Cast Away and the New Hollywood - Essay Example

? Cast Away and the New Hollywood SECTION The New Hollywood values realism, exotic locations, strong themes and innovation. The players, although in a major studio setting, are more independent and project oriented than the contract players of the Golden Age. Cast Away (Zemeckis, 2000) reunites Tom Hanks and Robert Zemeckis (Forrest Gump, Zemeckis, 1994) in a tale of survival and will for a man living an urgent life, but not an important one. FILM SYNOPSIS The opening sequence is set in rural Texas near a crossroads. A FedEx delivery van pulls into a ranch with a big overhead iron sculpture which reads Dick and Bettram. The ranch is an island in a sea of prairie. The radio plays Elvis Pressley “Heartbreak Hotel” as the driver picks up a package stamped with a logo of two wings embraced by three halos. As the driver leaves, Elvis sings “I’m All Shook Up”; it’s not a radio, she’s an Elvis fan. The van door reopens in Russia. The package is delivered to her husband who is with another woman. The next package is delivered by a little boy to Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) who pulls a timer from the packet and continues his lecture on urgency, how time rules life. Back in Memphis, Chuck proposes marriage, actually he doesn’t, but promises to discuss it on New Years Day when he returns, to Kelly Frears (Helen Hunt) in a car at the airport. He was paged at Christmas dinner for this troubleshooting trip. She has given him a family heirloom, a railroad pocket watch used by her grandfather on the Southern Pacific, with her picture in the case. Chuck rushes to the plane. The plane crashes in the Southern Pacific. Chuck washes ashore, alone, on a small island. Chuck must learn survival skills such as building a fire, collecting edible plants, fishing and crabbing. An episode of self-help dentistry caps his early time on the island. Four years later, he is a competent provider and will survive. One day half a portable toilet shed washes up. He sees it as a sail to get past the breakers. He designs and builds a raft and awaits the changing winds and tides to escape. Finally, he is cast adrift again hoping for a sea rescue. When a freighter finds him, he is on his way to a home that no longer exists. He is dead in his home. Kelly has married and has a child. He knows he must find a new life. The Socio-Cultural Perspective of Cast Away Cast Away is set from 1995 to 1999. The coming millennium brought discussions of time or urgency versus the compass or importance (Covey, 2004). The religious aspects of the millennium and associated doomsday scenarios concerned the populace. The man versus the machine debate gained momentum. This film addressed these pressing and timely issues. The Clock Versus the Compass (Covey, 2004) The first speech Chuck Noland gives involves the importance of time. The film opens in rural Texas, a crossroads in the middle of nothing, where time is measured in days, not seconds. An artist listens to Heartbreak Hotel, foreshadowing the sight of the husband in Moscow. Chuck is in Moscow to troubleshoot the truck delivery issues faced by FedEx. He rewards the boy delivering the package with a portable CD player and an Elvis tape; Chuck is a fan too. Chuck is explaining through an interpreter that time is a relentless master, time rules over everything, time is like fire, it can give warmth or burn. Logistics is life, more important than his asking Kelly to be his wife. Christmas is a pager at dinner and two minutes in a car at the airport. Scheduling dinner requires both people with calendars looking for gaps in urgent activities. Kelly and Chuck are not priorities in their own lives. Traditional Hollywood views time as a “ticking bomb”. A deadline is set, for instance, the kidnappers will call for the money by noon. The action centers on accomplishing a task by a certain time. This film reverses that trend. Time is irrelevant on that island. Survival is relevant. Then in Act III, when Chuck is exhausted and just hanging on, time becomes relevant again, will he be rescued on time. The inciting incident in the film is Chuck’s decision to board the plane on Christmas, urgency over importance. A communications failure does not allow the pilots to warn of a course change due to weather. Chuck is now off course in turbulent weather with no communications. He removes his wristwatch to wash his face. The cabin loses pressure and Chuck is slung from the bathroom. He must now choose, life vest or pocket watch. He dives and crawls for the watch. The jet hits the water and he barely escapes with a life raft. His baptism in the Southern Pacific begins Act II and his rebirth into his new life. His pager and pocket watch broke in the wreck. Time stopped in his new life, now measured in days and months. Chuck learns new survival skills, time management is of little importance to survival. Finally, his battery fails in his flashlight; Chuck no longer controls the darkness. The importance of fire, both for cooking and signaling, requires a new skill. His leg is cut from an attempt to reach a passing boat, then he cuts his hand trying to make fire. In his rage over this failure, Chuck picks up a volleyball with a blood soaked hand and throws it, leaving a grotesque print that he modifies into a face. Chuck achieves companionship, Wilson, and a resource to explain his inner dialog. Four years elapse, his survival skills honed; providence delivers his means of escape, the sail for a raft to get him past the breakers. He now has a purpose, escape. The plan works and he awaits the tide and wind conditions. Chuck wants to be ready when nature provides his best chance for escape. Chuck escapes the island and is set adrift again. His concern is whether he will be rescued or run out of time. A storm rips the sails off his raft and dumps Wilson into the Pacific. The storm baptizes Chuck again as the castaway survivor to end Act II. Chuck finds himself back in Memphis, but his world has changed. Time eroded importance to create urgency. In four years, Kelly has gotten married, had a child and dropped her goal of becoming a PhD. Chuck is urged to give her time to adjust. The rest of his friends “let him go”. Chuck was now cast away because the relentlessness of time made hoping for his survival inconvenient. He would be “brought back to life” the next day, just not his old life. With the lessons learned on the island, Chuck knows he has no control over anything in his life, and he must keep breathing until the tide brings in new opportunities. When he delivers the package with the wings, “returned to sender”, the opportunity arises when Bettram gives him directions. Direction, the moral and ethical compass, the ethic to spend time on the important rather than the urgent things held Chuck tightly now. The Religious Aspects of Cast Away The New Hollywood enjoys good baptism imagery for major changes in characters’ lives. In The Shawshank Redemption (Darabont, 1994), Andy Dufresne (Tim Robbins) crawls through a sanitary pipe to escape the prison where he unjustly served a murder sentence. He is reborn a free man in a rain storm, arms out as though on a cross. While in prison, he ran the wardens money laundering scam. In the end, Andy stole the money. The movie Inception (Nolan, 2010) tells the story of interrogators using dream states to plant subconscious thoughts in their targets’ minds. Rising from one level of dream to the next involves being killed or falling in the dream. Often, the dreamer falls into water to be reborn into the next level of consciousness. Fight Club (Fincher, 1999) used a baptism of blood and violence to allow applicants to join. New members had to fight their way into the club. Cast Away used rebirth baptism imagery to signal a change in Chuck Noland’s life, and changes in the film’s act structure. His flight crashed during a storm, dumping him into the South Pacific. Chuck clung to an inflatable raft through the storm and onto the island. This scene ended Act I and began Act II. Halfway through Act II, a storm trashed Chuck’s raft shelter, and he fled into a cave. Chuck had journeyed from industrialized, urgency driven modern man to caveman. The second act ends with the rescue at sea after the storm took away all his possessions and Chuck let go of his paddles, his control over his fate. Chuck was reborn as a simple man in a complex world. He did not need a bed; he was appalled at the abundant seafood spread; and he still wanted Kelly, his heart. Of course, the reuniting scene with Kelly involved a rainstorm. Chuck was reborn as a man alone; a cast away man rather than a castaway. The movie ends with Chuck at a crossroads. He must choose a direction, or go back to Bettram’s island farm. During Chuck’s debriefing with his friend and colleague, he confessed his suicide plan. Chuck detailed how the inability to choose when and where he would die lead to his inner peace and acceptance. As a troubleshooter, problem solver, Chuck ignored the lack of control over parking boots and employee laziness. Chuck’s job was to overcome the lack of control, which gave him an illusionary sense of power over his environment. Four years on the island taught him reverence for nature; knowing he had no control provided him with peace. The tides kept bringing Chuck what he needed. When he accepted these gifts finally, Chuck created tools, companionship and a survival plan. Kelly motivated his daring survival and escape. Hope, love and faith freed Chuck to attempt the breakers again and regain his former life. But he left a world of urgency that did not change. Kelly, although admitting Chuck is the love of her life, remained in her home, in her life. In four years, she let him go, dated, married, had a child and the child grew. Time forced her onward. The ticking clock relentlessly commanding her to do. At the airport, when Chuck gave her a ring, Kelly said she was terrified. Yet, we find her four years later, married with a child. Kelly symbolized Chuck’s lost opportunity, his holy grail that was the reward for his trials. That was snatched away, and he let nature guide him forward. Kelly explained her grandfather’s watch kept him on schedule for the Southern Pacific. Chuck set it to Memphis time to remind himself of Kelly. The watch maintained him on the South Pacific as well. Only, it was the picture of Kelly, the dream of reuniting, that kept his spirits. Man Versus the Machine The debate about whether or not technology actually enhances lives or drives people apart is an important theme in New Hollywood movies. Carl Sagan’s Contact (Zemeckis, 1997) personified this debate as a stumbling point in Ellie’s relationship with Palmer. Palmer, a spiritual advisor, believed technology kept mankind separated from God and each other. Ellie, a scientist, thought science and technology improved man’s lot. In the end, she was given a chance to prove she had ventured through the wormhole. Without proof, people had to accept her word on faith. Another, earlier, Zemeckis film, Back to the Future (1985), distorted history through a time machine. A prodigy improved his family dynamic by changing the outcome of a confrontation his father has with a bully. As 2000 drew closer, movie goers were less enamored with technology. This theme of the New Hollywood runs through Cast Away, especially in the second act. The first act follows Chuck through his daily life of urgent matters. Truck schedules, sorting packages, airplanes, pagers, cell phones and troubleshooting keep him too busy to live the his true life. Reborn as a modern man in primitive conditions forces a re-evaluation of his needs. He now must survive. He accidently discovers stone tools when the rock with which he beats a coconut breaks into pieces, leaving him a sharp edge. Chuck loses his raft shelter, forcing him to live in a cave. This move provides security. He decides to open packages, giving up on actually delivering them, and finds other tools, steel tools. Chuck moves into a simple man mode, a caveman with steel tools. He discovers companionship, a volleyball painted in blood, a tool to introduce his inner dialog. Over four years, he becomes an efficient hunter gatherer, able to easily feed himself and survive. Chuck is now a confident man in his environment. Moving through Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (Hunt, 502-3), he accepts his condition and resolves to escape the island. The tides and winds then provide him with a sail, a means to escape. In the third act, Chuck returns to civilization and witnesses the excess and waste symbolized by the food at his party. The people at his party are insensitive to his ordeal; they relate it to the consequences in their lives. His one friend had lost his wife to cancer, and Chuck apologized for not being more of a friend at that time. Chuck realized that life is about loving and caring about people, not service to a company. All the jets, tracking and communications devices could not save or rescue Chuck from his fate. Hope, faith and love strengthened him enough to survive. New Hollywood explores the human condition rather than technology, the spiritual aspect of life. INDUSTRIAL PERSPECTIVE Cast Away can be viewed as a business within an industry. The film industry relies on creating intellectual properties that are sold to users as a rental or viewing. Each property is a business that is labor intensive for the creation period and marketing driven for the next few years. Collaboration is most important to produce a profitable finished product. Financing the films, especially blockbuster projects, require great producers to pitch to distributors and studios. Finally, the film must be marketable, especially in video to create an income stream, a payoff. Collaboration Cast Away reunited Robert Zemeckis and Tom Hanks. The two had previously collaborated on Forrest Gump, a film which grossed almost $680 million. Cast Away ultimately grossed almost $430 million. The New Hollywood seeks collaborative teams for specific projects. The old Hollywood was studio centered. Studios held contracts on stars and directors. The studio heads called the shots. The talent pool was finite within the studios. Writers and directors had to turn out a large volume of work to feed the Hollywood machine. The studio heads were limited in vision, and very bottom line oriented. Truman Capote’s work spanned both generations of Hollywood. Breakfast at Tiffany’s was a studio movie in which the male lead character became a love interest because the studio couldn’t sell him being gay. Then in 1967, In Cold Blood revealed a very heinous crime in the heartland of America. (Capote, 272) Neither movie would be made under different circumstances. The first was perfect for a studio production, the latter for an independent format. The change occurred fairly quickly. Stunts and dramatic car chases showed action. Film became an action vehicle rather than a story telling vehicle, moving away from stage drama to action drama. Just as Chuck Noland had to personally evolve into a simple man and let go of his illusion of control, the studios evolved into a manager of independent talent signed on project basis. The film makers were now in charge of the product. Financing The studios do control the finance area. Great scripts and attaching name brand stars to the project help finance in Hollywood. The studios control distribution as well. Money to create the film and outlets to distribute control the product and income streams. Modern films are very expensive. Budgets of tens of millions are common. Some large studios will not entertain a film with budgets lower than $25 million. When producers pitch film scripts and projects, potential marketing is as important as storyline. Attaching talent with a favorable box office appeal is required to get big studio financing. Many times, though, on small but interesting projects, big name talent and directors will go to independent studios in order to make a film. The “indies” fill the gap of lower priced films. The New Hollywood must compete with the strange ideas and innovative camera work of the indies. The indies also serve as a minor leagues for the big studios where filmmakers can earn some credibility by making profitable indies. Marketing The poster logline is “At the edge of the world, the end of a man’s journey is where his life begins” (Fandango.com, Trailer). This logline calls for an exotic location, the edge of the world. Rebirth, as in, where his life begins. Intrigue, why did the journey end? New Hollywood enjoys fish-out-of-water stories. At the end of his journey, his life begins congers the idea of a man floundering for identity or purpose in a strange situation. The marketing department wants to see a “what if” scenario. What if a time oriented man lost all ability to control his environment, could he survive? Tom Hanks had box office magic in 2000, when this film was released. Zemeckis had several hits leading up to Cast Away, all quality products. Helen Hunt was a star of a hit television series and was the flavor of the month. The core cast members would draw the first two weekends regardless. The downside risk was not too great. Awards marketing sells tickets also. Tom Hanks was popular in 2000, and he won several awards for this movie (Fandango.com, awards): Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama Won 2000 Hollywood Foreign Press Association Best Actor Won 2000 Chicago Film Critics Association Best Actor Won 2000 New York Film Critics Circle Hanks was nominated for four other best actor awards, and the soundtrack was nominated. This buzz rejuvenates a movie for a second round of viewing, thus more sales. Producers want to market to fans that already exist. Hanks fans would watch his movies. Hunt fans would watch her films. Zemeckis is marketed as the director who brought you: Back to the Future, Contact, Forrest Gump, etal., all quality products with a great fan base. The marketing department had an all-star cast, respected director with recognizable movie credits and a good story hook. With Hanks popularity and probable awards nominations, the marketers get a second bite of the apple. The past performance of a Hanks/Zemeckis film grossed over $600 million. This story makes a good pitch to the studio executives to green light a project. FORMAL PERSPECTIVE The language of film means showing rather than telling, structuring a story for understanding and comfort and drawing the audience into an unexplored world. Cast Away has elements of classical Hollywood movies and New Hollywood. The story unfolds in a classical manner. A three act structure is bookended with the desolation of Texas. Each 10 minutes, or ten pages of script, creates a plot point to keep the audience interested. The second act increases the hero’s difficulty to the point of a very high stakes outcomes, in this case, life or death. The third act carries the hero to his destiny. Using the Ackerman method (Ackerman, 79), the Cast Away plot points analysis: 1. The expository scenes tied the desolation of Texas with the hustle and bustle of Chuck’s world. Chuck drives to complete tasks, he’s a go-getter. He would have a fiance if he had time to propose, but he doesn’t. 2. The Inciting Incident: Chuck answers his pager instead of enjoying Christmas with his friends. 3. Plot Point 1: Chuck boards the jet instead of proposing to Kelly. 4. Plot Point 2: Heavy weather, the jet is in trouble, all technology is failing. 5. End of Act 1: The jet ditches and Chuck is the only survivor. This moment comes at exactly 30 minutes into the film, very traditional and pro forma, like time controlled the film. Beginning of Act II: 6. Plot Point 3: Chuck discovers stone tools. Begins to explore the island. 7. Plot Point 4: Chuck discovers the dead flight crew member, Albert Miller. Chuck did not take the time to know the man’s name in civilization, he thought it was Allen. Chuck buries him with no religious ceremony, just “Well, that’s it”. 8. Plot Point 5: Albert’s light dies out. Chuck must live by the natural day/night natural schedule. Chuck cannot signal a boat on the horizon. Tries and fails to raft out to the boat, injuring his leg badly in the attempt. Wilson is born. 9. Plot Point 6: Chuck builds a fire. A rescue beacon, warmth and classic entertainment as he dances singing the Doors “Light my Fire”. Chuck can now cook food, especially the crab. He will survive. 10. Plot Point 7: Chuck removes his own tooth, dealing with infection. 11. Plot Point 8: Chuck discovers his sail, half a portable toilet. 12. Plot Point 9: Making rope to prepare for his escape on the raft. Chuck talks to Wilson about trying to hang himself. Rope is available if he revisits that cliff. 13. Plot Point 10: He escapes the island on his raft and sets adrift. He loses Wilson in a storm. Chuck drops his paddles and trusts the currents to deliver him. 14. Plot Point 11: A freighter finds Chuck at sea and rescues him. End of Act II 15. Plot Point 12: Kelly will not see him at the hangar. She has a new home, a new life. 16. Plot Point 13: Chuck confesses to his buddy about the suicide attempt and letting go of the illusion of control gave him strength to continue. 17. Plot Point 14: Package delivery to Bettram’s ranch and at the crossroads. End of film. Act I and III were classic in length and structure. Zemeckis, as a student of Steven Spielberg, chose to bookend his film with the desolation of Texas. The first scene establishes Bettram as alone on her ranch, but perfectly happy. The last scene shows Chuck pondering joining her there, or at least visiting to introduce himself. The desolation seems inviting to Chuck. Each act is about thirty minutes and tells a distinct part of the story. Act I ends when Chuck’s world changes dramatically in a bad direction. Act three ends Chuck’s dream of reuniting with Kelly, and ends with coming closer to realizing his new dream. Very classic structure and story telling in these two acts. Act II, however, extends for twenty minutes past the conventional length. Instead of six fundamental building blocks, Act II has eight. The filmmaker decides to stretch the audience’s comfort zone of time. The audience expects the act to end and it drags, taking the audience into Chuck’s life experience. Time no longer matters, the film is not on a schedule anymore. Zemeckis used a similar ploy filming Contact. An extra 20 minutes of film lets the audience share Ellie’s experience through the wormhole; however, the rest of the cast experienced that as seconds. Later, the advisor’s share a secret that the recording is 18 minutes of static, even though they were sure it was seconds that had elapsed. This time distortion device creates sympathy for a character and their plight. The audience feels Chuck’s changing sense of time on a visceral level. The end of Act II also provides a life and death, high stakes gamble where everything is lost. Chuck has no option but to have faith in his eventual rescue. The third act is redemptive, Chuck finds a way to carry on. The New Hollywood finds interesting ways to explore the inner dialog. In Fight Club, Tyler Durden is played by two people who represent the good versus evil inner dialog. Tyler organizes amateur fights at night in one persona and represents crash damage analysis for a major automobile company in a different persona. The fight club Tyler is introduced to the audience in a subliminal frame in the movie. He starts flickering into frames early until finally appearing in full on a jet. The audience experiences his birth through their subconscious mind. Cast Away introduces Chuck’s alter ego as a Wilson volleyball. Chuck picks the ball with a bloody hand and throws it. The result is a grotesque face. Chuck gives it expression and begins talking to it. For the second half of Act II, Chuck has a device to communicate inner thoughts to the audience; and, ironically, an audience who cannot respond to Chuck. So again, the audience sympathizes with Chuck’s position. Chuck speaks to the audience without being clumsy. Traditional Hollywood had a choice of voiceover or titles. Old Hollywood became stale and a poor competitor with television. Old Hollywood competed based on size of screen, scope of story, length of movie and lack of commercial interruptions. Re-releasing Gone with the Wind and other sagas in 1966 showed a lack of creativity and an acknowledgement that the glory days were ending. (Harris, 267) The auteur directors began collaborating on edgier movies with new talent. Bonnie and Clyde and The Graduate were released in 1967 and New Hollywood gained momentum. Film now competed with edgier story content and daring and exotic filming. New Hollywood had its’ genesis in farces and comedy versions of classic Hollywood genres, for example Cat Ballou and Our Man Flint, send up comedies of westerns and spy movies. But the movie class of 1967 changed that. Newer, edgier films gained in popularity, but kept some traditional story telling characteristics. Old Hollywood began as a competitor to the live stage. As movies became more popular and profitable, the Golden Age of Hollywood developed. Next, as television became popular and colorized, Old Hollywood had to change to New Hollywood to compete. CONCLUSIONS New Hollywood creates devices to affect the audience in more visceral ways. The stories challenge reality. The New Hollywood values realism, but not reality. The exotic locations and times are no longer defined by real locations. New and strange worlds can be created electronically. The New Hollywood cherishes strong themes, the clock versus the compass, the flawed hero and flawed villain. Most of all, the New Hollywood enjoys creative innovation. Less loyalty to a studio is expected, but great loyalty to a project is. Collaboration of ideas and support to finish the project are valued. The crew, screenwriter, producer and directors, but especially the actors are judged on the end product. Shared vision and commitment for the one project is required of all the stakeholders. In the Golden Age, studios controlled everything including the talent. The director controls projects now. The producer is expected to keep the budget under control, but the director rules over the finished product. The New Hollywood rewards warping reality and innovative technique, as long as the resulting product is realistic and profitable. The creators work in unrestrained environments. The demand for entertainment is still quite high. Stories like Cast Away would have a difficult time being funded in an age when drawing room dramas were the standard. Modern movies have limited narration and rely on action rather than dialog. The inner dialog films are very clever. That innovation and creativity is the New Hollywood. References Ackerman, Hal. Write Screenplays that Sell: the Ackerman Way. Tallfellow Press, Inc: Los Angeles, California. 2003. Capote, Truman. Portraits and Observations. Random House: New York. 2007. Covey, Stephen. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. Free Press: New York. 2004. Darabont, Frank. Shawshank Redemption. 1994. Film. Fandango.com. Cast Away trailer. http://www.fandango.com/movie-trailer/castaway-trailer/15652 Fandango.com. Cast Away, summary and data. http://www.fandango.com/castaway_v229030/summary Fandango.com. Cast Away Awards nominated and Received. http://www.fandango.com/castaway_v229030/awards Fandango.com. Tom Hanks. Filmography. http://www.fandango.com/tomhanks/filmography/p93341 Fincher, David. Fight Club. 1999. Film Harris, Mark. Pictures at a Revolution: five movies and the birth of New Hollywood. The Penguin Press: New York. 2008. Hunt, Morton. The Story of Psychology. Doubleday: New York. 1993. Nolan, Christopher. Inception. 2010. Film. Zemeckis, Robert. Cast Away 2000. Film. Zemeckis, Robert. Forrest Gump 1994. Film. Zemeckis, Robert. Contact. 1997. Film Zemeckis, Robert. Back to the Future. 1985. Film. Read More