Paper Assignment #2
Due: December
English 300: The New Hollywood Cinema, 1967-77
Fall 2005
Prof. Susan White 621-5421
Michael Parker
Arianne Burford
Please hand in your paper in class, or sign it into the window in the Dept. of English, 445 MLB. DO NOT PLACE IT UNDER AN OFFICE DOOR, as it may get trampled or thrown away. Please keep a copy of your paper! If you wish to email the paper as an attachment, please ask permission first.
Write a five-page (1500-1800-word), double-spaced paper on one of the topics listed below, or on a topic of your choice as long as it pertains to one of the films we’ve seen in class or one of the novels we’ve read. If you develop your own topic, you need to email one of us your proposal, including your thesis statement, to have your topic approved in advance.
The most important elements of this paper are your thesis statement, which should be complex but coherent, topic sentences (the first sentence of each paragraph, which both refers back to your thesis argument and summarizes the content of the paragraph) and your supporting evidence, which should be specific and relevant.
Your audience is someone who has seen the film or read the novel, but may need very brief reminders to refresh his/her memory. We do not want long summaries of what happened in the film or novel. You are not simply retelling the film or novel, but analyzing the film and the novel from a particular visual, textual, and/or critical perspective.
You may not want to cover every element discussed in the questions below, but narrow your topic instead to allow you to explore fewer areas in greater depth. Excellent papers have been written, visually analyzing "as little as" one complex scene from a film.
Be sure to CITE SPECIFIC VISUALS from the films and to QUOTE PASSAGES from the literary works. You will need to use the visual analysis techniques and vocabulary covered in class and in the book Film Art. You MUST re-watch the film in its entirety and watch the scenes you are discussing several times, taking detailed notes. You can find each film we have screened in class on reserve in the Main Library Reserve Room (621-6406). These films can be viewed in the library's screening rooms (they can't be checked out of the library except at the end of the day).
This is not a research paper, but if you end up using any critical or historical background material, include a works cited page and footnotes/endnotes. You don't have to include films on your works cited page, or formally cite or footnote films throughout your paper. If you don't already know how to cite sources and write a works cited page, go to the library or bookstore and consult a standard style manual (like the MLA Handbook or the Chicago Manual of Style) to learn how.
Be sure to leave yourself enough time to edit your paper. It is important that you express your thoughts in a clear and coherent style, and that you avoid grammar, syntax and spelling errors.
We are available to help you with the different stages of writing your papers, so be sure to reserve a place in office hours if you feel you need help. Please use one inch margins and 12 point Times New Roman or equivalent size font.
Remember at every point in the paper that you are articulating an argument in the most persuasive way you can. Yet, this is NOT a research paper. Although you may certainly refer to other critics, especially those we have read for class, this paper is meant to be an original look at the film. If you do refer to the writings of other authors, be sure to footnote them and/or provide a works cited page (depending on your format).
PAPER TOPICS
Note that you don’t have to answer every question on a particular subject—just take the ideas and make your own thesis.
1. Write an essay that examines the characters’ differing relationships to sex in The Last Picture Show novel and/or film. In writing the essay, you might want to focus on such things as the way sex is depicted as a private act and/or as public property (gossip), or as a part of community history. Other issues to consider include what different characters seek via their sexual relationships and the following related questions: How do sex or conversations about sex serve as a kind of male bonding ritual? What is the function of intergenerational sex for men and for women? Does the film convey approval of these actions? How is sex depicted as a form of aggression or manipulation? You may also want to look at different forms of sexual depravity in the film, such as country bestiality versus urban saturnalia (the pool party). As with any essay, ground your analysis in specific textual details.
2. Compare and contrast the representation of small-town life and the coming of age story in the novel and the film versions of The Last Picture Show. The differences are sometimes quite subtle, so watch the film again with close attention.
3. How are the actions of the “rogue cop” justified and/or condemned in Dirty Harry? How does the film represent the cops’ relationship (if applicable) to the community, to masculinity, to non-white people, to homosexuals, to the “system,” and to women?
4. How does Taxi Driver, as a “lone gunman” film, work from or against the conventions of film noir and/or the “rogue cop” genre?
5. How is Taxi Driver a film about the Vietnam War? How does the film’s exploration of the returning veteran complicate issues of patriotism, violence and heroism in the film? What is the film’s relationship to the Western and how does that work with the Vietnam War overtones?
6. Describe the relationship between water and power in Chinatown. Include such elements as the fish motif, tide pools, water runoff, and Mulwray’s and Cross’s professional histories. Describe briefly the historical events concerning water and power upon which the film is based.
7. How is Noah Cross represented as a “primordial” figure who considers himself beyond the law? What is the significance of the Biblical connotations of his name? What is the relationship between his attitude towards natural resources and his attitude towards his daughter(s)?
8. Discuss the motif of vision in Chinatown. What ocular devices and symbols can be found in the film? What kind of comment do these devices make on the detective’s or spectator’s relative ability or inability to “see” what’s going on?
9. Many of the films we’ve seen in the last half of the semester have commented in some way on surveillance. Drawing on Question 8 for ideas about how to proceed, examine the role of looking and gazing and of listening and recording in The Last Picture Show, The Conversation, The French Connection, Jaws, The Godfather, or Dirty Harry. What or whom is being looked at in the film? What does the film seem to be saying about the various spectacles in the film and the act of surveillance? Does it comment on or implicate the viewer of films in this at all?
10. Discuss how point of view and range of knowledge are structured around the vision and identity of the investigator in The Conversation or another of the films we’ve seen since the midterm. To what extent is the investigative process a search for knowledge or a means of asserting control? What does the film seem to be saying overall about the process and outcome of detection?
11. Describe the function of the ethnic/social “other” in Dirty Harry or Taxi Driver. Start, for example, with the scenes in Dirty Harry where Scorpio takes aim at the gay couple in the park or where Harry asks the “punk” if he feels lucky or with those in Taxi Driver when Travis takes aim at the black couples in the park and on television. What other ways do either of these films use stereotyped ethnic images (e.g., cowboys and Indians)? Does the film you are analyzing comment on racial resentment and class structure in the U.S. during this period?
12. What is the function of the women in Taxi Driver? What kinds of stereotypes about women does Travis seem to construct around Betsy and Iris? How do these images seem to trigger reflex behaviors on Travis’s part? How do these women resist Travis’s stereotyping?
13. In one of the lectures someone suggested that in one of the films the female characters lacked depth. Analyze how women are portrayed in The Last Picture Show, The French Connection, Dirty Harry, The Conversation or The Godfather. To what extent, if at all, do the female characters defy or question stereotypes about women? You might look at how the women act in relation to men, how female sexuality is portrayed, how wives are portrayed, how female intelligence is portrayed, or a number of other issues. Be sure to ground your analysis in specific film techniques we’ve discussed this semester, look closely at specific scenes, and analyze the visual elements of the film in relation to the thesis you are arguing. Limit your analysis to one film.
14. How does the Bernard Hermann musical score in Taxi Driver create and celebrate romantic conceptions of the working class, and then deconstruct and destroy these romantic illusions? For instance, early scenes use a musical theme to celebrate the lone cabbie in the big city, and the magic of Betsy, the pure woman in the white dress. Then, later, the same musical theme is co-opted by “Sport” to seduce and deceive the twelve-year-old Iris. How does the music play a major role in manipulating the viewer’s perceptions of Travis’ world view, and the narrative trajectory of the film? (If you are interested in the musical score of another film we’ve screened, construct a question along the lines of this one on Taxi Driver and e-mail it to one of us for approval.)
15. How does The Godfather portray the conflict between family values and other kinds of values, such as patriotism? How are these conflicts expressed through contrasting visual and sound representations of Michael, his father, and his brothers?
16. Write an essay that examines the way that Taxi Driver treats the figure of the veteran. How does the film begin the cultural work that many post-Vietnam films have done of reintegrating the Vietnam veteran, often treated as psychically damaged and defined by his antisocial behavior, back into the American community. You could probably address the same issues in an essay that examines Jaws: Quint is a WWII veteran haunted by his experiences surrounding the sinking of the U.S.S. Indianapolis.
17. Write an essay that examines the cultural work done by the double in Dirty Harry. Ask yourself how the film uses the doubling between Harry and Scorpio to shape viewers’ attitudes toward issues of racism, law and order, the countercultural movement and police brutality.
18. Examine the portrayal of police brutality in relation to race in The French Connection. Does the film seem to be showing police brutality against black people as a problem or does it seem to be supporting it, saying
that it's standard operating proceedure? Or, is the film doing something else in its representation of these issues? You might consider also examining how crime is
represented in the film, and what the film is saying or showing about wealth and economic class, drugs, crime, race, and the law. Or, as part of your analysis you might also examine the stereotypes of African Americans in the film. Does the film question these stereotypes in any way, and if so to what extent?