Film and Events in American History. There

¶ … film and events in American history. There are five references used for this paper.

Some events in history and various aspects of the entertainment industry have been known to affect each other. It is interesting to determine whether the Great Depression affected American Comedy, as well as why newsreels were important during World War II, and how they influenced fictional combat film.

The Great Depression

When the Great Depression occurred, many Americans went from living in comfortable homes with plenty to eat, to living on the streets and begging for money and food on corners. These people did not have many reasons to laugh, and therefore it was important for the entertainment industry to find ways to take their minds of their troubles.

The Screwball Comedy

Since the "earliest days of cinema, there has been the existence of clown comedy, however the screwball variety arose during the Great Depression. One might liken it to an innovative brand of farce, where the old boy-meets-girl formula was turned on its ear, producing free-spirited heroines who gave as good as they got (Gehring)."

Two of the first screwball comedies were 'It Happened One Night' and 'Twentieth Century', both released in 1934. These movies and "screwball comedy in general, was predicated upon several developments then taking place in 1930s America. First, the genre was tied to a period of transition in American humor that had gained great momentum by 1934 (Gehring)." The capable hero that had previously appeared in movies was now replaced with one that was comically hopeless and inept. It is surmised that this transition occurred due the Depression. "In a world that seemed more irrational by the day, the antihero suddenly was more relevant than the omniscient philosopher type (Gehring)."

Screwball comedy was able to "embrace the Depression-era fascination with the upper classes. Escapism by movie audiences hardly is limited to any one period. Yet, viewers of the 1930s were so taken with these opulent film backdrops that period Wall Street analysts labeled the movies of the day 'Depression-proof ' (Gehring)."

The Great Depression also impacted American comedies since the "birth of talking pictures encouraged an army of wordsmiths to descend upon Hollywood. Journalists, playwrights, novelists, humorists, and every other kind of writer found at least a temporary California home as the film capital panicked over the sudden importance of verbiage. All this talent helped usher in a golden age of dialogue comedy (Gehring)."

Newsreels During World War II

Newsreels played an important role during World War II by keeping the country informed and influencing the fictional combat film.

Many people today look upon them as hokey or corny, pointing out that the "cameras were so bulky that the stories were mostly set-ups like publicity stunts or horse races -- stuff they could schedule far in advance. And even the real news- the hurricanes, the invasions and the train wrecks -- took place to dramatic music and breathless narration (Levin)." Most newsreels covered five or six stories over a six-minute span, with most stories considered fluff. While occasionally the "cameras would catch something truly eventful, like the explosion of the Hindenburg in 1937, in the days of newsreels, truly historic footage tended to be dumb luck (Levins)." One reason newsreels were so popular was they were "how a whole generation got their sex in the movies. It seems that newsreels fell outside the industry's code of self-censorship (Levin)" concerning sex.

Despite their corniness, newsreels allowed people to "gather information about the war, which were then a lot like today's 'evening news'. Newsreels produced a very emotional atmosphere in most movie houses, prompting many people to cry or shout when images of Hitler or the Japanese appeared (www.dangpow.com/~felixa/thesis.html)."

Combat Films

Combat movies "made during World War II attempted to establish the objectives of the war and how to achieve them. They functioned to depict a unity of purpose and why sacrifices were necessary. They also motivated and encouraged stateside audiences to do their part for the war effort (King)."