Kate Baker

UWRT 1103-003

Mona Lisa Smile: A Rhetorical Analysis of a Published Movie Review

The film I am researching is Mona Lisa Smile (2003) and is about a female university art

professor that teaches her female students in an unconventional way during the 1950s, a time

where women were seen as housewives and not powerful in the workforce. A movie review was

published in the Journal of American History in 2004 by a professor at Smith College. This

journal compiles academic articles regarding historical concepts. There is a particular section for

movie reviews in the journal, written by professors at colleges around the U.S. No pictures are

included in the reviews, just simply text broken up into two columns and separate sections of

multiple movie reviews. This design is used because of its placement in an academic journal and

justified to that of the time period and the commonality of simple print versions of text. The

purpose of these reviews, in general, is to highlight the disparities between actual historical facts

and what the film reveals to be true. It becomes obvious that Hollywood puts on a faade and

alters or ignores history in order to make the story interesting and/or put together. In this

particular movie review, the author, Helen Lefkowitz Horowitz, writes to inform critical movie

watchers, film buffs, and history lovers, about this disparity in what Mona Lisa Smile shows to

its viewers and what are the actual historical facts regarding the film, set during the 1950s at

Wellesley College. Horowitzs ethos or credibility is established from the listing of the college

underneath her name. Although there is no indication of professorship or degree holding, we can

assume that she is of an intellectual community at said college. The intended audience is

intellectual readers interested in history, who have more of a chance of reading the journal, with

the secondary audience being regular movie goers. Conventions of a film review consist of a

short and concise summary in the beginning to set a background for the critique. Then, the

criticizing of the film begins. In this particular film review, there is a heavy concentration of
 Kate Baker
UWRT 1103-003
historical critiques more than any other criticisms, which is attributed to the type of journal it

was included in. There are elements in the film that Horowitz points out as non-factual, but there

are also a few things she makes notice of that the moviemakers did well. A well-written review

will include both positive and negative features of the film. In addition, this is proven to be an

academic text of historical basis because of the citations used throughout. Most movie reviews

do not include citations like those to support their claims, so this review could be categorized as

formal. The normal conventions of informal movie reviews include pictures or stills of the film.

They also speak on overall themes, entertainment level, and may comment on casting and other

design elements. However, a formal movie review, such as this one, takes on a deeply analytical

tone and focuses on important (historical) components of the film and coherence or lack of such.
 Kate Baker
UWRT 1103-003
Works Cited

Horowitz, Helen Lefkowitz. "Movie Reviews: Mona Lisa Smile." Journal of American

History(2004): 1135-136. Film and Television Literature Index with Full Text [EBSCO].

Web. 19 Feb. 2017.