Film studies Notes

▪ Brad pit ▪ Morgan freeman ▪ Arnold (the big man) ▪ Jonny Depp ▪ Marilyn Monroe ▪ Denzil Washington ▪ Jackie Chan ▪ Micheal Kane ▪ John Travolta ▪ Eddie murphy ▪ Cameron Diaz ▪ Will smith ▪ Elizabeth Taylor ▪ Hugh Grant ▪ George Clooney ▪ John Wayne ▪ Russel crow ▪ Nicholas Kage ▪ Bruce Willis ▪ Leonardo DiCaprio ▪ Benerdict Cumberbatch ▪ Jona hill ▪ Chanum tatum

Name as Many actors as you

can

Fundamental in developing star theory Four key points: ▪ Star as capital value -They make money for the film companies -Films with stars will make more money than films without stars -How much are they worth? -They add monetary value to the film and reduce the risk of loss ▪ Stars as Construct -They are very much involved in their own mythification. How might they be involved? -Christie Gledhill wrote that stars ‘reach us through their bodies’ -We want to know the ‘real’ and ‘reel’. If we go to the film we will learn who they really are: real person, reel person, persona ie a combination of both -Average age for a man is 36; for women 27.

Christine Gledhill

▪ Stars as Deviant -They live their lives to excess, outside the normal rules of behaviour -Hollywodd dtars breaking the rules add to our interest ▪ Stars as cultural value -‘Stars signify moral, social and ideological values’ -They tell us what we think and hoq to behave, what is right and wrong, even how we should look and what our culture should be like

▪ Stars as a social phenomenon -How stars are understood as fulfilling a social and cultural function phenomenon -consider how we idealise them ▪ Stars as image -uses semiotics and cultural studies to ask about the social meanings and stardom in general and specific stars in particular and how these meaning are produces or constructed ▪ Stars as signs -is about the problems associated with a star and a particular representation of a character in a film and how the two interact. For example arnold in kindergarten cops

Richard Dyer

HOLLYWOOD DOMINATION