The Influence of the Movies

Introduction

“The Influence of the Movies” is a satirical piece that humorously critiques the impact of movies on an impressionable individual. The story is presented as a letter to a magazine, highlighting the absurd lengths the narrator goes to in order to emulate the characters and lifestyles portrayed in films.

This very short story uses humor and satire to critique the superficial emulation of movie characters and the unrealistic portrayals of life in films, highlighting the sometimes absurd impact of media on individuals.

Summary

The story is framed as a letter addressed to a fictional “Photoplay Megazin,” in which the narrator expresses profound gratitude to the movies for shaping his life. He starts by explaining that he was just a simple country youth until he began frequenting movie theaters. By observing the actors’ dress and behavior, he meticulously saved money to imitate their style. Notably, he references films like “Showboat,” “Bardelys the Magnificent,” “West of Zanzibar,” “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” and “The Trail of ’98” as his fashion inspirations.

His dedication to copying the actors’ mannerisms is so thorough that, despite his sophisticated appearance, he is consistently uninvited to social events. The narrator also adopts the criminal behavior depicted in movies like “The Great Train Robbery,” “The Racket,” “Underworld,” and “Forgotten Faces,” which ultimately leads to his imprisonment in Sing Sing, though he boasts about owning a mansion and having numerous servants.

The advent of talkies (movies with sound) marks a significant turning point for the narrator, who had lived in silence for thirty years. He learns to speak by mimicking the dialogues in talkies, acquiring phrases like “Jeeze, kid, dis is a swell dump!” and perfecting a distinctive accent he describes as “Jew-Yankee pronunciation.” He also adopts exaggerated pronunciations of words like “rawther” and “fawncy,” which he attributes to the influence of the movie “The Letter.”

In addition to learning speech, the narrator avidly reads movie magazines, gaining absurd insights. He humorously claims that the inhabitants of Temple, Texas, frequently drive 225 miles to Paris, Texas, in an hour, a feat he attributes to the expansive perspective of New Yorkers accustomed to the vast distances of their cityscape.

The letter concludes with the narrator mockingly providing advice on how to write a letter that won’t get published, signing off with “Love and hisses.”

Characters

  • Narrator: The protagonist who humorously attributes all his life changes to the influence of movies. He goes to extreme lengths to imitate the actors’ dress, behavior, and speech.

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