Mary O'Hare on 'War'
"You'll pretend you were men instead of babies, and you'll be played in the movies by Frank Sinatra and John Wayne or some of those other glamorous, war-loving, dirty old men. And war will look just wonderful, so we'll have a lot more of them. And they'll be fought by babies like the babies upstairs" (Slaughter-House-Five, p. 14).
In your blog, please respond to the above quotation. Do you agree or disagree? Do movies help promote war? Were films more likely to promote war in the past? Please explain your position.
Discuss the two or three war films that you have seen. Which ones would you consider pro-war and which ones would you consider anti-war?
For a list of the top war movies of all time go to the link below. You then can click on individual films and read a plot overview. For many of the films, you can watch the trailer using the Media Player.
Top 50 War Movie Links
P. S. Feel free to write about other facets of the media if warranted.
posted by Stephen Goss @ 7:53 AM
5 Comments:
www.07jeremiahd.blogspot.com
www.07jeremiahd.blogspot.com
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Mr. Goss,
I located your blog through Kim Moritz's blog and my teachers have been anxiously reading her words. I've linked to your blog now, in a training blog for my high school. If you wish to visit or perhaps offer suggestions and/or hints to other high school teachers, please feel free to comment at: http://carolburns.edublogs.org/
Your blog is a very good example showing blog teaching strategies and we thank you for the look!!
Carol Burns
I don't agree with this quote. Yes, movies do glorify war but they could show actual footage from the front lines which would be ten times worse than anything a producer could imagine. There will always be wars, no matter who tries to stop them. These people may not have been men going into the war, but when they returned home they were. I do agree that some of these soldiers are redicuolusly young and there is no need to send children to war to pay for their fathers' debts. Movies of the past show the more grapic parts of war, and now, due to federal regulations movies are more mild. I believe that older movies are closer to being pro-war. I haven't seen any of the movies on the list, so I chose the top two to discuss.
#1-Schindlers List-"The true story of Czech born Oskar Schindler, a businessman who tried to make his fortune during the Second World War by exploiting cheap Jewish labour, but ended up penniless having saved over 1000 Polish Jews from almost certain death during the holocaust."(Rob Hartill) This movie started out as pro-war, pro-Holocaust, and then changed fronts. Schindler then decided to help the Jews and save them from imprisonment and sure death.
#2-Lawrence of Arabia-"T. E. Lawrence is a young maladjusted lieutenant in the British Army in North Africa during World War One. Unhappy with his current assignment coloring maps, he is ecstatic when he is offered a job as an observer in what is now Arabia. At this point, the story of his life becomes the stuff that legends are made of."(Mark Logan) Upon reading this as well as other summaries, I have come to the conclusion that this movie is pro-war. It speaks of adventures with a war leader in the Middle East in a positive way, showing both sides, but glorifying the "good stuff".
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