by the upper class such as Hatfield, Mallory and Gatewood. The Apache attack on the plains allows Ringo to develop a hero-type character whose sharp-shooting helps save the riders in the stagecoach from impending death. The birth of Mallory’s child allows Gatewood to develop into an evil character that is willing to risk the life of a child in order to ensure he makes it to Lawrenceburg in time. The film creates closure by the use of a happy ending that creates an emotional release for the audience. The audience is happy that it is revealed Ringo and Dallas... ... middle of paper ... ...ness because they are used to the socially constructed world they are living in. The scene helps to further develop the social commentary of this film. While initially the upper class looked down upon Hatfield, now even Hatfield looks down upon Dallas and Ringo, showing that Dallas and Ringo are on the edges of society. This shows that even in the Midwest, “the land of opportunity”, social classes still preside over everything and the “opportunity” is not an opportunity for all. Works Cited 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. Kerner, Aaron M.. “Irreconcilable Realities.” Film Analysis: A Norton Reader. Eds. Jeffrey Geiger and R.L. Rutsky. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2nd edition, 2013. 462-83.
Braudy, Leo and Marshall Cohen, eds. Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings, Fifth Edition. New York: Oxford UP, 1999.
In “The Thematic Paradigm,” University of Florida professor of film studies, Robert Ray, defines two types of heroes pervading American films, the outlaw hero and the official hero. Often the two types are merged in a reconciliatory pattern, he argues. In fact, this
In the article “The Thematic Paradigm” exerted from his book, A Certain Tendency of the Hollywood Cinema, Robert Ray provides a description of the two types of heroes depicted in American film: the outlaw hero and the official hero. Although the outlaw hero is more risky and lonely, he cherishes liberty and sovereignty. The official hero on the other hand, generally poses the role of an average ordinary person, claiming an image of a “civilized person.” While the outlaw hero creates an image of a rough-cut person likely to commit a crime, the official hero has a legend perception. In this essay, I will reflect on Ray’s work, along with demonstrating where I observe ideologies and themes.
Furthermore, performing stage is characterized by “complete group identity complete, group morale is high, and group loyalty is intense.” Some of features of the performing stage is not all conspicuous in the film. While group morale is high, indicated but their eventual arrival at Lordsburg, loyalty is on a varying spectrum for the passengers. Gatewood, who seems entirely distant from the passengers, does not seem to have loyalty for the group beyond arriving at Lordsburg. In contrast, Ringo’s loyalty is shown after he is handed a gun to fight against the Apaches rather than easily fleeing from Curly and the Stagecoach. Hatfield’s final act to kill Ms. Mallory with his last bullet could be debated as being loyalty to group or disloyalty, depending on personal interpretations of his actions. Those who see his action as “protecting” Mallory from the savages could deem it loyalty to the group while others could construe his actions as a cowardly betrayal from fighting as a group and
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.
“When the legend becomes fact, print the legend,” this single quote by the newspaper editor Maxwell Scott (Carlton Young), utters throughout the whole film on what Ford is trying to get across. The whole film tells of a lively era that is so deep in the roots of American history, but we seem to lose sight of that in the here and now. The standard critical approach to Liberty Valance has been to emphasize the contrasts between its two worlds, the old and the new, and to characterize it as celebrating the mythic western frontier and remember its passing by the industrialized times it had to give in to. John Ford brought back that view in his westerns, and although it was the last film with the duo of Ford and Wayne, it can now be referred to as a classical tale of fact and legend.
Antirealism in film transcends and brainstorms the fantasies that never become reality. Even though antirealism is apprehensive with a smaller amount then actual stuff, our observation for an...
In 1880 a group of strangers board a stagecoach. The stagecoach is heading eastward from Tonto, Arizona to Lordsburg, New Mexico. Among these strangers is Doc Boone an alcoholic doctor, Dallas a prostitute, Mrs. Mallory a pregnant lady and Samuel Peacock a whiskey salesman. Marshal Curly Wilcox tells the stagecoach driver, Buck that his regular ride along guard went hunting for Ringo Kid. Wilcox decides to ride in place of the regular guard when Buck informs him the Plummer brother's are in Lordsburg.
There is also a type of division in social classes in these films. The Mariner is treated differently because he has gills and the little girl is called a freak because she has that tattoo on her back. In Stagecoach, Dallas is hated because she is a prostitute. Nobody wants anything to do with these two at the beginning but they end up being a huge help. Dallas helps with the delivery of Lucy’s baby and in the end Lucy feels bad for the way she treated her. In Waterword, he helps with finding dry land and the kid has the map to show them where to
Meneghetti, Michael. “Review: Ellis Cashmore (2009) Martin Scorsese’s America.” Film Philosophy 14.2 (2010). 161-168. Web. 6 Apr. 2014
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.
Barsam, Richard. Looking at Movies An Introduction to Film, Second Edition (Set with DVD). New York: W. W. Norton, 2006. Print.
Barsam, R. M., Monahan, D., & Gocsik, K. M. (2012). Looking at movies: an introduction to film (4th ed.). New York: W.W. Norton & Co..
The movie is by far the most famous work of Sergio Leone's and probably his best movie. Not only because it has become a part of our culture, but it also created its own sub-genre the spaghetti western. Despite the film’s western roots, the movie is free of any western clichés as any western themes are given either a unique twist or are removed by Leone's unique way of storytelling. The movie is constantly taking the cowboy hero approach that most westerns take and twisting it in new ways. For example, making the main hero morally grey, almost a scumbag anti-hero of sorts. He forgoes making the main hero an Everyman heroic cowboy who saves everyone gets the girl and ride off into the sunset like most westerns. Instead Leone goes for a more
Classic narrative cinema is what Bordwell, Staiger and Thompson (The classic Hollywood Cinema, Columbia University press 1985) 1, calls “an excessively obvious cinema”1 in which cinematic style serves to explain and not to obscure the narrative. In this way it is made up of motivated events that lead the spectator to its inevitable conclusion. It causes the spectator to have an emotional investment in this conclusion coming to pass which in turn makes the predictable the most desirable outcome. The films are structured to create an atmosphere of verisimilitude, which is to give a perception of reality. On closer inspection it they are often far from realistic in a social sense but possibly portray a realism desired by the patriarchal and family value orientated society of the time. I feel that it is often the black and white representation of good and evil that creates such an atmosphere of predic...