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What is a Typical American Film?
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Is there such a thing as a typical American film?
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It is true that there are many features that mark a movie as American,
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but perhaps the most essential feature is the theme of the loner-hero.
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From the earliest days of silent films
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until the recent extravagant science fiction films,
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the American movie has concentrated on the role of one individual
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who spends his or her life combating the forces of evil —
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and the good guy, the hero,
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usually wins by the end of the film.
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In the western movie,
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which comes out of many legends of the American West,
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a typical figure is the lonesome cowboy.
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He wanders into a town and straightens out its troubles.
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Those troubles can be cattle rustlers or out-laws.
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Then the strong and independent hero fades off into the sunset alone.
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Americans like this image in their films
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because they are highly independent themselves,
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and individualism counts a great deal with them.
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An individual who is able to correct the evils of the world,
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or of a small town, is someone to admire.
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Even the gangster movie,
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a very popular form of the typical American film,
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usually has a hero.
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Either he is a lawman out to catch the criminals or a gangster
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who suddenly sees the light and tries to go straight.
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During the violence?ridden period of Prohibition in the 1920s,
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it is natural that the gangster movie would grow in popularity.
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These films kept the same tone as the western —
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the bad cannot triumph!
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One good person can save the innocent.
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Recent science fiction films deal with the same themes.
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Against the forces of alien powers,
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people will fight to protect their ideals.
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Here, too, the action centers around a single individual,
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but now he or she must save the world.