Analysis of Michael Medved's America versus Hollywood

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Analysis of Michael Medved's America versus Hollywood

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Film critic, Michael Medved is aware that by publishing his book, "Hollywood verses America," he will not only enrage mostly everyone in the show business industry, but he will also loose some of his friends because of what he wrote. His strongly opinionated critique of popular culture examines the recent shift in the content of today's television, films, music and art. He has gathered statistics and opinions as well as shared personal experiences, all to illustrate one major point; popular culture has taken a turn for the worst.

Medved proves he's not the only one who is not pleased with what's happening in today's media. Figures prove that the American public is showing dissatisfaction with television, film and music. Major television networks' ratings have decreased, movie theater ticket sales are down and so are the sales of tapes and CDs. The recent loss of audience is blamed on the abandonment of traditional values by the media. Medved consistently receives letters from moviegoers expressing their frustration with the industry for this reason. Hollywood no longer portrays what most American families believe in, but instead it promotes foul language, sex and violence. Not only does it promote these vulgar behaviors but also it insults traditional values such as patriotism and religion and labels their supporters as conservatives and fanatics.

In partial agreement of Medved’s claims, I too see that the overall quality of American films is continuously dropping. I have seen many recent films in which the only element that could possibly keep the viewer interested are the constant actions of violence. One particular film that falls into this category is the 1999 release, The Matrix. This science fiction/action film is about a group of technologically advanced pioneers who venture into a parallel world to stop an unnamed enemy from doing some unnamed bad thing. The film was a series of chasing and fighting scenes in which they just kept coming up with new ways for the good guys to escape or shoot the enemy and new ways for the enemies to die. The climax of the story was at the end when the main good guy, Neo, had one last fight with the main bad guy. The fight ends when Neo is finally killed but then he is suddenly resurrected and he kills the bad guy; the world is safe again. The plot was nothing more than the overdone myth of "good verses evil," in which after a long struggle, good wins.

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