The Disney PIXAR movie Cars by John Lasseter and Joe Ranft exhibits a striking amount of pastoral. While the story focuses on Lightning McQueen and his journey to humbleness, there is also the storyline about Radiator Springs, a town that was forgotten as the interstates were built to get people from one city to another as fast as possible. The segment often called “The Story of Route 66” is a great example of elegiac pastoral as it mourns the loss of the harmonic balance of nature and Route 66. The decline of Radiator Springs is shown in flashbacks showing the town in its former paradisiacal beauty lost to the fast living times that can’t afford to wait and look at beauty.
The scene is accompanied by James Taylor’s “Our Town” which might seem a little heavy on the pastoral but works quite well with the rest of the movie’s soundtrack.
And as a treat:
P.S.:
With my rather brilliant nephew Fynn being nearly six it shouldn’t be a wonder that I’ve seen this movie.
It’s one of his favourites and we watched it a couple of times together (in English, of course, seeing that his is better than mine).
P.P.S.:
Perhaps I am not American enough but I just can’t any kind of harmony in “concrete streets + nature”.
Posted by Konstantin Zielke
Hahaha, no shame in watching Cars. I was 18 when I saw it, and I don't even have a brilliant nephew or excuse.
ReplyDeleteI like this post though.
Since I am a pretty American American, I have seen Jungle 2 Jungle, George of the Jungle, and Crocodile Dundee about 400 times. Each. So I can attempt to make an answer to your question about harmony within the environments.
Well on the first day or so of class, I remember learning that nature is pretty relative and kind of a construct anyway. I mean, even when humans lived in nature we started building societies and shelter. I don't think there is probably much of a difference between an advanced ancient Native American city and a modern city aside from the size and building material. And concrete is just like a mutated rock anyway. I think whenever people started becoming a stationary society is when things got weird and the relationship with the environment changed.