Intercultural sensitivity in Orientalist cinema

Edward Said’s dogmas of Orientalism are a succinct summary of western perceptions of the East, which reveal an essentially racist discourse that also speaks to the westerner’s self-perception. While there is a tendency in fiction film to polarize attitudes as either friendly or hostile, for reasons of narrative economy and to enhance dramatic conflict, this article argues that it is possible to measure the behaviour of fictional characters on a continuum describing intercultural sensitivity to assess how these characters appear to respond to the idea of cultural differences, broadly ranging from the most ethnocentric views to more ethnorelative ones. Since the intercultural development continuum (IDC) is structured as five developmental stages, it provides a finer psychological template than Orientalist binaries, offering a more nuanced view of character motivations and attitudes. The IDC scale is ideally suited to narrative analysis as it usefully describes successive stages that characters may exhibit throughout the course of a story depicting intercultural exchanges. The IDC allows the analyst to gauge the degree of conformance of any given film to Said’s aforementioned dogmas, particularly those films that either express an ambivalent attitude or appear superficially more enlightened or accommodating of difference. This model will be illustrated with a number of case studies selected from a filmography focusing on western representations of Singapore in film and television, from 1940 to 2015, including titles such as the Bette Davis plantation melodrama The Letter, the science fiction thriller Hitman: Agent 47 and the Australian period TV series Serangoon Road.

The Right Place to Be

Days after leaving Selznick, Steiner became the highest-paid staff composer at Warner Bros. It was a deal he was quietly arranging before leaving Selznick, detailed here for the first time. Steiner would spend most of the next three decades at Warners. This chapter provides a detailed examination of the studio’s music department, and explains why its infrastructure, staff, and varied creative content were ideally suited to Steiner’s talents. The chapter describes his friendly if competitive relationship with Warner Bros.’ favorite freelance composer, Erich Wolfgang Korngold. Steiner works discussed include the Best Picture–winning Life of Emile Zola, the start of his long collaboration with Bette Davis, and his iconic Warner Bros. fanfare. The chapter also chronicles the unexpected death of Steiner’s mother in Vienna, and Max’s frantic—and ultimately successful—efforts to bring his father to America, after Hitler’s annexation of Austria.

Voyage into Fog

This chapter juxtaposes Steiner’s intense correspondence with his estranged wife—then living in New York, and hoping to begin a singing career at age 35—with the emotional power of his scores of the time. They include They Died with Their Boots On, starring Errol Flynn (a rare western Steiner loved scoring, thanks to its rich characterizations), and Now, Voyager, the peak of his work with Bette Davis. The latter score earned Steiner a second Oscar, and partially fulfilled one of his unrealized ambitions: authorship of a popular song. After nearly a decade of battles with ASCAP—which still refused to collect royalties for film music—Now, Voyager’s hit song “It Can’t Be Wrong” yielded Steiner much-needed royalties from sheet music sales and recordings. But these earnings could not save him from mounting debt or convince Louise to return to him.

Going Backstage, Then Getting Nostalgic

As the 1960s end and the 1970s begin, Betty Comden and Adolph Green worked on two new shows. The first was Applause, which though set in then-present-day New York was something of a backward glance. It was a musical version of the classic Bette Davis film All About Eve. The show, which had a score by composer Charles Strouse and lyricist Lee Adams, was a hit for the writers and its star, film luminary Lauren Bacall, who was making her debut in a musical. They followed with another nostalgic piece of writing, Lorelei, a revision of the musical Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, penned specifically for its original star, Carol Channing. Comden and Green were only to provide lyrics for a handful of new songs, but when the production was foundering on the road they stepped in as its directors, working on it for over a year.