East of Eden

Elia Kazan directed East of Eden, based on the John Steinbeck novel. The film is set in Salinas Valley around the time of World War I. This film won Best Dramatic Film at the Cannes Film Festival in 1955 and Best Motion Picture – Drama – at the Golden Globes in 1956. Kazan also directed A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) and A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945).

Two teenage boys, Cal (James Dean) and Aron (Richard Davalos), live with their father, Adam Trask (Raymond Massey). Cal is labeled “bad,” while his brother is “good” and “righteous.” East of Eden is a story of blocked communication between father (Adam) and son (Cal). Cal vies with his brother for their father’s love, although Aron easily holds on to all of his adoration. The characters in the film offer a real and emotional performance; it’s easy to feel the character’s emotions – jealousy, spite, sympathy, hope – throughout the entire movie.

The brothers are raised by their father, believing their mother, who shot their mother and ran away, to be dead. Adam often rebukes Cal and offers all of his love to Aron. Cal and Adam have arguments about Cal’s behavior. One day they are arguing and Adam tells Cal that he is bad. Cal replies, “You’re right. I am bad. I knew that for a long time. It’s true. Aron’s the good one. I guess there’s just a certain amount of good and bad you get from your parents and I just got the bad.” Cal, who needs to find a reason for the “badness” that lives in him, searches for his mother whom he suspects of being alive. He finds her running a successful brothel. Cal now holds the truth, and the power to destroy his fragile brother, in his hands. He can tell destroy his brother by telling him about their mother, whom Aron believes to be an angel in heaven, or keep his secret, thereby preserving Aron’s good nature, innocence and his hold on their father.

Abra (Julie Harris), who is Aron’s girlfriend, helps Cal through his struggles. At the beginning of the movie Abra is frightened of Cal and she feels that he is always spying on her and Aron. Abra comes to realize that she and Cal share common struggles and the emotions that accompany them, and she eventually becomes the person Cal can look to for friendship, guidance and love.

East of Eden also portrays stereotypes about Germans, since the film in set around the time of World War I. A German shoemaker, Gustav Albrecht, is a friend of the Trask family. He is constantly trying to defend the Germans throughout the film, explaining that they are not all terrible, and instead finds his friends turning against him, although the Trasks consistently defend him. Albrecht is seen leaving a carnival saying, “Can’t I say my opinion?” after trying to defend German reputation to his acquaintances. His formed friends follow him from the fair and start a scuffle with him on his lawn. The fight is broken up, but you get a sense of stereotyping in this short scene.

This film is worthy of viewing. It uses the simplicity of emotion (jealousy, love and hope) to recreate real situations that are present in everyday life. It doesn’t need complex special effects and gut-wrenching stunts or gore to absorb the viewer in the storyline. Everyone can associate an experience in their life with an event in East of Eden.

“You think you know who you are? You have no idea.”

Paul Haggis, director of Million Dollar Baby, brings the world of stereotypes to the forefront in Crash (winner of the Academy Award for Best Motion Picture of the Year for 2004), a complex movie set in Los Angeles. Watching this movie encourages viewers to consciously think about the pictures they have formed in their minds about people of different race, gender, ethnicity and social status. Hopefully people will question the common misconceptions they may have about people of another race or ethnicity.

Crash is a worthwhile movie because it will make people aware of their beliefs and the film works to challenge them. It is a film that will make you question your beliefs, your morals, your outlook on life. As the characters are introduced to you in the film, you will automatically create your own conclusions about them: who they are, why they act and talk the way they do, what they will become. Stereotypes people form at the beginning of the film will be challenged throughout the story. Crash is filled with intertwined lives of characters, stereotypes, emotions, morals and plot twists.

In the film a Persian family’s store is broken into and vandalized. The vandals graffiti the walls with derogatory terms and refer to the storeowners as “Arabs.” Shereen, the storeowner's wife, asks, “They think we’re Arab. When did Persian become Arab?” This leads the family to believe they were attacked for simply being “Arab.” Unfortunately, this is a common misconception that many people share; many people are guilty of grouping people in categories, such as “Hispanic,” “Asian,” and “Arab,” even though people within those groups would not describe themselves as such. People must realize they cannot lump all people into one race or ethnicity.

There are a variety of characters in this film, including a TV director and his wife, two young black men who steal and sell cars, a prominent district attorney and his distraught wife, a Mexican-American locksmith, a Persian family, a Chinese man who sells people into slavery and his wife, two police detectives and a seemingly racist police officer and his seemingly non-racist partner. Throughout the film the characters collide with each other in a multitude of situations that cause them to reinforce or contradict the stereotypes they hold and the stereotypes that are held against them.

Lippmann writes, “Out of the opposition we make villains and conspiracies” (70). People that are considered “different” are labeled as opposition. No matter what they do or how they behave they are plotting against the person who is the same. A person can always find fault with the “opposition.” For example, the district attorney’s wife tells her husband that she wants to get the locks on their home changed a second time after a Mexican-American man changes them the first time. They argue back and forth for a time and when her husband finally says okay, she yells, “And you might mention that we’d appreciate it if next time they didn’t send a gang member […]. Yes, the guy with the shaved head, the pants around his ass, the prison tattoo.”


As the story progresses, the viewers get a glance into the characters’ lives, explaining possible reasons for their actions and beliefs. Each of the characters has a back story that causes their frustration, anxiety, cruelty, happiness, anger, sympathy or hope. It’s left to the viewer to decide whether the characters’ background is sufficient enough to explain their behavior. Most importantly, Crash forces viewers to think about the racism, discrimination, stereotypes and prejudice that still occur today.

Spotlight: Philo T. Farnsworth, Take a Bow

Documentary: "Big Dreams - Small Screen"
Philo T. Farnsworth, a man who found his calling in life in stacks of old science magazines he found in the attic of his childhood home in Idaho. Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell were his heroes. He got his idea for creating a picture on television from a potato field. He spent his life working endlessly to bring his idea of electronic television of life, yet few people recognize his name.

When Farnsworth was fourteen years old he developed the blue print for an electronic television system. He realized that he could create a picture using electrons. He moved to California with his wife, Pem, when he was nineteen. Farnsworth set up a makeshift lab in the dining room of his Hollywood home and began to create his idea. Nothing in his system was store bought; therefore, he had to be financed by investors. He was the first person to acquire a patent for the television system. He eventually demonstrated his invention in a museum, although attendance was not extremely high.

While Farnsworth was working on his invention, he attracted the wandering eye of Vladimir Zworykin, a Russian engineer who was also trying to develop electronic television. Zworykin had financial backing from RCA, which meant he had much more financial freedom than did Farnsworth. He visited Farnsworth to get ideas on how to build transmission devices because Farnsworth was ahead of him. He basically stole Farnsworth’s blueprints. After this event, RCA tried to offer Farnsworth money for the patent for the television system and Farnsworth refused. RCA eventually demonstrated the workings of a television in New York. This debut is titled as the first electronic television system. The event was even attended by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, which empowered the history of RCA.

As the disputes for the patent ensued, Farnsworth’s fire for invention started to flicker; he began to burn out and eventually turned to alcohol for comfort. He was hospitalized several times while the disputes continued. Fortunately, Farnsworth finally won the patent dispute and for the first time in its history RCA had to admit defeat and pay royalties to Farnsworth. On the downside, RCA is often still credited for developing television.

Throughout this period, it is easy to see that Farnsworth, even though he was white and educated, was in the subordinate position and considered inferior, at least by RCA’s standards. Zworykin is clearly in the dominate position; he was backed by RCA and had the financial backing to work on developing television and to attract a crowd when he was ready to debut his system. The little guy is often trumped by the big guy when it comes to inventions and history. Big corporations (RCA) get recognition over individual inventors. Farnsworth lacked the financial resources and recognition that RCA had.

It’s important to realize that the big names we know, whether they are inventors, athletes, celebrities, etc., are not always the pioneers of their field. Popularity and money often go hand-in-hand and the people who receive recognition for their deeds are often famous and have money. This documentary is worth-watching because it places the true inventor of television, the lesser-known little guy, in the spotlight where he belongs. Now we need to realize that just because history recognizes one person or corporation as the “father” of something doesn’t mean that that person really deserves to hold that title. Seek out the little guy and give him (or her) some credit.