The Films of the Eighties: A Social HistorySouthern Illinois University Press, 1993 - 335 pages In this remarkable sequel to his Films of the Seventies: A Social History, William J. Palmer examines more than three hundred films as texts that represent, revise, parody, comment upon, and generate discussion about major events, issues, and social trends of the eighties. Palmer defines the dialectic between film art and social history, taking as his theoretical model the "holograph of history" that originated from the New Historicist theories of Hayden White and Dominick LaCapra. Combining the interests and methodologies of social history and film criticism, Palmer contends that film is a socially conscious interpreter and commentator upon the issues of contemporary social history. In the eighties, such issues included the war in Vietnam, the preservation of the American farm, terrorism, nuclear holocaust, changes in Soviet-American relations, neoconservative feminism, and yuppies. Among the films Palmer examines are Platoon, The Killing Fields, The River, Out of Africa, Little Drummer Girl, Kiss of the Spiderwoman, Silkwood, The Day After, Red Dawn, Moscow on the Hudson, Troop Beverly Hills, and Fatal Attraction. Utilizing the principles of New Historicism, Palmer demonstrates that film can analyze and critique history as well as present it. |
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... Apocalypse Now and Go Tell the Spartans , are actually fully set in Vietnam . The reason for calling this the epic phase is based upon the nature of the two most important films of the phase , The Deer Hunter and Apocalypse Now . Both ...
... Apocalypse Now . David Halberstam writes of Apocalypse Now ( Washington Post , 8 March 1987 ) that it " was two films , an occasionally brilliant Vietnam movie mixed together with Coppola's version of Heart of Darkness . " A similar ...
... Apocalypse Now in 1978 was the first American film to demonstrate any consciousness that blacks fought in Vietnam . Vietnam War films , including Coming Home and The Deer Hunter , had preceded Apocalypse Now , but with the exception of ...
Contents
The Vietnam War as Film Text | 16 |
The Coming Home Films | 61 |
The Terrorism Film Texts | 114 |
Copyright | |
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