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StudyQuestions: WeekEight

God Bless America

The Last Picture Show (1946)

The Deer Hunter (1949)

The Dream Shattered

The 1970s saw the faith in the American Dream begin to falter, and the popular media began to focus on characters, communities, and cultures which had, for various reasons never made the transition to the middle-class suburbs which had become the home of those Americans who had found their share of the dream. Members of the urban, industrial working classes began to appear in films and on television. For example, All in the Family (1971-79) featuring Archie Bunker and his family was the decade's most popular sitcom. Films which focused on losers vainly in pursuit of the Dream (Midnight Cowboy, 1969; The King of Marvin Gardens, 1972), on working-class protagonists facing bleak futures (Taxi Driver, 1976; Saturday Night Fever, 1977); and on a rural world in decline (Harlan County USA, 1977) enjoyed critical and box office success.

These films, Taxi Driver for example, often invoked the war in Vietnam as a primary cause of their characters' failure and alienation. The connection seems well-founded in view of the fact that the war was fought by the sons of the working classes who had not secured draft deferments by attending college and professional school. Although the devastating effect of the war in southeast Asia on the American Dream can be found in a number of films during the 1970s (Coming Home, 1978; Go Tell the Spartans, 1978, The Boys in Company C, 1978; and Apocalypse Now, 1979), the film which goes furthest in exploring this theme was Michael Cimino's The Deer Hunter (1978).

Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show (1971), not only dramatizes the way in which the American Dream eluded youngsters growing up in those remote and rural communities which never enjoyed the prosperity of the post-World War II years, but it also marks a renewed popular interest in those years which, as we will see in Back to the Future, were recalled with nostalgic longing. The Last Picture Show, set in 1951, manages to evoke that nostalgia while, at the same time, calling into question the optimism of that era.

1. To begin with the big question: In what ways does the closing of the last picture show and the decline of Anarene, Texas serve as a microcosm of America and the Dream which it once nourished? Why is emphasis placed on losing football and basketball teams? How is the fate of the teams linked to the film's main theme?

2. Throughout The Last Picture Show pairs of characters from different generations are set against one another: Sam-the-Lion and Abilene, Sam and Sonny, Lois and her daughter Jacey are good examples. How do these pairings comment on the difference between generations? Which generation is favored in this film? How does this identification offer a contrast to Rebel Without a Cause or Five Easy Pieces?

3. Throughout the film a chorus of local men (generally led by the Sheriff) comment on the action. They finally dismiss the dead Billy as "just a dumb kid." What does their presence say about both the nature of American masculinity and the character of the town? In what ways do Coach Popper and the Sheriff symbolize community institutions in decline?

4. Early in the film Genevieve refers to Sonny's father and his "pills." Later Sonny meets his father at the town Christmas party. What do you learn about both the father and the relationship with his son from this brief scene? What other father-child relationships in the film reflect the same problematical relationship? Consider surrogate fathers as well as actual blood relations.

5. How does the treatment of sex and romance in the film deflate one of the key components of the American Dream? Consider the fate of Lois Farrow.

6. The film uses other films to contrast ideals with reality. How do the scenes we see from Father of the Bride (1950) and Red River (1949) comment ironically on the behavior of the characters? Both these films embody the ideals of the era. Consider Sonny and Charlene who watch Father, and think about the fact that Ben Johnson was best-known as a youthful cowboy in westerns of the 1940s.

7. What is the thematic significance of the sound track made up of popular lyrics? How is the increasingly intrusive voice of network television a reflection of larger national forces undermining the old institutions? What influence do they have in shaping the dreams and desires of the characters?

8. What drives Jacey to behave as she does? Is the "meanness" in her nature as Genevieve claims, or has it something to do with the society around her?

9. At the center of the film there are a pair of intercut sequences: Jacey's initiation into the world of Bobby Sheen and Billy's introduction to sex with Bobby Sue. How do these scenes parallel one another and serve to undercut the assumption in earlier films that middle-class life is morally superior to lower-class life?

10. In what specific ways is the death of Sam-the-Lion the film's crucial event? How does Lois Farrow's treatment of Sonny after his disastrous elopement reflect the same sense of honor she admired in Sam-the-Lion?

11. In despair Sonny attempts to leave Anarene (Jacey and Dwayne have already escaped). What draws him back? In returning to Ruth, has Sonny advanced or regressed? Is she a lover or a mother? Why might the film have been entitled Back to No Future?

12. Why does The Deer Hunter begin in the steel mill? How does the opening sequence define the class, the political attitudes, and the vulnerability of the central characters? In what specific, visual ways is the mill sequence linked to later battle sequences? What theme is evident in these similar images?

13. What common ideas and attitudes do Michael and his fellow workers share with Sonny and Dwayne?

14. What is the importance of the references to "sun dogs' and Natty Bumppo, the Deerslayer, as the men leave the steel mill? How do the references connect to later events? To what degree is Mike a modern version of the Deerslayer? What does his abandonment of the hunt say about the fate of American myths during the 1960s and 1970s?

15. What is the importance of the wedding sequence? What moral and social strengths are evident in the ethnic community of Clairton? What weaknesses are evident (think of the conversation between Steve's mother and the priest, of the willingness of parents and mentors off to Vietnam, of dangerous omens)? How, for instance, does Stan represent a darker (and weaker) side of Michael's ideals? Why do the two men fight over borrowing a pair of boots?

16. In what way might Steve, Nick, and Mike each represent a separate and significant response to the disaster of the war in Vietnam? What, for example, does Vietnam do to Nick's mind, to Steve's body, to Mike's idea of manhood?

17. What do you make of the Russian Roulette episode while the three are prisoners? It has no historical basis and thus is meant to symbolize the war rather than offer a realistic picture of it. How is it tied to Nick's fate? How does it distort the actual nature of the American presence in Vietnam?

18. How does Nick's funeral serve as an ironic version of the earlier wedding? What are the prospects of Mike and Linda making a life together, and what does their future imply about the community of Clairton at large? Today the steel mills are empty.

19. How would you interpret the significance of the final scene in which the survivors sing "God Bless America"? Does it suggest the defense of a traditional idea of patriotism or a repudiation of it? This is not an easy question to answer.

20. How would these films reflect the opinion, often voiced during the 1970s, that the cultural myths which once united America had failed?