Barbara Marantz--Here's another angle on revolutionary
representations, the form in which such events have become
ritualized as a Hollywood generic convention: historical
adventure. The level to which these are full-fledged revolts or
simply revolutions varies, but they are surely to be considered.
For instance, note the swashbuckling treatment given the French
Revolution, both pro and con, in The Fighting Guardsman, The
Scarlet Pimpernel, Scaramouche, and The Black Book
Reign of Terror. A similar pattern is found in more remote
historical periods, whether The Flame and the Arrow, The Exile
(1947), and the whole pattern of Robin Hood and Zorro legends.
The same conventions are carried to their fictive extreme in Omar
Khayyam, The Prince Who Was a Thief, and other "Oriental
swashbucklers". Even imperial adventures typically include some
kind of revolution, including Khartoum, The Long Duel, Gunga Din,
King of the Khyber Rifles, and The Real Glory. This is only a
very brief sense of some of the ideas in my forthcoming book, The
Romance of Adventure: The Genre of Historical Adventure Movies,
appearing this summer from U of Miss Press. Forgive the
self-promotion, but when you mentioned revolution, I couldn't
help but dive in, since I use this notion as the genre's main
structuring force.
Brian Taves, Library of Congress, Film Division
[log in to unmask]
My interests and views are not necessarily those of the Library
of Congress.
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