The most obvious pair of contradictions is of course the contradiction between civilization and wildness (freedom). In "The Wilderness", it is the contradiction between the cowboy and the homesteader. In "Noon" it is the contradiction between the sheriff and the east. The bad guy caught by the sheriff is pardoned by the east, and The east began to invest in the small town. An important reason why the sheriff’s former friends were unwilling to help the sheriff was also worried that another gun battle would lose the investment in the east. Civilization is the side of justice in "The Wilderness", but in "Noon", it is more inclined to the side of the sheriff who is used to solving problems with guns. Civilization and wildness have no obvious difference between who is right and who is wrong. Just like Rick’s cowboys in "The Wilderness", Rick’s cowboys are not bad guys. Rick has always advertised himself as reasonable people, and his confession to Joe It makes sense. He thinks that they risked their lives to open up this land. Now these self-cultivators can come here to divide his land without taking any risks. He feels that it is unfair. At the same time, the hero of the western hero is the most embarrassed in this pair of contradictions, because he has the dual attributes of civilization and wildness. He belongs to the past era, but also guards the achievements of civilization. In the end, it is difficult for both parties to accept him. . Whether it is Sean in the film or the sheriff in "Noon", their final ending is to leave the town.
The second pair of contradictions is an extension of the first pair of contradictions. It is the contradiction between women and men, which is actually the contradiction between family and wild nature. Women have always been a symbol of family in Western films, and the greatest responsibility of women is to attract Western heroes to put down their guns and return to their families. This symbolism is the most obvious in "The Wilderness". Every homesteader forms his own family and has a wife, while the group of cowboys in Lake is always a group of men gathering in a bar to drink. See you To any female figure. In "Noon", the heroine has been actively calling the sheriff to put down her gun and go with her, and let the sheriff choose between marriage and responsibility. Of course, the heroine who was finally transformed was the heroine, and she picked up the gun. Help the sheriff to kill a bad guy. In "The Wilderness", Sean tried hard to integrate into the family, and fell in love with Joe's wife, he also put down the gun, but he finally found that he was not suitable for this kind of life. Joe's wife knows best. Once Sean shoots again, he must leave the town.
The invasion of the eastern civilization into the western towns is always emphasized in "The Wilderness", "there is already a prison", so "the era when you can grab someone's land with a gun is no longer." The era of the cowboys is over, and the era of Sean as a hero of the West has also passed. The use of guns to kill people was increasingly banned in later heroic films. In movies such as Superman, Spiderman, and Batman, these heroes can only capture bad guys alive and hand them to the police, or these bad guys can only Kill yourself while plotting the hero. In short, heroes are no longer allowed to commit suicide privately.
Civilized rituals are an important tool to repeatedly confirm the value of civilization. In "The Wilderness", National Day and funeral are the keys to maintaining the unity of the community. After a homesteader was killed and everyone else was ready to leave, Joe persuaded them to attend the funeral and rekindled everyone's belief in and protection of family and community values through the funeral.
The role of the child. Although the West has passed away, through the repeated viewing and imitating of Sean (the hero of the West) by children (actually the audience), the spirit of the West is passed on to the next generation again. Perhaps the more obvious manifestation of this effect is the 1969 "Tear of the Earth", which was released at the same time as the "Thunder of the Earth", as well as "Easy Rider", "Midnight Cowboy" and "Tiger Leopard", the latter three works. They were all new Hollywood works that rebelled against their fathers and authority. However, that year, Oscar alone awarded the best actor award to the one-eyed sheriff played by John Wayne in "Land Thunder". In "Thunder in the Ground", as a child, he has been watching Wayne as his father. Although Wayne is now old, fat and ugly, he is still an undoubted hero.
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