War Films Research Articles

Narrating Crisis through the Loyalist Witness

Abstract Scholarly interest in Syrian wartime witnessing has overwhelmingly focused on how cultural production bears witness to state violence. In this article, I shift attention to a form of loyalist wartime witnessing by asking how the films of Syrian director Joud Said construct war stories giving meaning to regime narratives of a ‘crisis’. Drawing on two of his films, Maṭar Homs and Darb al-Sama, I argue that Said’s works narrate crisis through the loyalist witness, a subject victim shifting attention towards how armed groups and other Syrian ‘enemies’ perpetrated violence and inflicted trauma on Syrians. In positioning the loyalist witness as the subject through which Syrian trauma is narrated, Said’s films delineate what can and cannot be seen and said about the Syrian conflict. As the subject of his war films, the loyalist witness functions to obscure and render invisible regime violence and responsibility for Syria’s catastrophe.

Bomb Archive: The Marshall Islands as Cold War Film Set

This essay offers a decolonial analysis of the inaugural moment of the United States’ Cold War project—the nuclear weapon “testing” in oceanic environments. As an alternative to the usual framing of Pikinni Atoll as a site of the Cold War arms race that tends to invisibilize Marshallese experiences through a Cold War binary logic, this article invites the reader to focus on the Pikinni Atoll as a film set. It offers such an approach with the hope of reframing questions of justice and recognizing the worlds lost due to the production of US nuclear modernity.

The Battle of Neretva (1969): Production, Exhibition, Reception, Aesthetics, and Historiography

The Battle of Neretva, directed by Veljko Bulajić is one of the biggest war spectacles produced in Yugoslavia following the famous partisan battle with Axis forces during World War II. The film serves as a useful site from which we can understand the conventions of the Yugoslav war film while its exceptional production and exhibition strategies and reception history signal a critical turning point in the cultural understanding of the war film as a meditator of history. By studying the film’s production, exhibition, and reception, aesthetics, and historiographical significance, and drawing upon original archival documents preserved in the Jugoslovenska Kinoteka/Yugoslav Cinematheque in Belgrade, this paper aims to identify, assess, and expose the layered significance of the film The Battle of Neretva, and to further map out its position within (Yugoslav) film history.

Analyze the innovative exploration of war history movies from "Eight Hundred"

War movies in the new era not only bear the box office, but also bear a nation's attitude towards history and its own cognition. The innovation of technology, the liberation of ideas and the increasing distance of time and space between the audience and history make the development of war films face new problems and challenges. More and more mainstream war movies still do not break the traditional mainstream war movies' plot conception, characterization and didactic meaning are too rigid. As one of the few successful war movies in recent years, Babai overturns the flat characters in traditional movies and uses imagistic symbols interspersed with each other, which is a major breakthrough. And in the plot of a large number of "black and white contrast" to the film invisibly added a bit of tragedy. At the end of the film, the image of the white horse and the rat will be displayed, and the artistic depth of the film will be raised abruptly. These new explorations in the film will undoubtedly become an important reference for future war films.

Discussion on Domestic War Films in the Post-Epidemic Era from the Perspective of Film Industry Aesthetics

With the development of Chinese film industrialization in recent years, the development of domestic historical war films has taken on new trends and situations. On the one hand, these films are well produced and have exquisite special effects, reflecting the extremely high industrial level and even setting new box office records; on the other hand, setting cultural confidence, tapping the treasures of traditional and local culture, making domestic war films have more Chinese spirit and temperament and better telling the Chinese story.

The Creation of the Hero Image in Realistic Military Drama—Take "Li Yannian of Meritorious Service" as an Example

In recent years, the ratings of military dramas have continued to decline, and there are few characters that audiences are enjoying. As a recent fire out of the circle of red theme film and television drama "Meritorious service". Through the realism unit military drama Li Yannian, this paper discusses how the heroic image in contemporary military dramas can avoid falling into the vicious circle and how realistic dramas construct the heroic image. Excellent literary and artistic products can always be moved and resonated by people all over the world, and the heroic image of defending the home and the country is respected and revered by all mankind. Through the realistic creation direction of military drama and the construction and typical image of the theme characters of military drama, this paper analyzes the important core of the realistic theme drama, in order to express the invincible, brave and tenacious optimistic fighting spirit of Chinese men.

Особенности перевода названий военных фильмов с английского на русский язык

Importance. The features of the translation of war film titles from English into Russian are considered. Today there is a problem of adequate translation of film titles from English into Russian. Due to the different characteristics of the source language and the target language, as well as the cultural characteristics of all ethnic groups, the translation of a military-themed film from one language to another is not just a translation, but a recreation of the military reality of foreign armed forces. To do this, the translator must have the necessary background knowledge that will allow him to correctly recreate this reality. Special attention should be paid to the translation of titles that not only reflect the content of the film in a succinct form, but are also one of the first factors that potential viewers pay attention to. The purpose of the study is to identify the features of the translation of the names of war films and to determine how the translator can most adequately convey the meaning of the original title. Materials and methods. The war film titles in English and their translations into Russian are analyzed. A selection of the most interesting and problematic of war film titles was taken. Based on this sample, a classification of the types of translation of war films was compiled, as well as an analysis regarding this classification was carried out. The most frequent errors in the translation of war films were also identified. Results and Discussion. It is revealed that the translator, in addition to understanding the context of the film, must have the necessary background knowledge to adequately translate the title taking into account military realities. It was also revealed that some titles of military films cannot be translated literally, and require a creative approach of the translator. Conclusion. A number of recommendations are proposed for translators that can help more accurately convey the meaning of the original title. The described features of translating the war film titles in English into Russian can be useful not only for translators, but also for a wide range of readers and viewers. The recommendations formulated on the basis of the research results can help translators and localizers to more accurately convey the meaning of the war film titles into Russian.

Viper on the Hearth's Unfinished Business: Anti-Mormonism and Mormon Studies

<i>Viper on the Hearth</i>'s Unfinished Business: Anti-Mormonism and Mormon Studies

Editors’ Introduction

Editors’ Introduction

Genre, Narrative, and (Mis)remembering the Vietnam War in Jacob’s Ladder (1990)

In this article I examine the role of memory in Jacob’s Ladder (1990), and I argue that Jacob’s Ladder takes as its subject cultural memories of the war and dramatizes the problematic status of cinematic representations of the past as public memory. This is evident in the way in which the film draws on the viewer’s generic memory through the remediation of the iconography of contemporary Vietnam War films such as Platoon (1986), Hamburger Hill (1987), Casualties of War (1989), and Born on the Fourth of July (1989) but refuses the narrativization of the soldiers’ experience through the use of a modular narrative form. I argue that Jacob’s Ladder inhibits the formation of cultural memories about the war through a critique of the ‘veteranness’ of the ‘grunts’ war’ films of the late-1980s that sought to extend the experience of the Vietnam War to the viewer cinematically as a form of recovered memory. I also examine the ways in which Jacob’s Ladder represents the scenes of reminiscence as being both therapeutic and traumatic and discuss how the film presents an alternative path to coming to terms with the past through conscious acts of remembering and forgetting.

Between Adoration and Criticism Towards Japanese Colonialism：Reception Toward &lt;i&gt;Murudeka 17805&lt;/i&gt; Movie in Indonesia

This research study on how a collaborative war movie between Indonesia and Japan entitled &lt;i&gt;Murudeka 17805&lt;/i&gt; (2001) is received in Indonesia. Through content analysis of the movie, it is found that this movie depicts the intimate yet hierarchical relation between Indonesia and Japan, whereas Japan acts as the elder sibling who guides and will transfer their knowledge and skills to Indonesia, so that Indonesia may be able to fight against the colonizers. This is in line with the ideology of Greater East Asian War, termed “Greater Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.” Through the comments analysis of YouTube viewers, the result shows that there are comments expressing gratitude and adoration toward Indonesian and Japanese soldiers who had fought in the battlefield, and on the other hand there are also comments criticizing Japanese colonialization and arguing that the movie itself is a propaganda movie. The number of comments expressing gratitude and adoration and expressing neutrality by inviting the readers to forget about the past is larger than the number of comments criticizing the movie. The result of this study shows that this phenomenon is related to several factors：younger generation who never experienced Japanese occupation, the history lessons in schools which focusing more on memorizing events rather than critically reflecting on the past, the act of silencing critics toward Japan by Indonesian government in 1970s, and the massive spread of Japanese pop culture in Indonesia since 1990s. Although the number is not as high as grateful and adoring comments, comments that have critical reflection toward the movie still exists. The commentators are usually those who have heard stories about Japanese occupation in the past from the previous generation or have learned about it from various sources of knowledge.

De-enemizing the enemy in the contemporary truce film

The author’s interest resides in war films which re-humanize the enemy so as to question the militaristic philosophy and politics of a given military conflict. Her discussion focuses on the truce film as a notable subgenre of the war film which, characteristically, transcends both historical and nationalistic paradigms. The analysis of Kya Dilli Kya Lahore and Camp X-Ray, as examples of two subvariants of the truce film, serve to underscore the narrative and cinematic strategies used to construct the effect of the interchangeability of the enemy protagonists, therefore ostentatiously undoing traditional state and army enforced forms of ‘distancing’ (see Grossman, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society, 1995). The questions to be posed include where, when and why truce films are produced, how do they correlate to the prevalent definitions of the war film genre and, finally, to what extent can they be seen as potentially constructing a ‘prosthetic memory’ (Alison Landsberg, ‘Memory, Empathy, and the Politics of Identification’, 2009)?

Alien Listening: Voyager’s Golden Record and Music from Earth, by Daniel K. L. Chua and Alexander Rehding

<i>Alien Listening: Voyager’s Golden Record and Music from Earth</i>, by Daniel K. L. Chua and Alexander Rehding

Military terms in the modern war films: translation issues

The study explores the military lexicon used in the modern war movies, such as “1917”, “Fury”, “Dunkirk”, “Hacksaw Ridge”, “Unbroken”, “Journey’s End” and “Midway”. The article examines military terms of modern-day war films as well as specialized methods of the interpretation of military lexicon into the translated language. The study discusses military terms and phrases as a key element of the movies’ and suggests its own classification of analysed material. According to their official definitions, their conceptual and semantic meaning, military lexical units are sorted out into the following lexical semantic groups: “Nominations of military way of living” (24%), “Nominations of military professional terms” (31%), “Nominations of military positions, groupings and ranks” (26%), “Military commands” (15%) and “Nominations of enemy’s army soldiers” (4%). The translation of the military lexicon used in the films, which is implemented by Ukrainian interpreting companies, requires thorough approach in the aspects of translating highly specialized vocabulary of an audiovisual product and adapting it in accordance with the context. The article reveals that 51% of the material analysed in the research is translated with the use of complete equivalents – lexical units that coexist in both languages and carry the same semantic meaning. The other part of the lexicon explored is interpreted with the help of translation transformations such as modulation (25%), adaptation (8%), generalization (3%), omission (1%), joining (2%), and transliteration (3%). Additionally, the research determines another group of cases of the language units’ specific interpretation, when jargon words and collocations are applied in the target language (7%). The study’s discussion will contribute to improvements of the further studies of lexicology and terminology of the military branch, thus defining semantic classification of the military language units, dealing with the methods of translation transformations, and selecting the most appropriate translational variations of a particular lexical unit with no accurate equivalents. The material analysed in the article can be used for translating military lexicon in the war films and military projects as well as for studying linguacultural and sociolinguistics studies.

‘Be a real man for our motherland’: Masculinity and national security in Chinese Korean War films

There has been increasing societal discussion and criticism on the ‘lack of masculinity’ among Chinese young men. In response, the Chinese Ministry of Education in 2021 advised schools to ‘foster the students’ masculinity’. The Chinese National Radio and Television Administration also set strict rules for casting and choosing performing styles, custom and makeup in order to eliminate the ‘abnormal aesthetic’ and the ‘male feminization’ in Chinese television, film and advertisement. At the same time, various war films and television shows present characters and circumstances that highlight an ‘ideal’ masculine archetypes as well as the quality of a Chinese male character – patriotism, heroism, selflessness, strength, loyalty and intelligence. This article examines and compares the male images in two Chinese Korean War films, Shangganling and Changjinhu. It analyses the changing portrayal of male war characters based on three levels of analysis, namely nationhood, leadership and individuals. This study argues that the ‘masculinity crisis’ has led to the securitization of Chinese masculinity, a process and outcome driven by the Chinese government’s continued efforts to control and channel the broad social and cultural changes which have impacted popular culture, sexuality, gender and women’s rights and roles across Chinese society over the past several decades.

Scattered Showers by Rainbow Rowell

Reviewed by: Scattered Showers by Rainbow Rowell Amanda Toledo Rowell, Rainbow Scattered Showers. Wednesday, 2022 [288p] Trade ed. ISBN 9781250855411 $24.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781250855428 $12.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 8-12 Master of romance Rainbow Rowell shows her prowess yet again with this delightful short story collection featuring characters new and returning. “Midnights” is a young adult homage to When Harry Met Sally, about two best friends reaching for each other over a series of New Year’s Eve parties throughout their high school years. “Kindred Spirits” is a witty, pop-culture tale of burgeoning new love discovered in the line to see the new Star Wars film circa 2015. Each story is crafted with humor and care, and the joyful early stories transition smoothly into more somber fare. “Winter Songs for Summer” is a mature but wickedly funny exploration of a first break up and moving on. “If the Fates Allow” revisits Reagan from Rowell’s Fangirl during the 2020 pandemic; “The Prince and the Troll” is a somber story about a world falling apart, ultimately focused on the sweet, human connection in the midst of chaos. Simon and Baz of Carry On are featured in “Snow for Christmas,” a perfect, poignant epilogue to the trilogy. This anthology neatly straddles the line between Rowell’s young adult and adult fiction, and it’s a must-read for fans of the author, while also offering a treasure trove for romance fans in general. Copyright © 2022 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

An Analysis of Speech Act on Civil War Movie

This research aims to analyze speech act found in Civil War movie. This research focuses on the conversation between Captain America and Iron Man. The method used in this research is qualitative using conversation analysis. The data were collected from conversation script between Captain America and Iron Man. The result of this research shows that in the conversation between Captain America and Iron Man. It was found that there are three kind of speech acts used between Captain America and Iron Man. They are locutionary, illocutionary, and perlocutionary acts. The most speech act frequently used is locutionary act with total number is 33 (46%). While the second speech act frequently used is illocutionary act that are 23 (33%). For perlocutionary act is only found 15 (21%). In locutionary act, the conversations consisted of rhetic and phatic act. Illocutionary act dominated by asking and answering and perlocutionary act involved sarcasm, joke and caution.

Forgettable Tales of a Forgotten War: Narrative, Memory, and the Erasure of the Korean War in American Cinema

The Korean War is paradoxically remembered in the United States as “The Forgotten War.” While there are many reasons for this amnesia, the war’s representation in American popular culture, and cinema in particular, remains a key factor. Looking beyond the narrow canon of Korean War film “classics,” this article surveys a broad spectrum of American-produced Korean War films made since 1951 in terms of their capacity (or rather incapacity) to serve as adequate means of Korean War remembrance. Building on memory studies scholar Astrid Erll’s theory of media and cultural memory, the article proposes a typology of the kinds of (non-)memory work done by American Korean War films, with a specific focus on common narrative strategies that not only hinder remembrance but facilitate forgetting. These include the frequent subordination of the war to background or other ancillary roles, overly generic and nonspecific treatments of the war, and the tendency to conflate Korea with WWII. The article frames the mnemonic implications of these narrative strategies in terms of the compromised memory potentials they generate, including “peripheral memory,” “vague memory,” and “parasitic memory.”

Great Patriotic War in Soviet and Post-Soviet Cinematography: Problems of Remediation

The article is devoted to the representations of the Great Patriotic War in Soviet and postSoviet cinematography. The study presents the comparative analysis of the heroic narrative dating back to wartime propaganda and most clearly manifested in post-war film epics, as well as the tragic narrative, which is inextricably linked with the ‘lieutenant’ prose of the Thaw-era. The changes in the images of the Soviet cinema in the Russian war films of the 2000s are considered. It is proved that these changes, found in modern series and remakes, are critically evaluated by both academic circles and youth audience. On the basis of discussions held in ten focus groups the main critical attitudes are analyzed. Particular attention is paid to the problem of remediation which consists in the predominance of visual images only outwardly copying popular Soviet films, without independent reflection on the specificity and the meaning of military experience. It is noted that the concept of remediation makes it possible to shift the focus from dissatisfaction with individual parts of films about the Great Patriotic War to the general problem of changing the media regime in modern society and to start analyzing the mechanisms of its functioning.

The soldier as victim and aggressor: subverting the hero soldier in Apocalypse Now, Dien Bien Phu, and White Badge

ABSTRACT This article examines the subversion of the hero soldier figure in three Vietnam War films from three different nations that faced defeat in Vietnam: Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, Schoendoerffer’s Dien Bien Phu, and Jeong Ji-yeong’s White Badge. A close analysis reveals that all three films undermine the image of the virtuous and powerful hero soldier through recurring stylistic elements. Apocalypse Now, through the ‘Ride of the Valkyries’ helicopter sequence – as well as the opening and ending sequences – portrays the American soldier as a barbaric aggressor. Dien Bien Phu, meanwhile, visually undermines the image of the powerful hero soldier through cinematographic techniques which portray the French soldiers in the field as small and powerless. Finally, White Badge – which, unlike the two other films, takes place in the post-war period – subverts the image of the hero soldier through its use of auditory and visual elements to portray the Korean soldier as aggressor and, first and foremost, victim. The article concludes with a discussion of how the three films influence audiences’ perceptions of those who fought in Vietnam.