The American Cowboy’s Screen Myth——the Film Study Of Clint Eastwood

Clint Eastwood (1930-) receives the most sincere respect and affection of audiences around the world for his impressive film and television works (including about10films acted by himself and32works directed by himself). As one of the most famous filmmakers in American entertainment circles, not only great commercial successes are obtained in his productions, but also considerable artistic values are presented. Although he follows traditional, he still pursues innovations and breakthroughs, especially his characteristic features at character creation and type breakthrough.Four parts are described for discussing Clint Eastwood’s films by using "Cowboy" as the clue in this paper. The era transmutation of the cowboy character is exhibited in the part one and part two that the cowboy image acted by Clint Eastwood changes from West Cowboy to Urban Cowboy. The part three and four are focused on films directed by Clint Eastwood. And the part three emphasizes the cultural inheritance and development of the cowboy in his directing films. Furthermore, this part is discussed emphatically from three aspects of the cowboy culture: individual heroism, violence with violence and feminist consciousness in the world of men. Last but not at least, the artistic styles of narrative structure and photographic fashion in his films are analyzed detailedly in the fourth part.Two innovations are involved in this paper. On one hand, Clint Eastwood stands a significant place in American Cinema and investigations about his film are much sufficient abroad, however, the systematic theory studies are scarce in the mainland. On the other hand, this article is not focused on broad director theory and exhaustive studies of Clint Eastwood’s films, but detailed discussions on charactering cowboy image through the clue of "Cowboy", while the cowboy culture of America has been inherited and developed.