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2. Literature Review
During the history of film development, there are various kinds of films like romance, comedy, fantasy, Sci-Fi and horror, etc. With so many excellent films emerging, people start to focus on different films and try to study some of them. Also, films become an important intermediary for people to comprehend perse culture.
“Dictionary of Film Art” gives the definition of comedy: Comedy is a kind of film which produces effect with laughter as characteristic and contains a complete comedy concept in general by creating comedy characters and major background. Exploring the ridiculous phenomenon in life together with inflated processing is the main artistic means to achieve the unity of the reality and exaggeration. Its purpose is to glorify the wonderful and progressive things or ideals with the help of laugh. It also satirizes or taunts the unenlightened phenomenon in order to entertain and educate audience in laughter. The result that positive forces vanquish evil forces is often the solution to solve contradiction in comedy. Generally, the outcome tends to be comparatively happy and relaxed.
So we can simply say that comedy films just pay much attention to happiness in real life. It dose not talk about any gloomy side of life. Comedy differs from tragedy in that it shows positive attitudes towards life. However, some scholars put forward that comedy is something of no value and we do not have to waste time on such unnecessary things. The statement that affirms comedy deserves no value is ridiculous.
Up to now, many scholars have studied the comedy from the perspective of professional angles, such as anti-intellectualism, philosophy, traditional religion and so on. However, for ordinary human being, it may be too hard to understand it. So, as far as I am considered, we should connect the comedy with people’s real life. There are few people who have made research that combined American comedy films and American culture.
The American dream, as an important part of American culture, has been included into the theme of films for many times. Such films mostly focus on the changes of American social life and the study of social problems. In recent five years, many scholars have studied this film from different cultural angles, for example, Wangmin analyzes the film from the perspective of class consciousness in 2009, and other professors , like Yang Huhong，from the point of active exploring spirit in American value system.源-自-优尔:,论'文'网]www.youerw.com
However, few of them like the comedy Forrest Gump can reflect a strong vigor and vitality of the traditional American dream after the counterculture movement, which means the fragmentation and return of the traditional American culture. As a result, I want to write a paper to make up for absence in this area.
3. Film：Mirror of Culture
3.1 Brief History of Comedy Film
Film is not only a kind of expression which takes advantage of modern technological achievements and various materials to create the visual images, but also a kind of modern art, called the “seventh art” after the literature, music, architecture, art, sculpture and dance. It shapes realistic images through the space and time of the screen to reflect social life. In 1894, the history of American film started after Edison invented the film endoscopic. Later, as the World War I broke out, Hollywood films flourished, the film center changing from Europe to the United States. Nowadays, American-made films are popular all over the world.
The history of comedy traced back to the ancient Greeks, whose concept and practice has been influencing today’s works. Some defined comedy as a form of drama which uses ordinary characters in every situation in an entertaining way. Other ancient writers improved this definition and found out that in comedy, the characters tend to be private inpiduals who face life easily and happily and hold positive attitude. As Griffith created the narrative form of the film, the American comedy film has made historical progress. The outstanding artists truly assigned the American comedy film the concept of narration, making comedy films occupy the whole silent film era. In a sense, the silent film era is the era of comedy, and the 1920s is golden age of American comedy.