초록 열기/닫기 버튼
This paper explores class issues in two popular films, Titanic and Pretty Woman as an example of how to deal with narrative from a Marxian perspective. The films, focusing on cross-class romance, reveal that class is not simply a matter of money, but also related to other things such as race and moral strength; middle class life and values are the invisible norm and both the upper and low class are found to be lacking. Hollywood films avoid depicting class warfare in positive ways and when this does happen, it is set in the past and often involves notions of progress from the imperfect class structure of the past toward the idealized system of the present. This is true of Titanic and Pretty Woman. Even though Titanic is criticized as leftist propaganda intended to trigger class consciousness and resistance, the film displaces notions of justifiable class conflicts and change into the past. Further, it reveals that class differences are un-American while validating the American Dream. Pretty Woman touches on the everyday struggle that lower class prostitutes have to face. But it soon suppresses this theme and provides a fantasy that romantic love can resolve the gap between classes. Both films imply that the class struggle is un-American and temporary. They also openly acknowledge the privilege of wealth but simultaneously suggest that wealth could threaten the characters’ happiness. Indeed, Hollywood films argue that all challenges to the class structure are undesirable.
키워드열기/닫기 버튼
Marxism, Literary Critical Theory, Class, Ideology, American Dream, Titanic, Pretty Woman.
