Hollywood takes flight

Of all the major Americanisms to spread their wings and leave US shores, it is fair to say Hollywood, or more specifically the Hollywood culture, has been the one to have the greatest global impact. And yet, it would not be unreasonable to suggest that film cultures from across the world have indeed had a profound impact on American society and Hollywood filmmaking.
This to-and-fro effect is an example of hybridity, whereby cultures influence others until the point of forming a new and unique culture.
In recent times we have seen more and more international actors winning the big awards such as a Golden Globe for Marion Cotillard or an Academy award for Jean Dujardin. However, actors, like people in all professions, are prone to travel, and what is really worth examining is the degree to which the spread of cinematic cultures outside of the United States has influenced Hollywood and American filmmakers.
I have previously discussed the works of Quentin Tarantino in this blog, and his filmmaking influences are well documented elsewhere. But outside of Tarantino, Martin Scorsese and Woody Allen are just two directors who have been inspired by foreign cinematic methods. On top of this, the influence that Italian culture in particular has had over Scorsese is often revealed in his films.
While not always a direct result of hybridity, the recent increase in success that Hollywood has seen globally owes much to transnationalisation and the ever increasing stream of American films being distributed overseas. Randolph Bourne (1916) wrote as far back as the first World War that America is ‘coming to be, not a nationality, but a transnationality, a weaving back and forth, with other lands, of many threads of all sizes and colours,’ and nearly a century on, this is still ringing true.
But just as equally, many countries apart from the United States are becoming more transnationalised, and, as discussed, just as foreign film cultures have captured the imagination of Hollywood, so too has the Hollywoodisation of those countries’ film industries seen a transnational effect take place there as well.

References
Bourne, R 1916, Trans-National America, Swarthmore College, retrieved 25 September 2013, ‹http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/rbannis1/AIH19th/Bourne.html›