The film, Hell or High Water, is aptly named. The phrase means a strong will to do something, regardless of any difficulties which may lie in the way. This is exactly the mindset of the two brothers in this crime thriller which takes place following the 2008 financial crisis. Through stereotypes, realism, and the struggle over representation, Hell or High Water shows that while people in West Texas may divide each other up by race and class, they are all united against the tyranny of the banks and large institutions. Hell or High Water takes place in West Texas. There, two brothers commit a series of bank robberies targeting the Texas Midlands Bank chain. They take only small, non-traceable notes and are sure to hide their faces during the robberies. Tanner, the ex-con, and reckless brother, takes increasingly unnecessary risks during these robberies. As a result, an innocent bank teller is killed. The film ends when Tanner is killed in a standoff with the police. Toby gets away with the robberies and uses the money to pay off the mortgage on his late mother’s home. This saves the farm from foreclosure and allows them to live off of the untapped oil reserves which lay beneath. Films have the power to both influence and reflect society. The stereotypes prevalent throughout American culture are reflected in most films. While the United States is becoming an increasingly diverse country, this diversity is not portrayed within American cinema. Minority figures often occupy
Another historic surge in black cinema arose out of the nineties alongside hip-hop music. The two were a response to the social fragmentation, gentrification, and violence among the black males lived experience. The renaissance faded out by the turn of the century as a reaction to Hollywood’s tendency to be overly attentive and cautious with its portrayal of black America in order to mollify white markets. By being so focused on the bottom line, the material and career options of black filmmakers are limited and opportunities for black artists are constrained (Dyson, p.210). When Hollywood has finished exploiting black culture and got all that they could gain from it, they no longer need to reach out to the African American fallback audience. As of late, films such as Django Unchained (2012) and Straight Outta Compton (2015) offer a glimmer of hope as misrepresentation and subjugation can be uprooted. Black filmmakers have been struggling for control and supervision over the production and exhibition of black films. It is incontestable that Hollywood has overlooked the racial tension over the years and instead opted for formulaic and safe movies that will reel in as much profit. Get Out is a film that excites me because it gets the better of social prejudices and directly addressed the
Unlike most people today, I rarely watch TV and do not follow any shows; therefore, I decided to evaluate my favorite film franchise, Disney. The Disney Corporation began creating movies in a rather non-inclusive time, the early 1900’s; thus, several of their movies depict racial and gender stereotypes. The problem does not revolve around the actual making of the movies but that Disney still holds on to several of these iconic movies. For example, Dumbo and Peter Pan are two movies still admired today with racial stereotypes.
Through the use of images, films, and other media outlets harmful stereotypes are often times created. One of the many challenges that American cinema endures is the inability to correctly portray characters of color. Film directors have formed a habit of creating and defining characters in a way that the audiences can easily identify with, thus leading to the reproduction of racial stereotyping. Black characters have generally been stigmatized throughout the course of history as aggressive, inferior, and irrational beings. These common stereotypes are perpetuated through the use of redundant film clichés that have a significant impact on society’s popular image of blacks. Within the article In Living Color, Michael Omi claims that despite progressive changes in America pertaining to race, popular culture is still responsible for damaging racial stereotypes and racism. Whereas, within Matt Zoller Seitz article, The Offensive Movie Cliché That Won’t Die, he discusses film clichés such as “Magical Negro” that uses an African American character for the sole purpose of acting as a mentor for their oblivious white counterpart. However, Get Out, a horror satire on the micro-aggressive black experience, directed by Jordan Peele, debunks these racial stereotypes centered around black men. The film subverts the use of racial stereotypes, as it rejects America’s depiction of common black men behavior pertaining to their criminalized lifestyle, masculinity, and aggression in
During the process of producing a television series, the demand for the producers to introduce their characters with only their highlighted traits make it impossible for viewers to gain a deep understanding of the community that the characters represent. One of the stereotypic traits that is usually seen on movies and television shows is societal difference that each race is placed into. Michael Omi in his article In Living Color: Race and American Culture stated that “in contemporary television and film, there is a tendency to present and equate racial minority groups and individuals with specific social problems” (546). There are many films and television shows found today that ground racial minorities into a specific social problems that are related to the color of their skin. It can be inferred from the current popular culture that this stereotype still persists.
For all of its existence, the United State of America has suffered with its representation of minorities in media. From minstrel shows to The Birth of a Nation, diversity in media has been almost non-existent until the latter half of the twentieth century. Although there have been some bright spots like There Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and the works of Langston Hughes, most media have been almost exclusively from a white, oftentimes male, viewpoint. According to a 2016 diversity report done by the Ralph J. Bunche Center for African American Studies at UCLA, minorities are underrepresented 3 to 1 among film leads, 5 to 1 in film writers, and 3 to 1 among film directors. This surprising, as the same reports states that America’s increasingly diverse audiences prefer diverse casts and films, pointing to the fact that diverse films had higher median global box office receipts.
The fourth circle of upper hell contains the hoarders and the spendthrifts, whose wills were too weak in life to manage their assets. Aware only of their own needs on earth, they each work towards their own goal in Hell, pushing a rock. They are forced, however to cope with like-minded souls and collide rather than cooperating, which results in eternal frustration.
There are many times when people say that everyone has some sort of prejudice towards an ethnic group. A perfect example is that of the portrayal of races through stereotypes in American films that are being made and sold to the public. Since the beginning of the silent black and white movies there have been stereotypes that misrepresent ethnic groups, such as the negative portrayal of African-Americans in minstrel shows. Although these extreme negative racist portrayals have ended, the film industry still insists on adding stereotypes that negatively portrays ethnic minorities, such as Asian-Americans, Hispanics-Americans, and African-Americans.
The 2015 Hollywood Diversity Report, published by UCLA’s Ralph J. Bunche Center, said that while minorities account for more than half of frequent US moviegoers, the representation of those minorities has dipped since 2013. The report describes that year as a “breakout year” for black films, including 12 Years a Slave and The Butler. In 2015, Straight Outta Compton made over $60m, which was $20m higher than expected. (Hollywood Diversity Report). The report says black audiences are repeatedly undervalued. What the report is proving is that the lack of diversity in the film industry is actually costing Hollywood money. The problem and solution seem almost obvious when looking at these specific examples – do not underestimate minority audiences and how much money they will collectively spend watching movies with diverse
In most films, African Americans are also shown in a stereotypical manner that promotes notions of moral inferiority. When it comes to the terms of movie characters shown by race African Americans use more vulgar profanity than whites. African Americans are also being physically violent and restrained than whites. The despite history of African Americans in television, there has been improvement in some of the television and movie roles and portrayals. Improvement in media roles still needs to accurately reflect our diverse roles in society.
Many times we become exposed to many different movies and we don’t always seem to pay attention to the stereotypes or the classifications in which different scenes of the movie portray. I feel like many of the movies that we watch or even movies that we display to children might employ or dictate negative stereotypes or present minorities and different cultures in a negative perspective. As future educators I feel like we should watch out for these types of things and how we divulge students into learning about other people and their cultures by the media we convey in our classroom.
After watching the filmed introduction, I realized how Asian Americans are not presented in films and videos. Asian Americans seem to always portray stereotype roles such as being a nerd, villain and martial artist. Sometimes their hard work goes unnoticed and not given credit for. There are many Asian American actors that are very talented and giving them stereotypical roles can limit their work opportunities and hinder their talents in so many ways. The stereotypes of Asian Americans in films can also have a big impact on public perception about Asian American people.
“Oscars So White” a phrase that began trending on social media sites after the 2016 Academy Awards announce their nominees for Best Actor and Best Actress, it was predominately white for a second year in a row. The movie industry is no stranger to controversy and since its inception it’s constantly been guilty of underrepresenting ethnic people. It’s evident that film is a type of mass media that has a certifiable amount of power to influence audience’s views, yet this platform constantly disregards the need for diversity in favor of stereotypes. Movies such as Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961), Scarface (1983), and Pan (2015) are all guilty of this. The depiction of non-American characters in Hollywood movies are constructed around racial
For over 80 years, Americans have been entertained by Hollywood productions on the big screen. Movies and films have always been a favorite pass time of the country. As a result of the fact that so many Americans turn to the big screen for fun, there is a lot of influence potential carried with the films or the movies that Hollywood produced. With increased ability to disseminate information comes the responsibility of presenting images that are accurate and factual. The influence and perception that Hollywood created was not always positive. There were multiple groups that were marginalized in film through stereotypes. Native Americans were one of the groups that were negatively
“Water can flow or water can be stagnant. I set the film in the 1930s but the people in the film live their lives as it was prescribed by a religious text more than 2000 years old. Even today, people follow these texts, which is one reason why there continue to be millions of widows. To me, that is a kind of stagnant water. I think traditions should not be that rigid. They should flow like replenishing kind of water.”
Love is key theme in titanic. Titanic is an epic romance film, which also contains certain historical and authentic aspects of the time it narrated. Titanic is a movie directed by James Cameron, which was released in 1997. Titanic movie is a kind of sad love story, where I notice love couldn’t discriminate by any classes such as elite and poor. Here we know that love is painful but again people cannot live without love.