Hollywood and Nathaniel West's The Day of the Locust
Works Cited Missing
Although set in the 1930s, Nathanael West’s The Day of the Locust ironically resembles contemporary Hollywood. Within the glamorous setting of Hollywood, West’s characters take on multiple roles instead of assuming individual personalities. They put on and remove these imaginary personality masks, similar to those in the Commedia dell’Arte, to exhibit a range of emotions that only their character type would exhibit. Consequently, West’s characters are trapped in this restrictive atmosphere, especially at the end of the novel when they become part of a collective mob. In these manners, the characters in The Day of the Locust exhibit qualities akin to modern actors, proving that they are nothing more than a cast of personages rather than individuals.
Hollywood is not simply a point on a map; it is a representation of the human experience. As with any other location, though, Hollywood’s history can be traced and analyzed up to present day. In 1887, Harvey Henderson Wilcox established a 120-acre ranch in an area northwest of Los Angeles, naming it “Hollywood” (Basinger 15). From then on, Hollywood grew from one man’s family to over 5,000 people in 1910. By then, residents around the ranch incorporated it as a municipality, using the name Hollywood for their village. While they voted to become part of the Los Angeles district, their village was also attracting motion-picture companies drawn in by the diverse geography of the mountains and oceanside (15). The Los Angeles area continues to flourish, now containing over nine million people, an overwhelming statistic compared to Wilcox’s original, family unit (U.S. Census Bureau 1). However, these facts only s...
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...ic category. Instead, they have the freedom to shift between different roles and characters. In West’s The Day of the Locust, the characters exhibit traits most closely linked to these new types of Hollywood actors. Although he introduces them as types, he develops them throughout the novel with variable personalities. Todd’s emotions, for example, towards Faye range from sweetly romantic to vindictively dangerous. Yet, these variable personalities do not prove individuality, as the characters can all be labeled as characters, just like all actors are just actors at the end of every movie no matter what role they play. Unfortunately, West’s characters can never escape their fixed roles and established places in the narrative despite how often they attempt to change. They are forever stuck as modern actors in a 1930s Hollywood setting, and therein lies their tragedy.
The idea of Hollywood, before it was Hollywood as we know it seems foreign. However, it did exist and was known as "Pre-code." Pre-code Hollywood refers to the era in the American film industry between the introduction of sound in the late 1920's and the enforcement of the Hays Code censorship guidelines, which went into effect on June 13, 1934 (Association of Motion Picture Producers 1934). Durin...
“When the Movies Moved to the Suburbs.” The New York Times. Janet Maslin, 29 Oct. 2011.
In Nathanael West’s “The Day of the Locust,” multiple characters are introduced within Hollywood, California, which is widely regarded as the national capital of the film industry. One main character focused on throughout the novel is Tod Hackett, who West portrays as being superior to the fantasy observed around him. Many of the characters have traveled to Hollywood in pursuit of a personal, ambitious goal. However, there is a reoccurring theme of failure in their pursuits due to the fictitious personalities and actions they have created for themselves influenced by a setting full of artificialness.
Nathanael West’s The Day of the Locust is said by many to be the best novel to be written about Hollywood. When we immediately think of Hollywood, we think of a glamorous story, in the picturesque setting of Los Angeles, full of characters with abundance of talent living the much sought after American dream. This is perhaps what sets West’s novel apart from the rest. The story is full of characters that have a vague impression of the difference in reality and fantasy in life. The characters are submerged in their lives in Hollywood, with what seems to be a false reality on how the world works. The untalented would-be actors, withering vaudeville performers and prostitutes place a certain grotesque over the novel from the beginning, and in a world of certain fantasy and chaos like this, violence is bound to come to the fore as a theme in many different forms. The protagonist of the story, Tod Hackett, is different to the rest of the characters in the novel. Tom is a talented artist, but still has a good view of reality by times, so Tom can act part as an observer in the novel. Tom however has been sucked in to the fantasy world also life has become somewhat submerged in the fantasy world.
When pondering about what an individual thinks of you, people have varying views. Some people are not concerned; to others it is the most critical matter on their mind. The feeling of being judged is a very potent emotion. Likewise, conformity is one of the largest controversies in today’s society; the behavior of someone in accordance with socially accepted conventions or standards. So if someone personally made his or her expectations on what you should be like evident, would you change? In Matthew Quick’s The Silver Linings Playbook, he illustrates that judgment and expectations conform a person into someone they are not due to their personal identity. This can be seen through a character’s loyalty to another, dominance and the vulnerability it includes, and a character’s love and devotion. Conformity and the reasons for its appearance will be analyzed through samples from Matthew Quick’s bestselling novel.
As the case with most “Novel to Movie” adaptations, screenwriters for films will make minor, and sometimes drastic, adjustments to the original text in order to increase drama and to reach modern audiences. Baz Luhrmann’s 2013 film interpretation of The Great Gatsby followed the 1925 classic great plot quite accurately, with minor deviations. However, Luhrmann made some notable differences to the characters and settings of The Great Gatsby in order for the story to relate to the current generation and to intensity the plot
The noir style is showcased in Sunset Boulevard with its use of visually dark and uncomfortable settings and camera work, as well as its use of the traditional film noir characters. In addition, the overall tone and themes expressed in it tightly correspond to what many film noirs addressed. What made this film unique was its harsh criticism of the film industry itself, which some of Wilder’s peers saw as biting the hand that fed him. There is frequent commentary on the superficial state of Hollywood and its indifference to suffering, which is still a topic avoided by many in the film business today. However, Sunset Blvd. set a precedent for future film noirs, and is an inspiration for those who do not quite believe what they are being shown by Hollywood.
Since the California dream was aided so much by the impact of what Hollywood was doing, it only seems necessary, for the images of Hollywood to determine the mental state of America. In the heart of the dream in Hollywood, the films that were being produced by studios, exhibited a less than satisfactory representation of moral ideals. In this, while the California dream offered a sense of hope to Americans, the way in which it operated was far from the ideal scenario. At this time a shift was occurring from the once idolized images of the flapper, jazz, and gangsters, as more and more people began to question the validity behind the images. In 1921, scandals includi...
... ed (BFI, 1990) we read … “contrary to all trendy journalism about the ‘New Hollywood’ and the imagined rise of artistic freedom in American films, the ‘New Hollywood’ remains as crass and commercial as the old…”
A new edition to the course lineup, this week's film classic, Sunset Boulevard. This film will focus on the culture and environment of the Hollywood studio system that produces the kind of motion pictures that the whole world recognizes as "Hollywood movies." There have been many movies from the silent era to the present that either glamorize or vilify the culture of Hollywood, typically focusing on the celebrities (both in front of and behind the camera) who populate the "dream factories" of Hollywood. But we cannot completely understand the culture of Hollywood unless we recognize that motion pictures are big business as well as entertainment, and that Hollywood necessarily includes both creative and commercial
Clara’s experience with the motion picture industry gives us a picture of what it was like in the 1920’s. It was new and intriguing, enticing and corrupt. The motion picture industry underpaid Bow, which is almost inconceivable today. The environment of Hollywood now pays actors and actresses corpulent amounts of money...but that may be the only change. The “star-maker” environment is still as enticing and corrupt as yesterday’s.
I will begin my essay by looking closely at the narrative of Sunset Boulevard to see where and how the film represents the Hollywood Studio System. At the beginning of the film the audience is introduced to Joe Gillis, a script writer who is struggling to pay his rent as he in unable to sell his scripts to the ‘majors’ of Hollywood. The film follows Joe to ‘Paramount Pictures’ one of the major studios in Hollywood, which the film pays a large self reference to as the producers of Sunset Boulevard as well as representing the studio system.
California saw many changes very fast. Most of these play part in shaping it into what it is today. From Hollywood to San Francisco, today’s lifestyles in California have roots in the Gold Rush. Because the failure rate was so high, it became common to come out to California lookin...
Gainor, J. Ellen., Stanton B. Garner, and Martin Puchner. The Norton Anthology of Drama, Shorter Edition. New York: W. W. Norton &, 2010. Print.
Schatz, Thomas. Hollywood Genres: Formulas, Filmmaking, and the Studio System. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1981.