Who Is The Hero

Shane, WHO IS THE HERO?

Movies have evolved a great deal since the days when a couple fighting scenes and a small love story satisfied audiences. Today movie plots are much more complicated and have much more action, thanks to modern day technologies. Although these new technologies seem to make movies increasingly complicated, some crucial roles in movies will never change. One thing that has remained constant in the film industry is the role of the hero. No matter what the genera of the film and or when the film was made the hero’s always share similar characteristics and are put through similar series of tests to prove their heroism. When these tests are completed it seems to pull everything together in their films. Although the hero Shane in the movie Shane and the hero Ripley in the movie Aliens are from two separate generas and are also from separate time periods, the hero’s in each movie share characteristics and are put through similar tests that make them, in theory, one in the same. Heroic characteristics start to become evident right from the start of each of the movies.

At the beginning of the movie Shane we see (the hero) Shane on his horse, coming from the mountains and we are not really given much backround as to where he came from. Similarly, at the beginning of the movie Aliens we see Ripley (the hero) in some sort of bed, and when she is introduced we are not given much backround as to where she is from. In both movies the hero’s were introduced without giving much information on there past. This is a characteristic of movie hero’s because at the start of movies director’s don’t want the audience know much about the hero’s. They do this so the audience has the task of slowly looking for characteristics throughout the movie that makes the “hero” actually fit his or her title. These so called “tests” of heroism that the audience must look for are also very similar in movies and can also be illustrated in these two films.

One of the first tests in both films that the hero’s endured was a test of their character strength. For example in the movie Shane even though Joe doubted him at the start he still sticks up for him when Ryker harasses him because that is what he believes in. This is similar to Ripley’s situation near the beginning of the movie Aliens.