| Chapter 2: | Reel Truth |
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Curiously Hollywood films are often an amalgamation of the conservative and liberal. My perception is that “Hollywood” is more liberal than Middle America. Political and economic themes in movies are almost always liberal. The “compromise” is that while films more often than not reflect liberal values, the tendency to emphasize the individual hero keeps the films more middle of the road. I’ll discuss this more fully in the next section on “individualism.”
What’s of particular interest to me is when I find a film that might seem one way, but in fact be the other. The Hollywood Shuffle is such a film. Robert Townsend’s film seems liberal in the sense that it is conspicuously criticizing discrimination. But in every other aspect of that film it is conservative – stressing his character Bobby’s need to make his own choices, help himself, work hard, honor his family, and his decision to work for the post office has red, white, and blue literally written all over it.
I think one of the basic questions to ask in thinking back over a movie, which may advertantly or inadvertently eventually influence your own thinking, is whether it was conservative or liberal?
What are the film’s assumptions about the relationship of the individual to the group?
Marshall McLuhan has said that he isn’t sure who discovered water, but he knows it wasn’t the fish. His point is about how difficult it is to separate ourselves from our environment. “Individualism” is so implicit and assumed in American culture, that when a filmmaker rejects its assumptions, audiences and critics are often left confused.
Consider the following quote from Elizabeth Cagan: