The
Big Tomorrow: Hollywood and the Politics of the American Way
Lary May
Chicago & London: The University of Chicago Press, 2000.
$30, 348 pages, ISBN 0-226-51162-6.
Nicolas Magenham
Université de Paris X - Nanterre
Most people, if asked when American popular culture began to "promote"
radical politics, would answer the 1960s, forgetting that three decades
earlier, established values were frequently questioned, notably in
Hollywood movies. In The Big Tomorrow, Lary May reminds the
reader of the fact that the normative 1940s and 1950s were a parenthesis
between the democratic ideals that characterized the 1930s and the
emergence of a counterculture in the 1960s. The nature and impact
of the rebellious spirit of the 1960s has certainly nothing to do
with what happened in the 1930s, all the more so as some scholars
think that the New Deal saved rather than sapped capitalism. Nevertheless,
May argues that the rebellious movement against the dominant culture
in the 1930s is generally underrated, even though World War II quickly
put an end to it.
Lary May offers a rereading of Hollywood cinema in the 1930s when,
under the guise of entertainment, a great many films criticized social
inequality and upheld progressive values. A large part of the book
is dedicated to one of the most popular figures of the 1930s, the
Cherokee humorist Will Rogers. Although Rogers has often been regarded
as an embodiment of Anglo-Saxon Americanism, May goes against this
generally accepted idea, claiming that "Rogers's capacity to
combine left-wing populist rhetoric with calls for a redistribution
of wealth to realize an inclusive Americanism suggests that these
views have to be revised". May underpins his belief in a pluralistic
American culture in the Depression era with many other examples, one
of the most illuminating being perhaps Sternberg's Blonde Venus
(1932), in which Marlene Dietrich crosses racial and gender barriers.
Furthermore, May insists on an event which is hardly known, viz. the
fact that most of the stars of the period not only fervently supported
Roosevelt's policy, but also joined the union movement in order to
"recover control over their labor". In a very interesting
chapter, May also evokes American movie houses which evolved towards
more humility, notably by getting rid of the aristocratic accents
of their decorations and names. However, as the U.S. entered the war,
the social ideals of the 1930s had to be put aside. Therefore, many
movies in the early 1940s showed what May calls the "World War
II conversion narrative", a narrative pattern involving characters
who have to forget about their politics in favor of a "commitment
to hierarchical institutions”, dedicated to saving the world.
The most famous examples of characters who have to concentrate on
patriotism are no doubt Rick and Ilsa in Michael Curtiz's Casablanca
(1943).
But May's work loses its originality as soon as it reaches the post-war
period. It is in no way less compelling than other well-known books
on the subject: May's style is neat and forceful, and there are even
a few (sometimes) stunning anecdotes about the excesses of the Red
Scare (the one concerning Nancy Reagan—who was denied work by
mistake—is particularly juicy); but generally, this part does
not bear comparison with the first refreshing chapters. Thus the reader's
interest wanes a bit in the second half of the book. When Lary May
analyses non-conformist directors and actors who tried to express
progressive ideas during the normative Cold War era, his remarks are
quite trite (at least in comparison with the first half of the book).
He doesn’t break any new ground when he details the way John
Huston and Billy Wilder bypassed censorship or when he studies the
conservative intentions of Bible films. As for his remarks on the
rebellious aspect of the personae of James Dean, Marlon Brando
and Marilyn Monroe, they can be found in dozens of books before Lary
May's. The choice of illustrations reveals this lack of originality
on the part of the author: in the last chapter, the well-known photos
of Dean and Brando in Rebel Without a Cause (1955) and The
Wild One (1954) contrast with the more original illustrations
of Will Rogers or movie houses that pepper the beginning of the book.
It is necessary to conclude with what appears to be the main quality
of The Big Tomorrow—but which could turn out to be its
main drawback too—that is, May's argumentation. An impressive
number of films sustain May's theories, but if some of his arguments
seem foolproof, they are far from highlighting cinema. Indeed, the
films he refers to are so numerous that May has not always the opportunity
to analyze them in depth, and aside from a few exceptions (notably
his comments on the "reworking of cinematic practices" in
the 1930s, and the working on light in film noir), May regards films
as mere plots, no more no less. For instance, Lary May uses a sampling
method that reflects this unilateral vision very well. With the help
of his research assistants, the author undertook global analyses of
hundreds of plots taken from films that cover the period studied in
the book. Just like any poll, the result is double-edged: May offers
a unique overall view of Hollywood cinema from 1915 to 1960 or so,
which makes his theories seem unanswerable; but this method is ambiguous
from an ideological viewpoint. As May himself admits, his sampling
method prevented him from "[gauging] other aspects of moviemaking",
as it did not take into account meaningful details which could qualify
or even contradict some ideological values, however conspicuous in
the film plots. That sampling method could thus be seen as backfiring
on May himself and his fresh theory on 1930s films: many films that
appear to be progressive according to their plots could turn
out to be conservative when watched carefully. Though somewhat abstract,
my reproach is legitimized by the fact that seemingly progressive
Hollywood movies that are actually reactionary are quite widespread.
So in spite of a dubious sampling technique, May's The Big Tomorrow
is still an excellent book on 1930s American culture, and its
relatively disappointing last chapters provide nonetheless a very
good introduction for anyone who is not familiar with Hollywood during
the Cold War.
