The Grapes Of Wrath Film Analysis

[1] The silent film, With Daniel Boone Thru the Wilderness, was produced in 1926: a time of prosperity, an era without the skepticism of the modern American mind. People were not yet questioning the stories and histories they had been taught as children. The entertaining story told in this Robert North Bradbury film is loosely based on the life of an American hero. However, the presence of several insidiously inaccurate historical representations demonstrates how an entertaining film might not be as innocent as it initially seems. This film fails to question certain key issues concerning the Daniel Boone legend. In fact, it does quite the opposite. The creators of this

According to the film critic, Phillip French, “The Western has always been about America rewriting and reinterpreting her own past,” if this is indeed the case, then the two most popular Westerns of the early 1990s reveal that many Americans had rejected the traditional interpretation of the Old West. The critically and commercially successful, Dances with Wolves and Unforgiven, repudiated the patriotic frontier myth that had characterised the Western when it was the preeminent genre in American cinema. Informed by new Western historiography, itself an expression of political concerns that had been moving into the American mainstream since the 1960s, the movies display a complex and nuanced understanding of the frontier experience. Dances with Wolves rejected the traditional narrative of the inherent superiority of the Anglo-American hero conquering both Native Americans and the wilderness, and also focused on the environmental destruction that accompanied the ideology of Manifest Destiny. Unforgiven would similarly reject the frontier myth, replacing the democratic, civilised frontier town, with a brutal regime in which white men’s property rights prevail over any sense of justice. The film is noted for its self-reflexive nature, with a writer documenting and embellishing the tales of the Old West before the viewer’s eyes. This self-reflexion indicates that Americans were re-evaluating the myths of the frontier, and seeing them for what they were, creations by the

In John Ford’s 1962 western, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” the audience experiences a narrative with a flashback retell for most of the film. Ford uses diegesis storytelling to portray details about the taming of the western frontier and the experiences of his characters in the modernization of the frontier through narrative.

As the segment put it, the movie is a classic Hollywood roadtrip/buddy cinema that uses humor to tell a story of loss and redemption about the two main protagonists, Thomas Builds-the-Fire and Victor Joseph (208). The author goes on to more clearly contend the singularity of the film in comparison to other films such as Powwow Highway in the sense that Smoke Signals did not center around an Indian and white conflict, but instead it focused on Victor’s internal struggles with his father (210). This, combined with the fact that Native Americans were not only in the film, but also a part of the outside, introduced the reasons why the film had a unparalleled plot and a set of different standards to meet in comparison to past films. As Cobb put it, the film had to find a balance in creating a film that had an implicit political goal, while also being a relaxing American and Native cinema that appease both audiences and was able to achieve some commercial value. According to the writer, the film was able to achieve this in the comedic conversations between Victor and Thomas, highlighting a famous scene of a bus that challenges the stereotypical images of the Indian warrior and medicine man (214).

The western movie I pick is John Ford’s movie Stagecoach (1939). The movie is about a group of people traveling together by stagecoach from the town Tonto to Lordsburg. The people traveling together are a diverse group of people. All of them have the specific motivation for going, but they all share the same goal reaching to Lordsburg. The characters are Dallas who’s a prostitute, Mrs. Lucy Mallory who is the wife of the Army Cavalry officer, Ellsworth Henry Gatewood who is a banker, Hatfield who is a gambler, Samuel Peacock who is whiskey salesman, Doc Josiah Boone who is a alcoholic doctor, Buck Rickabaugh who is a stage driver, Marshal Curley Wilcox who is a marshal riding shotgun, and Ringo Kid who is an escaped outlaw.

John Steinbeck wrote the The Grapes of Wrath in 1939 to rouse its readers against those who were responsible for keeping the American people in poverty. The Grapes of Wrath tells the story of the Joad family, migrant farmers from Oklahoma traveling to California in search of an illusion of prosperity. The novel's strong stance stirred up much controversy, as it was often called Communist propaganda, and banned from schools due to its vulgar language. However, Steinbeck's novel is considered to be his greatest work. It won the Pulitzer Prize, and later became an Academy Award winning movie in 1940. The novel and the movie are both considered to be wonderful

“Film is more than the instrument of a representation; it is also the object of representation. It is not a reflection or a refraction of the ‘real’; instead, it is like a photograph of the mirrored reflection of a painted image.” (Kilpatrick) Although films have found a place in society for about a century, the labels they possess, such as stereotypes which Natives American are recognized for, have their roots from many centuries ago (Kilpatrick). The Searchers, a movie directed by John Ford and starred by John Wayne, tells the story of a veteran of the American Civil War and how after his return home he would go after the maligned Indians who killed his family and kidnapped his younger niece. After struggling for five years to recover

In 1939 John Ford masterminded a classical western film by the name of Stagecoach. This film has the integrity of a fine work of art. Being that it could be considered a work of art, the impression left on a viewing audience could differ relying on the audience's demographics. However, it is conceivable to all audiences that Ford delivers a cast of characters that are built on stereotypes and perceptions conjured from 'B' westerns that preceded this film's time. Each character is introduced to the audience in a stereotypical genre, as the film progresses, these stereotypes are broken down and the characters become more humanized. This is apparent with a handful of characters being

The American western frontier, still arguably existent today, has presented a standard of living and characteristics which, for a time, where all its own. Several authors of various works regarding these characteristics and the obvious border set up along the western and eastern sections have discussed their opinions of the west. In addition to these literary works by renowned authors, one rather convenient cinematic reference has also been influenced by these well-known, well-discussed practices of this American frontier. “True Grit”, a film recently remade in 2010 by the Cohen Brothers, crosses the boundaries of the west allowing all movie-goers to capture one idea of the western world. The movie, along with a few scholarly sources

Over the course of his life, John Wayne developed a powerful and one of a kind star persona. John Wayne's persona is highly tied to masculinity, which we see through many of his character roles in his Western films. John Wayne made many movies throughout his long, illustrious career but he is most well-known for his appearances in Stagecoach (1939), The Searchers (1956), Rio Bravo (1959), True Grit (1969) and many more. Throughout John Wayne's career, his persona shows us the nature of the world where men are forced to choose to be part of a family or to remain independent and keep their masculinity. Ultimately, his persona sends the message that men can be family

The movie “Flags of our Fathers” is based on the book written by James Bradley, the son of the flag bearer John Bradley. To have so much confusion and misinformation behind what was believed to be a victory for the American forces which was the platform to show the contrasts between the realities of war and this image of war that was used as if it was

As I have said, one of his trademark characteristics was his use of scenery. John Ford used the environment to describe his characters and the situations they were in instead of

“They had no argument, no system, nothing but their numbers and their needs. When there was work for a man, ten men fought for it – fought with a low wage. If that fella’ll work for thirty cents, I’ll work for twenty-five”(Steinbeck). The renowned novel, The Grapes of Wrath, is a realistic portrayal of life and social conditions during the 30’s when the Dust Bowl swept across the nation, causing many to fall deeper into the depression. This caused many families to leave their homes in search of a safer and more hopeful land. The Grapes of Wrath follows Tom Joad, his family, and many other migrant farmers as they migrate from their Oklahoma farms into their new, hope filled life in California. The struggles that these characters endure

Considered one of the greatest of all American directors, John Ford would no doubt be regarded an auteur by those who choose to utilize the phrase. One can imagine Ford carefully weaving beautiful images of monument valley, to fulfill his artistic allegories, or demanding the most effective of performances from a cast who manage to convey the emotions which stir inside this most American of auteurs. Just as Corman seems to put a great deal of philosophical thought into crafting what many consider to be "simple" films, Ford seems to suggest that his cinematic choices are often over-analyzed. In an interview with fellow western film director Burt Kennedy, Ford was asked about some of these choices, which have come to define much of his style, and his answers are surprisingly simplistic. When questioned about his connection to Monument Valley, and the reasoning behind choosing that location, Ford responded "I knew

The Grapes of Wrath is a film that shows America’s most distressed and calamitous time period, “The Great Depression” which was a name given to an economic crisis and the apocalyptic “Dust Bowl”, a term that referred to a cataclysmic dust storm which eradicated and obliterated most of all America’s agriculture causing numerous farmers to be deprived of their own living and had their job ceased. The film was released on March 15, 1940 a year after the actual Great Depression ended, Directed by John Ford and starred by Henry Fonda, Jane Darwell, John Carradine, Charlie Grapewin, and six other main characters. The film shows how people had to leave everything behind in order to live and help their family survive. In the film “grandpa” had to leave