Ancient Greek Virtrues and Modern Film

The purpose of this research is to examine the depiction of ancient Greek virtues and ideals in modern films. The plan of the research will be to set forth the cultural context in which the resonance of ancient Greek virtues with modern artistic narrative forms assumes importance, and then to discuss ways in which different aspects of the Golden Age ethos, especially relative to the Greek myths, theogony, and religious attitudes, can be discerned in contemporary films.

The relevance of ancient Greece to contemporary Western culture--especially popular culture such as films--may seem tenuous at best. The polytheistic paganism of ancient Greece, the fact that Greek civilization was so soundly eclipsed by Great Rome, the difficult and dense poetic and discursive philosophical texts, and the archaeological evidence of the primitive features of daily experience in the ancient world establishes less a linkage than a disconnect between that world and today's technology-driven environment of convenience. Yet of course Greece does retain its fascination for modern sensibility because it was the seat of the culture of the West that survives today. And it is a fascination with the familiar. Protagoras, who lived in the fifth century BC, is credited with the declaration that man is the measure of all things (976). For him, the declaration was an exercise in ontology and the legitimation of human reason; the whole of his statement reads thus: Man is the measure of all things, of being th

Related Essays

ANCIENT GREEK AND HEBREW THOUGHT .... "Ancient Greek vs. Biblical Education." Retrieved at: Homeschoolstudies.com/ TG/Philosophy/11biblicalvsgreek.htm No author listed (2002). .... (1688 7 )

Role of Women in Ancient Greek Society Role of Women in Ancient Greek Society The relationship between Greek goddesses and women in ancient Greek society; the historical underpinnings of Greek .... (2984 12 )

Sibling Relationships in Ancient Greek Plays .... Kitto uses the term DikA� to describe the Greek idea of the universe as "a cosmos, an ordered whole, a balance of opposites. . .... Graves, Robert. The Greek Myths. .... (3044 12 )

Ancient Greek Values: The Case of Antigone Ancient Greek Values: The Case of Antigone In Antigone, Sophocles (60) early establishes Antigone's dilemma: her brothers have been killed and Creon, king of .... (775 3 )

The Icarus Paradox of Management In ancient Greek mythology In ancient Greek mythology, Icarus had wings of feathers held together by wax which enabled him to fly. Entranced with his newfound .... (2506 10 )

his friend. Undoubtedly, such a narrative would have been alien to Greek or Roman society in the ancient period, since these were slave states and since slaves do not seem to have been perceived as human. That does not prevent Kubrick from projecting humanity onto the slave persona, however, and in that projection is contained the Greek idea that reason is part and parcel of the human condition and that it can be used to good effect. The attempts of Spartacus and Varinia to establish a more or less normal and moderately lived civilized domestic life in the context of desperate flight and battle against Rome therefore assume a degree of poignancy. The same dynamic is at work in Antoninus's determination not to see Spartacus crucified, for such a spectacle would surely demoralize and devalue everything that the slaves have been trying to construct for themselves. Indeed, at his limited leisure, Spartacus finds time to ruminate with Varinia on the idea of a god. Reason, speculation, life lived moderately--those are the values that the rebellious slaves embrace, and they are to be likened to the proper cosmic order of things. Equally, they are to be contrasted with the punishing Roman response to the revolt. Kubrick's penultimate f

Category: Film - A