This is a take-home exam due at the start of class on Thursday, April 8th.

Choose 3 of the following 5 questions (not including the extra credit question) and respond to each as thoroughly as you can. Each of your responses should be 2-3 double spaced pages in length. Be sure to address every part of each question you choose.

1. Is Romero’s Night of the Living Dead scary? Why or why not? If so, what about it frightened you? If not, how might it have been scarier? Does it still resonate for the reasons Phillips discusses?

2. Peter Dendle argues that movie zombies can be seen as a “barometer of cultural anxiety.” According to Dendle, the preponderance of zombie movies over the years, in other words, speaks to various anxieties and fears that inform a particular cultural moment. What other genre (or sub-genre) of movies speaks to our fears and anxieties in a similar way? How? Why? Has it evolved in a way that might be compared to zombie movies? Be sure to use plenty of specific evidence from movies or our readings to back up your arguments.

3. Watch Touch of Evil and pay careful attention to the final scene. Consider the last few lines, spoken by Marlene Dietrich’s character, and discuss their significance to the movie. What does she mean by “He was some kind of a man . . .What does it matter what you say about people?” How might we interpret that line? How might we connect it to the moral sensibility typical of film noir according to Schrader, Naremore, Grossman, or Borde and Chaumeton? Use evidence from the film and our readings to back up your argument.

4. Watch a movie released in the 1940s or 1950s (it can be one that’s assigned, recommended, or one you choose to watch on your own on Netflix or archive.org) and discuss how it does or does not adhere to one or more of guidelines for patriotic, anti-communist movies as delineated by Ayn Rand in her 1950 pamphlet, “Screen Guide for Americans.” Be sure to back up your assertions with evidence from the movie and Rand’s infamous pamphlet.

5. Released in 1964 by Columbia Pictures and based on similar source material, Fail Safe and Dr. Strangelove both speak to prevailing fears and anxieties over the very real threat of global nuclear war. They do so, however, in distinctly different ways. Discuss how each film presents the threat of a nuclear apocalypse. What sort of conclusions do they seem to reach about the cold war conflict and the possibility of a doomsday scenario? Be sure to cite evidence from the films and our readings by Whitfielfd and Perrine in supporting your argument.

EXTRA CREDIT QUESTION (optional)
6. “Are you now, or have you ever been a Communist?”