Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Bc. Monika Křižánková Soldier Archetypes in The Second World War Films Master’s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: Jeffrey Alan Smith, M.A., Ph.D. 2016 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. …………………………………………….. Author’s signature I would like to thank my supervisor, Jeffrey Alan Smith, for his insightful comments, suggestions, and very positive encouragement of my specific field of study. But the greatest and the deepest gratitude is dedicated to my father who introduced me to these Second World War combat films. Table of Contents Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 5 1 The Second World War Combat Genre ......................................................................... 9 2 Archetypal Theory ....................................................................................................... 16 3 Narrative Analysis ....................................................................................................... 19 4 “Group” Soldier Character ........................................................................................... 21 5 “Leader” Soldier Character .......................................................................................... 28 6 “Group” Soldier Archetypes ........................................................................................ 33 6.1. The Knights of the Round Table .......................................................................... 34 6.2. The Band of Brothers ........................................................................................... 40 7 “Leader” Soldier Archetypes ....................................................................................... 49 7.1 “Father” Archetype ............................................................................................... 50 7.2 “Cowboy” Archetype ............................................................................................ 53 7.3 “Christ” Archetype ................................................................................................ 56 7.4 Shapeshifters ......................................................................................................... 60 8 Idea Hidden Behind Archetypes .................................................................................. 64 Works Cited and Used .................................................................................................... 71 Resumé ............................................................................................................................ 79 Résumé ............................................................................................................................ 81 Appendices ...................................................................................................................... 83 4 Introduction “American culture remembers past battles because the collective act of recalling a national past of violent conflict has proved to be a particularly compelling way of addressing and negotiating anxieties and desires besetting the current cultural moment” (Bronfen 111) The thesis focuses on the soldier characters in the Second World War combat motion pictures from the U.S. film production. A Second World War combat genre appeared in its basic structure immediately in the early 1940s and as a proper genre it was quickly and fully recognized before 1950. However, it was Jeanine Basinger who published complex analysis of that genre in her book The World War II Combat Film: Anatomy of a Genre. Her research in filmography led to what is now a firmly established definition of the Second World War combat genre with a detailed list of generic requirements. Jeanine Basinger is a primary authority on this genre and other authors draw heavily on her work in their own research into the combat films. Even though, Basinger´s work constitutes the very basis of the genre knowledge, the book was originally published in 1986 when an interest into war filmmaking was going through a steadily decline. The genre renaissance appeared later in 1998 with Saving Private Ryan and The Thin Red Line. Basinger completed her original work with few of her essays about Saving Private Ryan, however, she has not written anything substantial about later films such as Band of Brothers or The Flags of Our Fathers. More contemporary work is presented by Stuart Bender in his book Film Style and the World War II Combat Genre published in 2003. He also builds his research upon the Basinger´s genre conventions but he goes further and completes her study with a stylistic view of the Second World War combat films. He discusses how style, camera and issues 5 raised in those films contribute to the established genre. Being one of the more recent works than Basinger´s, he includes post-Saving Private Ryan films but he still puts a lot of emphasis on issues introduced in this particular film. Considering purely studies into soldier characters in films, Jeanine Basinger singled out soldier “types” within a specific group of soldiers that she understands to be a necessary element of the genre conventions. She recognizes in the Second World War combat films these “types” of soldier characters: “the father figure, the hero, the old man and the youth, the comedy relief, the peace lover and the minority representative” (Basinger 51). As other authors and filmmakers use her study, they assume the “types” without questioning them. The first study that attempted to describe soldier characters through archetypal theory is focused solely on defining them as hero archetype. In this field, Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces deals with the hero archetype by applying his notion of hero´s journey and introduces a concept of the “descending hero”. Later Gavin Davie in his thesis The Hero Soldier: Portrayals of Soldiers in War Films considers Campbell concept of the “descending hero” and applies it onto the Second World War films. He then constitutes a “non-hero” or even an “anti-hero” archetype of soldier characters in the Second World War combat films. Regarding other studies conducted in the field of the Second World War combat genre, they are mostly embedded in overall studies of filmography. Doherty in his book Projections Of War: Hollywood, American Culture, And World War II considers a complex relationship of a film industry and the Second World War genre and it focuses on general ideas and themes that these genre films promote, also with a touch upon topical issues of women and black people in these films. Same can be said about Suid´s Guts and Glory or Dick´s Star-Spangled Screen. All of these books mention soldier characters as 6 singled out examples, however, their purpose is limited to illustrating a restricted theme of the work. Especially with Saving Private Ryan and some later films, the scholarly discussion is focused on a question of accuracy and violence in them and how they contribute to an overall film´s message. So there is no study that would deal with soldier characters in the Second World War combat films in their complexity and that would define patterns of their representation on the screen. Therefore, this thesis is trying to introduce and expend archetypes found in the soldier characters in the Second World War combat films. The archetype is a certain collective image. The standards and recurring depiction of the soldier characters is as the “hero” archetype. Later the “hero” is also described in a dichotomous connection with a “coward” figure. However, this work is set to identify other archetypes in the soldier characters´ representation on the screen. Moreover, the soldier character´s understanding here is not limited on individuals but it includes group of soldiers who constitute a certain close unit. Therefore, the thesis deals with two kinds of characters. Firstly, it presents a “group” soldier character as the meticulously composed male unit and secondly, there is a “leader” soldier character standing for individuals. The first section of the thesis is devoted to already well-established theories used throughout this piece of work. First of all, the scope of American war films is restricted to the Second World War combat genre films. First chapter defines the genre and its conventions. Moreover, it explains the particular selection of films for this thesis. It also briefly mentions why some films fulfilling the genre conventions are excluded from the analysis. 7 The second chapter presents theory of archetypes as it was established by Carl G. Jung. The next chapter deals with narrative analysis, a method which is used for the actual analysis of the films and their characters. The main section is devoted to the actual analysis of the soldier characters. The first part introduces and defines the “group” soldier character and the “leader” soldier character. The second part is devoted solely to the “group”. It identifies the “group” soldier archetypes and their evolution and change through these various combat films. The “group” characters appearing in the 1940s and 1950s combat films are defined as “knights of the round table” archetype. Then 1990s films follow with them developing and establishing an archetype of their own, “band of brothers” archetype. The third part of the main