>Mail*Link(r) SMTP               RE>>Maverick: A Disappointing Fil
>
>>>   I utterly reject your comparison between "Pride and Prejudice" and
>>>"Finnegan's Wake."  I'll state it simply:  Will _Maverick_ live alongside
>>>of _Stagecoach_ or _The Searchers_ or _The Wild Bunch_ or _Once Upon a
>>>Time in the West_ or will it fade into oblivion before the year is out?
>
>Please explain to me how these films gave any insight into American history
>of the period or expanded our understanding of the "myth" of the west.  Then
>explain how BLAZING SADDLES and PALEFACE do not.
>
>Guy
 
 
GUY--I'm afraid my personal time in limited, but I would surely and without
hesitation recommend the following:  Gunfighter Nation by Richard Slotkin.
If he does not convince you of the "significance" of the Western then I
probably could not either.  And I did NOT say that BLAZING SADDLES and
PALEFACE do not.  In fact, I agree, they do. BLAZING SADDLES is
particularly a brilliant deconstruction of both the West and the Western in
its revealing how racism, sexism, homophobia, anti-Semitism, etc. were
implicit in the Western genre and often explicit in the West.  Thus, the
film is a marvelous anti-genre piece. I believe it was MAVERICK we were
talking about however, when I claimed that it was less than successful.
 
DD
 
_____________________________________
David Desser,UIUC Cinema Studies
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