Learning Objective

To understand the representation of ethnicity in

Action Adventure films

• Villains are often non-white or ‘foreigners’ in Hollywood Action Adventures.

Ethnicity

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom – Indians and Raiders of the Lost Ark - Germans

The Mummy - Egyptians

The Goonies – the Fratellis (Italian)

Ethnicity• Asian (Chinese, Japanese etc)

characters are often wise or skilled in martial arts (Karate Kid, Jackie Chan/Jet Li/ Bruce Lee films).

Blaxploitation• The 1970s also saw the emergence of

black action cinema (sometimes called "blaxploitation") with both male and female heroes deploying violence, gun power, and martial arts against oppressive enemies and institutions.

•In particular, the international stardom achieved by the Hong Kong cinema martial arts icon Bruce Lee (1940–1973) suggests the possibility of shifting the seemingly fixed association of white heroes in US cinema. Lee's premature death, in the same year that his first (and only) American production, Enter the Dragon (1973), scored a huge commercial hit, reinforced his iconic status.

Biracial casting in ‘Buddy’ FilmsJust as 1970s blaxploitation deploys uncomfortable racial and sexual stereotypes, the 1980s variant of biracial buddy movies, such as 48 Hours (1982), the Lethal Weapon series (1987, 1989, 1992, 1998), and the Die Hard series (1988, 1990, 1995), has been read as a strategy to exploit and contain black male stars, such as Eddie Murphy. These films pair black and white stars in order to appeal to the widest audience demographic, and in the process black characters are typically portrayed within primarily (or entirely) white institutional contexts.

Die Hard

The cowardly/incompetent black side kick

• Chris Tucker as Ruby in The Fifth Element

•Snails in Dungeons and Dragons (Marlon Wayans)

More recent improvementsDenzel Washington

Wesley Snipes

Samual L Jackson

Will Smith

Hancock

Question 3

• Discuss the ways in which the characters are represented in the extract. [20]

Stereotype Representation Ethnicity Target Audience

Expectation Roles Blaxplotation