When Life Imitates Art: Political Messages in Modern Cinema

by

Sydney Laws, B.A.

A Thesis

In

Political Science

Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of Texas Tech University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

Approved

Dr. Toby Rider Chair of Committee

Dr. Katharine Hayhoe

Dr. Seth McKee

Mark Sheridan Dean of the Graduate School

August, 2019

Copyright 2019, Sydney Laws

Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

It would be a crime to understate the impact of Dr. Toby Rider on my professional development while at Texas Tech. I will be forever grateful for his support and encouragement of my somewhat unconventional research interests. I would also like to thank Dr. Seth McKee and Dr. Katharine Hayhoe for taking the time to be part of my committee amidst their already busy schedules. Each is the type of professor that students wish for and are rarely lucky enough to encounter. To this exceedingly talented and marvelous committee: you will never get back the time you have spent reading, critiquing, and assisting me with my work. I sincerely hope that I have made it worth your while.

I would be remiss not to express my appreciation for the friends and family who listened to me complain for months on end and yet still find it within themselves to associate with me. This writing experience has taught me that other people can provide invaluable support, and that even though my cat is my number one cheerleader, verbal communication with another human can come in handy when you realize that those 89 pages really will not write themselves.

Special appreciation goes to: Cacy Clements, Kayla Gray, Rowan Lee, Madeline Neely, Kate Spencer, Chi Ha, Danie Vaughn, Aakriti Pyakurel, Emily Acosta, Cheryl Bushey, Rylie Gates, Shivaun Landeros, Dr. Kristina Mitchell, Dr. Iñaki Sagarzazu, Dr. Beverly Pair, and my parents, Sharon and Scott Laws. Thank you for helping me maintain my sanity, because I certainly could not have done it alone.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ...... ii

ABSTRACT ...... v

LIST OF TABLES ...... vi

CHAPTER I - INTRODUCTION ...... 1

Literature Review ...... 2

CHAPTER II – THE METHODS ...... 12

Assumptions ...... 14

Technical Mechanisms ...... 15

Narrative Mechanisms ...... 21

CHAPTER III - THE CASES ...... 24

Race ...... 24 Get Out ...... 25 Sorry to Bother You ...... 30 Black Panther ...... 34 BlacKkKlansman ...... 38

Gender ...... 43 Call Me by Your Name ...... 43 Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri ...... 46 Moonlight ...... 49 Easy A ...... 55

Climate Change ...... 60 Beasts of the Southern Wild ...... 61 Snowpiercer ...... 64 Interstellar ...... 66 Mad Max: Fury Road ...... 69

CHAPTER IV – RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ...... 74

The Mechanisms...... 74

The Films ...... 76

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CHAPTER V - CONCLUSION ...... 85

BIBLIOGRAPHY ...... 88

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ABSTRACT

Cinema has long been both a reflection of society and a powerful influence on how people think about and interact with it. Many filmmakers use this power to portray issues of injustice faced in the real world, regardless of how fantastic or otherworldly the setting may be. This paper attempts to draw connections between what we see on the big screen and how that can affect the way we behave, both politically and personally. I discuss a set of twelve films that each send a message related to a social justice issue, evaluating their potential to influence a behavior change in their audience based on how effectively that message was communicated. The resulting case study determines that effectiveness based on a typology which gauges the level of emotional engagement a film creates for its audience, leaving us with two final lists: films that hit the mark and films that fall short.

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LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Technical Mechanisms ...... 15

Table 2. Narrative Mechanisms ...... 21

Table 3. List of Films ...... 24

Table 4. Typology Table ...... 75

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

“Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life.”

-Oscar Wilde, The Decay of Lying

Introduction

Injustice has always existed, and there have always been those who wish to fight against it. The realities of social injustice are more widely known than ever before, with the rise of the internet and social media connecting people all over the world in the blink of an eye. In a world that is evolving faster than we can keep up with, focus most often lies in analyzing the effects that the mass media formats of news outlets and social media platforms have on public perception of political events. Here, I suggest that this theoretical framework can be applied to a different source of media, one that has been a factor in setting the public agenda since long before the internet and instantaneous communication: the film industry. It is clear that writers and directors regularly draw on real-life experiences and events to inspire their films, and even those with a less obvious concept are often abstract reflections of reality. Films can be utilized as a running social commentary on what is happening or has happened in a certain place at a certain point in history. A plethora of social, cultural, and political issues can be explored from this perspective of reflection in

Hollywood. However, I am more interested in the films that are ahead of their time, that pave the way for the above-mentioned issues to become salient and have an effect on the general public’s response to and understanding of events that can have a major political impact. I will discuss films that send messages falling into one of three categories: race,

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 gender, and climate change. This paper will begin with a review of relevant literature from several disciplines, followed by a discussion of the methodological approach chosen to best code the qualitative data. This includes an explanation for how the films were collected and a breakdown of the typology created to evaluate them. Next is a long and arduous trek through the cases, where each film is discussed in great detail to describe how its message was conveyed. This is followed by a results and discussion section that will determine whether each message was communicated effectively, indicating the likelihood that it will inspire action among its audience. Lastly, a conclusion will wrap up the cases and discuss implications for future study.

Literature Review

There is a vast body of literature exploring social movements, effective communication, and film analysis. However, it is rare to see these fields brought together for a single purpose, and here is where I will argue that this paper makes its contribution.

The rather unconventional compilation of literature on which the foundation of this study was built begins in 1957 with Anthony Downs’ seminal contribution to the study of voting behavior, An Economic Theory of Democracy. Downs deconstructs the basic logic of voting, superimposing economic Rational Choice Theory onto political behavior in order to predict the probability that an individual will turn out to vote.1 This is modeled using the following equation, which was modified later on in 1968 by William Riker and Peter

Ordeshook.2

1 Downs, Anthony. An Economic Theory of Democracy. New York, NY: Harper, 1957.

2 Riker, William H., and Peter C. Ordeshook. "A Theory of the Calculus of Voting." The American Political Science Review 62, no. 1 (1968): 25-42.

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V = pB + D > C

The symbols employed are assigned as follows:

V represents the probability that a voter will turn out

p is the probability that a voter believes their vote will “matter,” or be decisive in the final ballot tally

B is the benefit a voter expects to receive should their preferred candidate be victorious over the candidate they do not support

D stands for a voter’s personal feeling that political participation is part of their duty as a citizen, or a psychological feeling of goodwill and social benefits they receive by voting as opposed to not voting

C is the cost a voter will incur by choosing to vote

Downs concludes that C is typically too high to warrant voting, and that when someone does choose to vote, they do so irrationally.3 All this to say the general consensus among scholars is that benefits must outweigh costs in order for us to act. This theory can be extrapolated to cover a broader range of political participation outside of choosing whether or not to vote. We constantly make cost-benefit analyses to help with decision-making in our everyday lives, assessing a situation and choosing one path over another based on which will benefit us more. In this study, the focus is on the ability of a film to raise benefits or lower costs for their audiences with regards to taking action in favor of one social justice message or another. The key to triggering those perceived benefits lies in large part in the way we communicate with one another, or in this case, the messages filmmakers send to their audiences and how those messages are received. Just as in the equation above, in addition to benefits the audience must believe that if they were to act, their actions would have the capacity to make a tangible difference. When dealing with the somewhat abstract concepts in this study, that is no small feat and requires a very strategic plan of attack.

3 Downs 1957, 39.

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When a film sets out to tackle a social justice issue or simply provide a social commentary, effective communication is vital to a successfully delivered message. Exploring a broadened field of literature on communications, film studies, philosophy, and psychology,

I will argue that the more effectively a message is transmitted to the audience, the more likely a film is to inspire a change in behavior.

An article published in electronic media from Hoffman and Thomson discusses the effects of viewing late-night television shows or local news channels on political participation.4 Their results suggest that watching those programs increases civic engagement and perceived political efficacy. The family has declined as the main source of political socialization in favor of mass media, and the rise and prowess of social media has morphed the playing field of political communication for all other types of media, including news, television, and film. This article was published in 2009, and the advancements in technology over just the past decade have been unprecedented. While

Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone showed us the rise and fall of social capital over the past century and in part blames television for the decline, I would argue that in the current social climate where many people put a great amount of stock into the lives they conduct online, mass media can instead assist in the development of social capital.5 Finding an online community focused around social justice movements is easier than ever, giving more and more people access to information they would normally be hard pressed to find. This helps realize Putnam’s suggestion for increasing social capital by making the arts and culture

4 Hoffman, Lindsay H., and Tiffany L. Thomson. "The effect of television viewing on adolescents' civic participation: Political efficacy as a mediating mechanism." Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 53, no. 1 (2009): 3-21.

5 Putnam, Robert D. Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York: Simon & Schuster. 2000.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 more interactive; film and television spark constant online debates in which people share their ideas, concerns, and takeaways. When a social justice issue makes an appearance in entertainment media, it will no doubt be subject to online discussions, and regardless of opinions, will at the very least raise awareness of the issue itself.

Dipping more into the field of communications literature, there are a few foundational theories that are relevant for this study. Gunther Kress has made many highly cited contributions on the theory of multimodality which revolves around the process of meaning-making. Kress and Theo Van Leeuwen define a mode as a resource for presenting a meaning in a way that other people will understand it.6 They are produced socially and can become cultural sources for meaning-making, and it is up to the receiver to decide what is significant. For example, Kress describes a situation where we can visit a webpage and see a banner with the title of the site in the color red. Here, the mode is color, and we have to decide if meaning is being conveyed through the use of the color red. In Multimodal

Discourse: The Modes and Media of Contemporary Communication, Kress and Van

Leeuwen lay out the theory of multimodality and its uses in various types of media, whether written text, images, film, or oral communication. Their most basic explanation of multimodality breaks the term down into its two root words: multiple modes. This refers to the way in which we choose to communicate, especially in the age of great technological developments. A combined use of words, images, and sounds will provide a much richer meaning than they could when used alone.7 The general consensus among communications

6 Kress, Gunther R., and Theo Van Leeuwen. Reading images: The grammar of visual design. Psychology Press, 1996.

7 Kress, Gunther, and Theo V. Van Leeuwen. "Multimodal discourse: The modes and media of contemporary communication." (2001).

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 scholars is that multimodality is the most efficient form of communication because it has the ability to convey the most amount of information and with the most cultural nuance.

Wingstedt et al. make the case for the use of music in film, notably its ability to combine with visuals and provide a deeper meaning through intermodal communication.

Part of their study focuses on the iconic theme from Jaws and how the score was used very strategically in order for the audience to instantly associate it with the shark’s presence.

This is known as a leitmotif, which is established by observing “a clear and consistent relationship between a musical idea and its onscreen counterpart.” 8 Another prevalent example of a successful leitmotif comes from the Game of Thrones television series: “The

Rains of Castamere,” a song associated exclusively as the theme for the Lannister family, begins to play just moments before a rival family is slaughtered in the Lannister name.9

When one of the main characters recognizes the song, the audience quickly catches on and both feel a range of emotions over the next several minutes, confusion shifting into trepidation and then to a true sense of dread as we finally understand the stakes. Kress and

Van Leeuwen encourage us to embrace this relatively recent and more holistic take on multimodality “in which it is therefore quite possible for music to encode action, or images to encode emotion.”10 Several seasons of repeatedly hearing the song played to signify the

Lannister family has primed the audience for that moment, successfully making the emotional toll that much more harrowing and effective. On the subject of emotional

8 Wingstedt, Johnny, Sture Brändström, and Jan Berg. "Narrative music, visuals and meaning in film." Visual Communication 9, no. 2 (2010): 193-210.

9 Game of Thrones. “The Rains of Castamere,” HBO, June 02, 2013, written by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, directed by David Nutter.

10 Kress, Gunther and Theo Van Leeuwen. Multimodal Discourse: Mode and Media of Contemporary Communication.” Oxford University Press, 2001: 2.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 connection, Berys Gaut discusses how the audience becomes invested in characters. He argues first for identification, which he defines as being able to imagine believing what a character believes, or to imagine feeling what they feel. Essentially, you are putting yourself in the character’s shoes and imagining how you would react if put in their position.

He then argues for empathy, which is to actually feel that emotion, not simply to imagine what feeling it would be like. According to Gaut, these are the two most powerful ways to increase the audience’s emotional engagement with the characters.11

Emotional engagement is imperative when the topic shifts to media with a social agenda. This becomes important when we look at our next piece of literature, Don’t Even

Think About it: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change by George Marshall.

The author strives to understand the psychology behind how and why we can understand that something is true while simultaneously behaving as though it is not, or as though we do not have that knowledge in the first place.12 One of the main arguments presented here centers on the idea that there are two systems for decision-making in our brains: the rational side and the emotional side. While these two sides work in tandem and communicate with one another, the emotional brain ultimately decides what actions we will take. Throughout human evolution, the emotional brain has “maintained its dominance” due to its being more capable of responding quickly to threats, a rather primeval and raw reaction for the sake of survival.13 However, the emotional brain is not naturally equipped with the tools to process such a long-term, slow moving threat as the one climate change represents. So while the

11 Gaut, Berys. "Empathy and Identification in Cinema." Midwest Studies In Philosophy 34, no. 1 (2010): 136-57.

12 Marshall, George. Don't Even Think about It: Why Our Brains Are Wired to Ignore Climate Change. First U.S. ed. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2014.

13 Ibid., 49.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 rational brain may comprehend the scientific facts and figures and be convinced by the overwhelming amount of data that begs for immediate action, the emotional brain does not feel particularly threatened by the dangers posed by climate change. The individual is too far removed from the concept of climate change, and one must actively choose to view it through a far-reaching lens of risk assessment and fight against their nature to write it off as unimportant. Marshall backs up this claim in an interview with psychology professor

Daniel Gilbert and his discussion of how we have evolved to react forcefully to only four stimulants or triggers: Personal, Abrupt, Immoral, and Now (PAIN).14 While none of the four are triggered by thoughts of climate change, the most important for our discussion are

Abrupt and Now. The former stresses that we are put on high alert for threats that are sudden, and we tend to give little thought to threats that move at a slower rate. The latter focuses on the fact that while we have the ability to look into and plan for the future, we tend to be much more concerned with matters that affect us in the present moment. Until the worst impacts of climate change appear in our backyard, the emotional brain will have a difficult time accepting and planning for a way to deal with them. And by then, it will be far too late. As discussed above, people participate in social and political movements because they receive something out of it;15 where climate change is concerned, that promise of future reward simply does not outweigh the immediate cost that must be paid. When expanded outside the realm of climate concerns and into other social justice messages, the same logic applies in that the problems are both abstract and seem to many as issues that

14 Ibid., 47.

15 Rosenstone, Steven J., and John Mark Hansen. Mobilization, Participation, and Democracy in America. Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 do not and will never affect them. The task for the filmmaker is to make this issue real for the viewer, and that is accomplished by a successful emotional engagement strategy.

“The horror film is meant to end in hope.”16 Thus begins the summary of Kevin

Wetmore’s analysis of modern horror and terror films, Post-9/11 Horror in American

Cinema. This book argues that the world of horror movies experienced a fundamental change in structure following the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001 in the United

States. No longer are we guaranteed a hopeful conclusion to a horror film; we do not even have the luxury of a guarantee that any of the characters will survive the end of the movie.

While box office reflections make it apparent that movies directly dealing with 9/11 itself do not have a wide appeal, those that focus on the abstract feelings inspired by it tend to do much better at drawing in large audiences.17 One particular phenomenon Wetmore zones in on is the new concept in recent horror films that death is doled out with seemingly no motivation; your own actions are no longer the reason for your tragic fate. Instead,

“random and anonymous death” has the potential to find you at any time, and to no fault of your own.18 With the extreme memorialization of the events of 9/11 and the passing of the highly controversial USA Patriot Act (Uniting and Strengthening America by

Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act) by the

George W. Bush Administration, the sense of heightened paranoia among Americans was indisputable. While the random death framework was not unheard of pre-9/11, it became markedly more common after the attacks. Less than one month after the attacks on 9/11, a meeting was held between senior adviser to the Bush administration Karl Rove and several

16 Wetmore, Kevin J. Post-9/11 Horror in American Cinema. New York: Continuum, 2012.

17 Ibid., 2.

18 Ibid., 81.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 top Hollywood film executives in an effort to discuss how film and television could play their part to “be part of the spirit” supporting the War on Terror.19 This attempt at collaboration supports the theory that film has a significant effect on how the public perceives their reality. The release of movies such as Cloverfield (2008), The Strangers

(2008), and the Final Destination franchise (save for the first installment, which was released in 2000) shows the audience that death no longer plays by the horror movie tropes we are all so familiar with. The “final girl,” the young, white, responsible, sexually abstinent woman who survives to the end of the film because she negates to participate in the morally bereft behaviors of her friends who have since been killed, is no longer guaranteed safety. The message here is that your positive actions do not have the power to protect you from harm; your fate is determined by some outside force that you have absolutely no control over. Many major films of this sort were released several years after

9/11 and are still being made today, but they continue to tap into the same emotions instilled in 2001, thereby sustaining the paradigm shift in American cinema.

When applied to the subgenre of climate disaster film, this sentiment has the potential to leave moviegoers with the message that there is no hope for a viable solution.

This structure will in no way inspire change or mobilization, and as we analyze the climate- related films in this study, this phenomenon will crop up on multiple fronts. Issues of race and gender in media are also evolving, as more women and people of color now have better opportunities to tell their stories either in front of or behind the camera. How they choose to tell those stories and the messages they convey are the focus of this paper. Filmmakers have all of these resources and tools at their disposal; how do they use them in order to

19 King, John. "White House sees Hollywood role in war on terrorism." CNN Washington Bureau, November 8, 2001. http://www.cnn.com/2001/US/11/08/rec.bush.hollywood/.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 communicate their message to their viewers? The goal of any social commentary is to bring awareness to the issue and inspire people to take action against the injustice being done. In order for a film to have this kind of impact, it must effectively present the benefits of the agenda to the audience in a way that is both convincing and credible, all while keeping them entertained and giving them a sense of hope for the future.

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CHAPTER II THE METHODS

In this section, I will describe the methodological approach taken in this study in order to best evaluate the effectiveness of a group of assorted films that seek to send their audience a message related to a social justice issue. The aim is to create a typology that will aid in coding the qualitative data gathered from this collection of films. This type of data is too complex and nuanced to be analyzed using any method other than an explanatory case study, as this will provide a richer and more thorough understanding of the data.

Evaluating these films requires an in-depth description of each case, followed by a systematic process to determine the likelihood that these social justice messages were conveyed in a manner that has the potential to encourage a behavior change. While I am not testing whether viewers actually act after receiving these messages, the idea is that if a message is communicated effectively, then audience members will be more inclined to change how they interact with these issues in various forms of political participation.

Among a laundry list of examples, this can include voting for policies or politicians that promise to combat climate change, joining protests for racial or gender equality, signing petitions or even simply changing your personal mindset and behavior toward that particular issue. If a movie fails to communicate its message in a way that engages viewers on an emotional level, then it is unlikely that any of these behavior changes will take place.

I have compiled a list of twelve movies that can be divided equally among three categories: race, gender, and climate change. Chosen at random based on the film’s central message falling into one of those categories, the criteria for selection included a release date within the last decade, as well as a Metascore above 61 or in the “Generally Favorable

Reviews” classification. This is not to say that movies receiving scores that are not

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“favorable” could not have effectively communicated messages that inspire their audiences to change their behavior, but this classification indicates that the film is more likely to have been seen by a more sizeable audience. Metascores are created by distilling a consensus of reviews from highly respected critics across the globe, as opposed to reviews submitted by users like many other rating systems. The release date stipulation is in place not only because there are films being made with a social justice angle now more than ever, but also because their popularity has increased. From this list of requirements, I chose a reasonable mix of mainstream and independently produced films that were viewed by a variety of audiences, made with very different budgets, and procured various amounts of box office revenue. High budget, blockbuster films targeted to mass audiences are now beginning to include more than car chases and Star Wars installments, allowing for movies made with a social justice message in mind to enjoy a bigger market and more financial success than they have been afforded in the past. Several of these films have won or been nominated for

Academy Awards such as Best Picture, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Original Music

Score, as well as a multitude of accolades from awards guilds in the independent film market. The categories of race, gender, and climate change were chosen for the fact that they are extremely hot button issues in today’s social media-driven environment. However, there is of course room for future studies to tackle other issues like class divisions, education, animal rights, healthcare, or any number of social problems faced in modern society.

In order to conduct this analysis, I have created a typology to assess how well a film’s message was communicated to its audience. This is measured by the film’s ability to engage its viewers on an emotional level rather than simply giving them a rational understanding of the issue, because while we may logically comprehend a social problem,

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 we are seldom pushed to action unless we experience an emotional connection to the problem itself or to the people it affects. Each film will be discussed at length and given a binary rating for each point within the typology, with each of those points being chosen based on the previously discussed literature detailing how best to emotionally engage an audience. The typology can be divided into two groups: technical mechanisms and narrative mechanisms. Technical mechanisms stem from the cinematography perspective of filmmaking, covering everything from camera angles to lighting choices. Narrative mechanisms are more concerned with the elements of storytelling and how the writers choose to transmit their message through dialogue and overall theme.

Assumptions

Before dissecting my typology for effective communication, I need to address the assumptions made in this study. The first of which acknowledges that there is more information that can be gained from viewing a film aside from what is directly portrayed.

This information can be separate and independent from the images shown on screen and is often left up to the audience’s interpretation. Specific interpretations of smaller details may vary from viewer to viewer, but the overarching central message will remain consistent.

This assumption helps to simplify the model while still providing enough information to determine if a film utilized the mechanism in question. Messages are conveyed through multimodality, using a combination of images, dialogue, and music to form the narrative.

These films are evaluated with an average movie-going audience in mind, with no special training or education in the art of filmmaking needed to receive and process a given message.

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Technical Mechanisms

A number of cinematic techniques can be utilized to successfully engage the audience on an emotional level, triggering the side of the brain that will make the issue seem more tangible and hopefully spur them into action. This has less to do with the storyline or message itself, focusing instead on the technical choices made by the filmmakers. Table 1 below displays the technical mechanisms and their definitions.

Table 1. Technical Mechanisms

Method Typology Definition

point of view shot a shot through the eyes of a major character to show us their perspective

expressive reaction an extremely close up shot of a character’s facial shot expression in reaction to a dramatic event

Technical leitmotif a song or melody played to signify a certain character’s Mechanism presence or influence

flashback/montage a scene set before the current timeline; a sequence of scenes presented in quick succession

color the strategic use of color to evoke certain moods and emotions

The first of these methods is a point of view shot. This shot lets us act as the character’s eyes, allowing us to see exactly what they are seeing as though from their perspective. This is quite a literal attempt at putting the audience in a character’s shoes.

This technique can be especially effective in a number of circumstances, the first of which being if the character in question is watching something particularly devastating occur.

This ranges anywhere from an act of violence, to an accident befalling a loved one, to any number of similar events. Another effective use of the point of view shot comes when the character is a child, or someone otherwise vulnerable when compared with the person or

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 thing they are facing. When we are given a shot from a child’s perspective, we are looking up at the people or things around us, and this helps us to identify with what that character is feeling. An example of the point of view shot used in a blockbuster film is in 2007’s

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Our main group of protagonists is locked into a deadly battle in the Ministry of Magic’s Department of Mysteries. Harry (Daniel

Radcliffe) watches as his beloved godfather Sirius Black (Gary Oldman) is struck with a curse that results in his death.20 The camera angles go back and forth between Harry and

Sirius for several seconds, until we are ultimately left to watch Sirius slowly fall backward into the veil, a one-way barrier between the living and the dead. Having just seen the shocked and terrified look on Harry’s face, we can now identify and even empathize with the horror he is feeling at this moment as we watch the events from his perspective. This death affects the audience nearly as much as it affects Harry himself, and this successful attempt at emotionally engaging the viewer is achieved in part due to the choice to utilize the point of view shot.

The next cinematic technique for emotional engagement is the expressive reaction shot. Arguably even more powerful than the point of view shot, this shot gives us a very close-up view of a character’s face after something important has happened, whether it makes them feel devastated, excited, scared, angry, or any number of dramatic feelings.

This up close and personal look at a character’s expression immediately following having seen the event that inspired that expression helps the viewer to feel what that character is feeling, or to imagine feeling what they are feeling. A solid example of the expressive reaction shot comes in the last few minutes of 2017’s Lady Bird.21 The protagonist,

20 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. Directed by David Yates. USA: Warner Bros. Pictures, 2007.

21 Lady Bird. Directed by Greta Gerwig. USA: A24, 2017.

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Christine “Lady Bird” McPherson (Saoirse Ronan), has applied to universities on the opposite side of the country from where her family lives, against her mother Marion’s

(Laurie Metcalf) wishes. Marion gives Lady Bird a harsh, extended silent treatment in the weeks leading up to her leaving for college, even refusing to walk inside with her when dropping her off at the airport. The next few minutes serve almost as a character study into

Marion herself; Marion is driving away from the departures/check-in area of the airport, and we are presented with an unwavering close-up shot of her face. The camera is focused on her for a full sixty seconds, with only a handful of quick cuts to show us the airport’s navigation signs. We watch as her face slowly transforms from the blank, unemotional expression she used to when she indignantly brushed Lady Bird off as she left the car, into a look of regret, then to sadness as she begins crying and hurriedly attempts to make her way back to departures, hoping to catch Lady Bird before she makes it to security. Simply watching this scene in a vacuum with zero context would be enough to hook the viewer and evoke an emotional reaction, without even knowing whether Marion makes it in time

(she does not). Part of the success of this scene in emotionally engaging the audience is of course thanks to outstanding acting by Metcalf, but it is also due in large part to the framing of the expressive reaction shot. Had this scene been filmed in any other fashion, the emotional impact would almost certainly be much less powerful.

The third technique for emotional engagement is the use of one or more leitmotifs, which were discussed in the literature review. This is the use of a song or melody to signify a specific person or group, played throughout the film whenever they are present or are otherwise influencing what we see on screen. The effects of the leitmotif may not be a conscious observation by the audience, but musical scores often drive the action of a film and play an important role in achieving the emotional connection that the filmmaker is

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 striving for. One of the most recognizable leitmotifs ever created comes from the

Halloween horror franchise in the form of a simple piano tune that plays to announce the appearance of the villain, Michael Myers. Though the score became so iconic as to be held consistent throughout the series, which as of 2018 was extended by its eleventh installment, the original film from 1978 solidified the leitmotif’s prowess by scaring audiences worldwide.22 Throughout the movie, Michael is a looming, almost omnipotent presence who makes only a few scarce appearances to kill unsuspecting teenagers for no discernable reason, with the characters likening him to The Bogeyman. His leitmotif will begin to play long before he arrives on screen, ratcheting up the suspense for the audience because they know that when they hear this song, they are about to witness Michael perform what will likely be a lethal act of violence. This leitmotif was incredibly successful at engaging the audience and inspiring emotions from anxiety and anticipation to fear and dread.

Another important tool in the filmmaker’s arsenal for emotionally engaging their viewers is the use of flashbacks or montages. The two are used in conjunction more often than not, so I will discuss them together as one category. Of course, these can often be short and inconsequential to the plot, but when they are used for a specific, dramatic purpose, they have the power to shock the audience or drive home an important point. A flashback is a scene that shows a time before the present setting of the central storyline. This can take place before the story being told in the film has begun, or it can show scenes we have already seen, either from a new perspective or to remind the viewer of their importance. A particularly effective use of a flashback sequence takes place in 1999’s The Sixth Sense, in which director M. Night Shyamalan pulls the first big twist of his career, now his directorial

22 Halloween. Directed by John Carpenter. USA: Compass International Pictures, 1978.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 signature.23 Protagonist Malcolm Crowe (Bruce Willis) is a child psychologist who encounters Cole Sear (Haley Joel Osment), a young boy who claims to communicate with spirits. Malcolm placates Cole throughout the entire film, telling him that he believes in his abilities while at the same time trying to find a way to help Cole with his delusions. In the last several minutes of the movie, Malcolm discovers that he himself has actually been dead since the beginning of the story; Cole can in fact communicate with spirits, and

Malcolm is one of them. We then see a collection of flashbacks from throughout the movie, moments when we believed Malcolm to be interacting with people other than Cole that now, viewed through the lens of the new information we have, make it clear that Malcolm was never physically there. Malcolm is the main character, and ipso facto we believe him to be a reliable narrator, but these flashbacks show us the error of our ways in the most effective fashion: taking us back in time to the moments when we arguably should have noticed that something was off. While a flashback takes us back in time, a montage is a sequence of different scenes edited together in quick succession to give the audience a more complete view of multiple events, rather than shooting the scenes separately. This can be especially effective when showing events that are happening simultaneously, as is the case with the now famous Baptism scene from The Godfather.24 The audience has followed the journey of Michael Corleone (Al Pacino) all the way from when he was a young veteran of the Vietnam War just returning home and refusing to become involved in the nefarious affairs of his family’s criminal enterprise, to his what may have been inevitable ascension through the ranks into the top position of Godfather. At the end of the film, Michael bears witness to the baptism of his nephew, and as Michael is reciting his

23 The Sixth Sense. Directed by M. Night Shyamalan. USA: Hollywood Pictures, 1999.

24 The Godfather. Directed by Francis Ford Coppola. USA: Paramount Pictures, 1972.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 vows to become the child’s godfather, we see a montage sequence of murders being carried out on Michael’s orders. The scene jumps back and forth between the church and the murders, all while we are listening to Michael vows of renouncing evil. The juxtaposition of these two very different sides of Michael Corleone shows us the essence of Michael’s character development, and it is perfectly encapsulated by this montage, with the cuts serving to drive home just how far he has come from the man we were first introduced to.

The use of flashbacks and montages to impart important information to the audience is a widely appreciated way to engage them on an emotional level. Viewers watching these scenes shot in rapid succession can experience the shock and awe intended by the filmmakers on a much more visceral level when compared with the rest of the film.

The final method of emotionally engaging an audience can be used in a wide range of styles, from extremely subtle to very loud and hard to miss. The use of color in film is often utilized for the purposes of aesthetic, but it can also be used to evoke certain moods and emotions or to represent certain characters. For the purposes of this study, the use of color to evoke moods and emotions is the central concern. Colors can have a specific meaning in the universe of a film, but they can also be interpreted more generally: red means anger, power, or danger, pink signifies beauty or femininity, etc. A well-known film that utilizes color is the first film in The Matrix trilogy.25 Protagonist Neo (Keanu Reeves) learns that humans do not live in the world they think they do, and in fact, their world is not a world at all, but merely a simulation from which their alien overlords source energy called the Matrix. When Neo is in the Matrix, the color palette is tinged with a dull green shade that, once compared with the sharp blue palette of the real world, seems faded and lackluster. However, the green feels much safer than the harsh blues of the real world,

25 The Matrix. Directed by Lana Wachowski and Lilly Wachowski. USA: Warner Bros. Pictures, 1999.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 which help the audience to understand that life there would be raw and unforgiving. The green palette is much more comforting to the audience, and to the characters themselves, which causes them to wonder if they would prefer to live blissfully ignorant in the Matrix or risk the tangible dangers of the real world. Once this question crosses their minds, the filmmaker’s strategic use of color has emotionally engaged the viewers.

Narrative Mechanisms

Apart from the technical aspects of cinematography, filmmakers rely on the storytelling itself to engage their audiences. The central message can sometimes be plain as day, hand delivered to the viewers through dialogue, while other times the message can be left up to the viewers’ own interpretation, having been transmitted by only the most cryptic of signals. The most important question we must ask is whether or not the film fully explained the issue at hand. Table 2 below displays the narrative mechanisms and their definitions.

Table 2. Narrative Mechanisms

Method Typology Definition

issue the social issue the film attempts to tackle is made clear to the clarity viewers

solution a solution to the social problem is presented and followed through Narrative Mechanism hope the end of the film leaves the viewer with a sense of hope for the future

benefits the benefits of acting are raised or the costs are lowered

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Issue clarity can be described as making certain that the audience has a solid grasp on the subject that the film is attempting to tackle. This does not have to be delivered in the most straightforward manner in order to be successful. For this study in particular, issue clarity was achieved as long as the viewer leaves knowing that the film they just saw revolved around one social justice issue or another.

Another major aspect of the narrative is the solution to the problem. If a solution is proposed and followed through, then the audience is more likely to feel as though they themselves have the efficacy to create a solution as well. Ensuring the audience gets the impression that a personal behavior or attitude change would have some positive impact on the issue in question is an important step toward inspiring change on a greater scale.

The next question we need to answer with regards to messages delivered using narrative mechanisms concerns the ending of the film; does the message leave the audience with a sense of hope? With this study focusing on movies with a social justice message, leaving the viewer with a bleak outlook on the issue in question will result in their feeling helpless and will likely not inspire them to take action. Though a film with a bleak ending may still have succeeded in engaging the emotional side of the viewers’ brain, they may exit the theater already feeling defeated.

Lastly, as previously mentioned with both Downs’ and Marshall’s discussions on rationality, action is much more likely to be taken if the benefits of acting are raised, or if the costs are lowered. A film can accomplish this in a multitude of ways, as long as the filmmaker convinces the audience that their expected returns will be well worth whatever price they must pay. On an individual level, this can be particularly difficult when the problem only applies to one type of person (only black people, only women, etc). The filmmaker must take care to ensure that their message will be absorbed whether or not that

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 problem applies to each and every audience member. In some cases, of course, this is not possible because some people will simply not be receptive no matter how the message is packaged.

There will be some overlap among the narrative mechanisms, but it is important to include each of them as their own category because while they may not be mutually exclusive, it is still the case that some may appear when others do not. For example, if a film does not clearly explain the issue it is attempting to raise awareness for, then it is unlikely that solution, hope, or benefits will be forthcoming. If there is no solution presented, then the raising of benefits will be difficult, but at the same time, the presence of a solution does not automatically mean that benefits are raised. The mechanisms may be connected, but they are not inherently reliant on one another and thus, must remain separate.

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CHAPTER III THE CASES

This section contains a detailed breakdown of the twelve films I have chosen for this case study, divided into the categories of race, gender, and climate change. A summary of each will be presented, accompanied by details of the cinematic and narrative techniques used to deliver the film’s message. Each category features four popular films from the past decade that seek to make a social justice-related impact on their audiences. Table 3 below lists the movies with their respective categories. A results section will follow that evaluates the effectiveness of those messages and the likelihood that they resonate with viewers on an emotional level that could inspire change.

Table 3. List of Films Category Films Race Get Out, Black Panther, Sorry to Bother You, BlacKkKlansman

Gender Call Me by Your Name, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, Moonlight, Easy A Climate Beasts of the Southern Wild, Snowpiercer, Interstellar, Change Mad Max: Fury Road

Race

Ever-present at the forefront of the social justice crusade, issues of race have long been depicted in major motion pictures. The difference in recent years stems from who is holding the camera, and more and more often now, the narratives are being controlled by people of color themselves. Specifically, black audiences more than any other racial

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 minority are seeing themselves positively represented on the big screen like never before.

Many films released today with a majority black cast will have an explicit racial component to their message, and in the following pages, I will evaluate the effectiveness of those messages from a handful of popular movies.

Get Out

Writer and director Jordan Peele of Comedy Central fame shocked the world with his unflinching take on being a black man in modern America. Get Out won the Academy

Award for Best Original Screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture in 2018, making waves all throughout society in all of its horror/thriller glory.26 The story begins at night in a seemingly unremarkable neighborhood as we watch a young black man, Andre (Lakeith

Stanfield), walk down the street with a cellphone to his ear. At first nothing seems amiss, but he is soon being stalked by a slow-moving Porsche. The situation escalates quickly, with the driver exiting the vehicle, incapacitating Andre, and dragging him into the trunk of the car in under a minute. This opening scene lets the audience know that music will play a very important part in Peele’s storytelling. As the Porsche pulls up to the curb, we hear a tune from the 1930s playing over the stereo. The song “Run Rabbit Run” by

Flanagan and Allen was popularized during World War II, and it sends a chillingly clear signal to the audience: Andre should get out.27

After the title break, the scene opens in a New York City apartment filled with black and white urban photography. We meet Chris (Daniel Kaluuya), a young black photographer in his mid-twenties, and his white girlfriend, Rose (Allison Williams). The

26 Get Out. Directed by Jordan Peele. USA: Blumhouse Productions, 2017.

27 Flanagan and Allen, "Run Rabbit Run," The Little Dog Laughed, Decca, 1939.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 two are going to visit Rose’s parents for the weekend, and right off the bat Chris asks if they know he is black. If we didn’t already know going in, we are now certain that racial dynamics will be at the forefront of the film’s agenda. Rose’s parents do in fact not know that Chris is black, but she convinces him it won’t be an issue and they take off, leaving the city for the countryside. Their drive introduces us to Chris’s best friend Rod (Lil Rel

Howery), a TSA agent, who is watching Chris’s dog while he’s out of town and calls to check in. When the call ends, the audience gets their first jump scare of the film as a deer slams into the windshield. They call local police to report the accident, and the officer on the scene, a white man, behaves with increasing hostility toward Chris although he hasn’t spoken a word to him, while Rose angrily jumps to his defense. This critical interaction paints Rose as an ally we can trust, assuring us that she will use her privilege for good and not allow anyone to discriminate against Chris. When the two arrive to the secluded estate,

Rose’s parents Dean (Bradley Whitford) and Missy Armitage (Catherine Keener) meet them at the door, and though they greet them with enthusiasm, there is still a special sort of tension and way of communication between them that feels slightly off. The family has two employees Walter (Marcus Henderson) and Georgina (Betty Gabriel) who live on the estate, a groundskeeper and a maid respectively, both of whom are black. Dean, a neurosurgeon, takes Chris on a tour of the house and laments this fact to him, the background story being that they were hired to care for Dean’s aging parents, and when they died, he simply “couldn’t bear to let them go.” There are several references of this sort to Dean’s parents throughout the film, all along those same lines of “they’re still here with us” and “we keep a piece of them here.” Rose’s brother Jeremy (Caleb Landry Jones) arrives later that evening and immediately begins to talk of Chris’s “genetic makeup” and the advantage his physicality would lend him in a fight, while explaining that mixed martial

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 arts style fighting like jiujitsu is more strategic. We can take from this that Jeremy is implying that Chris has the brawn while he himself has the brains. Ever Chris’s fiery protector, Rose complains about her family’s racist behavior when the two are alone, while

Chris simply acknowledges her points, offering no comment. He expected this and won’t bother to pay it too much mind. Chris begins noticing the increasingly odd behavior of

Georgina and Walter, just as Missy, a psychiatrist, begins what appears to be an intense session of hypnosis under the guise of helping Chris quit smoking. She asks probing questions about Chris’s mother’s death, and we watch as Chris loses control and sinks into the Sunken Place: a space-like corner of his own mind where he watches the outside world through the window of his eyes. This takes the concept of a point of view shot to an entirely new level, as we see Missy through the window inside Chris’s mind. Immediately following, we are given what might be one of the most effective reaction shots ever made.

An extremely close-up shot of Chris’s face, frozen in horror, with tears streaming down his otherwise motionless face. He awakens confused back in Rose’s bedroom but chooses to go about his day like normal.

Rose’s parents have a gathering planned for this weekend, and the partygoers arrive in droves, all white and most in their sixties and seventies. The use of color here starkly sets Chris apart from the visitors because each of them has red incorporated into their outfit in some way, while Chris is wearing a blue denim shirt. When Rose and Chris politely make their rounds speaking to all the guests, each of them asks Chris a variety of exceedingly bizarre and specific questions. In a brief moment of relief, Chris spots another black man and attempts to speak with him. When we see his face, we discover it is Andre, the man who was kidnapped in the very first scene of the film. The audience can note here that Andre is not wearing red until the white woman he is with hands him a red

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 handkerchief. The dramatic irony confirms for the viewers once and for all that there is something gravely suspicious transpiring here, but Chris, oblivious to the details, is simply confused by Andre’s (now called Logan) strange behavior. Next, Chris happens upon a famous blind art dealer, Jim Hudson (Stephen Root), with whom he discusses his own photography. Jim tells us the sad story of his foray into photography at a young age before he discovered that he doesn’t have “the eye” for it, and then how in his later years, he lost his sight altogether. Chris though, Jim says, most certainly has the eye. After yet another awkward encounter with Georgina, Chris once again finds himself surrounded by older white folks who want to ask him intrusive, racially charged questions. Andre/Logan is drawn into the conversation, but when Chris tries to sneakily take a photo of him and forgets to turn the flash off, Andre freezes. After long seconds of Andre staring into space, he becomes aggressive and begins repeatedly shouting at Chris to get out. He is dragged away by Jeremy and Missy, screaming and fighting the whole way, and Dean later diffuses the situation by explaining that it was nothing more than a “seizure.” Throughout the party, we have seen or heard mention of the guests playing stereotypical white games like bocce ball and badminton, so Dean’s suggestion of a game of Bingo sends the crowd back out onto the lawn. Chris and Rose leave the group and have an intense discussion where Chris insists that he is uncomfortable and wants to leave as soon as possible. While this conversation is taking place, we are taken back to the estate to watch the progression of the

“Bingo” game, which turns out to be a silent auction. Bingo cards are raised at intervals in the crowd as we finally see the photo of Chris beside Dean who is serving as the auctioneer, at last letting us in on the secret that our own protagonist is being sold to the highest bidder.

It should be noted that each Bingo card has already been stamped in a winning order for everyone in attendance, except for an older Asian man whose card has no stamps at all.

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While he may not be the one who is quite literally up for sale, he is still not an equal. When

Rose and Chris return to the house to pack their bags, Chris calls Rod to discuss the photo he took of Andre, as they both now recognize him as the friend of a friend, their suspicions ramping up. Rod looks into Andre on social media and discovers that he was reported missing several months ago, and his suspicions are confirmed. Chris stumbles upon a hidden door and finds a box of photographs: Rose in each picture, a different black man by her side in every one. When he gets to the last two photos, we recognize Walter in the first and Georgina in the second. This is especially troubling to Chris because Rose told him that she has never had a black boyfriend before, but having seen the auction, we the audience have a good idea of what might be going on. Chris attempts to leave with Rose despite this discovery, and as she digs for her car keys, Rose’s parents and brother are nonchalantly blocking his exit. Rose refuses to give Chris the keys in a reveal that shouldn’t be quite as shocking as it is: Rose was in on the game the entire time. Having conditioned him since his first day on the estate, Missy uses her hypnosis techniques to swiftly and efficiently incapacitate Chris, sending him back into the Sunken Place. When he awakens, he is strapped to a chair in the Armitage’s basement. He is shown what appears to be a rather old video, and we quickly gather that the purpose of this almost infomercial-style clip is of Dean’s father. Here, we are provided with proof once and for all that Dean’s parents inhabit the bodies of Georgina and Walter. We learn that the goal here is to transfer the consciousness of Jim Hudson (the blind art dealer Chris spoke with earlier) into Chris’s body, where Jim will control all motor functions and Chris will simply live on in the

Sunken Place as a passenger. Jim praised Chris for his eye for photography when they first met, and soon it will belong to him, both physically and metaphorically. The invasive questions and odd comments on Chris’s physicality that have been thrown at him since he

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 arrived to the Armitage’s estate finally begin to make sense. The Armitages and their group think that black people have a higher quality genetic makeup than white people, so they developed a way to transfer their own consciousness into a black body, creating as they see it an ultimately superior being. In a rapid turn of events, Chris manages to escape and kill

Jeremy, Dean, and Missy in quick succession, leaving only Rose and her grandparents left to follow him as he attempts to escape. Chris steals Jeremy’s car and takes off, running over Georgina in the process, and after he crashes the car into a tree and continues on foot,

Walter tackles him to the ground. Remembering the earlier episode with Andre, Chris uses his phone to take a flash photograph of Walter, momentarily snapping him back into himself. Walter takes a gun from Rose under the pretense of killing Chris. At the last second however, he turns the gun on Rose and then on himself. While Rose is bleeding out on the pavement, we hear police sirens approaching and suddenly fear that all is lost for Chris; he will of course be blamed for the bloodshed, as any cop will take Rose’s word over his. But lo and behold, who should step out of what we now recognize as an Airport Security vehicle than Rod, having arrived just in the nick of time. The film ends with Rose’s last breath, paired with Chris and Rod’s victorious getaway. Rarely does a horror film end on such an uplifting note, but in this case, it is well and truly deserved.

Sorry to Bother You

The experience of being black in a corrupt capitalist system is satirized to the point of absolute absurdity in writer and director Boots Riley’s dark comedy Sorry to Bother

You.28 Our protagonist is a young black man named Cassius “Cash” Green (Lakeith

28 Sorry to Bother You. Directed by Boots Riley. USA: Significant Productions, 2018.

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Stanfield, previously from Get Out), and the film opens with him looking quite nervous at a job interview. Cash is clutching an Employee of the Month plaque to his chest and presents the interviewer with a trophy he received from his previous job for excellence.

The interviewer cuts through Cash’s references, letting us know that Cash lied about his work history on his resume, and the awards he brought in with him are fake as well.

However, the interviewer tells Cash that he doesn’t care about experience, and that the lengths to which Cash went to in order to sell his lies shows “initiative.” Cash’s dishonesty is rewarded with a job offer, and we already begin to see what it takes to succeed in this system. The following morning, Cash is discussing the concept of death with his girlfriend

Detroit (Tessa Thompson), where we learn that he is terrified of dying without having done something that “matters.” This existential battle will follow him throughout the film, prompting many of his questionable decisions. Later, Cash is absentmindedly watching a television advertisement for WorryFree, a company offering lifetime contracts in exchange for labor. The offer includes housing and food, and though the narration is cheerful and bright, we still get the sense that we are looking at a form of modern slavery. The phrase

“putting lipstick on a pig” comes to mind. It quickly becomes apparent that Cash is the type of person to whom money (hence, his nickname) and status matter a great deal. Very much a down on his luck, shoulders always hunched, reserved type of character, he is currently living with Detroit in his uncle’s garage and driving an old, rundown car he hates, so this new job at the telemarketing company RegalView is something he desperately wants to succeed at. During a staff meeting, the managers contend that the entire RegalView team is a “family,” hoping the workers will buy into this new brand of capitalism where exploitation is covered up by a superior insisting they are your friend, not your boss. They discuss calling strategies and encourage the employees to work hard and Stick To The

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Script in hopes that they can move up to the mysterious and coveted Power Caller position.

After being particularly unsuccessful at the job for several weeks, Cash receives an offering of wisdom from an older black man in the next cubicle over, imploring him to use his

“white voice” in order to make sales. This is not, the man insists, simply changing your voice to sound like a white person, but more about the feeling behind it, as though you have no worries or cares in the world. It’s what the mostly white customers think they should sound like, having the ability to use their entitlement to its fullest potential.

Cash becomes friends with another RegalView caller, Squeeze (Steven Yeun), who is adamant that they should all be paid more than their measly commissions and wants to work together to form a union. We come in contact with WorryFree once again, this time a news story about protests held by the group Left Eye against the company’s lifetime labor contracts. This introduces us to the CEO of WorryFree, Steve Lift (Armie Hammer), a young, posh white man who insists that comparing his company to slavery is both

“ludicrous and offensive.” Lift comes across as a very friendly, amenable guy, again fitting perfectly into the “I’m not your boss, I’m your friend” narrative used to mask the less than stellar realities of conditions in the workplace.

Squeeze organizes a warning strike, where everyone in the office will put their phones down for twenty minutes during their prime calling hours. Cash goes along with the group, but we can see that he is very skeptical; he desperately wants to be promoted, wants to move up in the company and finally make the kind of money he knows he is worth. He has already fallen into the trap. His success using the “white voice” has propelled him far above his coworkers, and he plans to ride that success all the way up to being a

Power Caller (PC), which he accomplishes shortly thereafter. On his first day as a PC, Cash meets a mysterious man, suavely dressed with an eye patch over his left eye, obviously

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 symbolic as turning a blind eye to the protest group of the same name. This man, also black, tells Cash that in this office, he must use his white voice at all times, and Cash quickly makes a phenomenal sale on his first day. We are never told the man’s name, he is simply referred to as Mr. _____, indicating that he has lost his identity in his quest to become one of the elite callers at RegalView. However, the PCs are not selling appliances and such as the callers downstairs; their biggest client is WorryFree, and they are selling cheap labor to the highest bidder. Cash’s new position comes with an outrageous pay raise, and with the RegalView strike still ongoing, it eventually causes him to lose Detroit and his friends as well. Cash goes with Mr. _____ to a party hosted by WorryFree CEO Steve Lift where we see issues of race brought to the forefront. The way Steve speaks to Cash makes it clear that he views himself as superior to everyone, but with Cash in particular, his superiority is racially charged. He relentlessly tries to make Cash regale the crowd with stories of

“gangster shit,” even forcing him up on a stage to rap after Cash has said several times that he does not know how. When the display of fanfare is over, Cash meets with Steve in his office where Steve offers him a line of cocaine, which he eagerly accepts. Steve attempts to persuade Cash to come work for him at WorryFree for a special project, but we quickly learn just how high the stakes are. WorryFree scientists have developed a new species they call Equisapiens, a human-horse hybrid that will increase productivity and efficiency for

WorryFree clients. The most troubling aspect to Cash is the way this transformation is implemented: the worker does what looks to be a line of a cocaine-like substance, and Cash immediately demands that Steve tell him whether what he offered at the beginning of this meeting was actually this product. Steve explains that of course it was just cocaine, and once Cash has calmed down, Steve proceeds to make his offer. Steve wants Cash to become one of the Equisapiens and serve as WorryFree’s man on the inside for a contracted five

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 years, then he would be returned to his human form and receive an absolutely exorbitant paycheck. This finally breaks Cash out of his money-induced state of passive acceptance when it came to the immoral sides of his job, and he attempts to expose Steve’s diabolical plans. This however backfires, and WorryFree’s stocks skyrocket as the world excitedly hails this scientific innovation and agrees that this is the future of labor. All attempts at protests fail, the only success being that Cash and his friends manage to free those who have already been turned in Equisapiens. In the film’s final moments, Cash has returned all of his expensive belongings and is once again in his uncle’s basement, but this time with a sense of gratitude for the things he does have instead of things he does not. Taking us a little aback, one final twist shows Cash, now an Equisapien, on Steve’s doorstep with a group of other angry Equisapiens, preparing to break in and wreak havoc on Steve for what he has done to them. An absurd ending to an equally absurd film. A comedy to its core,

Sorry to Bother You did not set out to make the audience feel particularly emotionally entangled with its characters on more than a surface level. A casual viewer can watch this movie and have no idea that it is an advanced critique of race and capitalism, aside from the use of the “white voice.” While Boots Riley seems to have had a clear message with his film, the level of absurdity will likely obscure the deeper meaning from the average audience, which tells us that perhaps he was not speaking to the average audience member to begin with.

Black Panther

A newer installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, director Ryan Coogler’s

Black Panther stood apart from the crowd and had a cultural impact the likes of which

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 were unprecedented, especially for people of color.29 The first superhero film to ever be nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards, Black Panther proved to filmmakers the world over that there has always been an untapped black audience just waiting to see themselves represented on the big screen. The movie begins with a background story to set the stage: long ago, a rare metal called vibranium struck the Earth right in the heart of

Africa, a place called Wakanda. It put the people who eventually came to inhabit the land leagues ahead of the rest of the world in terms of technology and scientific innovation. The inhabitants of Wakanda split into five warring groups, and one man was led by a spirit guide to a heart-shaped flower that bestowed him with superhuman powers. This man became the first Black Panther, and all but one of the five factions bent the knee to follow him as King. In order to protect the vibranium, Wakandans decided to shield themselves from the rest of the world and put up a front that posed them as just another small, poor

African nation. Wakanda stood quietly by while slavery, war, and death ravaged the world, and more to the point, their fellow Africans. When we fast forward to the first real scene of the film set in 1992 Oakland, California, we meet Prince N’Jobu (Sterling K. Brown), a

Wakandan spy who has betrayed his people in order to help an outsider, a white terrorist by the name of Klaw, steal vibranium. The tradition of keeping the rest of the world ignorant to Wakanda’s true nature does not sit well with N’Jobu after he experiences living in the outside world for several years, and he hopes that this act of violence will force

Wakanda out of hiding. However, his brother King T’Chaka discovers his act of treason through the work of another spy, Zuri, who posed as a confidant to N’Jobu. T’Chaka sentences N’Jobu to return to Wakanda and face the council for his treachery.

29 Black Panther. Directed by Ryan Coogler. USA: Marvel Studios, 2018.

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In present day, we learn of T’Chaka’s recent death and the coming coronation of his son, Prince T’Challa (Chadwick Boseman). We are quickly introduced to our cast of main characters: Okoye (Danai Gurira), General of Wakanda’s Dora Milaje special forces unit; Nakia (Lupita Nyong’o), T’Challa’s ex-girlfriend and current Wakandan spy;

Princess Shuri (Letitia Wright), T’Challa’s younger sister and the spearhead of Wakandan scientific innovation. The group returns home for T’Challa’s coronation ceremony, where he is challenged to ritual combat by M’Baku, the leader of the rogue Jabari tribe. T’Challa defeats M’Baku and is officially crowned King of Wakanda, quickly followed by Zuri giving him the Heart-Shaped Herb and endowing him with the gifts of the Black Panther.

The Herb is bright purple in color, signifying royalty and evoking a feeling of reverence whenever it is shown throughout the film.

In London, we are introduced to Erik Stevens (Michael B. Jordan), a young black man who we learn is assisting Klaw in stealing a Wakandan vibranium artifact from the

Museum of Great Britain. T’Challa learns that the vibranium is set to be sold to an

American buyer in South Korea, so he goes with Nakia and Okoye to Busan in hopes of stopping the trade. The buyer is white ex-Air Force pilot turned CIA Agent Everett Ross

(Martin Freeman), with whom T’Challa already has a rapport, and when Klaw’s henchmen open fire in their meeting place, Ross takes Klaw into custody with T’Challa’s begrudging help. Stevens and his accomplices successfully recover Klaw from the detainment center, gravely injuring Ross in the process as he saves Nakia’s life. Against Okoye’s advisement, they return to Wakanda with Ross in tow, knowing that Shuri has the technology to heal him. Upon their return, they are met by Stevens who has killed Klaw and presented his body to the council as a show of strength. Here, T’Challa’s world begins to unravel as he learns the truth about his father: when T’Chaka confronted N’Jobu about his betrayal,

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N’Jobu drew his weapon on Zuri and T’Chaka killed him before he could fire. T’Chaka’s executive decision was to speak nothing of N’Jobu’s treason or his death, and in addition, to leave his young son alone in Oakland. We learn that Stevens is N’Jobu’s son, and he spent his life preparing for the opportunity to take on T’Challa for the crown. He was a

United States black ops soldier who earned the name Killmonger, and he plans to arm oppressed peoples the world over with Wakandan weapons. Killmonger challenges

T’Challa to ritual combat, where he kills Zuri and throws T’Challa over a waterfall’s edge to his death. Now that he is King, Killmonger has the support of the Dora Milaje and the army of the Border Tribe led by W’Kabi, T’Challa’s close friend and Okoye’s lover. Shuri,

Nakia, and the Queen Mother escape to the Jabari tribe’s land and offer a Heart-Shaped

Herb to M’Baku in exchange for the help of his army in defeating Killmonger. M’Baku refuses, but he shocks us all by revealing that T’Challa was found by one of his fishermen and is still alive. Once he is healed, the gang heads back to Shuri’s lab where Killmonger is attempting to launch weapons caches to hidden operatives around the world. Upon realizing that T’Challa is alive, Okoye and the Dora Milaje turn their weapons on

Killmonger, while W’Kabi and his soldiers continue the fight in support of Killmonger’s world domination plot. Ross shoots down the planes carrying the weapons caches, narrowly escaping with his own life, and M’Baku’s Jabari soldiers make a surprise appearance to aid the Dora Milaje, successfully ending the battle. Meanwhile, T’Challa and Killmonger are in a battle all their own, ending with T’Challa as the victor. He tries to convince Killmonger that Shuri can heal him, but he is met with dismissal as Killmonger insists he would rather die than be incarcerated. To Killmonger, T’Challa and all the former leaders of Wakanda failed their fellow people of color living in the outside world. Centuries of slavery, violence, and relentless racism have passed, but still the Wakandans remained

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 behind closed doors and did nothing to aid them. The film does an excellent job at creating a highly complex villain; it is difficult to hate Killmonger because he is not wrong. His plan to solve the problem in the present day by adding more violence does not a hero make, but to write him off as another nonsensical bad guy would be altogether inaccurate. In the film’s final moments, T’Challa and Shuri are in Oakland where N’Jobu was killed, and we learn that this very building will be the first Wakandan International Outreach Center. A new era is ushered in as Wakanda finally breaks its longstanding tradition of secrecy in favor of sharing its technology with the world. The common social elements of racial issues are not present in Black Panther, making it even more profound than if they were. This movie targets a large audience, and a significant subgroup of that audience consists of children. When young, black children watch this film, they finally see themselves represented in a positive light, being a relentless force for good. There is a mainstream superhero that looks like them, and for that, Black Panther’s impact cannot be overstated.

BlacKkKlansman

Directed by Spike Lee, the movie BlacKkKlansman is loosely based on the real-life story of Ron Stallworth, the first black cop hired by the Colorado Springs Police

Department in the 1970s.30 The film received global critical acclaim, receiving the

Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and a nomination for Best Picture in 2019.

The film begins with a short clip from Gone with the Wind of a Confederate battlefield littered with dead and injured soldiers, which quickly switches to an old-fashioned video of a host in front of a projector, giving a very mistake-filled hate speech to the viewers

30 BlacKkKlansman. Directed by Spike Lee. USA: Blumhouse Productions, 2018.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 about black people and the “international Jewish conspiracy” to gain racial equality.

Another rapid transition brings us to the main story, with our main protagonist Ron

Stallworth (John David Washington) starting his career at CSPD. He has assured Chief of

Police Bridges (Robert John Burke) that he can handle any slurs that his fellow officers may throw his way, which he soon has to prove is truly the case. His request for a transfer to an undercover position is at first denied until civil rights leader and former Black Panther

Kwame Ture (Corey Hawkins) is scheduled to hold a rally at Colorado College. Ron is instructed to attend the rally wearing a wire and note the reactions of the attendees to Ture’s speech. A number of expressive reaction shots of the students are shown in a near dreamlike state throughout Ture’s passionate lecture, lending a divine quality to Ture himself. That night, Ron is introduced to Patrice Dumas (Laura Harrier), the president of the Colorado

College Black Student Union and the person who invited Ture to speak. The two meet later that evening at a bar and it becomes clear that Patrice will be a major point in Ron’s storyline, although she of course has no idea that he is a police officer. When Ron relays the intel he gathered at work the following day, Chief Bridges assigns him to the intelligence unit. Once there, Ron sees an advertisement for the local chapter of the Ku

Klux Klan and, seemingly on a whim, calls the contact number and strikes up a conversation that ends with a scheduled meeting for the next night. Ron convinces Chief

Bridges to let him run point on a mission to infiltrate the organization, and they decide that his partner Flip Zimmerman (Adam Driver), a white, Jewish man, will play the role of

“Ron Stallworth,” as Ron tells the Chief, “With the right white man, we can do anything.”

Flip will be “Ron” during in-person meetings, while Ron himself will continue to control the phone conversation aspect of the relationship. Their strategy works, and Flip manages to convince the Klan members that he should be part of their group. However, one member

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 named Felix Kendrickson (Jasper Pääkkönen) takes an immediate dislike to Flip and chooses to give him a particularly hard time, insisting that Flip take a polygraph to prove he is not Jewish. This brings anti-Semitism into the film’s greater discussion on race, and we see Flip struggle with this throughout his foray into the Klan. Over the next several weeks, Flip gets deeper into the Klan and the officers use his intel to prevent a cross- burning demonstration, discover that national security agents are active members, and even go as far as having “Ron” inducted into the Klan by Grand Wizard David Duke himself

(Topher Grace). Before his arrival, Duke received copious death threats, so the CSPD provided a security detail for his visit in the form of none other than Detective Ron

Stallworth. In a highly effective point of view shot, we watch Flip’s induction from Ron’s perspective. This is in addition to watching Ron watch Flip, which provides an equally effective reaction shot. After the ceremony in a banquet hall gathering, Flip is recognized by a Klan member whom he arrested years earlier, who then shares this information with

Felix. Before Felix can expose Flip, he gets an emergency call from his wife Connie (Ashlie

Atkinson) who has been sent on a mission to plant a bomb at a civil rights rally. Neither

Flip nor Ron knew the details of this plan, but Ron chose to come clean to Patrice about his job as a police officer in order to warn her about a possible attack, effectively ending their relationship. Ron watched Connie exit the banquet hall and called for backup, but

Felix coaches Connie into Plan B: planting the bomb at Patrice’s house. Connie panics when the bomb will not fit into the mailbox and places it instead under Patrice’s car, and this location switch eventually leads to the deaths of Felix and two other Klan members.

Connie is arrested and Patrice is unharmed, so the CSPD counts this assignment as a success. However, though they are hailed as heroes, Ron and Flip are instructed by Chief

Bridges to discard all files from the investigation and cease contact with the Klan because

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 the department does not want the information getting to the public. The end of the film features a cross-burning in the hills outside Ron’s apartment, followed immediately by video footage from the 2017 Charlottesville, Virginia far-right rally, the car attack at a protest against that rally that resulted in the death of Heather Hayer, and both David Duke and Donald Trump’s statements following the events. The last image we see is an upside- down American flag that fades into black and white. The message is clear: modern-day race-relations have not progressed as far as we might think, and history is already repeating itself.

Conclusion

Race is and will likely always be a hot topic of worldwide concern, and only within the last few years have people of color been given legitimate opportunities to take the reins and tell their own stories on film. They depict their experience from their own perspective, as opposed to a white director’s interpretation of that experience. This allows for a clearer, more accurate message to be delivered through the film and to the audience. Each of the films discussed above tackles issues faced by black people in modern society, some in more straightforward ways than others. When watching, the rational messages are very apparent, whereas the levels of emotional engagement are hit or miss. Jordan Peele’s Get Out is without a doubt the film in this collection with the most to offer its audience in terms of message, both rational and emotional. The writing, directing, acting, and cinematography are all individually and holistically working to provide a cohesive message: though strides toward racial equality have been made, the world is still a very dangerous place for people of color. Get Out also sets a good example for other films on social justice issues, proving that a heartfelt drama is not the only way to emotionally engage an audience and transmit

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 your message effectively. This is where Sorry to Bother You falls short, as while it is highly entertaining, the message gets lost among the absurdity when shown to the average moviegoer. Black Panther effectively engages its audience by its existence alone: a mainstream superhero movie from arguably the most well-known comic book universe in the world featuring an almost entirely black cast is unprecedented. Its moments of family- friendly comedy endear the audience to the characters, and the general likability of each major character makes us want to see them succeed. The criticism of BlacKkKlansman

(some of which coming from Sorry to Bother You director Boots Riley) comes during the time of the Black Lives Matter movement, and sensible arguments can be made for both sides of the debate. However well-produced it may be, a movie essentially making light of this topic in this specific way is bound to ruffle the feathers of some audience members regardless of race. While director Spike Lee may be averse to categorizing the film as a comedy, the average audience will likely see it as such.31 The inclusion of documentary- style footage at the end of the movie successfully engages the audience on an emotional level, but these moments of engagement are scattered throughout the rest of the film. The

Academy Award nominations themselves make it undeniable that BlacKkKlansman is a highly entertaining, high quality film that many audiences enjoy. But this off-the-wall historical dramatization as a direct reaction to the current era of racial politics may be difficult and upsetting for many moviegoers. This was no doubt Lee’s intention, as he successfully added fuel to the racial politics fire. These four films represent a sample of racially charged messages from Hollywood, and for some of them, entertainment value comes at the price of sacrificing effective communication.

31 Collins, K. Austin. “‘I’m Not Using the Word ‘Comedy’’: Spike Lee on BlacKkKlansman, the Trump Era, and His Place in the Canon.” Vanity Fair, Sept. 2018.

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Gender

The political landscape for issues of gender is ever-evolving, whether it be reproductive rights, LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender) rights, feminism, battles for equal pay, protections for sex workers, or any number of other problems. This evolution is reflected in Hollywood, and more and more high budget films are beginning to address these issues on the big screen. Two of the films in this section are LGBT-related, and the remaining two look into women’s rights, and more generally, society’s expectations for how women should behave. Historically, LGBT characters were forced to be presented either only from a perspective of moral corruption or to be saddled with a tragic end, likely in the form of a violent death, due to the Motion Picture Production Code established in 1930, more commonly known as the Hays Code.32 The Hays Codes was put in place to regulate the types of things that could be shown in films, allowing for only the most “morally correct” actions and implications, and was harshly enforced until 1965. Still today, it is rare to see an LGBT film with an optimistic ending or that is not otherwise littered with tragedy. Filmmakers must carefully craft their gender-related messages in order to communicate them effectively and give the audience a sense of satisfaction when they leave the theater.

Call Me by Your Name

The controversial movie adaptation of André Aciman’s 2007 novel Call Me by

Your Name took the world by storm upon its release in 2017, eliciting passionate responses

32 Motion Picture Production Association of America, Inc. “Motion Picture Production Code.” Hollywood, CA. March 31, 1930.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 both from those who support it and those who oppose it.33 The film won the Academy

Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture in 2018. Directed by Luca Guadagnino, the film explores an LGBT relationship in a relatively peaceful environment, which is not often the case for films of this subject. Those who are familiar with Guadagnino’s work will automatically recognize his style from the very first scene, his trademark opening sequence set to an upbeat piano score coupled with his study on the intimate relationships between people who, by many societal norms and standards, should not be together for a myriad of reasons. The film opens in the summer of 1983 in Northern

Italy where 24-year-old Oliver (Armie Hammer, previously from Sorry to Bother You), an

American doctoral student, is arriving to the home of archaeology professor Dr. Samuel

Perlman (Michael Stuhlbarg). He was invited to live with the family for six weeks while he finishes a manuscript and assist Dr. Perlman with his academic papers. Dr. Perlman’s

17-year-old son Elio (Timothée Chalamet) shows Oliver to his room, which connects to the guest room where Elio will be staying. When Oliver instantly passes out from jet lag, we begin to learn more about Elio, our main protagonist. He is an incredibly talented musician, composing and playing his own music. From just the title sequence, we understand that music will play an important part in this film, and Elio contributes to that a great deal. The movie is scored with several piano pieces, some of which make recurring appearances at different times, and also a healthy dose of French, Italian, and English 80s pop. In conjunction with three original songs by musician Sufjan Stevens written specifically for the film, the score successfully engages the viewer’s emotions on a level that is rarely seen today, even among award-winning films. We can tell early on that Elio

33 Call Me by Your Name. Directed by Luca Guadagnino. USA: Sony Pictures Classics, 2017.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 is highly introverted, and this contrasts greatly to Oliver, whose carefree, outgoing, and blasé attitude seem not to sit well with Elio. The Perlmans are Jewish, and Elio is shocked to discover that Oliver is as well, noting the Star of David necklace he wears with pride.

When the two go into the small town so that Elio can show Oliver the lay of the land, Elio thinks they have very little in common. The film progresses at an incredibly slow pace, with multiple scenes that seem so small and arbitrary we wonder how they could possibly have any meaning. But this is the power of Guadagnino’s directing: he builds up a nonchalant stack of interactions so high that when all the cards are finally laid out on the table, the progression seems perfectly natural, like it was always supposed to happen. We watch Elio and Oliver dance around each other for the better part of two hours, all the while they are each involved with a local girl, Marzia (Esther Garrel) and Chiara (Victoire Du

Bois) respectively. The more time they spend together, the more they realize they have in common. They discuss music and literature and life, learning from one another as the days pass. During a storm, Elio’s mother Annella reads aloud from an eighteenth-century French romance novel in which a knight and a princess have fallen in love, but their friendship is so strong that the knight is frightened to reveal his feelings. He asks the princess whether it is better to speak or to die, to which she responds that to speak is better, and yet the knight does not. Oliver and Elio later discuss this exchange on a surface level only in the context of the book, but the symbolism is not lost on either of them. The relationship between them is framed as temptation from the very beginning, and Oliver briefly gives in after this discussion. They both chose to speak, but now Oliver tells Elio that they cannot go further.

Several more days go by as Oliver slowly distances himself, until finally Elio wears him down to the point that he finally gives in once more, this time for good. Their relationship remains sexual from this point on, but they make no mention of it to anyone. There are

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 several moments of back and forth where we cannot tell how Elio feels about the situation, as he is so young and just now figuring out his sexuality. When it comes time for Oliver to leave, Elio is understandably devastated, and it soon becomes clear that Dr. Perlman and

Annella were never in the dark on their relationship. To say they were supportive would be an understatement, especially when compared to the usual way parental figures are portrayed reacting to the news of their child’s non-heterosexuality. The story ends with the

Perlmans receiving a call from Oliver several months later where he tells him that he is engaged. Elio remains calm and accepts that this is the way things are, a far cry from how he would have reacted at the beginning of the film. With tears silently streaming down his face, he stares unmoving into the fireplace for nearly five full minutes as the end credits make their way onto the screen. This is an incredibly poignant expressive reaction shot, leaving the audience no choice but to feel what Elio is feeling. This coming-of-age story turned into one of the most talked about LGBT dramas ever produced, and as such was highly influential. While it is most certainly not without fault and deserves much of the harsh criticism that is thrown its way, no one can deny that Call Me by Your Name inspired a new conversation surrounding LGBT issues.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri

The unexpected comedic aspect of Martin McDonagh’s Three Billboards Outside

Ebbing, Missouri landed the film two Academy Awards for Best Actress and Best

Supporting Actor, as well as a nomination for Best Picture in 2018.34 The story starts with our protagonist Mildred Hayes (Frances McDormand) purchasing the advertising rights to

34 Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. Directed by Martin McDonagh. USA: Fox Searchlight Pictures, 2017.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 three consecutively placed billboards on a rarely traveled road. They read as follows:

“RAPED WHILE DYING,” “STILL NO ARRESTS,” and “HOW COME, CHIEF

WILLOUGHBY?” Color begins to play a role in this film very early on, as each of the billboards is bright red with black letters. Anger, passion, and danger are all represented here. Mildred is often seen wearing the color red in some form or another throughout the movie. We quickly learn that Mildred’s teenage daughter Angela was raped and murdered seven months prior, and her frustration at the local police department for their lack of progress in the case prompted the billboard stunt. Chief Bill Willoughby (Woody

Harrelson) and Officer Jason Dixon (Sam Rockwell) express their disapproval, the former by giving Mildred a stern talking-to, and the latter by attempting to take out his aggression in an act of violence against the man in charge of the billboard advertising, Red Welby

(Caleb Landry Jones, previously from Get Out). Rumors around town say that Dixon tortured a black man during an interrogation, and his alcoholic tendencies paired with his sexist and homophobic behavior make him an understandably disliked figure. The rumor- mill also contains the open secret that Chief Willoughby has terminal cancer, and he is shocked to learn that Mildred put up the billboards even though she was aware of this information. The town itself shows its disapproval at this as well, though we might ask why the mere reputation of a man is of such great concern when the brutal unsolved murder of a teenage girl is old news.

Harassment and threats are relentlessly thrown at Mildred by the townspeople, the police department, her abusive ex-husband, and even her son. The crass, obscene nature of the film’s dialogue reminds us that we are in a small town in the American South, where gossip spreads quickly and people tend to take things personally. The more we learn about

Willoughby, the more we begin to feel that he is truly a good man, and he attempted to do

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 his job until Angela’s case ran cold. There is an uneasy relationship between Willoughby and Mildred, but it is in no way at the level of hostility that the townspeople seem to believe.

When Willoughby’s condition begins to deteriorate, he chooses to take his own life rather than put his wife and children through the pain of watching him die. Dixon takes the death extremely hard, and as is to be expected from him, takes his anger out on Welby, throwing him through the second story window of the advertising building. The man sent to be

Willoughby’s replacement witnesses this and fires Dixon immediately. Willoughby’s wife delivers a letter that he wrote to Mildred before he killed himself, insisting that the billboards had nothing to do with his suicide and that he has even paid to keep them up for the next month. That night though, someone sets fire to the billboards, and Mildred decides to retaliate. Meanwhile, Dixon comes to the police station after everyone has gone home in order to collect a letter that Willoughby left for him, in which he told Dixon that in order to become a detective, he would have to get his act together and get rid of the hate he holds for other people. Mildred’s act of retaliation comes when she throws four Molotov cocktails at the police station after hours when she believes it to be empty, and Dixon’s letter-induced change of heart urges him to grab Angela’s case file before he charges through the flames and out the window. Mildred’s friend James (Peter Dinklage) happens upon the scene in time to put the fire out on Dixon, and he also provides Mildred with an alibi for the crime.

As the fates would have it, hospital staff place Dixon in a room with a still- recovering Welby, and after an intense interaction of panic and apologies, the two come to an uneasy truce. Mildred has an eventful night of self-realizations when she goes out with

James after he covers for her with the police; she is her usual cynical self, but one too many snide comments sets James off and he leaves halfway through their date. That night, Dixon

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 is at a bar where he overhears a man telling his friend about what sounds to be a rape that he committed. Sure this is Angela’s killer, Dixon instigates a fight with him in order to attain his DNA, as well as his license plate number that informs him the man is from Idaho.

His efforts turn out to be futile, as the DNA does not match any crimes in the system, and both his and Mildred’s hopes are crushed once more. However, the two decide to embark on a road trip to Idaho to track down this man, because even though he was not involved in Angela’s case, Dixon is sure he was involved in someone’s case. The final moments show Mildred and Dixon in a station wagon, armed to the teeth, discussing whether they will actually kill this stranger when they arrive at his property in Idaho. They settle on making the decision along the way, leaving the audience with a rather ambiguous ending.

Many viewers were disappointed in the ending and the lack of closure on Angela’s case, but the point of this story was not to solve a murder. In addition to being a film that aims to raise awareness for the brutality that women face and the lack of attention that brutality is often met with, Three Billboards is a study on grief and loss, and the effects it can have on not only those directly involved, but on an entire community.

Moonlight

In 2016, the world was clearly ready for a film written by, directed by, and starring an all-black cast, and with a plot focusing on male sexuality. Moonlight, written and directed by Barry Jenkins, won the Academy Award for Best Picture, in the face of many competitors consisting of a mostly white, straight cast and storyline.35 A film with minimal dialogue, we follow protagonist Chiron through three stages of his life: as a small nine-

35 Moonlight. Directed by Barry Jenkins. USA: A24, 2016.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 year-old (Little), an older teenager (Chiron), and an adult in his late twenties (Black). Little lives with his mother Paula (Naomie Harris), a nurse, in a small apartment in Miami, where we witness their very tangible struggles with money. Little (Alex Hibbert) is bullied relentlessly, and we watch as he is chased through a neighborhood and into a deserted crack house, where he happens across a fairly unusual portrayal of a black man in a position of power: Juan (Mahershala Ali), the local drug lord with a heart of gold. Juan and his wife

Teresa (Janelle Monáe) take Little under their wings when they learn of his home life, offering him a much-needed escape. After hard work on Juan’s part to work past Little’s initial distrust, the two connect on a remarkably deep level. One scene in particular shows

Juan discussing life in depth with Little, sharing with him his perspective on what it means to be a black man in modern society. He tells Little of his childhood in Cuba where he met an older woman who said to him, “In moonlight, black boys look blue. You Blue. I gonna call you Blue.” They spend this scene on a beach, the water serving as a major player for

Little’s hard-won trust in Juan. This stage also introduces us to Little’s friend from school,

Kevin (Jaden Piner), another major character in his life. He is a positive source of encouragement for Little, as he sticks up for him against those who would make fun of him, in addition to being by his side in what seem to be Little’s few moments of truly enjoying childhood. He even fondly refers to Little by a different nickname: Black. Later, we watch and feel the tension as Little asks Juan and Teresa about being gay, telling them that his classmates called him derogatory names that he did not yet understand. Thus begins

Jenkins’ foray into exploring the experience of a person of color questioning their sexuality. When Juan happens across Little’s mother in his main block of business, we learn that Paula is a drug addict who secures her product from Juan’s own crew. The animosity between the two is clear, with Paula’s disdain for Juan’s misplaced superiority

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 in the face of Juan’s anger that Paula chooses drugs over her son. Here, Juan comes face to face with the consequences of his lifestyle. Little soon puts the pieces together of his mother’s drug use and Juan’s profession, and when he confronts him about it, Juan does not even attempt to lie or defend himself. Although Juan has clearly had a massive impact on Little since their first meeting, this devastating confrontation is the last we see of him, and the screen fades to black to mark the end of Stage I.

Stage II begins with our protagonist in a high school classroom, now a teenager and called by most his given name, Chiron. We see very quickly that Chiron (Ashton Sanders) is still considered weak and a target by vicious bullies who seemingly have it out for him for no real reason. When Chiron arrives home from school, his mother insists that he leave for the night. Based on Paula’s behavior in Stage I, we can now speculate that her weakened state and erratic behavior is a result of years of continuous drug use and prostitution. Chiron once again finds refuge in Juan’s home, but we can quickly put together the clues telling us that Juan is dead. No details are given, but a drug related act of violence would not be out of the question. Teresa however makes Chiron feel just as at home as she has for years, a constant pillar of support. When Chiron returns to his mother’s apartment, she is wild and strung out, and she forces him to give her all the money he has so she can get a fix.

Back in school, the bullying is still relentless, but when Kevin (Jharrel Jerome) reappears at Chiron’s side later that night on the very beach he once came to with Juan, Chiron seems to come back to life. Chiron is a naturally quiet, reserved person, but he speaks to Kevin leagues more than anyone else. These conversations are where we learn a great deal about who Chiron really is, other than what we can gather from pure speculation. Their relationship briefly turns sexual, but the following day spells disaster for both of them when

Kevin reluctantly accepts a dare from Chiron’s bully Terrel (Patrick Decile) to play Knock

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Down, Stay Down. Chiron is, of course, the chosen target, and Kevin gives in to peer pressure hitting Chiron again and again. Each time, Chiron stands back up and looks straight back at Kevin while Kevin begs him to stay down. There is no mercy here for anyone. When the fight is finally broken up, Chiron refuses to snitch and leaves in a daze that looks to be from pure mental and physical exhaustion. When he shows up to school the next morning, his fierce look of determination lets us know that “Chiron” has officially left the building. He enters his classroom and without hesitation, picks up a chair and slams it over Terrel’s head until he is unmoving on the ground. The last we see of Chiron, he makes eye contact with Kevin through the window of a police car as the screen fades to black for the second time.

Stage III opens with Chiron waking from a nightmare about his childhood, another remnant of his mother’s abuse. Chiron is now in his late twenties and unrecognizable in his new identity: Black. Muscle bound and clad in black from head to toe, a gold grill on his teeth and an ostentatious Chevy Impala in his driveway. Black (Trevante Rhodes) is now in Atlanta, where he was sent to prison after the violent episode in his youth. We follow along as Black goes about his day, and it quickly becomes clear that he is now a drug lord, just as Juan before him. Black is not who we expected him to be; he puts on what I can only describe as a menacing but muted front when collecting from his employees, again, just as Juan before him. This same night, Black gets a call from none other than Kevin

(André Holland), who operates under the guise of simply checking in on an old friend.

However, the two have not spoken since that day a decade ago when Black was carted away to juvie. The call is brief, consisting mainly of Kevin apologizing and Black accepting in silence. Kevin still lives in Miami, working as a short order cook for a small diner, and the call ends with Kevin telling Black to stop by if he ever comes back to town.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019

Black is visibly shaken after this encounter, and so are we, the audience, as we watch this now imposing figure stare at the ceiling in a daze. The next day finds us following Black to a rehab center where he visits his mother. She is an entirely different person than we are used to; though there is still obvious friction between them, she speaks to Black with care, apologizing for being absent when he needed her most. When Black leaves the center, we think that maybe that bridge isn’t completely burned after all. The next thing we know,

Black has driven twelve hours and is now in Miami, walking into the diner where Kevin works. Black seems to be just as shocked as Kevin by his sudden appearance, but Kevin takes control of the situation when Black is at a loss for words, just like he has from day one. The two begin discussing their respective lives, but this is more than two old friends catching up. The history here runs so deep, and Kevin is wildly shocked to learn that Black is selling drugs. This is not the Chiron that Kevin knows, and when he says as much, Black counters that he doesn’t know him at all. This is where we finally learned what transpired over the past decade; Black made his drug connections while in prison in Atlanta and decided to build himself into a new person. He rose through the ranks in the drug business as he transformed into this hard, hypermasculine imitation of his biggest role model: Juan.

When they make their way to Kevin’s small apartment, the subject is still on Black’s identity, as Kevin continues to hound him about who he really is. The last few minutes of the film are intense, as Black reveals that he has not been with anyone since Kevin, the night before the dare and the violence of Knock Down, Stay Down. This is the part of him that will always be Chiron, and Kevin well and truly knows him. After a decade apart,

Black and Kevin once again come together as the screen fades to black for the final time.

Director Barry Jenkins utilizes color in multiple ways throughout the film, each of them equally as emotionally engaging. In all three stages of Chiron’s life, there is a short

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 scene wherein his face is covered in water and reflected in a mirror, but each time, the frame is lit in a different shade of blue. Recalling that early conversation where Juan tells

Little of his childhood nickname Blue, the color blue comes to represent Juan and Little’s journey into becoming like him. In Stage II, we mainly see the color yellow, representing

Chiron’s cowardice as it follows him throughout this part of his life. Walls, pencils, railings, signs, buildings, lights, and most notably, his own clothing. He grabs a blue shirt before the encounter with his mother, but she does not allow him to put it on, forcing him to remain in his yellow shirt for another day. After Chiron’s night on the beach with Kevin, he wears his blue shirt to school but is still followed by yellow in his surroundings. Chiron’s bully Terrel wears red, a sign of danger, and encounters with him always feature the color red looming in the background. When Chiron decides to take revenge on Terrel, he walks confidently into the school wearing a solid blue shirt, passing by blue walls, columns, and doors. There is no yellow in sight. Chiron has officially transformed into the type of man he felt he had to be in order to survive: a replica of Juan. When we enter Stage III, Black wakes up surrounded in darkness, and he exudes a presence that we previously associated with Juan. There are small hints of both blue and yellow in Black’s environment, indicating that he is still not being totally honest about who he is. His visit to Kevin’s diner is covered in red, and when the two make it inside Kevin’s apartment, we see that the walls are bright yellow. When Kevin goes to take off his work clothes, he returns wearing blue, showing us that he and Black are now the same. Jenkins’ use of color tells us half the story of

Moonlight, and even if the audience doesn’t catch onto the specifics, the colors and lighting still serve to set the tone and evoke the appropriate moods and emotions at the right times.

This story is not just about gender and LGBT issues, but rather it is about being a gay black man and the suffocation brought on by society’s hypermasculine expectations. While all

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 men are subject to those expectations, adding the racial and sexual orientation components makes for a dangerous amount of pressure. Chiron could never fully transform into Juan because he held back the part of himself that was attracted to men in order to present only the toughest, hardest exterior. His role model of what a strong black man should look like did not leave room for his sexuality, and until he reunited with Kevin and shed the cowardice that followed him into adulthood, he had nowhere to express himself. The audience feels Chiron’s internal struggle right alongside him, and there is no way to leave this film without becoming emotionally engaged.

Easy A

The oldest movie in this collection, 2010’s Easy A struck a chord with its target audience of high school-age teens.36 Using Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter as the driving force behind both the plot and the message, the film wants the audience to leave the theater with a more positive view and deeper understanding of female sexuality.37 A soundtrack of generic pop hits from the early 2000s plays throughout the film and does not do much for the plot or the audience’s level of engagement. There is little attention paid to cinematography in the way of using specific shots to evoke certain emotions, and this can likely be blamed on the fact that this movie is a classic teenage rom-com and was shot as such. We are introduced to our protagonist, a young woman in her junior year of high school named Olive Penderghast (Emma Stone), by what seems to be a live-stream video of herself at her computer. It becomes clear that Olive will tell her own story, with the majority of the film consisting of flashbacks that she narrates in real time. We begin at

36 Easy A. Directed by Will Gluck. USA: Screen Gems, 2010.

37 Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. Boston: Ticknor, Reed & Fields, 1850.

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Olive’s school, where she is trying to convince her best friend Rhiannon (Aly Michalka) that she has a date over the weekend. This is, as Olive tells us, the “lie that started it all.”

When the weekend is over and Rhiannon grills Olive about it, Olive dances around the specifics and Rhiannon jumps to conclusions, insisting that Olive must have lost her virginity. Olive repeatedly denies this but eventually gives in and fabricates a story to satisfy her friend. Unfortunately for Olive, the comically melodramatic leader of the school’s aggressive religious group Marianne Bryant (Amanda Bynes) overhears this conversation and takes it upon herself to spread this information to the entire student body.

Marianne’s attempt at publicly slut-shaming Olive succeeds very quickly, and soon the rumor mill has blown the lie entirely out of proportion. After landing a spot in detention for some less than proper wordplay, Olive finds herself in the company of Brandon (Dan

Byrd), an old acquaintance who received detention after a bully beat him up for being gay.

The two eventually strike a deal, in which Olive will use her new promiscuous reputation to help Brandon convince the rest of the school that he is straight, hoping that this will protect him from their violent homophobia. They attend a party together and have a fake sexual encounter within earshot of the other partygoers. Their plan works exceedingly well, and we see Brandon immediately hailed as a hero while Olive is treated to snide comments and disgusted looks from her peers. We were already aware of the double standard between men and women when it comes to promiscuity, but this scene in particular drives home the isolation Olive feels while she watches as Brandon is swarmed by congratulatory high- fives and handshakes. This event quickly leads to a falling out between Olive and

Rhiannon, with the latter being upset that Olive has turned into a “super slut.” Their fight spurs Olive into a rapid downward spiral where she elects to embrace this new alter-ego that she has created, going as far as to create an entirely new wardrobe consisting of lingerie

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 style clothing and embroidering each piece with a red letter A. Her English class just so happens to be reading The Scarlet Letter, and she uses Hester Prynne as a tongue-in-cheek inspiration. Soon, throngs of insecure, unpopular boys are approaching Olive to ask for her permission to tell people that they hooked up with her. She is reluctant at first, but once she gives in, it quickly becomes a small business where she receives an array of gift cards and coupons in exchange for her fake services. When this new path begins to take shape, narrator-Olive makes a note of how the days of chivalry are behind us as a society, and she wishes that her life was more like a classic 1980s film. While harmless and quirky at first glance, this small detour from the story serves to undermine the true message of the movie.

Olive’s story is supposed to leave us with a feeling of female empowerment and a greater understanding of the negative effects of societal gender norms, but when Olive rattles off movies such as Say Anything, Sixteen Candles, Can’t Buy Me Love, and The Breakfast

Club, it calls into question the filmmaker’s true motivations. Those films all follow the same trope of a young woman who winds up with a man who is either objectively below her standards or whom she does not actually know apart from being infatuated with him from afar. The strong, independent woman that Olive seems to strive to become does not match up with her self-professed fantasy life, and this makes the central message of the film unclear. When we jump back into the story, word of Olive’s pastime gets around to the faculty members, including her English teacher Mr. Griffith (Thomas Haden Church), who has long been Olive’s favorite teacher. He expresses his concern to her and asks her to have a chat with his wife (Lisa Kudrow), the school guidance counselor. After a very non-productive meeting with Mrs. Griffith, Olive passes Marianne and her boyfriend

Micah (Cam Gigandet) as he makes his way into the counselor’s office, crying as he goes.

A short conversation between them leads to Olive reluctantly becoming Marianne’s

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 shoulder to cry on as she laments the fact that Micah’s parents are getting divorced.

Marianne drags Olive on a whirlwind friendship the following day, until she receives news that Micah is in the hospital having contracted chlamydia, and he claims that Olive gave it to him. We quickly learn that Micah actually got it from none other than Mrs. Griffith, who swears to Olive that she will come clean immediately and tell everyone that she herself is the real culprit. However, Olive insists that the blame stay with her instead in an attempt to protect her favorite teacher’s marriage. What once was run-of-the-mill name calling and slut-shaming quickly devolves into an all-out protest against Olive, with Marianne’s religious group leading the crusade. Again, we can note the difference between responses to Olive and responses to the man she allegedly slept with, who as far as we can tell, receives little to no social consequences. Throughout the film, Olive has short, casual conversations in passing with Todd (Penn Badgley), a boy she had a childhood crush on who is now the school mascot (earning him the nickname Woodchuck Todd) and does not seem to belong to any one friend group. When another boy takes Olive on what she believes to be an actual date and he attempts to solicit sex from her in exchange for a gift card to

The Home Depot, Todd swoops in to pick up the pieces and confess that he has real feelings for her. This spurs Olive to clear up all the lies she has told, but when everyone else refuses to come clean, she ends up back in Mrs. Griffith’s office, who tells her that no one will believe her if she tries to tell the truth. In retaliation, Olive tells Mr. Griffith about his wife’s situation with Micah, though she instantly regrets having done so. In order to promote her truth-telling webcast, Olive puts on a scandalous performance at the school’s pep rally with

Woodchuck Todd’s help. Having finally caught up to the present with all lies being put to bed, Todd shows up outside Olive’s window in very John Hughes fashion atop a riding lawn mower, holding speakers that are playing “Don’t You (Forget About Me)” by Simple

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Minds.38 Olive happily tells the webcast that Todd is waiting for her and revels in the fact that whatever she does or does not do with him is no one else’s business. The two ride off together on the lawn mower, thrusting their fists in the air to finish off the 80s film references. The overall theme of Easy A attempts to send a positive message about female sexuality wrapped in an updated 1980s aesthetic, and it generally achieves this. But if we examine the film closer, the message begins to fall apart and becomes lost among the details.

Conclusion

Films featuring women in leading roles are slowly making their way into the mainstream, and more importantly, many of these films are written and/or directed by women. While there of course have been movies throughout the history of cinema in which a woman plays a titular role, this role is often written from a man’s perspective and does not depict women in a favorable light. They tend to be unidimensional, with their personality or purpose revolving around a single characteristic or even another character.

As more women are allowed onto the playing field in positions of power, the more developed and complex female characters will become, just as discussed in the previous section with increased accuracy for depictions of people of color. Three Billboards Outside

Ebbing, Missouri gives us a female lead who is altogether unlikable in nearly every way imaginable. She is crass, loud, angry, and generally does not conform to the image of what a woman should be. But the audience is still able to connect with her because her story is so powerful and she is passionate about getting justice for her daughter. This film shows

38 Simple Minds. “Don’t You (Forget About Me).” The Breakfast Club (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack), Virgin, 1984.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 us that women do not have to look or behave like what mainstream media wants them to in order to be worthy of respect, while also bringing attention to the injustice that women are often dealt in their daily lives. Easy A will always be adored for its quirky main character and witty dialogue, and there is no disputing the fact that it pushed the boundaries of what was appropriate for a high school aged audience. Very risqué for its time, this movie depicts the effects of culturally encouraged slut-shaming and the intense double- standard surrounding men and women with regards to sexuality. However, it also suggests a very cookie-cutter solution to the problem in that the main character’s ending is considered a happy one because she “gets the guy.” She is still an acceptable protagonist because, contrary to all the rumors, she was never actually expressing her sexuality in the first place. In addition to evolving roles, the call for LGBT films is slowly breaking out of the indie market and into the mainstream, and both Moonlight and Call Me by Your Name are examples of films that have done representation in the right way. While the age difference between the main characters in Call Me by Your Name receives much criticism, it still managed to draw in a huge audience and successfully engage its viewers on an emotional level. Gender issues in society will continue to be reflected in major motion pictures, and that evolution is accompanied by many films with a solid, effectively distributed message of social justice. Though a film focused on gender may not explicitly dive into politics or show its characters on the streets leading the revolution, the simple fact of its existence is in and of itself a political statement.

Climate Change

From Twister to The Day After Tomorrow, filmmakers have long portrayed a climate in distress for their audiences to dissect and digest. While documentaries on the

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 subject abound, I am more interested in entertainment cinema’s portrayal of climate change because these films have the potential be seen by a larger audience, and they are not so direct with their messages. The desired effect is not so apparently to educate and inform, but instead to entertain and subliminally transmit a mantra of this could be us. The past decade has seen a plethora of films produced with a climate-related message, either literal or allegorical. Are recent portrayals of the effects of climate change in popular cinema effectively communicating the gravity of the issue in a manner that will urge audience members to act? Each of these movies depicts a world in which some climate disaster has befallen the Earth, and we are shown the different methods society might choose to employ in order to deal with this crisis.

Beasts of the Southern Wild

Quvenzhané Wallis and Dwight Henry star in 2012’s heartwarming Sundance

Grand Jury Prize Winner, Beasts of the Southern Wild.39 Our protagonist is a young girl of about five years old called Hushpuppy (Wallis) who lives in an extremely impoverished bayou community in Louisiana called The Bathtub. Land is sparse, and there are no solid building structures in sight. Water levels are exceptionally high, and a boat is necessary to travel from one part of The Bathtub to another. A word to take note of here is “boat”; it can refer to anything from a few wooden boards to an actual boat to the bed of a truck stripped so it has the ability to float. The level of poverty is starkly apparent at every point of the film. When Hushpuppy and her father Wink (Henry) are floating down the bayou, they pass by a row of chemical-releasing factories protected by a giant levee, to which Wink

39 Beasts of the Southern Wild. Directed by Benh Zeitlin. USA: Journeyman Pictures, 2012.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 flippantly says, “Ain’t that ugly over there?” He goes on to explain to both Hushpuppy and the audience that The Bathtub was purposely cut off from the dry side by that levee in order to stave off the relentless rising sea levels. Wink tells her that people on the dry side are afraid of the water, and this fear is something he makes certain that Hushpuppy will never possess. While the people on the dry side continue to run from the water, the people of The

Bathtub live alongside it. In school, Hushpuppy and her few classmates are learning about ancient aurochs that will be released when the ice-caps have melted, with their teacher painting a vivid mental image of the beasts as vicious, violent creatures of destruction. This is the beginning of the dreamlike fantasy element to this story. From then on, we are periodically shown the progress of the aurochs’ reanimation and journey toward The

Bathtub, and they become symbolic of a coming conflict that Hushpuppy will be forced to face. We soon learn that Wink is suffering from an unnamed illness, and Hushpuppy watches as his health begins to deteriorate. The point of view shot is used multiple times throughout the film, and it is especially effective because our protagonist is a small child.

This allows us to see the world from her perspective, looking up at her father when he is angry, helping us to identity with her and imagine how frightened we would be in her place.

The element of having Hushpuppy narrate her own story serves to emotionally engage us as well; the many profound statements made throughout the film are all the more impactful when heard from a child’s voice. When Wink and Hushpuppy are told that a storm is coming, Wink refuses to leave and seek higher ground. They ride out the storm, but the residents of The Bathtub realize that their source of freshwater has been contaminated by the saltwater of the sea. Wink and his friends devise a plan to destroy the levee, which they do so successfully. However, shortly after, officials from the dry side enforce a mandatory evacuation of The Bathtub, forcing its people into clinical, white, emotionless shelters. This

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 serves as a sharp deviation from the vibrant, lawless life they are used to living. After mere hours, the dry side officials are no longer enough to keep them in place, and the members of the Bathtub make their way back home. Wink’s health is beyond recovery, so

Hushpuppy attempts to track down her long-lost mother. She makes her way to a bar where she meets a cook who could potentially be who she is searching for, but we never receive confirmation. Rather than staying with this woman, Hushpuppy chooses to return home to

The Bathtub. Finally, the mythical aurochs have arrived, and Hushpuppy faces them alone, realizing that while they are of gargantuan size and appear quite scary, they will not destroy her. She is strong enough to face them, so she is strong enough to face her father’s impending death, which has long been looming over her. When Wink dies, Hushpuppy says her goodbyes and returns to The Bathtub, where she feels most at home. First and foremost, it is apparent that the effects of global warming will impact those in the lowest income bracket the fastest and with the most consequences. Here, those with higher income are literally part of the very reason this happens, rather than in the more abstract concept of our understanding that those who contribute the least to climate change will inevitably suffer the most. On a more inspiring note, we see in the people of the Bathtub the resiliency of the human race, the ability to adapt to unthinkable circumstances. Beasts of the Southern

Wild leaves us with a hopeful outlook and a newfound faith in our own survival instincts, prompting us to believe that we can find solutions to the problems we face. Understanding the realities of climate change is but the first half of the equation, and this film successfully fills in the second half by appealing to our emotional brains by transmitting the message that a single person can make a marked impact.

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Snowpiercer

This French graphic novel turned sci-fi thriller out of South Korea is not for the faint of heart. Complete with a star-studded cast, 2013’s Snowpiercer is full of tragedy, death, slavery, and rampant inequality.40 The film begins with audio from news clips informing the audience that a chemical called CW-7 has been released into the atmosphere in order to combat global warming and provide a cooling effect on the Earth. However, this attempt at geoengineering worked a little too well, and now the planet has entered into an ice age, leaving all life extinct save for those who made it onto the massive train for which the movie is titled. The narrative begins to remind one of Noah’s Ark when we learn the level of hero-worship many passengers bestow upon the creator of the train, Wilford

(Ed Harris). A myth to many because he is never seen outside of the engine room at the very front of the train, the legend of Wilford is even taught to the children in a way that is both disturbingly cheerful and nearly Hitlerian in nature. One particular example finds a young teacher and her students joyously singing, “What happens if the engine stops? We all freeze and die!” The Snowpiercer is strictly divided into sections; the tail end houses the highly regulated “scum,” the poor and the weak, while those in the elite class live lives of absurd luxury throughout the rest of the train. Our protagonist is Curtis (Chris Evans), a man in the lower class who has lived half of his life on the outside and half on the train. He has a close relationship with Tanya (Octavia Spencer), a woman whose son is taken by guards for an alleged “medical exam.” This is the catalyst for a long-brewing rebellion that

Curtis enacts the following day. He spearheads a plan with the help of his mentor Gilliam

(John Hurt), and leads his fellow rejects on a revolt by conquering the train one car at a

40 Snowpiercer. Directed by Joon-ho Bong. South Korea: Stillking Films, 2013.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 time. As Curtis and his crew encounter increasing levels of luxury with each new train car, the color palettes shift as well. The back of the train was nothing but dark and drab greys, browns, and blacks. When the rebels make it to the car that serves as a school for elementary aged children, the colors are bright and happy, accompanied by lots of light and open windows. A greenhouse car filled with plants is bright green and yellow, acting as the closest thing to true nature that the train’s younger inhabitants will have ever encountered. One of the highest status cars contains finely dressed people in a darkened room, with reds signaling power and passion being the central focus. Violence, gore, and a healthy dose of absurdity see Curtis to the very front of the train, finally face to face with

Wilford, the man behind the myth. Wilford is of course a very refined gentleman, discussing the world and its remaining humans as if they are all pawns in his own great game. Wilford throws both Curtis and the audience for a loop when he reveals that revolts from the tail end have always been orchestrated; Wilford, in conjunction with Curtis’s own mentor, incites rebellions by the lower class every few years in order to control the population. He goes on to tell Curtis that his destiny is to replace him as the leader of the

Snowpiercer, and that Curtis is to be the new leader of humanity. He details the mechanics of the train, how the engine will run forever but other parts have gone extinct, and here another crucial piece of information is revealed: those parts are being replaced with children (like Tanya’s son) from the tail end of the train. This revelation prompts Curtis and his trusted sidekicks to stop the engine, which forces the train off the rails and results in the death of almost all passengers. In the final moments, we are shown that the Earth’s surface is now capable of sustaining life, as two survivors brave exiting the train and spot a lone polar bear in the distance. The class divisions aboard the train are of course meant to reflect our own socio-economic system, with the ending presenting a message that only

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 total destruction can lead to a more prosperous world. Snowpiercer begins with a failed experiment to halt climate change, and the temporary second solution is no solution at all for the majority of those that remain. The overall message received by the audience here is not one of encouragement, but one of desperation, suffering, and hopelessness. The only solutions presented in Snowpiercer easily fall into the category of a “quick fix” to make our climate-related problems disappear instantly. When these fail and no other solution is offered, the average moviegoer will leave the theater and feel no urge whatsoever to change their daily behaviors for the benefit of the climate. Because after all, one person’s contribution would never be enough to save all of humanity, and the world, overnight. The depiction of class divide aboard the Snowpiercer is absurd for a reason, likely to drive home the same point as in Beasts of the Southern Wild: suffering will be disproportionately felt by the poor, those who contribute to the problem the least. Unlike in The Bathtub, the lower class on the Snowpiercer have no hope of taking control of their own lives, and they fight and die for a goal that is never realized.

Interstellar

Matthew McConaughey is the front man for Interstellar, 2015’s Academy Award winner for Best Visual Effects.41 We are introduced to a world in the not so distant future where the majority of people are forced into a life of farming, a governmental regulation put in place to (unsuccessfully) counteract the massive worldwide drop in food production.

Crops are dying left and right as the result of a blight that no one can discover how to stop.

Our protagonist is former NASA pilot turned reluctant farmer Cooper (McConaughey),

41 Interstellar. Directed by Christopher Nolan. USA: Paramount Pictures, 2014.

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 who plants his crops with the help of his father-in-law and two children. Strange dust patterns make a seemingly supernatural appearance on the bedroom floor of Cooper’s daughter Murph (Mackenzie Foy), which Cooper eventually concludes are caused by gravity and are likely geographic coordinates. When Cooper and Murph set out to follow those coordinates, they find the well-hidden location of the new underground NASA facility, secretly funded by the government due to the public outrage that would be heard if the people knew money was being funneled into space exploration. A council headed by

Cooper’s former director Professor Brand (Michael Caine) has gathered at NASA when

Cooper arrives, and they explain to him the details of a space mission to find a new planet for humanity to inhabit, because they are only projected to survive through the next generation. According to Brand, a wormhole has appeared in Earth’s solar system, leading to a distant galaxy with twelve planets that may have the capacity to sustain human life.

Twelve volunteers traveled solo on what was almost certainly a suicide mission to each of the planets, collecting data to send back to the NASA headquarters. Only three transmitted positive data, leaving the remaining nine with negative data or no data at all and stranding them on their respective planets with no hope of ever returning home. Two plans have been decided on: Plan A relies on solving an equation for a gravitational theory that will allow for Earth’s population to travel safely to one of the hopefully habitable planets, while Plan

B accounts for that theory being insoluble and instead takes the form of 5,000 frozen human embryos aboard the Endurance spacecraft to be used in colonizing a new planet. A mission has been designed to pilot the Endurance through the wormhole to each of the three planets that transmitted positive feedback and assess whether or not any of them is truly viable for humans. If so, assuming the scientists back home can solve the gravitational theory, then the people on Earth will soon be moved to one of these planets. However, if that equation

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 is not solved, then Earth’s inhabitants will die out, and the human race will begin anew with the frozen embryos populating the new planet. Cooper is told that he is the only person who can pilot this mission, and because his concern lies with the family he is leaving behind, he accepts the task fully determined to succeed with Plan A. Wormholes, black holes, and relativity all accompany a dramatic sequence of events resulting in Cooper transmitting data across time to his now-adult daughter in much the same manner of

“supernatural” that sent them to the NASA headquarters in the first place. Murph (Jessica

Chastain) uses the data to solve the gravitational propulsion theory and save humanity from its impending doom. The message received in this film follows the age-old trope of waiting for a savior, and this will urge absolutely no one to act against climate change in their daily lives. This savior is almost always a) male and b) white, and he will possess some special skill that makes him unique in his ability to solve a problem. This can also be observed in movies like World War Z (2013), The Terminator (1984), and The Matrix (1999), just to name a few. Early on, Cooper laments his lot in life to his father-in-law: “It’s like we’ve forgotten who we are: explorers, pioneers...not caretakers.” This is a superb line for any adventure loving science fiction fan, but when deconstructing the message that Interstellar sends, the truth of the matter is that we are caretakers. The Earth we currently inhabit is presumably the only one we will ever have, so maintenance is key if we want to lessen the effects of future climate change related issues. The average moviegoer will not feel emotionally compelled to take action, even if they are rationally convinced of the legitimacy of the issue at hand.

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Mad Max: Fury Road

The most dystopian of all, the world of Mad Max: Fury Road is controlled by battle- hungry warlords.42 Tom Hardy and Charlize Theron star as warriors who come together under unusual circumstances. Like in Snowpiercer, news reports give us background information before we dive headfirst into the story. Guzzolene (the tongue-in-cheek term for gasoline) and water are extremely rare resources, and the climate has turned into a dry, arid wasteland. An exclamation during the news clips of “It’s the Guzzolene, stupid!” harkens back to the United States presidential election of 1992, when Democratic candidate

Bill Clinton’s campaign slogan told sitting George H.W. Bush that the real issue is “the economy, stupid!”43 Disease, poverty, disfigurement, and malnutrition run rampant among all, regardless of status. A tyrannical leader by the name of Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-

Byrne) enslaves women to use as “breeders” to populate his gang of War Boys, as he simultaneously allows the people of the Citadel only the smallest amounts of water possible. We follow our first protagonist Max (Hardy) as he is captured by the War Boys and eventually escapes into the desert, coming across Imperator Furiosa (Theron) driving a War Rig in the meantime. We learn that Furiosa is attempting to liberate Joe’s enslaved

“wives” from imprisonment, and though they got off to a very rough start, we eventually find Max and Furiosa working together to free both the wives and themselves from the desert wasteland they live in. Their goal is a utopian land called the Green Place that

Furiosa remembers from her childhood, but tracking it down proves to be much more

42 Mad Max: Fury Road. Directed by George Miller. Australia: Village Roadshow Pictures, 2015.

43 Kelly, Michael. “THE 1992 CAMPAIGN: The Democrats -- Clinton and Bush Compete to Be Champion of Change; Democrat Fights Perceptions of Bush Gain.” The New York Times. October 31, 1992. https://www.nytimes.com/1992/10/31/us/1992-campaign-democrats-clinton-bush-compete-be- champion-change-democrat-fights.html

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 difficult than anticipated. The journey is filled with numerous close calls, as the group is being relentlessly pursued by Joe and his army of War Boys. One of those soldiers is Nux

(Nicholas Hoult), a War Boy desperate to earn a place in Valhalla by dying in a fiery blaze of glory while proving his worth to Joe. Nux, like most of the War Boys, is extremely sick and is lucky to have survived as long as he has, so he really has nothing to lose as he fights his way onto Furiosa’s War Rig multiple times. After several failures, Joe’s bride Capable

(Riley Keough) manages to convince him that he is worth more than serving as cannon fodder for Joe and his selfish agenda. Nux becomes an integral part of the group, ultimately sacrificing himself during battle so that Furiosa, Max, and the brides can escape.

Throughout the film, the battles are underscored by a soundtrack of hard and edgy cyberpunk music, effectively hyping up the audience to the danger and action taking place.

Joe’s militia is led into battle by Coma the Doof Warrior (played by Australian musician iOTA), a blind War Boy who plays a flame-throwing, double-neck electric guitar through giant speakers mounted on a war truck known as the Doof Wagon. Coma’s persistent playing serves to relay orders to the troops and keep up morale, encouraging the War Boys to fight for Joe until their final breath. When the audience hears Coma’s guitar, they know that a vicious battle is imminent. In addition to music, color also plays an important role in building this post-apocalyptic world, with everything including the environment possessing a quality of extreme saturation. This makes the characters and the audience wait with barely contained anticipation as the group moves closer and closer to the Green Place, ready for that moment when a shock of green will break up the endless brown and orange color scheme of the desert. However, when they discover that the Green Place no longer exists, the audience is just as let down as the characters because we have all been waiting for the relief that would accompany the expected green landscape. After the initial

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 devastation has passed, the group begins to chart a course back to the Citadel with a plan to defeat Joe once and for all. When their plan succeeds and Immortan Joe is dead, Furiosa and the wives release the valves and allow water to flow freely into the crowd of waiting commoners, indicating that a new era has come to the Citadel. Mad Max: Fury Road hands the audience a how-to guide on hope in the midst of disaster; our group of fugitives faces obstacle after obstacle, but they refuse to give up regardless of the consequences. The idyllic image of the Green Place feels too good to be true the moment we hear Furiosa describe it to Max, and when we learn that indeed it is too good to be true, the group decides to retrace their steps back to the Citadel and fix the world they have instead of running away from their problems. This is in direct conflict with the proposed solutions in

Interstellar. In the first five minutes of Fury Road, Max and the audience see a small wind farm in a patch of greenery atop the cliffs of the Citadel, a sight that brashly sticks out amidst the browns, reds, and oranges of the desert wasteland. This scene stays with Max and prompts him to suggest the return to the Citadel when the voyage to the Green Place turns out to be for naught. The Citadel was the real Green Place all along, transmitting an extremely poignant message to audiences everywhere: there is no second world we can escape to, so addressing the issues here on Earth is the only way to survive. A triumph of bravery, hope, and self-sacrifice over a negative, defeatist attitude will result in a better world for all.

Conclusion

The average moviegoer does not purchase a ticket to a climate-related film and consciously register that they are viewing a social commentary. While the films discussed above each have elements of a high-fantasy, science fiction dystopia, the world built by

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 each of the filmmakers begins with the same assumptions as the world we live in today, and the messages they send to their audiences will transcend genre. The film industry is first and foremost in the business of entertainment, so we know that what sells is what gets produced. Each of the films analyzed here was awarded several accolades, whether that be in the independent film market (Beasts of the Southern Wild and Snowpiercer) or in the world of big budget Hollywood blockbusters and Academy Awards (Interstellar and Mad

Max: Fury Road). As Beasts of the Southern Wild has proven with its relatively small budget of 1.8 million USD, there is no price on the messages that can be transmitted by effective storytelling. When the audience receives a message that appeals to the emotional brain, they are much more likely to be compelled into changing their behavior as opposed to if the message only appeals to the rational brain. Interstellar and Snowpiercer are high energy, science fiction thrillers that are highly entertaining but do not instill in their audiences the type of hope that is necessary for mobilization. While Beasts of the Southern

Wild and Mad Max: Fury Road could not be more different in almost every way possible, from genre to budget and more, they each leave the audience with a feeling of untapped potential in the real world. They provide hope and encouragement, and suggest that there is in fact a way out of the climate catastrophe we may be well on our way to experiencing.

Analyzing the attempts for scientific accuracy in climate-related films could also be of value, especially as many filmmakers today seem to favor a more reality-based landscape.

The implications of studies such as these could potentially see new ways to transmit messages that will entice moviegoers into looking at the world’s climate from a different perspective. This aptly named cli-fi genre will likely expand, as more and more information about our world’s climate continues to make headlines, and with this comes an increasing responsibility for the filmmakers in question. This responsibility is of course to their

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Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 audiences, but it is also to the truth; their portrayal of climate-related issues becomes an ethical issue when we take into consideration the ramifications their work could have, whether positive or negative. Film has always had a significant impact on society, but as technology continues to improve and the line between entertainment and politics grows ever blurrier, reflections of real-life situations can often be read as predictions. In an ideal world, those predictions will successfully encourage society to wake up and take action.

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CHAPTER IV RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The Mechanisms

An overview of the findings from this analysis is presented on the following page in Table 4. If a film included the mechanism, there is a check in the box, while if that mechanism was not included, the box is highlighted. A cursory glance at the table lets us know that generally, the fewer technical mechanisms used, the fewer narrative mechanisms will be used and vice versa. One lone mechanism was used by all twelve films in this study: flashback/montage. Seeing as this is an efficient way to disseminate large amounts of information to the audience while saving time (or portraying its passing), it is not a surprise that this tool is used most frequently. Expressive reaction shots are the next most frequent to appear on the table, likely due to their ability to quickly engage the audience by showing the exact emotion the filmmakers are trying to evoke. Equally as likely to appear, with only one film neglecting to utilize it, is issue clarity. Perhaps the most important narrative mechanism, as discussed in the methods section, it would be nearly impossible to provide a solution, inspire hope, or raise the benefits of acting on an issue if we are not clear on what exactly that message is. This is reflected in the case of Sorry to Bother You, wherein the issue at hand is not made clear, leaving solution, hope, and benefits neglected as well.

A solution was presented in all but two of the films. Color was equally as likely to be used to engage viewers as was leaving them with a hopeful, inspiring ending, appearing in all but three films. Benefits were raised in all but four of the films. At the bottom of the list, leitmotif and point of view shots were used with the same frequency, each making an appearance in seven out of the twelve movies.

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Table 4. Typology Table

Category Film Technical Mechanisms Narrative Mechanisms

point of expressive flashback/ issue leitmotif color solution hope benefits view shot reaction shot montage clarity

Get Out ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Sorry to Bother You ✓ ✓ Race Black Panther ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

BlacKkKlansman ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Call Me by Your Name ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ Gender

Moonlight ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Easy A ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Beasts of the Southern Wild ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Climate Snowpiercer ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ Change Interstellar ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

Mad Max: Fury Road ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓

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The Films

Right away, we notice that four films made use of all nine mechanisms available to emotionally engage their audiences: Get Out, Call Me by Your Name, Moonlight, and Mad

Max: Fury Road. This collection of films has little in common, aside from Call Me by Your

Name and Moonlight having LGBT-centric messages. Those two movies are much more focused on tapping into the viewer’s emotions in a dramatic, heart-wrenching way than the remaining two, with both of them successfully creating an environment that pulls you in and paints most scenes with a hint of melancholy.

In Moonlight, Chiron encounters obstacles in every stage of the film, and only some of them are related to his sexuality. We especially see him struggle in his relationship with his mother over both her drug use and their financial strain. While he is bullied in part because his family is poor, Terrel mainly targets him because of his sexuality, and much of Chiron’s inner struggle comes from attempting to understand himself in an environment that actively encourages against it. Ultimately though, Chiron finds someone who understands him and shares his perspective, and the audience can feel the relief and the hope in the last few minutes right alongside the characters. We leave Moonlight better understanding the experience of being gay and black in our modern society, and this film encourages us to expect a brighter future. Contrarily, Call Me by Your Name does little to address the trials of identifying as LGBT and instead focuses on the relationship itself.

When we see the trailer or read a review, we would expect a movie on this subject matter to include things like the protagonist agonizing over how to come out to their parents, facing hate and discrimination in public, having slurs tossed at them left and right, and even constant tragedies steering their life off course. This film stands out in modern LGBT cinema because it contains none of those things. Elio is not obligated to have a dramatic

76 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 confrontation with his parents about his sexuality because they already know; they paid attention to his behavior, gave him space to figure himself out, and provided advice when asked. In other words, they never gave him reason to fear that he would not be accepted.

There is contention among some audiences and critics about the relationship between Elio and Oliver, but it does not stem at all from the fact that they are both men. Call Me by Your

Name seeks to normalize LGBT relationships by showcasing one in what would ideally be a normal environment. There is an inherent sadness in both stories, though their endings promise the audience that the characters were moving forward in their lives, successfully humanizing gender and LGBT issues to a level that has the potential to inspire a behavior change in its audience.

Get Out is a particularly accomplished film, and there is good reason for its worldwide praise. There has been much debate over its genre classification, with many dubbing it a “social thriller,” but it is difficult to ignore the horror aspects that set audiences on edge. Horror films are rarely expected to provide a coherent social commentary, often lacking a true narrative altogether. Jump scares, violence, and gore have long dominated the horror scene, especially once special effects and computer-generated imagery (CGI) began making their way onto the mainstream. Get Out made its mark on horror history because it managed to tell a compelling story while still managing to terrify its audience, utilizing every technique for emotional engagement along the way. Historically, horror films that do intend to tell a compelling story about a societal issue translate this message more often than not through an extended political allegory, resulting in misunderstandings and allowing viewers to come to false conclusions. These are films like Rosemary’s Baby

(1968, on women’s bodily autonomy), The Babadook (2014, on mental health), Us (2019, on the prison industrial complex), and Burning (2018, on toxic masculinity). The past few

77 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 years have seen genuine storytelling begin to crop up in horror films, including social critiques that send specific messages to their audiences and seek to inspire change. Rather than using the entire two-hour runtime of a film to tell one story on the surface and hide the true message under layers of subtext, Peele makes sure we understand his message within the first five minutes of the film, and he does not waver from that point. This is what makes Get Out work so well.

Mad Max: Fury Road takes audiences on an action-packed post-apocalyptic thrill ride from beginning to end, which again, would not normally coincide with a hard-hitting, effectively communicated social justice message. Like the horror genre, action movies are generally held to a lower standard in terms of their stories and plotlines. Fiery explosions, intense car chases, and hand-to-hand combat scenarios are often enough to satisfy the action film’s target audience. However, Fury Road was made with a higher purpose in mind, and director George Miller uses every tool in the emotional engagement arsenal to transmit his message effectively. This film shows us every environmental scary story we have ever been told: Earth is a desert wasteland, water is an extremely scarce resource, oil supplies are being rapidly depleted, women are seen as tools to be used and discarded, the gap between the rich and the poor has increased exponentially, and disease runs rampant and untreated. We follow our group of heroes as they fight for their cause as well as their lives, and we exit the theater with the satisfaction of knowing that they prevailed against their oppressors and found a way to thrive in their less than ideal environment. Fury Road shows us that humans are resilient, and reassures us that if we act now, we can handle our current environmental issues.

Black Panther, BlacKkKlansman, Beasts of the Southern Wild, and Three

Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri each ticked every box save for one: point of view

78 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 shot, color, and leitmotif for the remaining two, respectively. These films still manage to send effective messages despite choosing not to employ one of technical mechanisms, and this can be attributed to a) their execution of the remaining technical mechanisms and b) their particularly strong, unmistakable narratives. Black Panther is part of a multibillion- dollar superhero film franchise consisting of 22 movies thus far, and it is the first to feature not only a black lead, but a majority black cast. The film covers racial topics from slavery to modern day oppression faced by people of color at large, and perhaps most important of all, these messages are delivered in such a way that even casual fans who are only interested in the superhero aspects will still walk away with a better understanding of modern race- relations.

Spike Lee’s BlacKkKlansman is highly controversial and will likely not sit well with many types of audiences. However, Lee’s specialty lies in packaging his racially charged messages in a way that is very entertaining but does not shy away from providing an uncomfortable amount of shock value. He accomplishes this through his unapologetically radical depiction of both the oppressors and the oppressed, and the high production value that makes the film feel uncommonly cinematic. The shots, the score, the acting, and the writing work to send a message that is altogether impossible to ignore: history is already repeating itself, and inaction is not an option. BlacKkKlansman encourages audiences to become involved in today’s racial politics with a very real reminder that if we are not actively part of the solution, then we are passively part of the problem.

The story told in Beasts of the Southern Wild is touching and engaging, but more than that, it is the way the story is told that makes it truly memorable. The lack of a leitmotif scarcely registers to the viewer because the narrative as told by Hushpuppy is so incredibly

79 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 powerful. Point of view shots are integral to the film’s ability to connect with the audience, using a child’s perspective to drive its message home. Beasts is showing us what the future could look like if we refuse to act against climate change, and Hushpuppy’s point of view makes us think ahead to the ramifications of our inaction on future generations. This is an independent film with an extremely small budget in comparison to the other films in this study, and yet it still managed to receive four Academy Award nominations. The global impact of this small-scale film cannot be overstated, which is a clear testament to its highly effective strategy of communication. Rather than delving into the science behind climate change and attempting to disseminate information in the style of a documentary, director

Benh Zeitlin gives us a film that feels raw and real even with the added element of fantasy.

The solutions presented are directed more to the individual rather than at a societal level, asking us to identify with Hushpuppy and Wink and examine what we are willing to lose.

Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri takes a close look at the citizens of a small town and the seeming inadequacy of its police department. We see the town through the eyes of a woman who does not conform to the modern standards of how a woman should behave and how she should look, and this undoubtedly contributes to the obstacles she faces while seeking justice for the murder of her daughter. The story begins months after the crime has occurred, and Mildred has grown increasingly desperate with the lack of progress the police have made on the case. While this makes the aftermath of the murder into the subject of the film and not the murder itself, both contribute to the overall message about how violence against women is often downplayed or overlooked completely. Three

Billboards presents us with a protagonist who is not entirely likeable, but we identify and engage with her anyway because her story is so relatable; we feel Mildred’s anger and disappointment just as she does, thanks to director Martin McDonagh’s execution of all

80 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 but one of the technical and narrative mechanisms. This film’s message is urging us to pay closer attention to how women are treated and reexamine how we ourselves treat women and the expectations our society places on them. If we try to imagine that Mildred’s character was a man, we can then ask ourselves whether he would be treated the way

Mildred was by the townspeople and law enforcement alike. The answer is a resounding no.

The remaining third of the films in this study did not communicate their messages effectively to their audiences. Interstellar, Snowpiercer, Easy A, and Sorry to Bother You each neglected to utilize four or more technical and narrative mechanisms to emotionally engage their viewers. While most of them have a clear message, the presentation of that message is not conducive to inspiring viewers into an attitude change, let alone a behavior change. There is little argument to be had over whether or not most people consider

Interstellar to be a “good” movie; the four Academy Award nominations and win for Best

Visual Effects, and the worldwide total of 677.5 million USD in box office revenue are hard to deny. This film revolves around enacting solutions to combat the devastation of climate change, and humanity’s salvation is essentially in the hands of one highly skilled man. There is no other solution presented whatsoever besides a) an extremely dangerous mission piloting a spacecraft into a recently discovered wormhole or b) solving a gravitational propulsion theory that can only be solved using information from inside a black hole. Real-world scientific theories extrapolated to play up the drama leave little room for the average moviegoer to see a solution that they themselves could enact, let alone a reason to try. There were no benefits raised or costs lowered. A message taken from this film could play into the already existing collective action problem around combating

81 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 climate change: why should an average person feel compelled to act when they have no chance of solving the problem and are left with nothing but their incentive to free-ride?

Snowpiercer is a violent, somewhat confusing film and is certainly not for everyone. Though it boasts an elite cast and compelling story, it does not communicate a message that leaves the audience feeling hopeful or empowered. The film begins with the failure of one climate change solution and ends with another. Not that director Bong Joon- ho was aiming for realistic suggestions to save the human race, but the dismal ending with two lone survivors raises no benefits and lowers no costs for the average person. Many viewers are left confused by the ending as a whole, and especially by the death of every passenger aboard the Snowpiercer save for two children who are now the only humans left, and the seemingly random appearance of a polar bear meant to convey that life can now be sustained on Earth outside of the train. Snowpiercer asks a lot of the average viewer in terms of the amount of symbolism they must wade through in order to get to the point. Just as with Interstellar, the general unfairness and familial drama can certainly emotionally engage the audience on a surface level, but this does little in the way of furthering the film’s message. Layers and layers of subtext make the true message difficult to surmise, and even if one does spend the time to think through the film and come to the correct conclusion, it remains that the message is not one that will inspire action.

Beloved by millennials everywhere, myself included, Easy A felt like quite a scandalous and illicit story when it was released in 2010, while still managing to be funny, witty, and heartfelt. The webcast storytelling element was new and exciting, as was the constant use of instantly recognizable pop culture references. That level of meta-awareness was not prevalent in movies of the time, and this made Olive’s story highly relatable. As far as the technical mechanisms, director Will Gluck neglects to use point of view shots,

82 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 expressive reaction shots, and a leitmotif to emotionally engage the viewer and further the film’s message, and this is likely due in large part to the genre and target audience. The film is aimed at a teenage audience as a hip and modern romantic comedy, and it requires a relatively low level of sophistication to be fully interpreted. In contrast to Snowpiercer,

Easy A does not ask anything of its audience in terms of digging through mountains of symbolism to find the core message. Instead, it is extremely straightforward from beginning to end, placing high value on its use of flashbacks and montages along with

Olive’s narration which again taps into the rare quality of meta-awareness. While a generically happy ending can leave the viewer with a generic sense of hope, no real solution is presented and no benefits of a behavior change are raised. Initially, the film’s message seems to try its hand at normalizing the concept of young women owning their sexuality while also portraying the harmful effects of slut-shaming. But however risqué the film attempts to be, the audience easily accepts Olive because they know that she isn’t actually doing any of the things her classmates accuse her of. If the rumors about Olive were true,

Easy A would be a very different movie with a very different reception.

Sorry to Bother You is the final film in this lineup and is the only one that does not utilize any of the four narrative mechanisms. This paired with the use of only two technical mechanisms, expressive reaction shots and flashbacks/montages, leaves the audience essentially emotionally disconnected throughout the entirety of the film. The message that director Boots Riley is attempting to send gets lost among the (admittedly entertaining) absurdity, flashy sets, and fast-paced storytelling. What boils down to an artsy, independent exposé on the relationship between capitalism and racism will undoubtedly leave many a viewer confused as to what they were meant to take away. The phrase about being unable to “see the forest for the trees” comes to mind when trying to understand this movie; it is

83 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 filled from beginning to end with countless small details that take up so much space in the narrative, it becomes difficult to piece together what big picture message it is trying to send. The biggest hindrance to transmitting this film’s message is its lack of issue clarity.

The first half of the film is relatively clear with its message, presenting us with Cash and his financial struggles in a straightforward manner. The second half is where the narrative begins to fall apart, and the level of absurdity continues to climb until the average moviegoer has no hope of parsing out a single, core message. One cannot argue that Sorry to Bother You is anything other than a satirical social commentary, but getting to the root of exactly what aspect of society it is commenting on is not a simple task.

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CHAPTER V CONCLUSION

This paper has been an exploration of modern cinema and its power to spur audiences into action against social injustice. We have discussed twelve films released in the past decade that tackle the issues of race, gender, and climate change, and we have determined whether or not those messages were communicated effectively. The typology used to measure emotional engagement proved to be generalizable across genres, eras, languages, and issues. Movies show us what reality could look like, and filmmakers are in a position offered to few others to drive the public agenda, should they choose to do so.

Radical, taboo, and often unthinkable realities exist on film, and this is not only in reference to magic, superheroes, and intergalactic warfare. Commentaries on a never-ending list of social justice issues can be parsed out of the scripts of most Hollywood films today, many of which seek to share their particular social message with the public in hopes of inspiring their audiences to take action. Determining which films did this successfully can suggest new directions for future filmmakers to take, if they too wish to have a global impact.

Considering that the film industry is first and foremost a business, a likely opposition to this theory could argue that a film would not be produced if the public was not already primed to hear its message. To this, I would counter that the nature of art has always been to push the barriers of societal norms and expectations, and in this way film

(especially in independent markets) will strive to lead the discussion instead of following the crowd. Based on the trends that follow risqué or taboo issues moving more and more into focus over the years, we could estimate that in this case, the personal is marketable.

Especially with regards to race and gender, minority group representation in recent decades has increased, making its presence known at the Oscar and Emmy Awards levels and being

85 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 met with praise for its groundbreaking nature. While big budget films showcasing supervillains, exorcisms, and the latest and greatest in computer-generated imagery may rule for a day in the box office, the task undertaken by filmmakers is ultimately to tell the audience an original story. It is this creativity and drive for innovation that leads the way for what were once fringe social issues to make their way to center stage.

Future study on this subject would do well to research a broader list of social justice issues, include more films over a longer period of time, or add to the list of mechanisms for emotional engagement. The limitations of this study are certainly located in its wholly theory-based nature, but it is a first step in what can lead to further research to strengthen the connections between the typology and behavioral outcomes, whether through quantitative surveys or qualitative interviews. There have been empirical studies published that attempt to measure the effects of landmark movies in each of the categories I have researched. These include a study on public opinion after the release of The Day After

Tomorrow (2004),44 research on a group of faculty members during a course for racial and social justice development which used scenes from the movie Crash (2004),45 and an analysis of online forums that suggests using entertainment media in higher education courses is an effective way to teach diversity and social issues, including discussions on

Brokeback Mountain (2005).46 Social and political commentary disguised as an action- packed adventure, a don’t-look-under-the-bed thriller, or a heartfelt doomed-from-the-start

44 Norton, Andrew and John Leaman. “The Day After Tomorrow: Public Opinion on Climate Change.” MORI Social Research Institute, London (2004).

45 Ross, Paula T., Arno K. Kumagai, Terence A. Joiner, and Monica L. Lypson. "Using film in multicultural and social justice faculty development: Scenes from Crash." Journal of Continuing Education in the Health Professions 31, no. 3 (2011): 188-195.

46 Tisdell, Elizabeth J. "Critical media literacy and transformative learning: Drawing on pop culture and entertainment media in teaching for diversity in adult higher education." Journal of transformative education 6, no. 1 (2008): 48-67.

86 Texas Tech University, Sydney Laws, August 2019 romance has the power to be highly influential in our modern, entertainment-focused society. The film industry will continue to play a role in the public’s perception of political events and movements, and there will never be a shortage of movies to study. Films have the power to suspend our disbelief, move us to tears, and when the right tools are used, spur us into action.

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