: Study Questions: Week Ten

Stupid Is as Stupid Does

Forrest Gump (1994)

Fargo (1996).

Was the Rescue Worth the Trouble?

On the surface, Forrest Gump and Fargo seem to take very different views of what it means to have regained the American Dream during the 1980s. Robert Zemeckis' Forrest Gump, by listening to his Mama, manages to pass through the social, political, and cultural upheavals of the 1960s and 1970s unscathed. He experiences the Civil Rights Movement in Alabama, survives the war in Vietnam with no lasting physical or psychological wounds, becomes a successful entrepreneur, and helps his son set out in his own footsteps. Despite the loss of his mother and Jenny Ben "Bubba" Blue, Forrest remains relentless upbeat, and his movement (with the aid of digital imaging technology) through almost all of the major events of the baby-boom era links him to the spirit of America itself. In many ways he is the very embodiment of the enduring values of the American Dream.

Fargo, on the other hand, offers a darker and more ironic perspective on the Dream in the 1990s. Like many films from independent filmmaker -- including Red Rock West (1993), True Romance (1993 ), and Pulp Fiction (1994 ), for example -- Fargo satirizes the values which lead to alienation and downright criminal behavior. Jerry Lundergaard and his family are a grotesque version of the families celebrated in earlier films such as The Best Years of Our Lives (1946), and a sort of paralyzing alienation engulfs nearly all the characters who regard happiness only in terms of the American Dream.

Yet there seems to be a thematic countercurrent in each of these films (which may be unintentional in Forrest Gump). The fact that Forrest's success is largely a function of his low IQ ("stupid is as stupid does"), and the film's treatment of Jenny suggests that deviation from mainstream values can be deadly. Conversely, Fargo presents Marge Gunderson and her devoted husband as dull and comic but also decent and loving. And, as in Forrest Gump, the next generation is in their hands as the pregnant Marge makes evident.

1. What is the significance of the feather which Forrest picks up as the film opens? When does it return again? How is it related thematically to Forrest's attempt do decide whether we 'each have a destiny' or whether 'we're all just floating around accidental like'? What does the film suggest is the correct choice. What specific aspects of the film influenced your choice?

2. What is the significance of Forrest's braces? How does his liberation from them reflect his mother's belief that people create their own destinies? How might the fact that his liberation is pure fantasy call into doubt the reality of the American Dream he eventually shares?

3. In many parts of Forrest Gump, the hero seems to express an understanding of events which he never explicitly acknowledges and which his low intelligence would forbid. For example, while his mother seduces the school principal to get her son a better education, Forrest sits outside with a strangely knowing expression on his face. How many similar moments can you find in the film?

4. Why is Forrest immediately attracted to Jenny? Are we to see her as a realistically conceived character or as the symbol of a particular period in American history? If Forrest represents mainstream American society from the 1950s to the 1980s, what specifically does Jenny represent? In what way is her fate a criticism of the values she represents?

5. The film places Forrest in the midst of many history-making events: the integration of the University of Alabama, the war in Vietnam, etc. At the same time the hero's naive narrative voice tends to strip these events of troubling political and moral contexts. How does this technique influence your attitude toward these events? How do Forrest's whimsical responses help obscure the serious implications of the events which divided the country during the 1960s and 1970s?

6. How does the fate of Lt. Dan reflect the effect of the war on America at large? What is the significance of attending Forrest's wedding with a Vietnamese fiancee?

7. "Stupid is as stupid does" is a refrain heard throughout Zemeckis' film. How do you interpret this phrase? Does it mean that is is wiser not to be too smart? To be naively obedient rather than rebellious? Could he be the goodhearted foil to an age that is too intellectual and too cynical?

8. Fargo opens with a sequence behind the credits of a landscape devoid of warmth and human life save for the central character alone in a car. This image is repeated later as Jerry walks across the parking lot of his car dealership. What do these images say about the hero and his middle-American society? How might these images help explain his behavior?

9. Fargo concludes with a character condemning the obsession with money which has led top multiple murders. Is this speech presented seriously, ironically, or both? Is the speaker to be understood as wise or rather simple and naive (like Forrest Gump)?

10. When Fargo opens, we quickly learn that Jerry Lundergaard is in financial trouble, yet the film never mentions why. Is this an omission or merely a way of saying that he is a crook? Or is there an implication that the zealous pursuit of the American Dream encourages dishonesty?

11. In what ways is Jerry's job as a used car salesman similar to his criminal activity? Consider the way the couple buying a car is treated. What does the film imply about the parallels between commercial and criminal codes of conduct?

12. The epigraph to Fargo claims, in documentary style black and white that the story is true and "told exactly as it occurred." In fact the story is entirely fictional. What, in your estimation, is the significance of this misleading introduction? Does it make the kidnapping more believable? Or does it reinforce one of the film's central concerns: the misleading surfaces of ordinary life?

13. Fargo's setting -- Brainard and Minneapolis -- and its characters (except for the out-of-town kidnappers) are almost stereotypically middle American. How do these characters and their setting make the plot even more bizarre?

14. What, in your estimation, is the major character difference between Carl Showalter and Gaear Grismund. Why doesn't the latter ever seem anxious or upset? How is it possible for him to watch soap operas while his victim is lying dead on the floor?

15. What do you make of Jerry's father-in-law? Is he better than his son-in-law? Or is he as bad in a different way?

16. In what ways are the Lundergaards a grotesque version of the typically American family? How do Marge and Norm turn conventional; family roles upside down? Is the treatment of them satirical or sympathetic? Consider the scene in which he brings her lunch, and she gives him a bag of nightcrawlers.

17. What is the narrative significance of the return of Marge's old friend, Mike Yanagita? How might his story reflect one of the film's main themes?

18. The men in this film, with a single exception, are given to fierce rages when provoked. The pretend to be cool and self-contained but are always close to hysteria. What does this pattern of behavior say about conventional conceptions of heroism and/or masculinity?