If I watch movies from say, the 40's...with bad acting, will I get an idea....?

Question

of the mentality of that time?
Like I think there's a biiig generational gap between the baby boomers and people born in the 70's...
And I don't really understand what people back then had to deal with.
Will old movies help me understand?

With bad acting I think you can see through people more.....

(I was born in 79 (i'm 28)

HEY, I'M NOT SAYING THEY COULDN'T ACT BACK THEN, QUITE THE CONTRARY.
Sorry for shouting...not on purpose...
I'm saying if there was a movie With bad acting. 60% of movies today I find are full of bad acting....

Thanks Rick. What I was asking!! ;-)

Dan Bueno and Mr Ed....thanks for such valuable answers...
That's some reality and culture for me!

Answer 1

Bad acting? Percentage wise there are much, much more BAD movies made TODAY then there were in the forties, and fifties. And they just DO NOT make actors like they used to...

Jimmy Stewart
Edward G. Robinson
Henry Fonda
Katherine Hepburn
Cary Grant
Rita Hayworth

and hundreds more!

Answer 2

lI often think when watching those movies, people were so naive back then, and I guess they reflect the "smaller worlds" that people lived in. The movies appear to be made for a mass audience that hasnt traveled internationally or been exposed to other cultures. An unsophisticated group of people.

There was no global community so these movies have very stereotypical usually false cultural roles. You will also notice that Hollywood was a white world, and ethnic characters are played by white actors "made up" to look Chinese or Indian or whatever.

Another thing I cant help but notice is the overdramatization of every emotion - I am not sure what the motivation for that was. Its something I have often pondered - I believe they were made for a society that loved the high drama. But were also based on the way roles were played in the theatre, vaudville, and opera - all stage productions as if it took them time to realize the movie camera can pick up more subtle expressions and actions.

While the actual content and acting doesnt necessarily reflect the way life was back then I believe that in this case the media is most definitely the message and it is very revealing about how society during those times.

The one thing in the actual story line I believe does reflect society of those eras is they were made when men were men and women looked pretty and swooned a lot and clung to the arm of a virile tall dark and handsome man as often as possible.

Definitely men ruled and women followed unless the female lead was a devious and evil person.

You will also notice there were "good girls" and "bad girls" and nothing in between --

Answer 3

Well you can get an idea of the general thoughts in society but not really about the intelligence of that group. T.V. was new and not a well developed art form. They just didn't know how to do it very well. They thought they had to spell everything out for the viewer to ''get it''.
You will see a lot more concerning the fact that women were thought of as second class citizens.
I have also come to realize how racists these old movies were. Even up to the 70's. In any of the old westerns Native Americans and Mexicans were either evil and cruel or childish and stupid. Any white woman who was taken captive by Natives were either crazy or just no good any more. These things do not represent a lack of intelligence, just a superiority complex. We are still struggling with this more in the world than in the movies and TV

Answer 4

When I think of popular movies with bad acting from the 1940's, I think Frank Capra! I would say those movies would tell you something about the era, because people loved them. They glorified the common man and appealed to the values of the times. However, the plots were so corny and the lines were so cheezy! I know I will draw fire from all sides for this, but "It's a Wonderful Life" is enough to send you into a diabetic coma! When that little girl says the line about the angel getting his wings, my whole family screams and makes knife slashing motions. "Meet John Doe" is nauseating and "Mr. Deeds Goes to Town" is an insult to Vermonters. My poor father should have gotten the Congressional Medal of Honor during WWII, because he was stuck on a destroyer in the Pacific for 14 months with no other movie except "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington"! He said they'd play it over and over, just shouting out the lines in unison for fun. Once another ship came alongside and they asked if they had any movies to trade. Guess what the other ship had?
Having said all that, I think "Arsenic and Old Lace" is great and "Lost Horizon". I was thinking that "Sullivan's Travels" was a Frank Capra movie, but it isn't. That one is good.

Again, sorry if I've stepped on toes! We also scream and slash during "The Sound of Music".

Answer 5

I think you might get a better idea of what dedication & training was all about. Those actors & actresses were ususally under contract & had to do what they were told to do...or else! If they so much as looked at the studio owner the wrong way, they could end up on the road, rather than shooting in the studios! Look at some of Judy Garland & Mickey Rooney's old movies as teenagers & you can see the pain in their eyes. Black Beauty, National Velvet & the Bad Seed have some really good bad acting in them too. The studios were brutal on their people back then. It was kind of a trade off for fame...you sold your soul to the devil, so to speak!

Answer 6

first of all there were not any baby boomers around until the late 40's they were caused by all of the returning soldiers returning from ww ii with a little bit of build of passion --- so you might want to look to the 50's for the boomer=== as kids it was the best of times -- fast cars and new interstates being built and the start of cheap air flights and than along can the 12 year war which had more effect on the baby boomers than any thing else == but most live through the era and cut their hair and cut back on pot and bevcame upstanding peelers of the nation!!!! you may get a taste of it if bush keeps fulling around with the middle east you will see what american was like toward the end of my war when college kids were being shot and/or fleeing to canada!!!

Answer 7

Not withstanding smoking, drinking, and chivalry in the movies, ....

I've noticed that the biggest differences between movies then and now is the number of cuts between scenes. Nowadays it seems that the whole movie is done in the cutting room. The number of cuts is outrageous. If you say "CUT!" every time a scene changes in a movie these days, you'd drive yourself (and everyone else in the room nuts.

Watch an Alfred Hitchcock or a Rod Sterling movie and watch the pans, rather than the cuts in movies.... . Acting back then was more of an art where you had to remember more than one line at a time.

Alfred Hitchcock's movie "Rope" has ONE CUT in the whole movie. It was done more like a stage play than a movie. Awesome!

Look at the movies done then and the re-makes done now. The technology makes the movies more exciting to watch but with that, you don't need or have as good actors.

GOOD luck and have fun.

Answer 8

Hi Craig D-
There's a generational gap every decade because current events have an impact.. Each decade different trends exist that we can only see in hindsight. For instance; My Dad was at Pearl Harbor and fought in the Pacific for the duration of the war. I saw a generation of guys (deceased now) that wore their hats ****** to one side, chewing their gum with their mouth open and walking with a defined gate. They adapted these habits from Errol Flynn, Jimmy Cagney or Tyrone Power and were kept through their lives. I have a forty one a yr old son that has some mannerisms like Tom Cruise (Top Gun). I dare not tell him!

Anyway, each movie presents events, dress, mannerisms, value systems and philosophy of the time.

http://www.homevideos.com/indexbestpic.htm

This will get you started. Go get 'em, Cowboy!:
:) Juju

Answer 9

You will notice that people smoked more in those days; the actors and actresses were constantly smoking or lighting cigarettes. I believe that most adults in those days did smoke. Some people actually did use cigarette holders.
Most men wore hats with the front brim slightly turned down. (there's a name for those hats, but I don't remember, my dad always wore one). Women also wore hats, and most of those hats were ridiculous looking. Men in movies always wore suits, no matter what their position in life was. Not so in real life, but men did wear suits a lot in those days.
People, in movies, always seemed to have bottles of liquor sitting out on a table or counter. (maybe they did that in some places, but not where I lived; I was a young boy during the fifties, and raised in a little old northern prairie town) Drinking, as well as smoking, was considered a natural progression into adulthood during those times.
Men always opened doors for women, mostly true in movies as well as real life. Same thing with helping women take their coats off. (we, as young boys, were expected to learn these things; make them a habit)
Most of this stuff sort of ended during the sixties, when things got really wild.

Answer 10

I'm not sure movies are the place to go to get a true idea of what people had to deal with. Hollywood is notorious for its skewed view on things. I guess you could get an idea of Hollywood ettiquette, or values, but I doubt it would match the real world back then any more than it does now.