Dream West: Politics and Religion in Cowboy Movies

Author:   Douglas Brode
Publisher:   University of Texas Press
ISBN:  

9780292748286


Pages:   390
Publication Date:   01 November 2013
Format:   Paperback
Availability:   In Print   Availability explained
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Dream West: Politics and Religion in Cowboy Movies


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Overview

While political liberals celebrated the end of ""cowboy politics"" with the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, political conservatives in the Tea Party and other like-minded groups still vociferously support ""cowboy"" values such as small government, low taxes, free-market capitalism, and the right to bear arms. Yet, as Douglas Brode argues in this paradigm-shifting book, these supposedly cowboy or ""Old West"" values hail not so much from the actual American frontier of the nineteenth century as from Hollywood's portrayal of it in the twentieth century. And a close reading of Western films and TV shows reveals a much more complex picture than the romanticized, simplistic vision espoused by the conservative right. Examining dozens of Westerns, including Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Red River, 3:10 to Yuma (old and new), The Wild Ones, High Noon, My Darling Clementine, The Alamo, and No Country for Old Men, Brode demonstrates that the genre (with notable exceptions that he fully covers) was the product of Hollywood liberals who used it to project a progressive agenda on issues such as gun control, environmental protection, respect for non-Christian belief systems, and community cohesion versus rugged individualism. Challenging us to rethink everything we thought we knew about the genre, Brode argues that the Western stands for precisely the opposite of what most people today-whether they love it or hate it-believe to be the essential premise of ""the only truly, authentically, and uniquely American narrative form.""

Full Product Details

Author:   Douglas Brode
Publisher:   University of Texas Press
Imprint:   University of Texas Press
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 4.30cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.626kg
ISBN:  

9780292748286


ISBN 10:   0292748280
Pages:   390
Publication Date:   01 November 2013
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  College/higher education ,  Professional & Vocational ,  Tertiary & Higher Education
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print   Availability explained
This item will be ordered in for you from one of our suppliers. Upon receipt, we will promptly dispatch it out to you. For in store availability, please contact us.

Table of Contents

"Acknowledgments Introduction. “Code of the West”: Politics, Religion, and Popular Culture Part One. Cowboy Politics: Roosevelt through Reagan 1. To Die in the West: The O.K. Corral, History versus Film 2. Sheriff of Cochise: Thirty Seconds to Eternity 3. Red, White, and Blue States: Political Philosophy in Nineteenth-Century America 4. “From My Cold, Dead Hands"": Gun Control in the West and Westerns 5. Way of the Gun: Violence in American Life 6. It‘s a Man's World? Gender Politics on Hollywood’s Frontier 7. Go West, Young (Business)Man: American Dreamers, Political Schemers 8. Redistributing the Wealth: Gene Autry, Frank Capra, and the New Deal Western 9. Don‘t Fence Me In: Rugged Individualism and Open Range 10. Silent Springs, Vanishing Prairies: Environmentalism and the Western 11. Red States, Red Menace: Of Cowboys and Communism 12. Once upon a Time in a Revolution: Radical Politics and the Western Film 13. Viva Juárez! Viva Villa! Viva Zapata! The Biographical Western as Political Allegory 14. All the Right Stuff: The World According to John Wayne 15. Flag-Waving on the Wild Frontier: Stars and Stripes as Political Ideology Part Two. God‘s Country: Religion in the Western Film 16. Odes to American Imperialism: Manifest Destiny in Western Movies 17. The Town and the City: Space as Theme, Place as Character 18. Glory in the (Wild)Flower: Romanticism on the Open Range 19. Hearts of Darkness, Souls of Light: Visions of Nature in American Film and Fiction 20. A Chapel in the Canyon: Religiosity, American-Style 21. Multiculturalism, Mormonism, and Movies: Hollywood’s History and Cultural Appropriation 22. End of the Trail: The Dark Side of Faith 23. Ride Out for Vengeance: Revising a Western Paradigm 24. Old Testament and New: Days of Wrath, Angels of Mercy 25. The Church and the Saloon: Catholic versus Protestant Westerns 26. Onward, Christian Soldiers: The Pistol and the Pulpit 27. Harts of the West: The Gospel According to Clint 28. Then Came Sam! From Pappy to Peckinpah 29. Count No Man Lucky until His Death: The Western as American Tragedy 30. Born Again: Of Cowboys, Christianity, and Conversion Conclusion. No Country for Bold Men: The Western Film in the Twenty-First Century Notes Bibliography Index of Films and Shows General Index"

Reviews

"""Why did Hollywood want to change the old west cowboy? Making the cowboy more entertaining and creating a larger story base may be reasons. Brode makes the point that these actions were liberas ideas encouraged by those wanting gun control, environment , respect for non-Christian beliefs and community cooperation, as opposed to the concept of a ragged individual standing alone. The book makes us rethink everything we thought we knew about silver screen cowboys [...] dream west is an excellent book for lovers of the cowboy movie""- Jerry Turner, Area News"


Why did Hollywood want to change the old west cowboy? Making the cowboy more entertaining and creating a larger story base may be reasons. Brode makes the point that these actions were liberas ideas encouraged by those wanting gun control, environment , respect for non-Christian beliefs and community cooperation, as opposed to the concept of a ragged individual standing alone. The book makes us rethink everything we thought we knew about silver screen cowboys [...] dream west is an excellent book for lovers of the cowboy movie - Jerry Turner, Area News


Clearly Brode has made an important contribution to the literature on Western motion pictures. On nearly every page readers are confronted with new perspectives and ways of understanding how a film genre over one hundred years old addresses critical issues of American politics and religion. Western Historical Quaterly


Author Information

Douglas Brode is a novelist, graphic novelist, produced playwright, produced screenwriter, film historian, award-winning working journalist, and award-winning educator. He currently teaches at Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications, the University of Texas at San Antonio, and Our Lady of the Lake University. His many books include Shooting Stars of the Small Screen: Encyclopedia of TV Western Actors, 1946–Present, From Walt to Woodstock: How Disney Created the Counterculture, and Multiculturalism and the Mouse: Race and Sex in Disney Entertainment.

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