In 1938, Jed Buell was a movie producer who was well known for his black and white musical westerns, but all of his movies took on an odd twist. Jed Buell was known for his westerns with singing cowboys and he produced about twelve within a four year period. He was known to produce some unique and obscure movies, but he may be best known for his comical musical cult western; The Terror of Tiny Town (O 'Connor and Rollins 65). This movie is the world’s first and only know movie to feature an all dwarf cast. Every cast member, except for the man who is the announcer in the first scene of the film, is under four feet tall. The 62 minute movie has been appropriately nicknamed, “the best-worst movie ever made”, because of its’ tacky scenes and subtle jokes about the actors’ height. Despite being both an obscure and controversial film, The Terror of Tiny Town has become a classic among the small group of people who know about the movie.
As the emcee said at the beginning of the film, “I 'm told that it has everything, that is everything that a western should have” (Myton and Marks). The Terror of Tiny Town
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Many people would say that the actors were never treated with dignity and that many of the jokes in the movie were made at the actors’ expense (Crouse 213). The film is entirely politically incorrect, but that is what has made the movie ironically interesting and so popular. When the amateur cast took the job they knew what the movie would be like. The actors took their job seriously, and many of the actor went on to play roles in other movies (Simpson 208). Billy Curtis, however, generally avoided roles that undermined midgets. He was upset to see the movie posters advertising “Half-Pints in 10-Gallon Hats!” Later in his life Billy worked as an advocate for equal rights for little people. He worked against the Screen Actors Guild to allow little people full membership and full voting privileges
My analysis begins, as it will end, where most cowboy movies begin and end, with the landscape.Western heroes are essentially synedoches for that landscape, and are identifiable by three primary traits: first, they represent one side of an opposition between the supposed purity of the frontier and the degeneracy of the city, and so are separated even alienated from civilization; second, they insist on conducting themselves according to a personal code, to which they stubbornly cling despite all opposition or hardship to themselves or others; and third, they seek to shape their psyches and even their bodies in imitation of the leanness, sparseness, hardness, infinite calm and merciless majesty of the western landscape in which their narratives unfold.All of these three traits are present in the figures of Rob Roy and William Wallace--especially their insistence on conducting themselves according to a purely personal definition of honor--which would seem to suggest that the films built around them and their exploits could be read as transplanted westerns.However, the transplantation is the problem for, while the protagonists of these films want to be figures from a classic western, the landscape with which they are surrounded is so demonstrably not western that it forces their narratives into shapes which in fact resist and finally contradict key heroic tropes of the classic western.
Many westerns contain some of the same elements. For instance, almost every western ever made involves a sheriff. He is usually the peace-keeper of a small town overrun by outlaws and cowboys, which he eventually chases out of town or kills. Another element of westerns is a gunslinger. A gunslinger is usually a young man who makes his living shooting other men in showdowns, a classic example is Billy the Kid. Railroads are also a recurring image in westerns. Since the railroad was the major mode of transportation in the old west, it is always present in westerns. Finally, westerns always have a villain. The villain, usually a man, dresses very slick and will stop at nothing in his quest for power. In addition, the villain usually has a gang to carry out his dastardly deeds. The gang is usually full of incompetent, but loyal thugs, who would love to destroy a small town just for the pleasure of wanton destruction. The elements of a western are very simple, but easily manipulated into a very interesting plot.
Bernstein, Matthew. “The Classical Hollywood Western Par Excellence.” Film Analysis: A Norton Reader. Eds. Jeffrey Geiger and R.L. Rutsky. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2nd edition, 2013. 298-318.
True Stories is not a movie of a town but yet a movie of people that just happen to live in this little town called Virgil, Texas. True Stories had a lot of unique and bizarre characters that each represents a characteristic of a typical American. There were two main characters, in my opinion, which stuck out from all the others. Louis Fyne who represents the common man, and the very lazy Miss Rollings who represents a very typical yet sad American feature, materialism.
The Stagecoach, a critically acclaimed film, which followed the adventures of a group of unlikely and unfortunate passengers escaping from the brutality of Geronimo’s Apache warriors, established the precedent of the classic Western movie, containing crucial Western archetypical elements such as Ringo the Kid that has not hardly changed today. Furthermore, Stagecoach espoused social issues of the time by including passengers of varied social status and standing and emphasizing on such interactions that cross the rigidly defined and impermeable social divides at the time. The iconic movie was produced during the transition between silent films and films with spoken dialogue, and the remnants of the former film style are conspicuous throughout the film. Although explicit and spoken plot was crucial for the storyline, non-verbal communication offered implicit cues to attentive
While the film could be thought of as an inconsequential anomaly overshadowed by more conventional westerns released around the same time, such as The Searchers, Walsh’s movie was nonetheless listed as one of the top ten highest-grossing for 1958 in Britain, where it was better received than in the United States. If, as Nowell-Smith and Neale suggest, the feature film exists as a capitalist enterprise to please audiences and subsequently make as much profit as possible, it is entirely plausible that the crews of Captain Apache, Charley One-Eye and Chato’s Land took note of the unusual popularity of The Sheriff of Fractured Jaw among British audiences when writing and producing their own revisionist
The essence of community life was prevalent, so I agree with on of the town’s people who said, “You have to live in a small town to know how it is to live in a small town.” Doc pulls you in and makes you one of the community members within Centralia with his atmosphere exposure through not zooming.
A cinematic experience offers a false projection of the world that people have the desire to indulge in. In Guy Vanderhaeghe’s novel, The Englishman’s Boy, the portrayal of the film as a whole is consistent with Chance’s vision to rewrite the story of the Cypress Hills Massacre of 1873 as a mythic history of the settling of the American west. Film has the power to access an aspect of reality somehow absent in other media. One could argue that film brainwashes people and alters reality when it is both projected and screened. Vanderhaeghe’s narrative oscillation and use of common literary techniques often foreshadow his film (Besieged) in many ways.
Warren Beatty was the main character in this film. Virginia Hill was Bugsy’s love interest. These two actors did a wonderful job of acting in a manner congruent with the times of the 40’s. The cast was sprinkled with tremendous talent such as Harvey Keitel, Ben Kingsley, and Elliot Gould. As a whole I think the cast did a magnificent job taking the viewers to an era of America, which is not easily forgotten by those who lived through it. A time when the world was being destroyed by the Nazi Germans was over shadowed by America’s self-involvement. A time when Americans were beginning to be proud of their little world power was accented by the world war.
“All the Pretty Horses”, a novel written by Cormac McCarthy tells the tale about a man and his friend travelling the plains of Mexico after leaving their homes in Texas. As the novel’s name alludes to, horses are a central theme in the story as they represent manhood and freedom when John Grady, the protagonist, and his friend Rawlins get thrown in jail. McCarthy’s novel became critically-acclaimed which gained him more recognition, as well as a movie adaptation directed by Billy Bob Thornton. Even though Thornton’s adaption has the basics of the novel’s story it does not appropriately grasps its depth. While Thornton’s version stays faithful to the dialogue from the book’s included scenes it does fall short by having an erratic pace, having
Brower, Sue. ""They'd Kill Us If They Knew": Transgression and the Western." Journal of Film and Video 62.4 (2010): 47-57. Web.
An ironic ending is also foretold by the town’s setting being described as one of normalcy. The town square is described as being “between the post office and the bank;” every normal town has these buildings, which are essential for day-to-day functioning. The townspeople also establish a normal, comfortable setting for the story. The children are doing what all typical kids do, playing boisterously and gathering rocks. The woman of the town are doing what all stereotypical females do, “exchang[ing] bits of gossip.” The men are being average males by chatting about boring day-to-day tasks like “planting and rain, tractors and taxes.”
The movie The Quiet Man directed by John Ford is a far cry from the Westerns his most noted for directing however for John The Quiet Man “was the most personal film he ever made (it was also one of his favorites” (Berardinelli). In The Quiet Man John Ford brings together one of his most favorite Western actors, John Wayne, who is undeniably the central character, and the ever stunning Maureen O’Hara to brings to life a warmhearted, down-to-earth romantic comedy. He created a movie that is primarily focuses on characters and atmosphere, than on its plot, and is able to bring romance to life, not through the use of powerful dialogue, but through the use of glances and on screen tension. Having filmed most of this movie against the natural backdrop of Ireland in 1952, John was able to capture and bring to life the spectacular Ireland landscape by filming in Technicolor. Today The Quiet Man is truly considered a classic romantic because of the amazing chemistry between its actors, it’s cinematography that captures the truly magical landscape of Ireland, and by ending this movie with one of the longest nonviolent fight scenes in movie history.
A typical Western would usually be set in the late 19th century in the mid-west of America in a remote town. The town is usually small, lonely and unwelcoming. Typically a western set looks like it is in the middle of a desert with sand, cacti and tumbleweed which gives a desert look, there are usually never any lakes or rivers around these features make the place look really hot and deserted. The buildings are generally timber board houses with swinging doors and outside the buildings are places to keep their horses, there is also always a General Store and a Saloon. Horses and carriages and cattle are used to give a western feel. The cowboys are typically dressed in western style clothing for example they wear simple shirts and jeans they may also wear ponchos, waist coats, hats, boots with spurs, guns and a belt to hold the gun and bullets, Hero's tend to wear lighter clothing and the villain’s tend to wear darker clothing.
In today’s society there is a high fear of crime by society. Society actions show that there is anxiety and fear about crime. Therefore, anxiety and fear about crime has placid our cities and communities. Society express fear of being victimized by crimes, criminal activities, and behaviors. Therefore, according to, (Crime, 1999) states that “ the level of fear that a person holds depends on many factors, including but, not limited to: “ gender, age, any past experiences with crime that a person may have, where one lives, and one’s ethnicity.” All of those factors have a huge impact on one’s fear level.