Social Commentary On Hollywood War Films

Movies have the ability to transport people to different times and places and distract them from ordinary everyday reality. They allow for a range of emotions to be experienced. At their core, movies examine the human condition. There are plenty of deeper truths woven into screenplays and plenty of lessons to be learned, even when an individual is solely seeking entertainment.

“The biggest mistake we have made is to consider that films are primarily a form of entertainment. The film is the greatest medium since the invention of movable type for exchanging ideas and information, and it is no more at its best in light entertainment than literature is at its best in the light novel.” - Orson Welles

Although the best reasons for “going to the movies” are to be entertained and eat popcorn, understanding a film is actually quite complex. Movies are not only a reflection of life, they also have the capability of shaping our norms, values, attitudes, and perception of life. Through the media of film, one can find stories of practically anything imaginable and some things unimaginable. Movie-makers use their art to entertain, to promote political agendas, to educate, and to present life as it is, was, or could be. They can present truth, truth as they interpret it, or simply ignore truth altogether. A movie can be a work of fiction, non-fiction, or anything in-between. A film is an artist’s interpretation. What one takes away from a film depends upon how one interprets what has been seen and heard. Understanding film is indeed difficult.

Every war will have those who support the war and those who are against the war. In 1965, those who were against the Vietnam War made their views known by many forms of protesting such as forming organizations, rallying, and anti-war protest music. Anti-war protest music was an opportunity to put people’s perspectives into song to hopefully spread their message. Buffy Sainte-Marie wrote the song “Universal Soldier” in 1962 and her message was that “Universal Soldier is about individual responsibility for war and how the old feudal thinking kills us all” (Boulanger). The song “Universal Soldier” was used as a protest anthem during the Vietnam War and attempts to untangle one of the paradoxes of life that war never leads to peace through

According to (Bates 665), “Cinematic society refers to the 20th century societal formation that recognizes itself via cinematic apparatus,” he points to the chief place that films hold in

Around this time another popular form of entertainment was movies. The movies were visited by about ninety million Americans per weekend during the 40s .These movies also showed many war influenced programing. An example would be the “Doolittle Raid”, this movie celebrated one of the first American war victories. Another example of the influenced of the war was that most popular movies and cartoons spotted war themes.

Jarhead follows the journey of Anthony Swofford during his service in Middle East. Throughout his journey, Swofford presents a unique perspective on a variety of issues that indirectly affect American life and the “war” on terrorism. Some of the issues touched on include the mental stability and mentality of American soldiers, the influence of politics in the presentation of war, and the construction of a marine. Through these themes, along with the unique perspectives offered by the characters in the film, the audience is able to gain insight into the corruption and lies that are “war”. This insight ultimately helps the audience analyze the text deeper and enables them to draw the similarities in current events and dissect what they

World War 2 had a powerful impact on America. This included Hollywood as well. Hollywood benefitted from the war, but was also under a lot of pressure cause of the responsibility that fell on its shoulders. Days after Pearl Harbor, the President of the United States gave Hollywood the task to bring the issues of the war to the American people. To inform them of the struggles that lied ahead. Doing what Hollywood does best, which was making and selling films. However the way they were making films required them to change every aspect of how the film industry operated. Hollywood transformed immensely from top to bottom.

Films and movies hold much than we can guess, they reveal a lot of vices and rots that are happening in society. Others give a history of a particular society, its beliefs, culture and their standard of living in the society. Films are used to disclose the social responsibilities in a given season and customs, moral values, societal worries and other cultural practices.

War has been present since the beginning of human history. Likewise, war movies have been present since the movie industry began. Just like most other genres of film, war films have been created as a form of entertainment to profit a person or organization. More people are willing to spend their money and time on a feeling of action, excitement, heroism, and patriotism than gruesome and horrid images of real and common human destruction. Propaganda has been used by governments for a very long time and when motion pictures came into existence, governments almost immediately saw the new medium as an opportunity to influence the public. Governments such as the United States of America, cooperate with the movie industry to

The Vietnam film is a specific sub-genre of the conventional Hollywood war film that arose as a result of the 1960s counter culture. According to Elliot Stegall’s article Ideological, Dystopic, and Antimythopoetic Formations of Masculinity in the Vietnam War Film many American war films depicted the glorification of war and emphasized the concept of American masculinity (Stegall). Previous to the Vietnam period, Hollywood war films stuck to contemporary tropes. These films often re-enact the idea of good versus evil in which the male hero of the film triumphantly fights for their country against a vilified enemy; thus reinforcing the American ideology of conquering the frontier (Schweitzer 67). The hollywood war films are often enjoyable

After nearly fifteen years of troops committed to the conflict beginning in 1959 and withdrawal in 1975, a number of films were made about Vietnam (Goldfield, 2014). The Green Berets, the sole movie produced during the conflict, featured an image presented by John Wayne consistent with the heroic battles in Europe during World War II. Filmmakers emerged in greater numbers in the late 1970s and 1980s after considering that rather than focusing on the perception of losing the war, there were more important stories to tell about the conflict. Some of the notorious films about the Vietnam War are Born on the Fourth of July, Platoon, Apocalypse Now, We Were Soldiers, Rambo, Deer Hunter, Full Metal Jacket, and Hamburger Hill. Vast differences between how and why the films were made and the background and inspiration for the directors who made the film were apparent. Within each director lay a unique interpretation of the conflict based on personal experience (Toplin, 1991). There were some films that attempted to counter the feeling that the U.S. had lost the war and explored a hypothetical favorable American outcome in unifying North and South Vietnam under democracy (Siskel, 1985). Movies like Full Metal Jacket explored new concepts such as how the press’ presence in Vietnam influenced public support for the war. Many of these films were popular because of their violent imagery. Scenes depicting

It was estimated that by the late teens of the 20th century, Zukor held 75% of the best talent in the filmmaking business. I was baffled by this statistic when I read it. For one studio to hold ¾’s of the best talent in the industry is nearly a monopoly. Another thing I found interesting was that Fox worked on 70 mm wide-screen techniques. This was thought provoking to me because this summer I saw the film Dunkirk, and my friends and I saw it with the 70 mm wide-screen edition. I had never seen a movie with this wide-screen 70 mm and it was definitely different from a regular screen. Another thing that caught my attention was the connection between film and politics. I was interested to learn that MGM used a film to bring down Upton Sinclair as he was running for office. I was also shocked to read that Charlie Chaplin was not let into the United States because of his progressive political views. I was baffled that a man that was once called the “king of comedy” in the United States was denied entry because of his political

This paper was prepared for Introduction to Film History, Module 1 Homework Assignment, taught by Professor Stephanie Sandifer.

The BBFC has commissioned me to undertake research as part of a project to ascertain to what degree films can be regarded as powerful within contemporary society. In this assignment, I will comprehensively explain the relationship between audiences and films with well explained examples. I refer to the different sectors relating to the topic that include the following: