How films reflect American cultural themes

¶ … films reflect American culture

In this class I argue that American films often contain themes of American innocence. American films often assume the innocence and goodness of America's dealings with the rest of the world, though at certain key moments in our history, mainstream films have raised questions about how America's international and military power is used. Tested against the films we have viewed in class, Swing Vote (2008), The Queen (2006) Rules of Engagement (2000) The Quiet American (2002) and an addition to one chosen by this writer Jarhead (2005) these propositions hold true.

Political power is seen as secondary to the individual. Militaristic values are the struggle between the power of the institution and the power of the individual, and according to many films most seek in innocence to fulfill some sort of valiant duty, which often then returns to the ultimate struggle of good and evil or at the very least, right and wrong. In film right and wrong are often cloudy in the center of the story and are illuminated more and more as the film storyline goes forward. Most of these assertions are demonstrated in some fashion in all five of the films to be discussed in this work.

The development of a clouded sense of right and wrong is the most prevalent of all issues with regard to the films noted above. In Swing Vote the protagonist, an ignorant American failing to meet his civic duties, meets the innocence of his nine-year-old daughter to help eliminate the cloud of right and wrong. While in The Queen, the Queen demonstrates ignorance regarding how to respond to the Death of Princess Dianna as life and the world seems to have gone on without her and the protection of the old guard sways her to refuse public appearance, almost to her own demise. In Rules of Engagement direct corrupt power lies to cover up a sad militaristic response to direct fire and the innocence of the hero is questioned, even by those he trusts the most. In The Quiet American the main character learns the true nature of a friend, though a love interest and through his poor decision to escalate a militaristic confrontation for personal gain. Finally, in Jarhead the hero is transformed into a villain, repeatedly seeking to understand the balance between right and wrong and personal transformation of the murky middle ground that is the military of America.

Explicitly films follow the ideologies of the culture in which they are introduced, and big box office films are the most easily related scenario. (Purdum, February 2, 2003, NP) Following at least two concerning presidential elections, Swing Vote (2008) is a fundamental challenge to voter apathy and responsibility. The protagonist becomes a "monitorial citizen."

Schudson's solution [in Good Citizen] to the void in democratic rhetoric and theory is the idea of the "monitorial citizen." Rather than try to follow everything, the monitorial citizen scans the environment for events that require responses. (Zaller, November 12, 1999)

Jarhead (2005) is a response to the fact that good intentions and innocence are not a good combination in war and that the horrors of war are eternal, all played out as the nation again begins to question American international intervention. The Quiet American (2002) though certainly not a blockbuster is a response to the fact that the nation felt as if some things are acceptable when there is a common enemy. The fact that the film period is not in the midst of American intervention in Vietnam but the earlier French war allows the work to discuss the issues, without making a judgment on mass American international militaristic intervention. Rules of Engagement (2000) comes before the post 9/11 resurgence of America is in the right, found in cinema, and it expounds on the fact that the time in America still allowed self recrimination. (Purdum, February 2, 2003, NP) (Klenotic, 2007)

Jarhead (2005) is probably the most reflective of the idea that "History is memory plus a story," (Klenotic, 2007, p. 85) as the hero seeks out his truths in a soup of varied identities and seemingly insurmountable challenges, only a few of which hva to do with the question of right and wrong. One example in the film that has to do with this issue is the confrontation between right and wrong, and the ways that good men make bad decisions occurs when the hero has an interaction with the group of Bedouins, who have been the victim of American Marine boredom and as the story tells it later one of the hero's platoon mates has killed three of their 8 camels. The hero struggles over this reality, as he and many others in the platoon are aware that the camel means life to a Bedouin and that the rash act of an "asshole" may have cost three men their lives. The film is although, reflective of both the challenge to American militaristic decision making and an exoneration of those who are charged with pulling the trigger. "Our experience of reality is wholly immersed in fleeting, irretrievable moments." (Kletonic, 2007, p. 101) The collection of irretrievable moments, for this man is the sum of his attempt to not only retrieve them but relay the immersion of them to others. When the film depicts the filters associated with soldiers in the field, the discussion of first amendment rights, preceding a news interview of the troops the work also explicitly supports the hypothesis of Fishman and Marvin who contend that, "where violence is associated with our own group, it is more likely to appear in forms that conceal its presence. By this means, our own group's capacity for violence is increasingly displayed, but is visually indirect and even positive terms." (Fisherman & Marvin, March 2003, p. 41) Yet, the film itself was meant to be an honest graphic assault on militarism, and again an exoneration of bad actions, especially upon these individuals' return to "polite society." (Boggs & Pollard, 2006) The film is a complicated emotional experience. The scenes of personal "madness" are also reflective of earlier films, such as mentions by Gianos, and especially in his discussion of Dr. Strangelove. (Gianos, 1999, pp. 139-142)

Rules of Engagement (2000) is only slightly less complicated, as one sees the issue from both sides, how things easily go wrong even when one or many individuals are attempting to make the "right" decisions. The power play is also essentially evident in this film as the depiction determines that an individual acted both for and against the institution but in innocence and in direct response to the real situations at hand. The combat scenes that make up the early part of the film are respective of the challenge that militarism places an individual in. "Walking in any American city today, one participates in a ritual that expresses the difficulty of being a good person in the absence of a good society." (Bellah, et al., 1991, p. 4) The film also clearly takes the context of the two periods of military life, i.e. Vietnam and the Embassy confrontation at a much later time in the context of the periods in which they fall, yet building the innocent character from the whole situation, his innocence is base don the valor of his intentions, rather than all his actions in combat. The film is likely to be grouped among those called docudrama, as defined by Giglio, in much the same way as Jarhead though both have obviously used dramatic license to fill seats. (2005, pp. 57-59) Yet, it must also be said that despite the dramatic; "Understanding the history of civic engagement in America is not a matter of positing a single standard of good citizenship and then documenting how well or how poorly Americans lived up to it in different eras." (Schudson, November 1999, NP)

The Queen (2006) is probably the most difficult of all the films to assess association with any thesis, as it does not depict Americans at all, but British officials during a time of serious loss, i.e. The death of Princess Dianna. Yet, the film's sources are American and the film was made in Hollywood. Probably harkening back to our own history, many Americans have a significant interest in the English crown, but millions of Americans where also profoundly intrigued by Dianna and would likely have little if any insight into the delicacy that the situation, without precedence placed on the Queen and even on the newly elected prime minister, Blair. This film depicts the situation in a simplistic manner, seeking to humanize the confrontation between tradition and modernity, which speaks to American innocence in a secondary manner. It is also proof of van Zoonan's hypothesis, that "contemporary politics has become thoroughly personalized." (2004, p. 69) Even the stoic Queen of England has been personalized by film likely with limited fact and much dramatic license.