Projecting Politics

Political Messages in American Films

Elizabeth Haas, Terry Christensen, Peter J. Haas

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9781317520023
• Topic: Media & Performing Arts
• Subtopic: Film History & Criticism

The new edition of this influential work updates and expands the scope of the original, including more sustained analyses of individual films, from The Birth of a Nation to The Wolf of Wall Street. An interdisciplinary exploration of the relationship between American politics and popular films of all kinds—including comedy, science fiction, melodrama, and action-adventure—Projecting Politics offers original approaches to determining the political contours of films, and to connecting cinematic language to political messaging. A new chapter covering 2000 to 2013 updates the decade-by-decade look at the Washington-Hollywood nexus, with special areas of focus including the post-9/11 increase in political films, the rise of political war films, and films about the 2008 economic recession. The new edition also considers recent developments such as the Citizens United Supreme Court decision, the controversy sparked by the film Zero Dark Thirty, newer generation actor-activists, and the effects of shifting industrial financing structures on political content. A new chapter addresses the resurgence of the disaster-apocalyptic film genre with particular attention paid to its themes of political nostalgia and the turn to global settings and audiences. Updated and expanded chapters on nonfiction film and advocacy documentaries, the politics of race and African-American film, and women and gender in political films round out this expansive, timely new work.

A companion website offers two additional appendices and further materials for those using the book in class.

Index

Page numbers in bold refer to images; page numbers in italics refer to notes.

Abe Lincoln in Illinois, 79, 117, 372

abortion, 34, 67, 75, 147, 172, 232, 244, 258, 315, 325, 334–335, 339

Absolute Power, 17, 18, 44, 230, 235, 372

Abu Ghraib, 286, 349, 379

Academy Awards, 16, 30, 63, 66, 106, 119, 132, 156, 178, 183, 187, 189, 199, 200, 201, 207, 210, 214, 271, 294, 295, 297, 304

Accused, The, 330, 332, 372

ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union), 72, 226

action hero (action movies), viii, 13, 28, 31, 32, 44, 47, 72, 78, 80–81, 83, 87, 154, 222, 224, 228, 240, 351

activist, vii, 30, 43, 46, 62, 74, 123, 124, 157, 164, 173, 179, 180, 182, 187, 199, 208, 211, 232, 280, 284, 285, 288, 294, 297, 304, 306, 331, 344

activism, 63, 77, 113, 154, 165, 170, 199, 207, 208, 215, 270, 293, 306

actors and acting, 45–48

actualities, 270

adaptation, 10, 26, 117, 142, 159, 212, 234, 299, 341, 355

adultery, 42, 69, 319, 320

Advise and Consent, 154, 157–160, 175, 176, 372

advocacy document...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• I. Studying Political Films
• 1. Setting the Scene A Theory of Film and Politics
• 2. The Making of a Message Film Production and Techniques, and Political Messages
• 3. Causes and Special Effects The Political Environment of Film
• II. Political Films by Decade
• 4. Politics in the Silent Movies
• 5. The 1930s Political Movies and the Great Depression
• 6. The 1940s Hollywood Goes to War
• 7. The 1950s Anti-Communism and Conformity
• 8. The 1960s From Mainstream to Counterculture
• 9. The 1970s Cynicism, Paranoia, War, and Anticapitalism
• 10. The 1980s New Patriotism, Old Reds, and a Return to Vietnam in the Age of Reagan
• 11. The 1990s FX Politics
• 12. The Twenty-First Century 9/11 and Beyond
• III. Political Films by Topic
• 13. True Lies? The Rise of Political Documentaries
• 14. Film and the Politics of Race The Minority Report
• 15. Women, Politics, and Film All About Eve?
• 16. White House Down? Politics in Disaster
• Appendix Closing Credits A Political Filmography
• Index
• About the Authors