“PLENTY OF HEART AND PLENTY OF HOPE”: AN ANALYSIS OF SOCIAL AND HISTORICAL IMPLICATIONS IN POST-WWII WESTERN MUSICAL FILMS

World War II had a profound and significant impact on American life and culture. Hollywood and film production was one area that was notably different after the war with themes and settings that promoted patriotism and American values being seen more frequently. Film lends itself to analysis due to its recorded and preserved nature that allows audiences today to view the same thing that audiences in the early 1950s were seeing, albeit with a different worldview. Western movies made in the late 1940s and early 1950s perfectly encapsulate the feelings of most Americans during the postwar period. Additionally, a new subgenre of films, the western musical, began to emerge and gain popularity due to the fact that they appealed more widely to the female audience than traditional westerns. Annie Get Your Gun, Calamity Jane, Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, and Oklahoma!, four of the most well-known postwar western musicals, offer substance to analyze against the cultural backdrop of 1950s America.