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October 2005, Week 4

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Subject:
From:
"Larsson, Donald F" <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Film and TV Studies Discussion List <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Wed, 26 Oct 2005 07:41:29 -0500
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There are probably many reasons (including her choice of agents!), but her early experience with soap opera  in AS THE WORLD TURNS could be one factor.  There's also something about her personal style that seems to fit the roles.  Even in BOOGIE NIGHTS, she plays a "motherly" role. SAFE, though contemporary in setting, seems a variation on the type, certainly a drama of "containment."  She forms an interesting contrast with the one other actress I can think of who has inhabited such "housewife" roles, Joan Allen (PLEASANTVILLE, NIXON).  I'm not sure how "nostalgic" such roles are, given the way THE HOURS and FAR FROM HEAVEN are both about repression, but they do reflect a trend that could be worth studying: how decades become examined and revised over years.  The portrayal of the 1950s in later films from THE LAST PICTURE SHOW to RAGING BULL to FAR FROM HEAVEN and now GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD LUCK is a topic worth exploring in itself.
.  
Don Larsson
 
-----------------------------------------------
"Oh!  Time, Strength, Cash, and Patience!"
                                         --Herman Melville
Donald F. Larsson
Department of English, AH 230
Minnesota State University
Mankato, MN  56001
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Office Phone: 507-389-2368
 

________________________________

From: Film and TV Studies Discussion List on behalf of Michael Kackman
Sent: Tue 10/25/2005 9:14 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [SCREEN-L] Recommended Texts for Prizewinner, The Hours, Far From Heaven?



For gender and melodrama in '50s cinema, Jackie Byars' All That
Hollywood Allows is a reasonable start.  The really interesting
question to me, though, is only secondarily about the 1950s.  How and
why has Julianne Moore become central to these nostalgic reflections
on containment and nascent feminism?

mk



At 06:45 AM 10/25/2005, you wrote:
>This may be all too obvious, but Betty Friedan's THE FEMININE
>MYSTIQUE might be a starting point.  Not about film, but the work
>that defined the "problem that has no name."  Otherwise, check
>standard references such  as the FILM LITERATURE INDEX, MLA Bibliography, etc.
>
>Don Larsson
>
>
>
>
>I'm planning to teach an extended unit on films such as The
>Prizewinner of Defiance, Ohio, The Hours, and Far From Heaven.  Does
>anyone have recommendations for articles or books that would be good
>companions for the study of gender and film in the 1950s (and
>somewhat specific to these films)?
>
>Thanks,
>Christina Lane

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