American Film, Made in the Period since 1945 - Titanic - Essay Example

Choose an American Film, Made in the Period Since 1945, which in Your View, Can be Legitimately Described as Popular The film Titanic exploded in movie theaters in the year 1997. It was a historical drama, epic film which intricately married fact and fiction, with sentimental narrative. It was a film by James Cameron, which was based on the historical sinking of the great ship the Titanic. The fictional perspective is introduced as 2 individuals, Jack Dawson (Leonardo DiCaprio, protagonist 1) and Rose Dewitt- Bukater (Kate Winslet, protagonist 1). These are the main characters which, although are from different classes, meet on the ship and fall in love. This essay will be exploring some of the textual and contextual criticism on this film. It will also examine the role or place for this film in a social, cultural and industrial context. Let us begin with a brief overview of film history from the mid 1940's up through the late nineties, when Titanic was introduced. During the 1940's, film evolved in a newly post war time and the genre of film noir began. During the 1950's post classical age in film, the introduction of television challenged the idea of film as it had been known. The 1960's brought with it the genesis of independent film which threatened the system of big Hollywood film. It was not until the 1970's that the term and idea of "blockbuster" was invented. By this time, the "new wave" of film was in place and the idea of cinema was changing. The 1980's kept the new idea of "blockbuster" alive with the introduction of teen based films (Breakfast Club, Saint Elmo's Fire). It was not until the 1990's that computer animation was alive and prominent in mainstream films. The movie Titanic arrived as not only a film using then, cutting edge computer animation but also an enormous (one of the largest in film history, a whopping $200 million USD) budget. Prior to this time period, big budget film was not as prominent. As an audience member to a showing of Titanic, one could watch a computer animated version of the famous ship ( The Titanic), slowly sink over a 2 hour period, bottom first followed by the full erecting of the ship in the Atlantic and finally the virtual sinking of the very ship that was never supposed to sink. This film is classified as historical drama or epic film, by most critics. An epic film or a historical drama (one in the same), can be defined as a historically based film that has been recreated and built upon fictionally. Usually, the use of powerful scoring and elaborate costumes can recreate a historical time or legend, so that the audience gains a sense of realism from the piece. In observing some criticism on the film, one critic says of Titanic"By deliberately adopting the stylistics of sentimentality in his screenplay, Cameron recalls yet another, less cynical time in Titanic. As with the golden age of Hollywood musicals or the 1950s-era films of Doris Day and Rock Hudson, Titanic eschews the irony of modernity and the narrative dislocation of post modernity in favor of yet another, more sentimentalized genre in which good inevitably wins out over evil, heroes invariably overcome class barriers, and lovers always find the means to endure despite harrowing odds" (Davis, Womack, 2001). This piece of criticism is referring to the film as viewing a "less cynical time" when that is really untrue. The essential conflict of the film, aside from the immanently sinking ship, is that the newly love stricken Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Rose (Kate Winslet) cannot be together but, due to their class differences, and Rose's engagement to another man, they are unable to be together. Certainly, if there is any truth to the circumstances of Jack and Rose, the entire time period was more than cynical. They were kept apart because one had financial means and social status while the other did not. The sentimentality observed by this critic is not necessarily pointing out a less than cynical time. Love, especially unrequited love is timeless and therefore irrelevant as an indication of cynicism or lack thereof. It is also somewhat confusing as to why this particular critic claims that this film displays good winning over evil or where "heroes invariably overcome harrowing odds". In the end of the film, Jack dies in the icy Atlantic after the ship sinks, and Rose goes on without him. She finally dies an old woman in her bed, on a ship. There is not a real sense of justice or heroism in this. A more thorough and realistic criticism illustrates the epic as more of a progressive piece that illustrates the modern woman of this time period routed in a sense of culture that anchors the audience into a safety within the idea of the "unsinkable ship""Within the symbology of the film, Rose shows herself to be a true woman of the new century by her sympathies toward Picasso and Freud even before they have achieved popular acceptance. 3 Those characters who keep assuring us of Titanic's safety, its unsinkability, see a well-ordered universe, a scientific rationality behind everything, and cannot grasp modern thinking as Rose instinctively does" (Chumo, 1999) Chumo's lengthy criticism points out specifics about the film that are indicators of stereotypes that Cameron somehow surpasses. For example, it is a common stereotype to portray a love stricken couple as the penniless boy and the "rich" girl. Although Cameron takes a risk with this overused stereotype, the "unhappy ending" is enough to balance this concept so that it is not a typical love story or historical drama. Truly, it can be said that the realism of the film comes into play when Jack dies and Rose grows old without the love of her life. This piece overall is a lesson piece in that it is straying from the norm in "love" stories where the boy gets the girl. In fact, all of the main characters die by the end of the film, displaying ultimate realism. From a social aspect, this film is a historical piece, made in the 1990's, with big budget computer graphics. The nineties was certainly a time for advancement for the views of women and women's issues. It is appropriate that this film is centered on the viewpoint of a woman, Rose (one of two of the film's protagonists). One critic explains the film in such a way that the realism of the death of Jack actually ushers in the idea of an independent woman, Rose, who does not need a man to survive" On board, however, she meets an engaging working-class man who ultimately succeeds in breaking her away from the oppressive clutches of her fianc. Up to this point in the film, the Hero/Villain formula is running true to form. Instead of being left with a romantic vision of two young lovers riding off into the sunset together, however, we are left with a dead hero who has sacrificed his life for that of his lover and a lone woman determined to face life on her own."(Hedley, 2002) From Hedley's gender oriented perspective, we can see this film as more progressive than it first appears. It is a film that would not have been made or certainly as widely accepted in an earlier decade. The 50's ideals of Donna Reed and June Cleaver left a cultural sense of patriarchy in film. It was necessary to show love stories with men as heroes and women being rescued. Ultimately, women were viewed as the weaker sex in film and in real life. The femme-independent quality of Rose Dewitt, would have been unusual for the time frame in which the movie was set. Women of class and money especially, at that time would have been expected to be very demure and submissive. Rose then appears as a model for women of her time and for women to come. Looking at this film from an industrial perspective, there are quite a few aspects to consider. The initial layer is the "working man" of the time, Jack. Jack is obviously very pressed for money as he has to win his third class ticket in order to board the Titanic. Rose, the "rich girl" is from a wealthy family and is staying in first class. This illustrates a heightened class system compared to the one in existence today. Although the present economy is not appealing, the economy of the time of the sailing of "the Titanic" was not something to covet. According to one critic" Walter Lord writes in The Night Lives On. "The Titanic has come to stand for a world of tranquility and civility that we have somehow lost," Lord continues. "Today, life is hectic, prices are climbing, quality is falling and violence is everywhere. In contrast, 1912 looks awfully good" (14, 18)." (Davis, Womack 2001). Culturally and industrially, it is not clear how anyone could covet such a time of class separation and patriarchy as exhibited by Cal (Billie Zane), Rose's controlling and wealthy fianc. The ideas of this paper are not in agreement with the words of Walter Lord, as he assimilates the world of Titanic as one of "tranquility and civility". There is nothing civil or tranquil about the separation of first, second and third class or the fact that the wealthy were the first to be saved. It is also important to look at the industrial significant of the fact that the movie about the most expensive ship ever built, one of the most expensive movies ever made. Interestingly, though the ship sank, the film did not. It profited over 1 billion dollars world wide. Looking at the film during the time that it was released, 1997, we see an almost cultural revival of historical interest over the event of the sinking of "Titanic" (the ship) "The release of James Cameron's film version of Titanic in 1997 is a good illustration of this kind of renewal. Following its box office success and the scheduling of several national exhibits by Titanic, Inc., the research component emerging from Robert Ballard's discovery a little more than a decade earlier, the general public was not only mesmerized by the film but also began to seek as much information as possible to satisfy both an intellectual and popular curiosity. (3) Fast approaching is Titanic's centennial, which will once more cause a resurgence of strong popular interest. That event will surely generate an unequaled popular obsession for the terrible tragedy of 1912." (Edgette, 2006). Based on Edgette's criticism of the film, it would seem that the film itself acted as a moving memorial for the events that took place on the sinking ship. It is however, not inappropriate to look at the sensationalism around the film and interpret it as exploitation. There is a school of thought that views large Hollywood productions like this one, as an exploitation of catastrophic events that took place in the past. It is human nature to be curious about such mass tragedies and only makes sense that a movie based on such an event would by all means draw the majority to the box office. Most of the reviews read for this essay, included an element of praise for the work of James Cameron in the film Titanic. As well as the work of the actors involved. It is safe to conclude that the film overall possesses an element of authentic history blended with creative edge. It is however, a bit overdone in the sense that it falls more heavily into a dramatic genre than a historical epic. The element of love and loss of love overshadowed the more realistic history of the piece. Works Cited: Davis, Todd F., Womack, Kenneth, 2001, Journal of Popular Film and Television Sedgwick, John, Pokorny, Michael, 2004, An Economic History of Film, London, Routledge Turner, Graeme, 1999, Film as Social Practice, London, Routledge Gehring, Wes D., 1988, Handbook of American Film Genres, Westport, Connecticut, Greenwood Press Edgette, J. Joseph, 2006, RMS Titanic: Memorialized in Popular Literature and Culture, Studies in the Literary Imagination vol. 39 Grainge, Paul, 2003, Memory and Popular Film, New York, NY, Manchester University Press Gehring, Wes D., 1998, Titanic: The Ultimate Epic, USA Today vol. 126 Chumo, Peter N, 1999, Learning to Make Each Day Count in James Cameron's Titanic, Journal of Popular Film and Television vol. 26 Hedley, Mark, 2002, The Geometry of Gendered Conflict in Popular Film1986-2000, Sex Roles: A Journal of Research http://rutgerspress.rutgers.edu/acatalog/A_Short_History_of_Film.htmlgclid=CNOAgrOGmJICFQKwPAodpgM6OQ http://www.filmsite.org/filmh.html http://www.historyinfilm.com/ library.thinkquest.org/29285/history/ www.tc.umn.edu/yahnk001/film/cinema.htm www.filmsite.org/filmh.html http://www.cinematical.com/2006/03/17/criticism-is-dead-long-live-criticism-laws-and-sausages/ www.filmreference.com/Films-Thr-Tur/Titanic.html Read More