the damaged male and the contemporary american war film

War. Therefore, the changing conception of the contemporary war film is predicated on a
crucial shift in how the US positioned itself on the global stage, and stepped out of the shadow
of Vietnam. The US’s new position was predicated on the twin pillars of clear strategic aims 16 ,
and the spectacle of immense force. 17
The changing nature of war and war films also means that monumental organising schemes
such as the concept of “genre” may not be useful anymore. Indeed, as Westwell observes, it is
probably more useful to conceive of ‘cycles’ of films, rather than grand, monolithic genres. 18
The very notion of genre itself may not be that helpful, since ‘different genres are designated
according to different criteria’ with science fiction and the western ‘defined by setting and
narrative content’, but horror and comedy ‘defined or conceived around the intended emotional
effect of the film upon the viewer’. 19 Further instability in the concept of genre is noted in the
‘ironic hybridisation’ of Hollywood film since the 1980s, in which genres, styles, and
conventions are blended. 20 This hybridisation is notable in films as diverse as Blade Runner
(Ridley Scott, 1982), which mixes elements of science fiction, film noir, and conspiracy films,
and Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994), which blends the gangster movie, romance,
blaxploitation, and the road movie. Janet Staiger points out additionally that this hybridisation
has been present in its un-ironic form throughout the history of Hollywood film, with many
films not ‘easily arranged into categories’. 21
16 Andre Gunder Frank, “A Third World War: A Political Economy of the Persian Gulf War and the New World
Order” in Triumph of the Image: The Media’s War in the Persian Gulf – A Global Perspective. Ed. Hamid
Mowlana, George Gerbner and Herbert I. Schiller (Oxford: Westview Press, 1992)
17 See the ‘Shock and awe’ tactics deployed by the US military during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and the frankly
ludicrous sight of US marines ostentatiously displaying their attack drills on a largely deserted airfield during the
1994 invasion of Haiti.
18 Guy Westwell, War Cinema, 9
19 Barry Keith Grant, Film Genre: From Iconography to Ideology (London: Wallflower Press, 2007), 23
20 Jim Collins, ‘Genericity in the Nineties: Eclectic Irony and the New Sincerity’ in Film Theory Goes To The
Movies. Ed. Jim Collins, Hilary Radner and Ava Preacher Collins (London: Routledge, 1992), 245
21 Janet Staiger, ‘Hybrid or Inbred: The Purity Hypothesis and Hollywood Genre History’ in Film Genre Reader
3. Ed. Barry Keith Grant (Austin, Texas: University of Texas Press, 2003), 185
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