Transcript September 29, 2011

September 29, 2011
Types of Political Films
High
Politically
Reflective
Pure
Political
Socially
Reflective
Auteur
Political
Political
Content
Low
Low
High
Political Intent
Source: Christensen and Haas, p. 8
Examples
 Political Reflective
 Independence Day
 Invasion of the Body
Snatchers
 Pure Political
 Mr. Smith Goes to
Washington
 The Candidate
 Socially Reflective
 Pretty Women
 Philadelphia
 Gone with the Wind
 Auteur Political
 The Godfather
 Natural Born Killers
 American Beauty
Source: Christensen and Haas, p. 9.
Differences Between Documentaries
and Feature Films
 usually shorter, lower production values
 more journalistic style
 narrator with interviews
 camera carried into places that movie cameras often do
not go
 increasing tendency for feature films to integrate
some documentary footage and for documentaries
to include contemporary films and popular culture
Influential Documentaries
 Nanook of the North (1922)
 Why We Fight (WW2)
 Triumph of the Will (1935)
 The Sorrow and the Pity
(1971)
 The Atomic Café (1982)
Box Office of Top 10 Documentaries
Title
Studio
Box Office
Fahrenheit 9/11
Bowling for Columbine
Winged Migration
Hoop Dreams
Lions Gate
United Artists
SPC
FL
$118M
$21M
$12M
$7.8M
Tupac Resurrection
Roger & Me
Spellbound
Paramount
Warner Bros.
Think
$7.7M
$6.7M
$5.7M
Touching the Void
The Fog of War
IFC
SPC
$4.6M
$4.2M
Source: Christensen and Haas, p. 229.
update
Michael Moore Documentaries
 Roger & Me (1989)
 Canadian Bacon (1995)
 Bowling for Columbine (2002)
 Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004)
 Sicko (2007)
 Capitalism: A Love Story (2009)
Controversy over Michael
Moore
 Bias in selection of images
 Skewed analysis
 Use of surprise interview tactics
 Use of deception to gain access to key people and
places
Giglio Book
“Why does Hollywood avoid the dogmatic political
film, the critical political biography, or the straight
political drama? The reason is quite simple:
political movies are box office poison. To admit
that 90 percent of Hollywood films are purely
commercial ventures ignores the remaining ten
percent that deliver messages that can be
ideological, propagandistic, historically deceptive
and politically motivated.” (p. 10)
What is Propaganda?
 David Culbert’s definition: “the controlled
dissemination of deliberately distorted notions in an
effect to induce action favorable to the predetermined
ends of a special interest group.”
 E.g. Triumph of the Will by Leni Riefenstahl or Salt of the Earth and The Red
Menace.
Source: Giglio, p. 45.
Triumph of the Will (1935)
Documentary by
innovative female
director Leni
Riefenstahl
Hollywood Ignores the Nazis
 There were no Hollywood movies about the Nazis
prior to the outbreak of WW2, with the exception
of The Great Dictator
 Most pre-WW2 movies referred to the Nazi threat
obliquely in terms of spies or saboteurs
 Were the Hollywood Studio heads asked to play
down the threat?
The Great Dictator (1940)
 Charlie Chaplin
played Adenoid
Hynkel in a satire of
Nazi Germany
 Hitler’s troops saw
ads for the movie
when they entered
Paris; they thought
the French were
welcoming them!
Clip from the film