Download or read book Hollywood Genres and Postwar America written by Mike Chopra-Gant and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2005-10-28 with total page 231 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a clear and engrossing account of how popular films in America just after the close of the Second World War played out America's mood at that crucial time. It is also a revisionist challenge to received scholarly understanding of this mood, which has tended to be seen as characterized by an abiding pessimism most clearly manifested in the films noir of the period. Chopra-Gant makes here an important contribution to film genre, which proposes that the 'noir and Zeitgeist' reading is based on the retrospective promotion of selected movies. He turns to the top box office successes of the period, including "Best Years of our Lives", "The Jolson Story" and "Two Years Before the Mast", finding that these films emphasise rather the triumph of American beliefs in democracy, classlessness and individualism. They deploy positive, performative masculinities and the pleasures of male friendships and celebrate the traditional American family, while recognising the problems of 'momism' and absent fathers.

Download or read book Hollywood s America written by Steven Mintz and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2016-01-04 with total page 453 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fully revised, updated, and extended, the fifth edition of Hollywood’s America provides an important compilation of interpretive essays and primary documents that allows students to read films as cultural artifacts within the contexts of actual past events. A new edition of this classic textbook, which ties movies into the broader narrative of US and film history This fifth edition contains nine new chapters, with a greater overall emphasis on recent film history, and new primary source documents which are unavailable online Entries range from the first experiments with motion pictures all the way to the present day Well-organized within a chronological framework with thematic treatments to provide a valuable resource for students of the history of American film

Download or read book Hollywood s Italian American Filmmakers written by Jonathan J. Cavallero and published by University of Illinois Press. This book was released on 2011-05-01 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hollywood's Italian American Filmmakers explores the different ways in which Italian American directors from the 1920s to the present have responded to their ethnicity. While some directors have used film to declare their ethnic roots and create an Italian American "imagined community," others have ignored or even denied their background. Jonathan J. Cavallero examines the films of Frank Capra, Martin Scorsese, Nancy Savoca, Francis Ford Coppola, and Quentin Tarantino with a focus on what the films reveal about each director's view on Italian American identities. Whereas Capra's films highlight similarities between immigrant characters and WASP Americans, Scorsese accepts his ethnic heritage but also sees it as confining. Similarly, many of Coppola's films provide a nostalgic treatment of Italian American identity, but with little criticism of the culture's more negative aspects. And while Savoca's movies reveal her artful ability to recognize how ethnic, gender, and class identities overlap, Tarantino's films exhibit a playfully postmodern engagement with Italian American ethnicity. Cavallero's exploration of the films of Capra, Scorsese, Savoca, Coppola, and Tarantino demonstrates how immigrant Italians fought prejudice, how later generations positioned themselves in relation to their predecessors, and how the American cinema, usually seen as a cultural institution that works to assimilate, has also served as a forum where assimilation was resisted.

Download or read book Hollywood Left and Right written by Steven J. Ross and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-08-01 with total page 513 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Hollywood Left and Right, Steven J. Ross tells a story that has escaped public attention: the emergence of Hollywood as a vital center of political life and the important role that movie stars have played in shaping the course of American politics. Ever since the film industry relocated to Hollywood early in the twentieth century, it has had an outsized influence on American politics. Through compelling larger-than-life figures in American cinema--Charlie Chaplin, Louis B. Mayer, Edward G. Robinson, George Murphy, Ronald Reagan, Harry Belafonte, Jane Fonda, Charlton Heston, Warren Beatty, and Arnold Schwarzenegger--Hollywood Left and Right reveals how the film industry's engagement in politics has been longer, deeper, and more varied than most people would imagine. As shown in alternating chapters, the Left and the Right each gained ascendancy in Tinseltown at different times. From Chaplin, whose movies almost always displayed his leftist convictions, to Schwarzenegger's nearly seamless transition from action blockbusters to the California governor's mansion, Steven J. Ross traces the intersection of Hollywood and political activism from the early twentieth century to the present. Hollywood Left and Right challenges the commonly held belief that Hollywood has always been a bastion of liberalism. The real story, as Ross shows in this passionate and entertaining work, is far more complicated. First, Hollywood has a longer history of conservatism than liberalism. Second, and most surprising, while the Hollywood Left was usually more vocal and visible, the Right had a greater impact on American political life, capturing a senate seat (Murphy), a governorship (Schwarzenegger), and the ultimate achievement, the Presidency (Reagan).

Download or read book Hollywood s America written by Stephen P Powers and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-02-19 with total page 296 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American motion pictures still dominate the world market with an impact that is difficult to measure. Their role in American culture has been a powerful one since the 1930s and is a hallmark of our culture today. Though much has been written about the film industry, there has been very little systematic attention paid to the ideology of its creative elite. How does the outlook of that elite impact on the portrayals of America that appear on the screen? How do their views interact with the demands of the market and the structure of the industry to determine the product that is seen by mass audiences? Hollywood's America is a marvellously rich and careful discussion of these questions. It combines a meticulous systematic content analysis of fifty years of top-grossing films with a history of the changing structure of the industry. To that mixture it adds an in-depth survey of Hollywood's creative elite, comparing them to other leadership groups. The result is a balanced discussion of unique breadth and depth on a subject of national importance.Placing the film industry in the context of American society as a whole, the authors point out that Hollywood's creative leadership impacts the larger society even as it is influenced by that society. The creators of films cannot remove themselves too far from the values of the audiences that they serve. However, the fact that films are made by a relatively small number of people, who, as the authors demonstrate, tend to share a common outlook, means that, over time, motion pictures have had an undeniable impact on the beliefs, lifestyles, and action of Americans.This study contributes to the debate over the role and influence of those who create and distribute the products of mass culture in the United States.The book also contains a devastating critique of the poststructuralist theories that currently dominate academic film criticism, demonstrating how they fail in their attempt to explain the political significance of motion pictures.

Download or read book The American Dream and Contemporary Hollywood Cinema written by J. Emmett Winn and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2007-09-26 with total page 174 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While the myth of a classless America endures in the American Dream, the very stratification that it denies unfairly affects the majority of Americans. Study after study shows that it's increasingly difficult for working class people to achieve upward mobility in the US - so how does the American Dream continue to thrive? J. Emmett Winn shows us that the American Dream's continued glorification in contemporary Hollywood cinema should not be ignored. The book explicates three major themes surrounding the American Dream in contemporary Hollywood cinema and relates those findings to the United States' social and cultural changes in the last 25 years. Through his thoughtful analysis of films as diverse as Working Girl, Titanic, Pretty Woman, Flashdance, The Firm, Good Will Hunting, Saturday Night Fever, Wall Street and many others, Winn shows that contemporary Hollywood is very much in the business of keeping the Dream alive.

Download or read book American Politics in Hollywood Film written by Ian Scott and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 2000 with total page 482 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the first book to investigate Hollywood's treatment of American politics, politicians and political institutions. The author explains the influence - through creative, ideological and financial means - that Hollywood has on politics, and vice-versa. Key questions of agenda setting are addressed, as are the value-oriented frames of reference that Hollywood has helped shape in educating and directing the American public about politics and democracy. American Politics in Hollywood Filmis structured thematically, introducing sub-genres of election films, political biographies, action, adventure and thriller films. There is an overarching chronological pattern, beginning in the 1930's and ending in the 1990's, allowing the reader to trace the progression of the genre. 25 black/white film stills are included.

Download or read book Directory of World Cinema American Hollywood 2 written by Lincoln Geraghty and published by Intellect Books. This book was released on 2015-02-01 with total page 314 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hollywood continues to reign supreme; from award-winning dramas to multimillion-dollar, special-effects-laden blockbusters, Tinseltown produces the films that audiences around the world go to the cinema to see. While the film industry has dramatically changed over the years – stars have come and gone, studios have risen and fallen, new technologies have emerged to challenge directors and entice audiences – Hollywood remains the centre of global media entertainment. The second volume of Directory of World Cinema: American Hollywood builds on its predecessor by exploring how the industry has evolved and expanded throughout its history. With new essays that discuss the importance of genre, adaptation, locations and technology in the production of film, this collection explores how Hollywood has looked to create, innovate, borrow and adapt new methods of filmmaking to capture the audience’s imaginations. Touching on classic films such as North by Northwest and Dirty Harry alongside CGI blockbusters like The Lord of the Rings and The Dark Knight as well as comedies such as When Harry Met Sally and Jerry Maguire, this landmark book charts the changing tastes of cinema-goers and the diverse range of offerings from Hollywood. User-friendly and concise, yet dense and wide-ranging, Directory of World Cinema: American Hollywood 2 demonstrates that Hollywood, despite its challenges from independent filmmakers and foreign directors, remains the undisputed king of moviemaking in the twenty-first century.

Download or read book The 1931 1940 American Film Institute Catalog of Motion Pictures Produced in the United States written by American Film Institute and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 1993 with total page 1198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The entire field of film historians awaits the AFI volumes with eagerness."--Eileen Bowser, Museum of Modern Art Film Department Comments on previous volumes: "The source of last resort for finding socially valuable . . . films that received such scant attention that they seem 'lost' until discovered in the AFI Catalog."--Thomas Cripps "Endlessly absorbing as an excursion into cultural history and national memory."--Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.

Download or read book Latino American Cinema written by Scott L. Baugh and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2012-04-13 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Latino American cinema is a provocative, complex, and definitively American topic of study. This book examines key mainstream commercial films while also spotlighting often-underappreciated documentaries, avant-garde and experimental projects, independent productions, features and shorts, and more. Latino American Cinema: An Encyclopedia of Movies, Stars, Concepts, and Trends serves as an essential primary reference for students of the topic as well as an accessible resource for general readers. The alphabetized entries in the volume cover the key topics of this provocative and complex genre—films, filmmakers, star performers, concepts, and historical and burgeoning trends—alongside frequently overlooked and crucially ignored items of interest in Latino cinema. This comprehensive treatment bridges gaps between traditional approaches to U.S.-Latino and Latin American cinemas, placing subjects of Chicana and Chicano, Puerto Rican, Cuban and diasporic Cuban, and Mexican origin in perspective with related Central and South American and Caribbean elements. Many of the entries offer compact definitions, critical discussions, overviews, and analyses of star artists, media productions, and historical moments, while several foundational entries explicate concepts, making this single volume encyclopedia a critical guide as well.

Download or read book The Columbia Companion to American History on Film written by Peter C. Rollins and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2004-03-24 with total page 695 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American history has always been an irresistible source of inspiration for filmmakers, and today, for good or ill, most Americans'sense of the past likely comes more from Hollywood than from the works of historians. In important films such as The Birth of a Nation (1915), Roots (1977), Apocalypse Now (1979), and Saving Private Ryan (1998), how much is entertainment and how much is rooted in historical fact? In The Columbia Companion to American History on Film, more than seventy scholars consider the gap between history and Hollywood. They examine how filmmakers have presented and interpreted the most important events, topics, eras, and figures in the American past, often comparing the film versions of events with the interpretations of the best historians who have explored the topic. Divided into eight broad categories—Eras; Wars and Other Major Events; Notable People; Groups; Institutions and Movements; Places; Themes and Topics; and Myths and Heroes—the volume features extensive cross-references, a filmography (of discussed and relevant films), notes, and a bibliography of selected historical works on each subject. The Columbia Companion to American History on Film is also an important resource for teachers, with extensive information for research or for course development appropriate for both high school and college students. Though each essay reflects the unique body of film and print works covering the subject at hand, every essay addresses several fundamental questions: What are the key films on this topic? What sources did the filmmaker use, and how did the film deviate (or remain true to) its sources? How have film interpretations of a particular historical topic changed, and what sorts of factors—technological, social, political, historiographical—have affected their evolution? Have filmmakers altered the historical record with a view to enhancing drama or to enhance the "truth" of their putative message?

Download or read book Home Movies written by Claire Jenkins and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2015-04-06 with total page 229 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The American family has long been at the centre of the typical Hollywood narrative. But the depiction of the nuclear family within contemporary mainstream US cinema has not yet been closely studied. Home Movies addresses this oversight by assessing recent cinematic representations of the family in terms of cultural politics and representations of gender, sexuality, race and class. Focusing on a diverse range of popular films - from Meet the Parents to The Incredibles - Claire Jenkins analyses the father-daughter relationship within sequels and series; Meryl Streep's embodiment of the mother; the superhero family and extraordinary manifestations of the ordinary family; disaster films which depict the president as father; 'mom-coms' and Hollywood's representations of the non-traditional family. She combines film studies, gender studies and family history to demonstrate the complexities of Hollywood's family values.

Download or read book The Hollywood Family Film written by Noel Brown and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2012-09-18 with total page 414 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Hollywood family film is one of the most popular, commercially-successful and culturally significant forms of mass entertainment. This book is the first in-depth history of the Hollywood family film, tracing its development from its beginnings in the 1930s to its global box-office dominance today. Noel Brown shows how, far from being an innocuous amusement for children, the family film has always been intended for audiences of all ages and backgrounds. He tells the story of how Hollywood's ongoing preoccupation with breaking down the barriers that divide audiences has resulted in some of the most successful and enduring films in the history of popular cinema. Drawing on multiple sources and with close analysis of a broad range of films, from such classics as Little Women, Meet me in St Louis, King Kong and Mary Poppins to such modern family blockbusters as Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Toy Story, this timely book underlines the immense cultural and commercial importance of this neglected genre.

Download or read book American History through Hollywood Film written by Melvyn Stokes and published by A&C Black. This book was released on 2013-12-05 with total page 507 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: American History through Hollywood Film offers a new perspective on major issues in American history from the 1770s to the end of the twentieth century and explores how they have been represented in film. Melvyn Stokes examines how and why representation has changed over time, looking at the origins, underlying assumptions, production, and reception of an important cross-section of historical films. Chapters deal with key events in American history including the American Revolution, the Civil War and its legacy, the Great Depression, and the anti-communism of the Cold War era. Major themes such as ethnicity, slavery, Native Americans and Jewish immigrants are covered and a final chapter looks at the way the 1960s and 70s have been dealt with by Hollywood. This book is essential reading for anyone studying American history and the relationship between history and film.

Download or read book Hollywood Remembrance and American War written by Andrew Rayment and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-08-31 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Hollywood Remembrance and American War addresses the synergy between Hollywood war films and American forms of war remembrance. Subjecting the notion that war films ought to be considered ʻthe war memorials of today’ to critical scrutiny, the book develops a theoretical understanding of how Hollywood war films, as rhetorical sites of remembering and memory, reflect, replicate and resist American modes of remembrance. The authors first develop the framework for, and elaborate on, the co-evolution of Hollywood war cinema and American war memorialization in the historical, political and ideological terms of remembrance, and the parallel synergic relationship between the aesthetic and industrial status of Hollywood war cinema and the remembering of American war on film. The chapters then move to analysis of Hollywood war films – covering The Great War, World War II, The Korean War, The Vietnam War, The Cold War, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq – and critically scrutinize the terms upon which a film could be considered a memorial to the war it represents. Bringing together the fields of film studies and memory studies, this book will be of interest to scholars and students in not just these areas but those in the fields of history, media and cultural studies more broadly, too.

Download or read book The Best American History Essays 2006 written by Organization of American Historians and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-09-23 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ten of the best articles in American history published in 2006 selected from over 300 learned and popular journals. Topics range from the general to the specific and cover all aspects of American history, from the early days of the republic through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. These are the questions that today's historians are asking.

Download or read book The Kennedys in Hollywood written by Lawrence J. Quirk and published by Taylor Trade Publications. This book was released on 2004 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Long-time Hollywood reporter and writer, Quirk has used his knowledge and friendship with the Kennedys and many film stars to create an engrossing saga of America's most revered dynasty.