Ep 5. The Cowboy President

Cinema Toast season 1 episode 5 is called "The Cowboy President." The episode highlights the strange and fascinating history of American Presidents who have dabbled in cowboy culture. It showcases how the mythic American cowboy has been a potent symbol in American politics for centuries.

The episode aims to give a lighthearted portrayal of the image of Presidency in American history by focusing on cowboy culture. Viewers will get a mixture of entertaining anecdotes and amusing trivia about some of America's most famous leaders, from Theodore Roosevelt's cowboy persona to Ronald Reagan's Hollywood triumphs.

The episode brings together various short films that are dedicated to different narratives of cowboy-inspired Presidents from different eras. The audience will be treated to a series of moving images that include animated shorts, public domain videos, and documentaries. All of the films have been chosen to entertain as well as inform.

There's a certain clarity in the thinking of the American cowboy - a fierce independence that's aligned with the image of rugged determination and stoicism. The "cowboy" President seems particularly well-suited to this strain of thinking, as demonstrated by the various Presidents featured in this episode.

One of the episodes anecdotes showcases how Grover Cleveland was a Sheriff, and spent much of his early life on the frontier, dealing with cattle rustlers and outlaws. We are taught that Franklin D. Roosevelt was famously photographed on horseback and wore a cowboy hat. Harry Truman famously joked that "I'm from Missouri..I know how to ride a horse." It's true that Presidents from this era were often photographed looking the part of rugged frontiersmen.

However, it wasn't until Ronald Reagan's presidency that the cowboy image became a highly marketable cultural symbol, much like a Hollywood movie. Reagan exuded a kind of breezy, aw-shucks charisma that was highly appealing to many American voters. He had a natural flair for the camera, and many of his star-studded movies during the 1950s and 1960s were unapologetically cowboy-themed.

Viewers of the episode will learn how Reagan deployed cowboy-style rhetoric to great effect when selling his administration's policies. Reagan once famously stated that "All great change in America begins at the dinner table," and this homespun, folksy wisdom tapped into an enduringly popular image of the cowboy as the ultimate populist.

The episode is framed around the idea of the cowboy as an evergreen American symbol - a representation of the untamed frontier spirit that has driven this country since its inception. The episode is framed in a way to provide continuity between the evolving American Presidency and the changing face of American pop culture.

Each of the shorts that make up the episode have been chosen for their humor, warmth, and their ability to evoke a nostalgic sense of our shared past. Some of the animation shorts are infused with a surreal, dreamlike quality, while others are more matter-of-fact in their presentation.

Overall, "The Cowboy President" is an uplifting and fascinating episode that offers the audience a glimpse into the mythology of the American Presidency. The cowboy has been the enduring symbol of the self-made man in America since the 1800s, and this episode makes clear why this image still resonates with so many people today.