Disha Murugupandiyan - Week #8 - Movie Myths
When I initially saw the theme “America” at the beginning of this quarter, my first thought was, “What even is American? What defines America in a way that I could write about it? Hamburgers? Football? There’s quite literally nothing else.” Contrary to my expectations, I did end up finding a lot more diverse topics than I thought to write about around the theme of America. However, since this is the last blog post for this quarter, and ultimately this semester, I think it’s only right that I go to where this started: the American stereotype.
Young kids in America often base their expectations of the world, including the high school experience, off of movies. Especially those cringy high school movies with the tall lockers, groups of student cliques, bullies, and impromptu sing-alongs. Personally, when I watched those movies with my older sister as a kid, I thought that the characters were so cool, and that they had a considerable amount of freedom to do whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted. But let’s be honest: that’s definitely not the case. I truly think I didn’t see a single one of those characters do even a piece of homework throughout the entire movie; instead, they either spent it creating a band, falling in love, or having some type of egotistical fight with a fellow classmate. Of course, there’s the occasional film that dips their toe into the deeper and more emotional end of this style of movies, including Dead Poets Society and The Perks of Being a Wallflower (both of which are amazing movies). Now, as high schoolers ourselves, we’re able to disprove certain aspects of high school lives in movies as well as approve of the accurate ones.
However, foreigners also learn about American culture through the movies that they see (among other forms of media). For example, they often think that there are visible hierarchies in American high schools and that they severely impact the way that each “rank” experiences their school life due to that cliche being portrayed repetitively in movies. With the jocks on top, the band geeks stereotypically end up at the bottom and are the ones getting picked on. This is among some of the biggest exaggerations that come with pop-culture movies that are created for entertainment. There’s also the constant physical bullying, the dramatization of prom and dating, as well as the huge, mansion-like houses present in some movies. While every state and region in the United States definitely has its own respective practices and cultures, there are some of these exaggerations that are taken too far.
From an entertainment aspect, there isn’t anything wrong with these films; they’re generally fun to watch and carry a good plot line. But these tend to be what foreigners use to conceptualize and understand American culture, and as a result, often end up disappointed when they visit the US. This goes not only for any genre of movie, but any type of media: social media, news articles, or whatever content is the most popular, most viewed, or most liked. That’s the type of content that reaches their phones first, rather than the smaller stories. It’s sometimes not the most favorable in aiding in bettering their view of us.
And let’s be fair, we unconsciously do the same thing with foreign content. Whatever we see in foreign media influences the way that we understand and view that respective culture or certain aspects about it, whether or not it has been dramatized. There’s always a good chance that we never get the full story.
Overall the development of the American stereotype has turned into more of a joke than anything. Stereotypes have developed from derogatory means to more novel ideas and humorous points. Take the “cringy high school movies” for example. The amount of parodies of these iconic movies I see online is surreal and they will come from people who have never even attended an American public school before. Though that doesn’t really matter since most of these movies are idealistic "expectations" of what the real world is like. I agree that although these movies are good for leisure they do not encapsulate the real American high schooler experience. Despite going to a school literally called “American High School” I would say our school is very different from those in movies. The majority of us are academically driven and if not academics we have found our own interests that we have devoted time and energy into. Although not perfect I do see that our school is not as focused on “student cliques” and "impromptu sing-alongs” that movies tend to focus on. I think the magic of these movies is that it excites us into wanting to go to high school and have new experiences. A large part of these coming-of-age movies is the main protagonist goes through this whole storyline in order to learn about what is within. That part of these movies is what I find to be most authentic, even if exaggerated just a bit. It gives us the hope that when we are their age we too will learn and grow.
ReplyDeleteI think the reason why all of these old high school movies used to same old cringy cliches is because cliches work. I admit that most of these cliches of nerds being on the bottom and the jocks with their varsity jackets are quite outdated and now to be perceived "cringy" however, that was not the case before. Our high school, American High School, has been extremely academically driven and it is blatantly seen that ones academic prowess is most prized above all else. This is a clear contrast to the old high school movies and is probably because we live in the Bay Area. Your comment on how these stereotypes in foreign movies are often embedded into us giving us a wrong impression of that culture is really good insight as I also had wrong insights in some parts of Indian culture and high school life.
ReplyDeleteHi, Disha. I remember when I first watched The Perks of Being a Wallflower, and it sparked something inside me. I agree that it’s a great (understatement) movie. I also think the first time I watched the Dead Poets Society was in my freshmen year English class, but I’m not too sure. I also deeply enjoyed that movie. I agree with your point about movies exaggerating high school, and more so how actors usually are played by people who definitely (and comically) look much older than high school age (ex. The Vampire Diaries, Riverdale, Dawson’s Creek, etc.). I think your point about how these movies are watched most and romanticized is probably because people generally like to watch light and upbeat movies compared to depressing ones. Shows/movies like 13 Reasons Why, Thirteen, and Palo Alto, show the darker side of American high school experiences. I think the target audience and age group that watch them the most are American teenagers/young adults because they can relate to them in some capacity. However, movies like Clueless, Mean Girls, and The Princess Diaries have a wider target audience and can (and are) watched by all ages because they’re more digestible and entertaining without needing specific representation.
ReplyDeleteI really like the idea overall of your blog. I have to admit, I was thinking of writing about this topic too. The way America seems to foreigners always baffles me because high school is not what they expect. It isn't just football teams and cheerleaders or having burgers; there is so much more to it. This reminded me of the phrase when people say “were you born in America?” or “are you from America?” as a way of implying how stupid we are. There are so many common stereotypes associated with our country and the individuals in it, being obesity as well as not that intellectual. Especially when you bring up cliche high school movies, I feel like the reason why producers do this is just because of how it works, and how it all falls under a common theme. While you do admit that there are some classics which I myself have also enjoyed, including Dead Poets Society and The Perks of Being a Wallflower, I wish there was more just like this. Now, high school movies are so expected and they all fall under a common theme: girl meets boy, boy likes girl, girl plays hard to get, and then they live happily ever after. It saddens me sometimes on how movie producers won't expand from these common ideas.
ReplyDelete