Conflict in The Quiet American

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The movie The Quiet American by Graham Greene is a fictional movie depicting non–fictional events and their outcomes in relation to the Vietnam War in 1952. The conflicts that arise out of this movie are the romantic love triangle between the British journalist Thomas Fowler, the young American Alden Pyle, and Fowler's Vietnamese girlfriend Phuong, the political turmoil and growing American involvement that led to the Vietnam War and the conflict Fowler fights by himself of trying to remain uninvolved. The director has used a number of production features such as voiceover, music and dialogue to help the viewer understand the idea of conflict. For the duration of the movie the three main characters are involved in a romantic love triangle. This triangle and the emotions that the male characters feel towards Phuong begins to characterize the way they feel about the country of Vietnam itself. When Fowler states,“I can’t say what made me fall in love with Vietnam,” it brings more conflict into the story because it seems as though he does not know what love he is fighting for. Is he fighting for the love of Phoung? Or is he fighting for the love of Vietnam in which Phuong symbolizes? The romantic love triangle between the three characters arose more conflict when Fowler states,“I should have realised how saving a country and saving a woman would be the same thing to Pyle,” because it shows that Phuong was just like a country in need to Pyle but all she wanted was some security. The manner in which Pyle and Fowler struggle over Phuong represents the approach that Britain and America employed in their fight to ‘save’ Vietnam from Communism. Pyle’s intentions toward Phoung, although similar in some cases to Fowler’s, differ greatly at the same time which is the main reason this conflict is arised. Fowler uses past tense because it was stated at the end of the
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