Genre Theory and John Fords Stagecoach Essay - 1964 Words

Genre Theory and John Fords Stagecoach The analytic theory posited by Robert Warshow in his essay The Westerner, itemizes the elements necessary for a film to belong to the genre of the western. Most contentiously, he mandates that the narrative focus upon the individual heros plight to assert his identity, and diminishes the importance of secondary characters and issues, or any tendency toward social drama. (431) He states that it is subtle variations that make successive instances of a genre film interesting, yet limits this variety to minor variations in the characteristics of the actors who play the heros role. (430) It is my belief that while exhibiting many of the traits itemized by Warshow, John Fords†¦show more content†¦Other elements expected by the western viewer include the importance of the vast landscape in relation to the men upon it; the figures of the morally ambiguous marshall, the cultured Eastern lady, the understanding yet fallen prostitute and the bad guy; and the conflict between nature and civilization, usually represented by Apaches and white settlers respectively. Lastly, the most general and material characteristic of a western is its setting on the American western frontier in the late 1900s. Each of these motives is evident in Fords Stagecoach ; however, there are several conventions of the western which the director intentionally manipulates, which exceed altering the traits of the actor who plays the lead role. The first convention varied by Ford is the heros expected relationships with two different types of women. The generic first lady is the refined Eastern schoolmarm character. She represents the paradigm of civilized virtue, and as such fails to understand the cowboys need for revenge, to do what he has to do. (457) In contrast, we usually encounter the highly-sexualized saloon girl or prostitute, whose shares with the hero marginalization by the fledgling civilization of the frontier. This second woman understands the cowboys code in a way that the cultured woman cannot. In the conventional western, the hero often ends up with the lady, but his choice is excused by the convenient accidental death of the saloon girl, usually dueShow MoreRelated John Fords The Searchers Essay1924 Words   |  8 PagesJohn Fords The Searchers A critical theory by Robin Wood posits that the filmic genres popularized by the Hollywood system are not discrete, but represent different strategies for dealing with the same ideological tensions. (478) Wood claims that conventional theories fail to address this ideological phenomenon, and proposes a search for the myths and contradictions, produced by American capitalism, which fuel disparate filmic genres. Woods attempt to discuss this ideology lists the componentsRead MoreThe Studio System Essay14396 Words   |  58 Pagesstudio-owned, first-run theaters. When the studios released these films to theaters they didnt own, they forced those owners to buy A-pictures in combination with a number of, often mediocre, B-pictures (no stars, bargain-basement genre pictures) and shorts, a practice called block booking. Moreover, the studios often made the exhibitors buy the films blind, not allowing them to see what they were getting before they got it. The end of Hollywoods Golden Age Read MoreStrategic Marketing Management337596 Words   |  1351 Pagesnecessarily is or is not ‘marketing’. They go on to suggest that the AMA definition presents marketing as a functional process conducted by the organization’s marketing department, whereas the general thrust of the more recent literature on marketing theory is that marketing is increasingly being conceptualized as an organizational philosophy or ‘an approach to doing † 4 S T R AT E G I C M A R K E T I N G M A N A G E M E N T business’. This strategic as opposed to a functional approach to