This blog is intended to supplement a course offering for the Spring 2010 semester at the University of Iowa, The American West and the Historical Imagination. Each book we read or film we view in the class will be shared on the blog, whereupon students and others can post questions or comments.
The instructor is Dennis Kuhnel.
As I was working on my paper, I came across a very interesting fact about homesteading. According to the Homestead Act, any person could obtain 160 acres of land free of charge. A small filing fee was charged, but other than that, the land was basically given away. After 6 months of residing and working on the land, it could be purchased for $1.25 per acre. It blows my mind that land was so cheap in the 1800s-buying 5 acres of land would be like buying a pack of cigarettes today! Today, an acre of land can be purchased for somewhere between $500 and 500 million depending on the location. Regardless, it's crazy to see how times have changed.
For my paper I watched the movie Hang 'Em High. I liked it the first time I watched it, but after writing my paper on it, I've come to appreciate it even more. I liked the messages it addressed on the ambiguous and arbitrary nature of law in the west. In the beginning of the film Clint Eastwood's character, Jed Cooper, is hellbent on finding and killing the guys who tried killing him. After being deputized as a Marshall by judge Fenton he is warned about not taking the law into his own hands and is asked to find the men, but to bring them back alive so that they can by tried and then hung. Jed Cooper makes a statement about there not being a difference between killing them out on the plains or "in front of the American flag", they'll be dead either way and justice will be served. The movie The Boondock Saints is another example of individual people taking the law into their own hands for the greater good of society. In The Boondock Saints the main characters murder mobsters, mafia members, and other murders. So what's so wrong about killing off all the bad guys? After watching movies like Hang 'Em High and The Boondock Saints, I'm almost lead to believe an eye for an eye is a justified theory. Almost. In reality everyone has their own opinion of good and evil and why should one person get to play judge and jury? Though set in different times and in completely different contexts Hang 'Em High and The Boondock Saints share some interesting points about law and the judicial system.
The trip to the Mounds was a good time. I really enjoyed the views along the way, it was interesting to look at Hanging Rock from what seemed like for ever, then a while later, standing on top of the Hanging Rock, I enjoyed looking back finding traces of the trail and also the previous spots of which we were just looking from. The hike was long but was enjoyable, we got to bond with each other while bonding with nature. The Mounds were interesting for many reasons, a thing that intrigued was that the mounds went on for ever, I wonder just how many lives were sacrificed along the way. Also the exhibits in the beginning were also pretty interesting as well. The trip was a great time and I recommend going to the mounds with your friends just to see it for yourself.
If you are not finished with reading No Country for Old Men yet, which I believe most of you are, make sure you have it done by this Thursday.
Additionally, skim (isolate the major points) of pages 541-573 in Richard White. It may inform your opinion of No Country, and possibly even give you some ideas for your own paper.
Finally, for Tuesday READ pages 575-632. You have read part of this chapter before, but I would like for you to return to it in the context of these last books we have read and movies we have seen that involve more the 20th century.
NOTE: All papers will use the following format: • Do not use cover sheets • Stapled, NO paper clips. • Name and section reference should be single spaced and put on first page, in the header. • Typed, aligned left, double-spaced with 1-inch margins all around. • Times New Roman, 12pt font—do not change the character spacing. • Use page numbers with first initial and surname (10pt font) in right header (e.g.: Kuhnel 2). This will help me keep your paper together should any pages come loose. For additional help when writing, please talk to me or contact the History Department’s Writing Center at 303 Schaeffer Hall well before the due date. Their web site is http://www.uiowa.edu/~histwrit/ or you can call 335-2584 to schedule an appointment.
I was watching Gran Torino today and I saw a lot of similarities between the Sheriff in No Country for Old Men and Clint Eastwood's character. They are both old-fashioned types of people who are not necessarily happy with what is going on around them and to some they may seem grumpy or mean, but I think that they are both characters that audience members generally like. I know that while watching the movie and reading the book I found myself feeling sorry for both characters, and I feel like their attitudes towards change are pretty common for the older generation. I just thought that was an interesting connection.
Today's discussion had me thinking about the sheriff, and of his views on truth. Our closing discussion kind of revolved around his perceptions of truth, but we also discussed the significance of the story about cleaning cemeteries. I think now that perhaps maybe the sheriff finds cemeteries so important because they are ever-present visual reminders of our history. Maybe the sheriff believes that cemeteries are more than just social constructs because they hold the truth that will remain even after the stories have been told.
While some may argue that the sheriff is a maniac stuck in the past ideals of the west, I still argue that he is an adorable old man who just wants to preserve the respect and honor of his western community.
I feel like the Sheriff is just having a tough time dealing with the changes. He can't quite figure out why it's changing and to what extent, but he knows that it is. He also feels like it's passing him by and there's nothing he can do about it. At the same time this is happening, he's struggling with himself and his past experiences. To tie into what we discussed today, the Sheriff is a character that has tried to leave part of his past behind but he knows that it's impossible. He had a very tough decision to make during his time in the war, and wonders if he shouldn't have stayed back with his group. He fights with himself, knowing that he'd much rather be alive than dead, but that it was his duty to stay with the men. The fact that he has so much trouble dealing with the past makes it that much harder for him to deal with the future. I think he's a very confused man... but at the same time, he's a very smart man and knows when his job is done and he's contributed to his society all he can.
Today's discussion of the sheriff reminded me of a fellow named Edmund Burke, a British guy who flipped out during the French Revolution because of how many historically-cemented ideas these revolutionaries were upsetting. He saw culture and "society" as something you inherited from your ancestors. You shouldn't start over just because you think you have a better idea for it. Burke admitted that society and goernment are illusions but insisted we must play by their rules to keep from killing each other. (Some evidence to his argument: People stopped playing by those rules during the French Revolution and very soon after started killing each other, exactly as he predicted they would.) Even if truth is socially constructed, it's socially constructed for a functioning reason. It's kind of all we have.
I think this is very relevant to the sheriff, though the two would probably disagree on principle about truth. Their disagreement, however, would be irrelevant. They both have conservative ideas about how we should treat history, how we should respect it, how we should grant it some agency to act on us. For example, McCarthy includes the story about the motel killers. The story is a really repulsive story for a lot of reasons. One of the most awful parts, however, is that all of the murdered people are elderly. The story goes against our traditionally protective concern for the past, a concern that the sheriff worries is deteriorating (or knows is deteriorating). Given that the sheriff is aging, he has a concern for who is inheriting society and what they will do with it.
That might be a reductive portrait of the sheriff (it's certainly a reductive portrait of Burke), but I think it captures a mood that has occurred repeatedly in this class. Notice that no matter what year a story occurs in, the main character is always looking back on a better idea of the West. The West is perpetually ending, even in the 80s. It's always finding new ways to be less cool and less moral than it used to be. How is this possible?
I felt that the title No Country For Old Men kinda was influenced by the idea that the Sheriff is the old wise figure in the story, one of the oldest yet throughout the chase and investigation he is always one step behind. He says a couple times that he feels like these new criminals are ones they can't control, that it is beyond the control of anyone in general because they are too ruthless and sharp to be caught. Chigurh is really one of the best villains ever because he is so methodical yet is willing to kill someone like that clerk just for getting the wrong vibe from someone. He makes you feel like anyone could be thinking about killing even in a convenient public place like the gas station where normally you feel safe, whereas at home something like that is much more likely.
Well I have done my research and according to Urban Dictionary, a very reliable source, "jankeming" is very real. You breath in methane and "start seeing stuff like dead people and purple dragons for days." Wikipedia, another reliable source, has a great page on this subject which, surprisingly, has a great history. It is good to know I learned a lot on the trip.
I thought that the trip was informative and fun. It was neat to see all the different mounds and memorials of Indians. I personally thought that it was cool how the mounds were in shapes of animals such as a bear. The trail itself was tedious and long, but it was a good experience. The stop points that showed the overview of the land was also cool to look at. Overall the trip was fun and it was a good time.
I was unable to make the trip to Effigy Mound with the class- but am going to try to go on my own. I plan on going Saturday (May 1st) I am hoping to be able to get off of work by 12- and thought I would see if anyone is interested in making the trip with me.
You can either comment here on the blog or email me at sarah-koepp@uiowa.edu
Overall the Effigy Mounds hike was a success. Some of the trail was steep at times but it wasn't too strenuous. I wish there were more mounds instead of the long stretch of plowed land. Definitely some interesting topics of conversation going around and I had to research a little about Jackie's comment about getting high off huffing your own shit. Supposedly it's called "Jankem" but doesn't seem to be too realistic. Anyways...
Well folks, the forecast for Effigy is it will rain all morning but stop around the time we get up there. This afternoon, there is just the chance for occasional showers and it might not rain at all. While this is far from great weather, based upon all your comments in class on Thursday I am thinking you will all be ok with this considering its your last shot practically to get the hike in.
Dress accordingly. Bring water/food. We will stop at one gas station with a Subway/convenience store on the way up if you want to hit that b/c you did not pack a lunch or etc.
See you at 9:30 in front of the Old Capitol on Clinton St. Be early.
Besides the fact that Paul Newman and Robert Redford add to the movie's appeal for being ridiculously good looking, I really enjoyed the movie for what it offered. After watching High Noon for my movie critique, it was entertaining watching a Western narrated from the "bad guys" point of view. In High Noon, the marshal is the character of interest, and the villains are represented as crude, dirty creatures. In Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the two robbers personify these sexy, intelligent, talented men, highly skilled in their trade. The scene dealing with the marshal asking his citizens to join his forces against Butch and Kid reminded me of scenes in High Noon when Kane seeks his citizen's help against Miller. It's interesting how two scenes, portraying the same thing, can be so vastly different. In Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, the marshal is this bumbling idiot, receiving no compassion when he's left standing alone. Whereas in High Noon, one immediately pities Kane and has negative feelings toward the cowardly towns people. A line in the film that I found foreshadowed the ending was when the sheriff says, "Your times is over and all you can do is die bloody! Your times is over!" From that phrase on, I knew the film wouldn't end in Butch and Kid's favor.
The Sunday Field Trip is still tenatively on. Be sure to check back in tomorrow morning on the blog before you head downtown to meet on Clinton St. in front of the Old Capitol @ 9:30. BE TEN MINUTES EARLY, AT LEAST, AS I WILL LEAVE PEOPLE WHO ARE LATE.
Right now, the forecast says its going to be overcast with a fifty/fifty chance of an occasional light shower tommorrow. I think we can still do it. Bring your rain coats. If anything, the cooler temps (60) will make the hike easier.
Check the blog before you head out tomorrow, as I will cancel the trip if the forecast gets worse but for now it looks like a "go."
The front page of the Cedar Rapids Gazette on Friday featured an article about possible damage done to Effigy Mounds. Unauthorized construction had taken place- which may have disturbed the ancient cultural features. See article below.
I just finished watching Crazy Heart with Jeff Bridges and I actually enjoyed it a lot. I think Jeff Bridges deserved the Best Actor Oscar he won based on this performance as Bad Blake. The movie showed the modern Southwest as Bad Blake performed in small town bars and bowling alleys. It also showed the contrast between the old style of Country Western music and the new style of country music. Bad Blake represented the old cowboy type of musician who drove around with his guitar, drank, smoked and wrote music. Colin Farrell's character, Tommy Sweet, showed the new style of country musician by traveling around in a tour bus and having people write songs for him. I liked how the movie portrayed Tommy Sweet as appreciative and content enough in his success to thank Blake for helping him along the way instead of as a snotty rich musician. The themes of this movie were the old style of the country musician versus the new style of the western musician. This related to the "New West" as opposed to the "Old West". The old musician and the old west represent simplicity, freedom, individualism and American ideals, while the new represents flashy buildings, money, industry and the loss of individualism. Overall I enjoyed the movie more than I thought I would and would recommend it anybody who likes movies that focus primarily on a single character and his quest to find himself.
Saturday morning at 9 A.M. in Shaeffer 140- a conference on the Iowa Artist Grant Wood will take place.
If you attend one of the talks and write a response to it, I will give you one extra credit point. I believe the talks last all day but can't find a schedule. There is an article on it in the Daily Iowan.
Hey, here is an article that describes a recent kidnapping in a Mexican hotel. I thought that since we are reading No Country for Old Men this is a relevant article because it shows the same kind of violence taking place today in the 21st century. Authorities believe that the kidnappings were targeted at certain individuals in the hotel. They also believe that it was part of organized crime in Mexico. Kind of similar to the hotel "happenings" in the book.
I really enjoyed reading this book. What I really thought was interesting was how Sheriff Bell felt like he didn't deserve the bronze star. He couldn't handle the fact that he deserted his men instead of dying during the war. He felt like it was his duty as a soldier to hold his ground. Bell also knew that his father Jack probably would have stayed. "Had Jack of been born fifty years later he might have had a different view of things." The quote shows how people change which goes along with the west changing also. I would say this is the best book we have read so far this year.
Picture: My sister at Mesa Verde in southwestern Colorado.
Remember to read the 20 or so pages from McGee for Thursday on The Wild Bunch that I wrote on the board. I believe it starts at page 144.
Also try and have No Country for Old Men read to close to 200 by Thursday.
We will discuss No Country for Old Men on Thursday.
I do not think we will view the film in class, so if anyone would like to see it outside of class let me know and we can watch it some night for extra credit.
The title comes from a poem called "Sailing to Byzantium" written by William Butler Yeats. The poem is written about a journey to Constantinople that is used as a metaphor for the spiritual journey of a man pursuing paridise.
That is no country for old men. The young In one another's arms, birds in the trees —Those dying generations—at their song, The salmon-falls, the mackerel-crowded seas, Fish, flesh, or fowl, commend all summer long Whatever is begotten, born, and dies. Caught in that sensual music all neglect Monuments of unaging intellect.
The fact that McCormac took the first line of this poem to be the title of the book really shows a lot about how he felt about the book and what it was supposed to say. It really portrays western themes and the fact that people were trying to find their paradise, it whatever way they could. In the book Moss finds the money and knows that the money could lead him to the paridise he wants for him and his wife. However, his lack of thought on the situation leads him into great danger. Also, the Sherrif in the book is a older gentleman who has seen a to old to be able to handle the West that they live in and the violence that takes place there. It takes him most of the novel to realize that the West really is "No country for old men" like him.
I found this review that Roger Ebert wrote about The Wild Bunch and I thought it related well to some of the things we were talking about in class today.
Talking about robbing trains today in class made me think of this song by the psychedelic country rock band, New Riders of the Purple Sage. If you've ever heard the song "Panama Red", then you know this band.
I did not like this movie at all. Starting out with a great shoot out and bank robbery you would think the movie could only get better but you thought wrong. It just gets worse. Maybe its because I don't know spanish and the director wanted to keep it more authentic so there were no subtitles. Maybe it was because the character development was poorly done. I did not care for this movie at all.
Don't forget that everyone is supposed to have their assigned movie watched by today. I will go around the classroom and ask everyone for a brief description of their film for the class' benefit.
I completely forgot we were supposed to blog over the movie..hope I can still do this, but the movie was interesting. It was difficult to get into because the lack of set up. However, it was a different Western than what we've watched so far in the sense of a traditional western. Shane for example had the good guy defending the family life with a set of ideas and the violence was more of random gun shots going off. Whereas the wild bunch was different in the sense of the gore and violence being displayed. However, the whole relationship between the outlaws and bounty hunters wasn't apparent to me. The outlaws didn't appear to be terrible characters, just men looking to keep living in their old ways and trying to survive without society conforming to a "civilization." However, I was like most of the class, very unsure what was going on.
After reading a article that Dennis posted from boozemovies.com a question about the content of the movie really stood out to me. The writed of the article said "It is unclear whether the greatest threat to Pike and his gang comes from their Mexican allies, the bounty hunters, or from fissures within their own group." This seems to be a very important question about the content of the movie and whether or not they Wild Bunch was successful in the end. They had more than one enemy and a large amount of people working against them. Because of this they had opposition from all sides which made it difficult for them to trust people as well as come out on top in the end. I think that the Mexicans allies were actually the biggest threat to Pike and his gang. Both sides were manipulative and wanted to always be in control of the situation, because of this there was a ton of tension between these opposing sides even though they were considered allies. An important theme that can be taken from this is the "need for dominance" that is shown in the movie by a majority of characters in the movie. None of them want to be the little guy and they seem to go to extreme lengths to make sure that they are never reduced to that level.
Personally, I did not enjoy the film. My biggest issue was not being able to distinguish who people were. Almost all of the actors looked the same, making it hard to keep up with what was going on. Besides that, it did have some major themes of the west, such as perserving the ideal of being a badass and doing whatever you want to, killing anyone that stands in your way. Another theme that stood out to me that we have continously talked about in class was the racial discrimination between the groups of people. I enjoyed seeing the dynamic between the Mexicans and whites.
On Tuesday we will discuss at length the film The Wild Bunch. Towards the end of the class we will discuss No Country for Old Men too, so make sure you are keeping up with your reading with that work. You should be around page 150 by Tuesday.
It seemed to me that many of the responses to The Wild Bunch only dealt with the film superficially and not in substance. Be prepared to discuss the film seriously on Tuesday and how it treats western history. It may be a good idea to read original reviews of the film and look up what the author says about it in From Shane to Kill Bill.
http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/19690803/REVIEWS/908030301/1023 A review from 1969 in Chicago.
The last half of the movie left me a little confused, I guess. I wasn't entirely sure why the Wild Bunch decided to take on the entire Mexican Army! And then the group of bounty hunters came and looted them all. Maybe it's a way of saying justice will always prevail? (or something ... ) This as an example and a few other parts added twists that weren't entirely answered, leaving a lot of questions after watching this movie. I did like to see how the Wild Bunch adapted and learned the ways of the different groups of people they encountered. They were always respectful; not what you would expect from the stereotypical group of outlaws. Overall, the movie wasn't all that bad. ;)
There is a show that is televised on the History channel at 9pm on Mondays called American Pickers. The show is kind of corny however it kind of relates to a topic in class. In the book The Professor's House, when Roddy sells the old materials to the German. Tom got upset because he was giving away the history they should have been preserving. Well in the show American Pickers, these guys go around and they scour the country for hidden gems in junkyards, basements, garages and barns. They buy these antiques, then help preserve them. They show how all across America there is history everywhere and while trying to preserve the materials and they may teach you a thing or two about American history along the way.
While watching The Wild Bunch, I did not find myself very intrigued with the film. The beginning had a bank robbery from the start which drew some attention, however that quickly vanished. I thought it was an interesting tactic that they used, having an ex-member or partner tracking down the group. Overall, the movie was confusing, however I enjoyed the ending for the violence and also how the outlaws, even though they died, they managed to evade the bounty hunters. It was a small victory they had even after their deaths.
So I was jammin out this morning and realized this is such a great song about outlaw cowboys. Its by the Grateful Dead.
Here's the lyrics:
Me and my uncle went ridin' down, South Colorado, West Texas bound. We stopped over in Santa Fe, That bein' the point just about half way, And you know it was the hottest part of the day.
I took the horses up to the stall, Went to the barroom, ordered drinks for all. Three days in the saddle, you know my body hurt, It bein' summer, I took off my shirt, And I tried to wash off some of that dusty dirt.
West Texas cowboys, they's all around, With liquor and money, they're loaded down. So soon after payday, know it seemed a shame; You know my uncle, he starts a friendly game, High-low jack and the winner take the hand.
My uncle starts winnin'; cowboys got sore. One of them called him, and then two more, Accused him of cheatin'; Oh no, it couldn't be. I know my uncle, he's as honest as me, And I'm as honest as a Denver man can be.
One of them cowboys, he starts to draw, And I shot him down, Lord he never saw. Shot me another, oh damn he won't grow old. In the confusion, my uncle grabbed the gold, And we high-tailed it down to Mexico.
I love those cowboys, I love their gold, I loved my uncle, God rest his soul, Taught me good, Lord, Taught me all I know Taught me so well, I grabbed that gold And I left his dead ass there by the side of the road.
I found the most interesting aspect of the film to be how the characters interacted with the presence of technology. During the train hijacking scene, the bunch showed some serious expertise at sneaking up and clandestinely disabling the train. Their ability to do that shows a tactical manipulation of new industrial tools. Their hijacking could not have worked the same way if it was working against a wagon and horses. They used the train's blind spots against it and took off before anyone knew what was happening. The bunch probably didn't start their careers robbing trains but discovered what about the new technology was weak, then learned to exploit it.
A different sort of interaction occurred with the machine gun. While all of the characters in the movie seemed comfortable and well-adjusted to rifles, the advent of the machine gun was a huge development. While the bunch had learned to manipulate the train, it seemed like no one had learned to manipulate the machine gun. The bunch first presented it to the Mexicans as a kind of exotic gem. It was wondrous and interesting. It became obvious after acquiring the gun that no one in the camp could effectively operate it. The first group to try went mad blowing everything apart. The gun was too powerful. Eventually, in the final fight scene, the Mexican camp learned to clumsily implement it. The death it caused was significant though haphazard.
The gun and the train exemplify technologies in different stages of understanding. Industry's influence on the culture of the West was very important. The viewer can tell how important by examining the difference between how the bunch had come to exploit the train and how the Mexican army attempted to exploit the gun.
The Wild Bunch was not one of my favorite movies. From the beginning I was confused with the plot, and I just found it to be stupid and cheesy for the most part. Some of the scenes were cool like the opening and ending of the movie. There were some themes that we read about in It's Your Misfortune and talked about in class. Mainly it had the theme of outlaws in the west. There is also the conflict of races, White has a whole section about Anglo-Hispanic conflict in our reading. Even though I can understand why it was important to see for what we are talking about in class, I really did not enjoy watching it.
Honestly, I really did not like The Wild Bunch. It almost seemed like it was trying to hard too be a "western shoot 'em up" type film. The opening scene of the movie could have been the final scene with the gunfight and violence it contained. I did like the dynamic relationship between Bishop and Thornton. I think it was interesting that an ex-outlaw was now leading the bounty hunters and I liked seeing Bishop's flashbacks of their past partnership. As far as the plot goes, I didn't think the game of cat and mouse was all that interesting, nor did I like the ending. It seemed like the movie was trying to make a statement about how the "old" west was dying as government and technology was improving. In the end, the outlaws knew they couldn't continue to live the way they wanted to and as a result they were all murdered. The movie didn't do much for me entertainment wise, but I see how people consider it to contain an important message.
Although I wasn't a big fan of this movie I thought it had some good parts. I enjoyed how the former member of the Wild Bunch was leading the bounty hunters to track them down. Although completely different themes surrounded both movies, it somewhat resembles the rationale behind Silence Of The Lambs. They used a killer to track a killer in that movie, in The Wild Bunch they used an outlaw to track outlaws. I also think this movie saw some similar themes with the painting of Custer's last stand that we looked at in class. The Wild Bunch may go down at the end, but at least they go down doing something they believe in. It romanticized the violence of gunfights to make them look manly and noble. I have seen better movies, but overall it was not too bad and had some themes relevant to our class.
I think the Wild Bunch captured the essence of bandits in the West. The movie opened with the bank robbery and they continued to stir things up continuing with the train heists. I also do agree as stated in someone's response that it was confusing to distinguish the different groups. Especially with the ex-bandit leading the charge, I felt like keeping him and Pike apart was a little difficult. The bandits did what they wanted and weren't afraid to take anything.
I thought that this movie was pretty good. I thought it was interesting how this group of outlaws really knew how to survive against all the different kind of people who they came across. I also found it interesting that the leader of the bounty hunters use to be one of the outlaws. I thought that the fighting was pretty realistic, and I only got lost at some of the parts with the Mexican groups. Sometimes those scenes were a little confusing to follow.
I found it interesting that an ex-member of the Wild Bunch is in charge of leading the group of bounty hunters. I was intrigued by the concept of having what seems to be an ordinary group of men- with no authority- in charge of hunting down and killing criminals. Rewards and bounty hunters were relied on to bring justice to the West opposed to the established law enforcement we have today.
In the beginning, does anyone in the temperance union repeat that they won't drink cider? At least one woman stopped at beer deliberately. I think it is a good contrast to put the temperance union right next to the shoot out in the beginning of the movie because none of the men in either the group of outlaws or guns hired by the railroad are in the least inclined to abstain from any sort of vice. Also, it is very difficult to tell the difference between the outlaws and the bounty hunters at all.
The theme of violence in the American West was shown in this film to an extreme. The 'wild bunch' who was a train robbing gang, was killing numerous amounts of people as the enforcements were after them. The bounty hunters were almost like security to their outrage. There was a sense of belonging to a group which would be the 'wild bunch'. We spoke in class how it was not just individual fights, but rather group fights. The idea of siding with someone and sticking to it was shown in this film. There was deaths in this group, but they continued to kill. They would rob trains as well as the bank. This gory film was the idea of how the 'wild bunch' turned the west into violence and their surrondings.
Here's a story about noble bandits. These people reject the system and live by their own way. Though their time is coming to an end, which is apparently a sad thing. There is a theme here that is common not just in American Westerns, but was also popular in Europe during for a time. The movie reminds me a little bit of the Robbers by Schiller, though that had a lot to with the reality of things and a disenchantment from the romantic legends. The similarity is in the notion of being a Highwayman or a Bandit is the only real form of freedom. These people go where they want, do what they want and take what they want. The movie also seems to claim that this is a life that is to be desired.
Here is a photo of the real Wild Bunch, composed of Butch Cassidy, Ben Kilpatrick, The Sundance Kid, Kid Curry, and News Carver. Sam Peckinpah's Wild Bunch portrays the lifestyle of these real outlaws, who committed their most famous heist on June 2, 1899 when they held up a Union Pacific train at Wilcox, Wyoming. They stole anywhere between $30,000 and $60,000 while wearing makeshift masks made out of napkins. haha. They went on to rob a few more trains and banks and eventually split up around 1901, when the annoyance of the lawmen became too burdensome.
I think some of the fine detail in the beginning of the "Wild Bunch" movie is particularly interesting. Unbeknownst to the viewer at the beginning, the film is set in the early 1900's, a time when increasing pressure was being put on outlaw gangs by the law, and some kind of social reform may have been taking place. When I first saw this movie, I did not understand the significance of the religious group that was pledging to abstain from alcohol, or the significance of the children burning the scorpion. Now I believe these events are a depiction of the time period of the film. The society seems to want to extinguish all things dangerous, bad, or unknown. This mindset is summed up nicely by Pike, the gang leader, just after they realize their loot is fake. He says, "We gotta start thinking beyond our guns, those days are closing fast."
Having the opening scene of The Wild Bunch as a bank robbery, while bounty hunters assume the position for the awaited shootout, demonstrates that the movie is about this group of aging outlaws who are nearing their end in a world as they once knew it; the shootout symbolizes "their West" is over. A definite distinction is presented between the Old West, displayed by the Wild Bunch, and the New West, displayed by the congregation of towns people and permanent town they preside in. Beyond the message set by the opening scene, I found many elements of the movie so far to be frivolous. The image of the little boy and girl hugging in the midst of the shootout was just dumb. In real life, those little children would have ran and joined their other friends hiding behind the building, not just stand in the middle of the street holding each other. Another scene that I found silly was when the Mexican in the Wild Bunch shoots his ex-girlfriend for kissing another man. The fact that shooting the girl was the ice breaker to getting invited inside for dinner was unreal. I'm anxious to see where the movie is going, plot wise, because I've had trouble following all the jumping around and mumbling. Hopefully it gets better.
My favorite scene in this movie is the one where Pike is talking to Earnest Borgnign's character while they are sitting around a fire at there hideout in Mexico after the first robbery. I think that it greatly exemplifies so much of the imagined west. The men substitute bad whiskey for bad coffee and talk about the foolish pride that takes the lives of so many men. angel, the mexican sings a peaceful ballad as they discuss getting out of crime, until they realize that there is nowhere for them to go from here, "back off to what?" As Pike tells Earnest about his plan to get one last score for them all before they quit, he mentions garrisons of army troops all along the border that they could rob... They'll be waiting for us. I wouldn't have it any other way. Pike... I wouldn't have it any other way either. Death looms as the soft ballad carries through the night.
I thought the movie started out with a lot of action and it grabbed my attention. It started out with a group of outlaws robbing a bank, and the railroad company hired convicts to stop the outlaws. There was a lot of gun shooting and many people died including civilians. Then the movie went on with less action and lots of talking. This first half of the movie reminded me of bandits and social bandits that we discussed in class. The thieves stole for their own reasons, such as for their own selfishness or to fight for their beliefs. This movie also gave me a perspective on how cowboys acted and what they were like. It showed that they liked to drink a lot, spend time and money on women, and they all had guns. It also seemed that some of the outlaws had a code of the West, for example, when the Mexican outlaw shot his lover because she was all over an officer. The outlaws could have just left him to be hung or shot, but he was a part of their team and they took care of him and did not leave him to die. Another example is when they are about to split the money they stole from the bank. A couple of the outlaws wanted to split the profit unevenly, but the leader was not having any of that, and he threatened to end the group if they did not split the profits evenly. I thought this first part of the movie clarified some of the social conflicts from the old West.
The Wild Bunch certainly started off with a "bang," eh? I think the very first scene goes along well with what we read about in It's Your Misfortune. White was explaining how people think of the West as a place where gunfights will randomly break out and all hell will break loose. The gunfight at the very beginning shows this. I'm liking how the group of men who are supposed to be the "bad guys" are seemingly portrayed in a good light. They are constantly talking about doing what's "right," sticking together, learning from their errors. The "good guys," the railroad company, prove to be after the "Wild Bunch" only because there's a reward out for them. The head man of the railroad group says something close to "The railroad IS the law." This is very interesting when considering justice during this time. It's my opinion that the railroad group is more of the "bad guys" than the Wild Bunch.
As I was reading today, it struck me that Chigurh and Bell are complete opposites, not just in their personalities, but also in what they represent in the story. Now obviously every story has a good guy and a bad guy, but what makes these two interesting is that they are sort of in the same situation and they both respond differently. They're in a position where they can do almost anything they want, Bell because being a county sheriff in Texas apparently as no restrictions, rules or guidelines, not only that but there is apparently no official county law so there's really nothing official to uphold. Chigurh is completely free simply because he's smart enough and bad enough to get away with it. So they both live in a lawless world, Bell decides to do what is right, he opposes criminals and protects the citizens, and Chigurh just does what he wants, which for a psychopath like him tends to be evil. He kills people like it's a bodily function, and in some cases he may believe that he is right to do so. In the scene with Chigurh and the gas station proprietor, Chigurh seems annoyed at the fact that the other man owns the gas station because he married into it, rather that earning it properly. He felt that he had to test this man's luck further with the coin toss. He refuses to call the out-come for the man claiming that it wouldn't unfair and even a moral wrong, indicating that Chigurh has some twisted sense of right and wrong. That really is what makes Chigurh a dangerous and interesting villain, because he thinks that he is in the right.
A couple of people in the class have told me that they will be unable to attend the voluntary field trip on April 25th and have asked if there was anything else they could do to make up for it.
Well, I have thought about it and decided that the only "make-up" that would be fair is if you did the trip/hike yourself and then wrote a response about it and the history of the region. If you are interested let me know.
I came across a show on PBS about the homestead act. The show follows modern families who are attempting to live as people in the American West did in the 1880's.
Those chosen to participate had rules to follow in order to make it as authentic as possible.
Basic info about the show can be found: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/frontierhouse/project/series.html
From the reading for today, I interpreted it as the West as a myth. Myths are used in order to help visualize and understand the West better. For example, myths of heroes help to understand the types of people that lived in the West and how they should act. Myths are not true statements, but they are stories that help us to visualize the history and of how our country came to be. I also realized that the West has been mainly about masculinity and men making history. The section on women was interesting because the book states that women were symbols of the West and they were there for men's entertainment. Women did not have much influence on the West because they were seen as nurturers and the West was more about violence than nurturing. This leads me to my final topic on violence and social conflict. I thought that the violence that occurred in the West had to do mainly with class, race, gender, and money. The West was not about individualism but violence among different groups of people. For example, the Americans had problems with the Indians, Chinese, and because of these problems, vigilantes and banditos started to rise up. There were also social bandits that committed crimes such as stealing, but were considered good because they helped out the community. Even though they helped out the society, the social bandits may have committed the crimes for individual reasons.
I just got done reading a book called Dead Man's Walk, by Larry McMurtry. The book is about a group of about two hundred Texas Rangers marching from Austin to Santa Fe in an attempt to annex New Mexico. A few of the things that were discussed in class reminded me of this book. First today we were discussing government sanctioned and extra-legal violence. The Ranger's "expedition" to Santa Fe in the book didn't seem to be by the order of the Texas government (I should mention that it was never very clear in the book but I believe Texas was still independent at this point). Usually when you hear about large companies of armed soldiers making a move on some territory its probably a legitimate military operation, but it just struck me as interesting that in this case that was not so. The unit's leader was called Caleb Cobb, a sort of land pirate, and it seemed that he woke up one day and decided that he wanted to take over New Mexico. I also heard somewhere that the book was based on an actual event, though I wouldn't quote that. Anyway the second thing that got from this book was the "buddy" motif we were talking about, from The Professor's House. Here the two main characters are Woodrow Call and Augustus McCrea, and they seem to be joined at the hip. The odd thing is that their personalities are like polar opposites. Call is dependable, organized and responsible, where McCrea is just this lying, cheating lout. So in a way they cancel each other out. I thought it was a little bit like Tom Outland and Roddy, though only a little, as one was more like a dewy eyed youth and the other a responsible father figure. There's a final thing this book reminded me of and that was the white man's view of the Native Americans, as well as Mexicans. The Rangers are under constant threat by Comanches. The book depicts them as a kind of force of nature. Many times it is brought home to Call that they are strangers in foriegn territory. The Comanches clearly know the land better and use that to their advantage. As for Texan-Mexican sympathies, the fact that a savage can get together several hundred volunteers to take over New Mexico speaks for itself. Most of the Rangers and camp followers were in it for the rumored money that was in Santa Fe. There was hardly a thought of there was an established government in New Mexico that would likely resist an invasion, nor did anyone stop to wonder if they could even take New Mexico from its owners
A big part of this book is how the characters are viewed. In class we spoke about if we thought if Roddy was a likable character or not. I think he is a likable character because he was just looking out for the best interest of Tom Outland. He was almost like a dad figure to Tom, and thought he was doing him a favor in a way since Washington did not go as well as they thought. As Tom Outland admitted he never expressed how much the things meant to him, so how was he supposed to know. I think that the family was once a happy family until the professor thought his life had been lived to the fullest. He was almost like depressed because the life he had now didn't live up to his expectations. He wanted more than what he had. He was sick of his family wanting to be invited to parties, the new house, and these fancy trips. He was happy living with the old way more snug. This book started off slow but definitely related to the idea that we have history so we know where we are today.
I really enjoyed this film even though it was much longer then I thought it was going to be (over 3 hours). The film seemed like a combination of Wyatt's early life before he became the iconic bad ass we know him as today and the movie Tombstone. In his early years Wyatt avoided violence and guns but after holding his first gun everything changed. Throughout the film he became more aggressive/bad ass the farther into the west he traveled. He was a lawman for many different territories and kept moving from one to the next trying to tame the wild west towns to be more civilized. As soon as he finished taming the town by kicking the "bad guys" ass, cleaning up the drunk miners, and establishing laws he would move onto the next town. As much as he moved around Wyatt and his family were always trying to settle down and make some money by being business men or miners. They failed because the need for justice always pushed the Earps to become lawmen and protect their family. The movie had the famous shoot out at the OK Corral, but I thought the way it was depicted in the film was extremely anticlimactic. I didn't like this gunfight because everyone standing about ten feet away from each other shooting and yet still missing each other. Maybe I didn't like one of the most famous gunfights in the west because I was just praying that the movie was getting close to the end. All in all if you want to watch this movie be prepared to clear your entire night to watch an all star cast.
Violence and Imagination of the West Reading the section on violence in "Its your misfortune" I thought that it was interesting that White suggested the term genocide when he was discussing Indian Hunters and the killings in California, but never really came out and said it. He seems to imply that there might have been organized and systematic killing by providing examples of people paying "subscriptions to Indian hunters to "clean" up the area. The reading suggests that the violence was due more to a culture of fear and a need for labor. Anglo-American culture attempted to shrink and enslave the Indian populations of the west. White also suggests that they accomplished their goals by citing that California's Indian population shrunk from 150,000 at the beginning of the organized killings to 30,o00 by 1870. This type of history is something that is rarely seen in our culture because it does not fit into our imagination of what the west is. The west is always viewed as a place where people could escape from authority and and establish themselves freely without any restraints. This section on violence paints a different picture; not just because of the Indian white relations, but also because of the violence shown against the working class of the west and the unions that they formed. In movies and books, violence is always shown when there are two clear sides, the good and the bad. As shown in this reading, violence was not always so simply divided. I think most of the violence in this reading have an underlying cause that can be traced back to economics, labor, and land.
The reading talks about the differences between actual historical violence in the West and our imaginative, individualized recreations of it. Here's a fun link briefly taking up the same notion (read #6, though the others are interesting too): http://www.cracked.com/article_18487_6-ridiculous-history-myths-you-probably-think-are-true.html
As you all know, today will be the last day we discuss The Professor's House.
For Thursday read pages 329-352 and 613- in Its Your Misfortune.
For next week (Tuesday and Thursday) read pages 1-159 in No Country for Old Men. Even though this sounds like lots of reading, it is not because the book is very small and filled with dialogue. In reality, this reading assigment is probably half of what the page numbers would suggest.
After reading half of Tom Outland's story it made his character even more intriguing for the end. The author gives a sense of mysteriousness that Tom is possibly exaggerating many of his stories but sometimes Tom comes off as credible. It is interesting how Tom really did not like someone like Roddy yet they became friends very quickly. Also there is a sense of how Tom has a passion for learning and adventure excites him at a young age as they venture into Cliff City. I am curious to find out what happens with Tom and Roddy because obviously something dramatic or suspicious happened as Tom fled New Mexico.
This weekend I was able to watch the movie The Last of the Mohicans. I thought that the movie showed a pretty good portrayal of the relationships between Indians and whites, and also Indians with other Indians. The movie is based on a war going on between the British and the French to gain the territory of the colonies. There are three men left who are part of the Mohican tribe. They end up helping out the British, but only so that they will survive also. It really is more of a romance I would say because of what happens in the movie, but I won't give that away incase anyone would like to watch it. It shows how many Indian tribes, during this war, took sides and helped fight. However, some stayed as neutral as they possibly could and tried not to get involved. I actually liked this movie and didn't find it to be one that seemed to be unrealistic like some of Jeramiah Johnson.
Personally, the most alluring aspect about Willa Cather's novel The Professor's House, deals with the questions that it raises. Pairing a character like St. Peter with Tom Outland is an excellent way to get people thinking about their own life. I found myself really pondering if I was spending my time doing exactly what I want to be doing. I take far too many semester hours, and time that I don't spend in a dance studio or in a classroom, I spend in rehearsal or doing homework. Then the idea of passion entered my train of thought. I truly am passionate about my dance; I hope that whatever path my life takes, dance will always be a part of it. Just as the professor spends all his time in his, for a lack of a better word, office, he is doing what he loves. In the comparison about passions that I drew of the professor to myself , it lifted the sort of pathetic connotation I applied to his leisure. Obviously, most people's life story would seem some what dull compared to Tom Outland's, however, life spent doing one's passion, regardless of what that passion may be, makes all the difference.
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