Saturday 17 August 2013

Do as I say, not as I do?

I have been reading The American West in Film: Critical Approaches to the Western, written by Jon Tuska and published in 1985. Tuska is concerned with seeing how the images of the West presented in Western writing and in Hollywood films (specifically) are true to history.

Unsurprisingly Tuska finds that the films are rarely accurate, with this reflecting a lack of research and/or the deliberate obfuscation of truths about ‘how the West was won,’ namely through violence, treachery,  and genocide.

Then, in his conclusion, Tuska mentions the snuff film, which he views as actually existing, but apparently without bothering to undertake any research or fact checking.

An ironic instance of ‘printing the legend’...

1 comment:

Elliot James said...

The closest realistic depiction of the west may be Deadwood.

Some writers have praised Albert Salmi's performance in the Twilight Zone episode Execution.