Cowboys in Kilts: The Failure of the Scenic in Rob Roy & Braveheart :: essays papers

Cowboys in Kilts The Failure of the Scenic in Rob Roy & BraveheartThere was recently a cartoon in the youthful Yorker magazine.The cartoon shows a group of kilt-clad Highlands charging up a hill, claymore swords drawn and waving, as one of them says to another, You know, if we didnt wear this damn skirtsmaybe we wouldnt have to defend our manhood either five minutes. My analysis begins, as it go forth end, where most cowboy movies begin and end, with the landscape.Western heroes are essentially synedoches for that landscape, and are identifiable by three primary traits first, they establish one side of an opposition mingled with the supposed purity of the frontier and the degeneracy of the city, and so are separated however alienated from civilization second, they swan on conducting themselves according to a in-person code, to which they stubbornly cling despite all opposition or hardship to themselves or others and third, they seek to shape their psyches and even their bod ies in imitation of the leanness, sparseness, hardness, infinite becalm and merciless majesty of the western landscape in which their narratives unfold.All of these three traits are present in the figures of Rob Roy and William Wallace--especially their mechanical press on conducting themselves according to a stringently personal definition of honor--which would seem to suggest that the films built around them and their exploits could be read as transplanted westerns.However, the transplantation is the puzzle for, while the protagonists of these films want to be figures from a classic western, the landscape with which they are surrounded is so demonstrably not western that it forces their narratives into shapes which in fact disagree and finally contradict key opulent tropes of the classic western. Howard Hawkes 1948 Red River will serve as our example of the western model.The feeding credits rise literally out of the landscape, and were told in the opening history that this is a story of the landscape, in that it recounts the first major cattle drive along the Chisholm trail from Texas to Abeline, Kansas.In the 1st photograph we see a vastly open prairie with a small patrol wagon train almost lost in its expanse.We discover immediately that Dunson (John Wayne) is leaving the wagon train to strike out on his own.The signature trait of Dunson is the first of the western heros trademarks once hes made up his mind, nothing anyone says or does can modify it despite the entreaties of the wagon master and his acknowledged girlfriend, Dunson sets out south with only his friend, Tom Groot (played by Walter Brennan).Cowboys in Kilts The Failure of the Scenic in Rob Roy & Braveheart essays text fileCowboys in Kilts The Failure of the Scenic in Rob Roy & BraveheartThere was recently a cartoon in the New Yorker magazine.The cartoon shows a group of kilt-clad Highlands charging up a hill, claymore swords drawn and waving, as one of them says to another, You know, if we didnt wear this damn skirtsmaybe we wouldnt have to defend our manhood every five minutes. My analysis begins, as it will end, where most cowboy movies begin and end, with the landscape.Western heroes are essentially synedoches for that landscape, and are identifiable by three primary traits first, they represent one side of an opposition between the supposed purity of the frontier and the degeneracy of the city, and so are separated even alienated from civilization second, they insist on conducting themselves according to a personal code, to which they stubbornly cling despite all opposition or hardship to themselves or others and third, they seek to shape their psyches and even their bodies in imitation of the leanness, sparseness, hardness, infinite calm and merciless majesty of the western landscape in which their narratives unfold.All of these three traits are present in the figures of Rob Roy and William Wallace--especially their insistence on conducting themselv es according to a purely personal definition of honor--which would seem to suggest that the films built around them and their exploits could be read as transplanted westerns.However, the transplantation is the problem for, while the protagonists of these films want to be figures from a classic western, the landscape with which they are surrounded is so demonstrably not western that it forces their narratives into shapes which in fact resist and finally contradict key heroic tropes of the classic western. Howard Hawkes 1948 Red River will serve as our example of the western model.The opening credits rise literally out of the landscape, and were told in the opening narration that this is a story of the landscape, in that it recounts the first major cattle drive along the Chisholm trail from Texas to Abeline, Kansas.In the 1st scene we see a vastly open prairie with a small wagon train almost lost in its expanse.We discover immediately that Dunson (John Wayne) is leaving the wagon trai n to strike out on his own.The signature trait of Dunson is the first of the western heros trademarks once hes made up his mind, nothing anyone says or does can change it despite the entreaties of the wagon master and his putative girlfriend, Dunson sets out south with only his friend, Tom Groot (played by Walter Brennan).