Thomas Schatz and Rick Altman are two contemporary film theorist who have focused their theory on film genre. Schatz’s theory discusses the cultural context film genres are built on, as well as explains the connection between film genre and genre films. On the other hand, Altman’s theory suggests a semantic/syntactic approach to help solve the contradictions within genres studies and offer a model to analyze genre. Schatz’s assessment of Badland (1973), directed by Terrence Malick would be that the film’s crime and drama genre has a mixture of elements from both the determinate and indeterminate space, which would make it difficult to classify under a single genre. Furthermore, Schatz would also argue that it would be difficult to determine
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Altman’s semantic approach states “we can as a whole distinguish generic definitions which depend on a list of common traits, attitudes, characters, shots, locations, sets […]” (Altman 10). This approach emphasizes the key elements that make up the genre that allow the viewer to determine the genre of the film. Badlands is classified under the drama and crime genres, the drama genre is a sub-genre and the film displays a small amount of the common traits like: real life characters, setting, and situations. However, the film does not display common traits of the crime genre like: the male protagonist, narrator, point of view of the world, the woman victim, and femme fatal. Altman would argue that the film does not fit under his semantic approach because the roles of the crime genre are switched, for example, Holly is the protagonist, she narrates the film which illustrates that the viewer is seeing the world through her point of view. The film does show crime, violence, innocent lives being killed, and the couple running from law enforcement, but Altman would question if that is enough. In addition, Altman would argue that the film does not follow the syntactic approach. According to Altman, the syntactic approach is a, “common constitutive relationships between undesignated and variable placeholder” (10), to clarify this approach is the story structure. Altman would not classify Badlands, under the crime and drama genre because it’s syntactic story-arc does not follow the traditional crime and drama structure. To further explain, the story of the film does not arc like a crime film for a few reasons: Kit is not a bank robber so there is not object to his crime, and there is no rational motive for the violence. When compared to a film like Bonnie and Clyde, the film falls flat in its story-arc which question its
Altman’s semantic approach states “we can as a whole distinguish generic definitions which depend on a list of common traits, attitudes, characters, shots, locations, sets […]” (Altman 10). This approach emphasizes the key elements that make up the genre that allow the viewer to determine the genre of the film. Badlands is classified under the drama and crime genres, the drama genre is a sub-genre and the film displays a small amount of the common traits like: real life characters, setting, and situations. However, the film does not display common traits of the crime genre like: the male protagonist, narrator, point of view of the world, the woman victim, and femme fatal. Altman would argue that the film does not fit under his semantic approach because the roles of the crime genre are switched, for example, Holly is the protagonist, she narrates the film which illustrates that the viewer is seeing the world through her point of view. The film does show crime, violence, innocent lives being killed, and the couple running from law enforcement, but Altman would question if that is enough. In addition, Altman would argue that the film does not follow the syntactic approach. According to Altman, the syntactic approach is a, “common constitutive relationships between undesignated and variable placeholder” (10), to clarify this approach is the story structure. Altman would not classify Badlands, under the crime and drama genre because it’s syntactic story-arc does not follow the traditional crime and drama structure. To further explain, the story of the film does not arc like a crime film for a few reasons: Kit is not a bank robber so there is not object to his crime, and there is no rational motive for the violence. When compared to a film like Bonnie and Clyde, the film falls flat in its story-arc which question its