Forrest Gump: comic representations of the recent American past

Mestrado em Línguas, Literaturas e Culturas - Estudos InglesesO presente trabalho propõe-se pesquisar a abordagem histórica das décadas de 50, 60 e 70 nas comédias americanas contemporâneas. Deste modo espero destacar os acontecimentos da história americana no passado recente que se prestaram a uma abordagem cinematográfica e foram retratados em comédias. As reacções a esses filmes permitem ainda reflectir sobre os valores culturais transmitidos nos filmes de comédia. Esta dissertação também aborda as características e funções da comédia enquanto género cinematográfico. Na fundamentação teórica também são abordadas algumas questões ligadas à adaptação cinematográfica. A vertente prática da dissertação centra-se no filme Forrest Gump, explorando a sua relevância histórica, e a adaptação ao cinema. ABSTRACT: This dissertation is intended to research historical approaches to the fifties, sixties and seventies in contemporary comedy films. Doing so, I expect to cast some light on recent American events that have proved to be cinematic and likely to be explored in a comic perspective. Viewers´ response to these films is also to be analysed so as to reflect on the cultural values rendered in comedy forms. Moreover, this dissertation includes some thought on the narrative and generic features of comedy as a film genre. The theoretical section also covers some issues raised by film adaptation. The practical research section focuses on the film Forrest Gump, exploring both its historical significance, and the precise nature of this adaptation

Crossing America’s Borders: Chinese Immigrants in the Southwesterns of the 1920s and 1930s

Today, when we think of the film Western, we think of a genre dominated by Anglo-American heroes conquering the various struggles and obstacles that the nineteenth-century frontier presented to settlers and gunslingers alike—from the daunting terrain and inclement environment of deserts, mountains, and plains to the violent opposition posed by cattle ranchers and Native Americans. What we tend to forget, most likely because the most famous Westerns of the last seventy-five years also forgot, is that Chinese immigrants played an important role in that frontier history. As Edward Buscombe confirms, “[g]iven the importance of their contribution, particularly to the construction of the Central Pacific railroad, the Chinese are under-represented in the Western.” In the 1920s and ’30s, many films focused on the smuggling of illegal Chinese immigrants—whether men for work or women for prostitution. Although a topic for a handful of social dramas such as The Miracle Makers (W. S. Van Dyke, 1923), Speed Wild (Harry Garson, 1925), Let Women Alone (Paul Powell, 1925), Masked Emotions (David Butler/Kenneth Hawks, 1929), and Lazy River (George B. Seitz, 1934), as well as newspaper-crime films such as I Cover the Waterfront (James Cruze, 1933), and Yellow Cargo (Crane Wilbur, 1936), the smuggling of Chinese people was also common in Westerns. According to the AFI Catalog, Chinese characters and actors appear in minor roles in at least seventy-eight silent and classical-era Westerns as cooks, laundrymen, and restaurant owners. These seventy-eight Westerns ranged from A-Westerns set in the nineteenth-century frontier to B-Westerns set in the modern West. Of the latter group, several Westerns—more specifically, “Southwesterns”—offered plots that connected Chinese immigrants to crime through the smuggling of opium, laborers, and prostitutes into the United States from China via Mexico. Southwesterns were lower-budget and were typically shot with cheap sets, grainy film stock, and few retakes (what we would call today B-Westerns), set in the contemporaneous Southwest (i.e., California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas) near the border with Mexico: it was this borderland setting that invited stories of smuggling and border penetration.3 According to the AFI Catalog, of the 182 Westerns released between 1910 and 1960 that are set in the Mexican–American border region, 39 offer plots centered on smuggling various kinds of things, from opium and liquor to silver, dynamite, and counterfeit money, as well as guns. Southwesterns exploited the borderland setting to offer exciting smuggling plots that connected crime to Chinese immigrants. Although the opium-smuggling films connect crime to China, they rarely feature Chinese characters. In contrast, the immigrant-smuggling films present Chinese people as a physical and visible alien threat to America’s national borders, and it is these films that are the focus of this article. As this article will demonstrate, there were many Westerns centered on smuggling plots related to Chinese immigration, and the borders that these films were concerned with were as much cultural and racial as territorial. In other words, the presence of illegal Chinese immigrants assisted the genre of the Western to confirm the borders of American national identity

First encounters: French literature and the cinematograph

Drawing on roughly forty years of French writing for examples, from the invention of the cinematograph to the publication of the first history of cinema in France, my aim in this essay is to consider how literature represented going to the cinema while this was still a new experience, how the raw material of this experience was processed into art. An alternative title would be ‘The Cinema Scene as Motif in French Literary Fiction’. Important work on this topic for the first part of my period has already been done by Stephen Bottomore in an invaluable essay to which I am much indebted

(Board)ing Schools: Rudyard Kipling’s young heroes

Rudyard Kipling’s young male characters, namely Stalky (Stalky & Co. ) and Harvey Cheyne Junior (Captains Courageous), whom he portrays with noticeable admiration, exhibit, on the one hand, circumspection, stoicism, leadership, and stalkiness, on the other hand, the absence of scruples in manipulating those acting in loco parentis to achieve their desired ends. This article aims to examine how these characters can shed light on one another, allowing for a better comprehension of them both. Furthermore, it will explore how the religious archetype of the trinity permeates Stalky & Co.’s composition of characters, and how muscular Christianity shapes Captains Courageous. Stalky and Harvey thrive in a masculine world, access to which requires leaving women behind, substituting them with brotherhoods or identification with the father. The perfect man, Kipling postulates, is the resourceful and courageous rule-bending Christian who is able to keep women and natives in a state of obedience.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

The Siren of San Francisco

The Siren of San Francisco is a story I have been interested in telling for the longest time focusing on the coming of age of the main character, Mia, and how she deals with change through gaining the power of shapeshifting. A lot of the graphic novel explores the relationships between Mia, her mom, and her close friends and how her relationships with them change during this transitional period. The driving force behind this story was my enduring interest in relationships, identity, feminism, and how people can shape the people around them, including themselves. I approached this particular story from a feminist angle; interested in the ways women interact and relate to one another. There’s been a wave of feminist graphic novels that touch on this subject but The Siren of San Francisco is unique because it doesn\u27t commodify feminist ideals; it allows its female characters to simply be characters without limiting them to feminist role models. I wanted the graphic novel to feel more personal, so I took pieces from my own experiences coming of age…after all, centering experience is a tenet of feminist ideology. The Siren of San Francisco deconstructs the superhero and coming of age genre, expressing the myriad of ways femininity can be expressed and experienced. The graphic novel is more a coming of age story rather than a classic superhero origin story; it’s more focused on the friendships and relationships of the main character and how she navigates change through the lens of the “classic” superpower of shape-shifting. The graphic novel and subsequent afterword, I explore what it means to have a “strong female character” without limiting such characters to one experience. To discuss this, I explore the idea of loving perception, or understanding through relating to other people’s experiences, and implement these concepts into the characters themselves

The Cowl - v.81 - n.11 - Dec 1, 2016

The Cowl - student newspaper of Providence College. Volume 81, Number 11 - December 1, 2016. 24 pages

Threads of influence: Greek tragedy and its relevance to the contemporary novel, with specific reference to Donna Tartt's 'The secret history', and my novel, 'The first seven years'

This MPhil concerns the contemporary literary novel and how it has been influenced by the Golden Age of Greek tragedy. It comprises of three parts: the thesis and the novel, hereby presented, and the journal of creative experiences, which was observed at viva. My thesis examines the historical development of Greek tragedy and its structure. It further explores how tragedy has influenced writers through the ages, culminating in the literary tragedy of today. The methodology of tragic form is investigated in the works of writers educated in Greek tragic structure, and also those with no classical background. This thesis aims to show how novelists without a classical education have accessed the tragic form, via threads of literary influence, and utilised it successfully, albeit often unconsciously. My novel, The First Seven Years, is a work of contemporary tragic fiction. It tells the story of one woman’s attempts to do the best for her child. Trapped between raising her young son, Alfie, and caring for an increasingly frail elderly relative, Kate becomes emotionally and physically stretched. When she discovers Alfie has been badly bullied in his failing state school, her attempts to change schools have tragic consequences. Finally, my journal, presented at viva, compiles my creative thoughts, notes and research for both novel and thesis in one portfolio. My original notebooks show much of my novel’s planning and I have included visual images used of characters, buildings, locations, Kate’s photography and Martha’s pottery. Factual research is also integrated; investigating peripheral neuropathy, school league tables and admissions criteria. Thesis research includes relevant newspaper cuttings, programmes to Oedipus Rex and Phèdre, readings by DBC Pierre & Jeanette Winterson, and an interview with David Guterson. This journal has proved invaluable throughout my MPhil, both as an inspiration and an aide-mémoire

Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books 48 (10) 1995

published or submitted for publicatio

The Problem with David: Masculinity and Morality in Biblical Cinema

The King David of the Bible, and especially as portrayed in the books of Samuel, is one of the most complex characters in ancient literature. We are told his story from his youth as a shepherd until his death as king of Israel. He kills a mighty warrior with a slingshot, goes to war with his king and later his son, and has an affair that threatens to throw his kingdom into disarray. The stories surrounding David seem perfect for cinematic adaptation yet what makes this character so compelling has been problematic for filmmakers. Here, three types of Biblical filmmaking shall be considered: Hollywood epics (David and Bathsheba (1951), David and Goliath (1960), and King David (1985)); televised event series (The Story of David (1976) and The Bible: The Epic Miniseries (2013)); and independent Christian films (David and Goliath (2015) and David vs. Goliath: Battle of Faith (2016)). Issues that shall be considered include: tone and genre, casting, democracy and ideology, masculinity, and sexual morality. This investigation shall explore how these issues are treated in different types of Biblical filmmaking and how genre constraints impact the reception of David on film