Paisley Livingston
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199570171
- eISBN:
- 9780191721540
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199570171.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Aesthetics, General
The first part of this book critically assesses some of the bold claims that have been made about films' contributions to philosophy and defends a balanced perspective on the topic. It argues that in ...
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The first part of this book critically assesses some of the bold claims that have been made about films' contributions to philosophy and defends a balanced perspective on the topic. It argues that in many cases, it is the philosophical commentator and not ‘the film itself’ that is the actual source of the philosophizing attributed to a movie. In some cases, however, it is the film-maker who, by working with a background of specific philosophical sources, creates a work that expresses philosophical ideas. With this possibility in mind, the second part of the book outlines a ‘partial intentionalist’ approach. In response to a series of objections, the book defends underlying assumptions about interpretation, expression, and authorship. The book's partial intentionalist approach is exemplified in the third part of the book, which focuses on the work of Ingmar Bergman. The book argues that Bergman was profoundly influenced by a Finnish philosopher, Eino Kaila. Bergman proclaimed that reading Kaila's book on philosophical psychology a tremendous philosophical experience for him and that he ‘built on this ground’. With reference to unpublished materials in the newly created Ingmar Bergman archive in Stockholm, the book shows how, in works such as Wild Strawberries, Persona, and In the Life of the Marionettes, the Swedish director took up and responded to Kaila's views on motivated irrationality, inauthenticity, ethics, and the problem of self-knowledge.Less
The first part of this book critically assesses some of the bold claims that have been made about films' contributions to philosophy and defends a balanced perspective on the topic. It argues that in many cases, it is the philosophical commentator and not ‘the film itself’ that is the actual source of the philosophizing attributed to a movie. In some cases, however, it is the film-maker who, by working with a background of specific philosophical sources, creates a work that expresses philosophical ideas. With this possibility in mind, the second part of the book outlines a ‘partial intentionalist’ approach. In response to a series of objections, the book defends underlying assumptions about interpretation, expression, and authorship. The book's partial intentionalist approach is exemplified in the third part of the book, which focuses on the work of Ingmar Bergman. The book argues that Bergman was profoundly influenced by a Finnish philosopher, Eino Kaila. Bergman proclaimed that reading Kaila's book on philosophical psychology a tremendous philosophical experience for him and that he ‘built on this ground’. With reference to unpublished materials in the newly created Ingmar Bergman archive in Stockholm, the book shows how, in works such as Wild Strawberries, Persona, and In the Life of the Marionettes, the Swedish director took up and responded to Kaila's views on motivated irrationality, inauthenticity, ethics, and the problem of self-knowledge.
Chris Baldick
- Published in print:
- 1990
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198122494
- eISBN:
- 9780191671432
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198122494.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century and Victorian Literature
This book surveys the early history of one of our most important modern myths: the story of Frankenstein and the monster he created from dismembered corpses, as it appeared in fictional and other ...
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This book surveys the early history of one of our most important modern myths: the story of Frankenstein and the monster he created from dismembered corpses, as it appeared in fictional and other writings before its translation to the cinema screen. It examines the range of meanings that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein offers in the light of the political images of ‘monstrosity’ generated by the French Revolution. Later chapters trace the myth's analogues and protean transformations in subsequent writings, from the tales of Hoffmann and Hawthorne to the novels of Dickens, Melville, Conrad, and Lawrence, taking in the historical and political writings of Carlyle and Marx as well as the science fiction of Stevenson and Wells. The book shows that while the myth did come to be applied metaphorically to technological development, its most powerful associations have centred on relationships between people, in the family, in work, and in politics.Less
This book surveys the early history of one of our most important modern myths: the story of Frankenstein and the monster he created from dismembered corpses, as it appeared in fictional and other writings before its translation to the cinema screen. It examines the range of meanings that Mary Shelley's Frankenstein offers in the light of the political images of ‘monstrosity’ generated by the French Revolution. Later chapters trace the myth's analogues and protean transformations in subsequent writings, from the tales of Hoffmann and Hawthorne to the novels of Dickens, Melville, Conrad, and Lawrence, taking in the historical and political writings of Carlyle and Marx as well as the science fiction of Stevenson and Wells. The book shows that while the myth did come to be applied metaphorically to technological development, its most powerful associations have centred on relationships between people, in the family, in work, and in politics.
HUGO LARA CHÁVEZ
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780197264461
- eISBN:
- 9780191734625
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197264461.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Latin American Studies
This chapter discusses a city created by a cinema and a cinema created by the city, with emphasis on the dynamic interplay of these two. In this chapter the focus is on the last three decades, from ...
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This chapter discusses a city created by a cinema and a cinema created by the city, with emphasis on the dynamic interplay of these two. In this chapter the focus is on the last three decades, from 1977 to 2007, a period wherein the symbols and social expressions that were used to delineate the city have grown in strength while some others have consolidated to form Mexico’s current identity. In some of the cases, these symbols were placed in the film intentionally, while others seemed like they appeared through chance. The development of cinema in Mexico was bound with the developments of the city. Mexican cinema has played an important role as a mirror that reflected the developments within the city. Through the medium of film, the moving image became the most useful tool for visualizing the immeasurable wholeness of the city. In this chapter, the most defining moments that have found their way into the Mexican cinema are discussed. These events are the 1985 earthquake, the realities of globalization, and the defeat of the PRI in the 2000 elections. These are interwoven into narratives and images that explore dislocation, isolation and different forms of resistance.Less
This chapter discusses a city created by a cinema and a cinema created by the city, with emphasis on the dynamic interplay of these two. In this chapter the focus is on the last three decades, from 1977 to 2007, a period wherein the symbols and social expressions that were used to delineate the city have grown in strength while some others have consolidated to form Mexico’s current identity. In some of the cases, these symbols were placed in the film intentionally, while others seemed like they appeared through chance. The development of cinema in Mexico was bound with the developments of the city. Mexican cinema has played an important role as a mirror that reflected the developments within the city. Through the medium of film, the moving image became the most useful tool for visualizing the immeasurable wholeness of the city. In this chapter, the most defining moments that have found their way into the Mexican cinema are discussed. These events are the 1985 earthquake, the realities of globalization, and the defeat of the PRI in the 2000 elections. These are interwoven into narratives and images that explore dislocation, isolation and different forms of resistance.
Dennis Lo
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- May 2021
- ISBN:
- 9789888528516
- eISBN:
- 9789888180028
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888528516.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The Authorship of Place is the first monograph dedicated to the study of the politics, history, aesthetics, and practices of location shooting for Taiwanese, Mainland Chinese, and coproduced art ...
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The Authorship of Place is the first monograph dedicated to the study of the politics, history, aesthetics, and practices of location shooting for Taiwanese, Mainland Chinese, and coproduced art cinemas shot in rural communities since the late 1970s. Lo argues that rural location shooting, beyond serving aesthetic and technical needs, constitutes practices of cultural survival in a region beset with disruptive social changes, including rapid urbanization, geopolitical shifts, and ecological crises. In response to these social changes, auteurs like Hou Xiaoxian, Jia Zhangke, Chen Kaige, and Li Xing transformed sites of film production into symbolically meaningful places of collective memories and aspirations. These production practices ultimately enabled auteurs to experiment with imagining communities in novel and contentious ways.
Guiding readers on a cross-strait tour of prominent shooting locations for the New Chinese Cinemas, this book shows how auteurs sought out their disappearing cultural heritage by reenacting lived experiences of nation building, homecoming, and cultural salvage while shooting on-location. This was an especially daunting task when auteurs encountered the shooting locations as spaces of unresolved historical, social, and geopolitical contestations, tensions which were only intensified by the impact of filmmaking on rural communities. This book demonstrates how complex circumstances surrounding location shooting were pivotal in shaping representations of the rural on-screen, as well as the production communities, institutions, and industries off-screen. Bringing together cutting-edge perspectives in cultural geography and media anthropology, this work revises Chinese film history and theorizes ground-breaking approaches for investigating the cultural politics of film authorship and production.Less
The Authorship of Place is the first monograph dedicated to the study of the politics, history, aesthetics, and practices of location shooting for Taiwanese, Mainland Chinese, and coproduced art cinemas shot in rural communities since the late 1970s. Lo argues that rural location shooting, beyond serving aesthetic and technical needs, constitutes practices of cultural survival in a region beset with disruptive social changes, including rapid urbanization, geopolitical shifts, and ecological crises. In response to these social changes, auteurs like Hou Xiaoxian, Jia Zhangke, Chen Kaige, and Li Xing transformed sites of film production into symbolically meaningful places of collective memories and aspirations. These production practices ultimately enabled auteurs to experiment with imagining communities in novel and contentious ways.
Guiding readers on a cross-strait tour of prominent shooting locations for the New Chinese Cinemas, this book shows how auteurs sought out their disappearing cultural heritage by reenacting lived experiences of nation building, homecoming, and cultural salvage while shooting on-location. This was an especially daunting task when auteurs encountered the shooting locations as spaces of unresolved historical, social, and geopolitical contestations, tensions which were only intensified by the impact of filmmaking on rural communities. This book demonstrates how complex circumstances surrounding location shooting were pivotal in shaping representations of the rural on-screen, as well as the production communities, institutions, and industries off-screen. Bringing together cutting-edge perspectives in cultural geography and media anthropology, this work revises Chinese film history and theorizes ground-breaking approaches for investigating the cultural politics of film authorship and production.
Dorota Ostrowska and Graham Roberts
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748623082
- eISBN:
- 9780748651122
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748623082.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book represents a radical attempt to rethink the post-war history of European cinemas. The chapters approach the subject from the perspective of television's impact on the culture of cinema's ...
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This book represents a radical attempt to rethink the post-war history of European cinemas. The chapters approach the subject from the perspective of television's impact on the culture of cinema's production, distribution, consumption, and reception. Thus, they indicate a new direction for the debate about the future of cinema in Europe. In every European country, television has transformed the economic, technological, and aesthetic terms in which the process of cinema production is conducted. Television's growing popularity has drastically reshaped cinema's audiences, and has forced governments to introduce policies to regulate the interaction between cinema and television in the changing and dynamic audio-visual environment. Cinematic criticism was slowest in coming to terms with the presence of television and therefore most instrumental in perpetuating the view of cinema as an isolated object of aesthetic, critical, and academic inquiry. The recognition of the impact of television upon European cinemas offers a more authentic and richer picture of cinemas in Europe, which are part of the complex audiovisual matrix including television and new media.Less
This book represents a radical attempt to rethink the post-war history of European cinemas. The chapters approach the subject from the perspective of television's impact on the culture of cinema's production, distribution, consumption, and reception. Thus, they indicate a new direction for the debate about the future of cinema in Europe. In every European country, television has transformed the economic, technological, and aesthetic terms in which the process of cinema production is conducted. Television's growing popularity has drastically reshaped cinema's audiences, and has forced governments to introduce policies to regulate the interaction between cinema and television in the changing and dynamic audio-visual environment. Cinematic criticism was slowest in coming to terms with the presence of television and therefore most instrumental in perpetuating the view of cinema as an isolated object of aesthetic, critical, and academic inquiry. The recognition of the impact of television upon European cinemas offers a more authentic and richer picture of cinemas in Europe, which are part of the complex audiovisual matrix including television and new media.
Nuno Barradas Jorge
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781474444538
- eISBN:
- 9781474481106
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474444538.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This is the first English-language study of internationally acclaimed Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa, examining the cultural, production and exhibition contexts of his feature films, shorts and ...
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This is the first English-language study of internationally acclaimed Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa, examining the cultural, production and exhibition contexts of his feature films, shorts and video installations. It situates Costa’s filmmaking within the contexts of Portuguese, European and global art film, looking into his working practices alongside the impact of digital video, forms of collaborative authorship, and the intricate dialogue between modes of production and aesthetics.
Considering the exhibition, circulation and reception of Costa’s creative output in settings such as film festivals, the art gallery circuit and the home video market, ReFocus: The Films of Pedro Costa provides an essential critical analysis of this major filmmaker – as well as of the multifaceted production and consumption practices that surround contemporary art cinema.Less
This is the first English-language study of internationally acclaimed Portuguese filmmaker Pedro Costa, examining the cultural, production and exhibition contexts of his feature films, shorts and video installations. It situates Costa’s filmmaking within the contexts of Portuguese, European and global art film, looking into his working practices alongside the impact of digital video, forms of collaborative authorship, and the intricate dialogue between modes of production and aesthetics.
Considering the exhibition, circulation and reception of Costa’s creative output in settings such as film festivals, the art gallery circuit and the home video market, ReFocus: The Films of Pedro Costa provides an essential critical analysis of this major filmmaker – as well as of the multifaceted production and consumption practices that surround contemporary art cinema.
Tilman Baumgartel (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The rise of independent cinema in Southeast Asia, following the emergence of a new generation of filmmakers there, is among the most significant recent developments in global cinema. The advent of ...
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The rise of independent cinema in Southeast Asia, following the emergence of a new generation of filmmakers there, is among the most significant recent developments in global cinema. The advent of affordable and easy access to digital technology has empowered startling new voices from a part of the world rarely heard or seen in international film circles. The appearance of fresh, sharply alternative, and often very personal voices has had a tremendous impact on local film production. This book documents these developments as a genuine outcome of the democratization and liberalization of film production. Contributions from respected scholars, interviews with filmmakers, personal accounts and primary sources by important directors and screenwriters collectively provide readers with a lively account of dynamic film developments in Southeast Asia. Interviewees include Lav Diaz, Amir Muhammad, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Eric Khoo, Nia Dinata and others.Less
The rise of independent cinema in Southeast Asia, following the emergence of a new generation of filmmakers there, is among the most significant recent developments in global cinema. The advent of affordable and easy access to digital technology has empowered startling new voices from a part of the world rarely heard or seen in international film circles. The appearance of fresh, sharply alternative, and often very personal voices has had a tremendous impact on local film production. This book documents these developments as a genuine outcome of the democratization and liberalization of film production. Contributions from respected scholars, interviews with filmmakers, personal accounts and primary sources by important directors and screenwriters collectively provide readers with a lively account of dynamic film developments in Southeast Asia. Interviewees include Lav Diaz, Amir Muhammad, Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Eric Khoo, Nia Dinata and others.
Gerd Gemünden
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780252042836
- eISBN:
- 9780252051692
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5622/illinois/9780252042836.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book provides an overview of the films of the Argentine filmmaker Lucrecia Martel, who counts as one of the most accomplished filmmakers from Latin America and as a leading female global auteur. ...
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This book provides an overview of the films of the Argentine filmmaker Lucrecia Martel, who counts as one of the most accomplished filmmakers from Latin America and as a leading female global auteur. It situates Martel’s cinema in the context of a post-dictatorship, neoliberal democracy, as well as within the emergence of a new wave realism (New Argentine Cinema), which profits from and is critical of the privileged role cinema assumes in this new economy. The book argues that Martel’s films challenge the primacy of the visual by emphasizing modes of perception such as hearing, feeling, and smelling to question not only the veracity of what we see but, more fundamentally, the epistemological foundations on which the visual is built. Focusing on her native region of northwestern Argentina, Martel’s Salta trilogy employs a heightened realism, combined with aspects of genre cinema, to articulate a powerful critique of dominant power relations and forms of entitlement. Her radical aesthetics force viewers to rethink privileges of race and class associated with Argentine bourgeois society. Martel’s more recent literary adaptation, Zama, traces the origins of the exploitation of indigenous populations to colonial times and unearths its long-lasting legacies.Less
This book provides an overview of the films of the Argentine filmmaker Lucrecia Martel, who counts as one of the most accomplished filmmakers from Latin America and as a leading female global auteur. It situates Martel’s cinema in the context of a post-dictatorship, neoliberal democracy, as well as within the emergence of a new wave realism (New Argentine Cinema), which profits from and is critical of the privileged role cinema assumes in this new economy. The book argues that Martel’s films challenge the primacy of the visual by emphasizing modes of perception such as hearing, feeling, and smelling to question not only the veracity of what we see but, more fundamentally, the epistemological foundations on which the visual is built. Focusing on her native region of northwestern Argentina, Martel’s Salta trilogy employs a heightened realism, combined with aspects of genre cinema, to articulate a powerful critique of dominant power relations and forms of entitlement. Her radical aesthetics force viewers to rethink privileges of race and class associated with Argentine bourgeois society. Martel’s more recent literary adaptation, Zama, traces the origins of the exploitation of indigenous populations to colonial times and unearths its long-lasting legacies.
Jonathan Culler
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780197266670
- eISBN:
- 9780191905391
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266670.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
Roland Barthes’s writings were very positively received in the United States – in 1979 Wayne Booth called him the strongest influence on American criticism today – but America played a strange, often ...
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Roland Barthes’s writings were very positively received in the United States – in 1979 Wayne Booth called him the strongest influence on American criticism today – but America played a strange, often contradictory role in his work. In his middle years he visited the US four times – in 1958, 1961, 1966, and 1967 – but his initial enthusiasm for New York City was soon qualified by a range of negative comments about the country and its culture, and after 1967 he only returned once, very briefly, though he was much in demand. While opposing the knee-jerk anti-Americanism common among French intellectuals in his day, and especially resistance to America’s modernity, he soon made America a foil for Japan, which represented true exoticism, the opposite of bourgeois Western culture. There are relatively few references to America or American literature in his writings, though American cinema was a significant cultural reference for him, but these do help to reveal the complexity of Barthes’s affective and intellectual engagements, especially since there is often a comparative dimension to them. This chapter explores the varying attitudes and comments about America in Barthes’s letters and his published writings.Less
Roland Barthes’s writings were very positively received in the United States – in 1979 Wayne Booth called him the strongest influence on American criticism today – but America played a strange, often contradictory role in his work. In his middle years he visited the US four times – in 1958, 1961, 1966, and 1967 – but his initial enthusiasm for New York City was soon qualified by a range of negative comments about the country and its culture, and after 1967 he only returned once, very briefly, though he was much in demand. While opposing the knee-jerk anti-Americanism common among French intellectuals in his day, and especially resistance to America’s modernity, he soon made America a foil for Japan, which represented true exoticism, the opposite of bourgeois Western culture. There are relatively few references to America or American literature in his writings, though American cinema was a significant cultural reference for him, but these do help to reveal the complexity of Barthes’s affective and intellectual engagements, especially since there is often a comparative dimension to them. This chapter explores the varying attitudes and comments about America in Barthes’s letters and his published writings.
Éric Marty
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780197266670
- eISBN:
- 9780191905391
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266670.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
With Roland Barthes par Roland Barthes (1975), Barthes broke with a taboo on the image shared by most Modern thinkers: a Marxist and structuralist puritanism closely associated with a violent ...
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With Roland Barthes par Roland Barthes (1975), Barthes broke with a taboo on the image shared by most Modern thinkers: a Marxist and structuralist puritanism closely associated with a violent critique of mimesis. The break Barthes introduced derived primarily from his uncoupling of mimesis from the regime of visibility particular to the image. The importance of Barthes’s little book will be explored by placing it in the context of Modernity. On the one hand, it will be read in relation to readings of the image associated with Barthes’s contemporaries (for example, Foucault on Velazquez’s Las Meninas); on the other, it will be read alongside his earlier and later proclamations relative to the image, from Mythologies to La Chambre claire. A shift will be traced from the rejection of mimesis in favour of non-figuration, to the emergence of a more fundamental visual paradigm for Barthes of animate/inanimate, initially accounting for his stated preference for photography over cinema, but ultimately neutralised, in the second part of La Chambre claire, through his discussion of the female automaton sequence in Fellini’s Casanova, and its fetishistic relation to the invisible/visible presence of the Winter Garden photo of Barthes’s mother as a child.Less
With Roland Barthes par Roland Barthes (1975), Barthes broke with a taboo on the image shared by most Modern thinkers: a Marxist and structuralist puritanism closely associated with a violent critique of mimesis. The break Barthes introduced derived primarily from his uncoupling of mimesis from the regime of visibility particular to the image. The importance of Barthes’s little book will be explored by placing it in the context of Modernity. On the one hand, it will be read in relation to readings of the image associated with Barthes’s contemporaries (for example, Foucault on Velazquez’s Las Meninas); on the other, it will be read alongside his earlier and later proclamations relative to the image, from Mythologies to La Chambre claire. A shift will be traced from the rejection of mimesis in favour of non-figuration, to the emergence of a more fundamental visual paradigm for Barthes of animate/inanimate, initially accounting for his stated preference for photography over cinema, but ultimately neutralised, in the second part of La Chambre claire, through his discussion of the female automaton sequence in Fellini’s Casanova, and its fetishistic relation to the invisible/visible presence of the Winter Garden photo of Barthes’s mother as a child.
Julian Murphet
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780252042768
- eISBN:
- 9780252051623
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5622/illinois/9780252042768.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book is a comprehensive study and appraisal of the career of Todd Solondz, one of the key figures of independent cinema in the 1990s, whose box office fortunes have been in decline ever since ...
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This book is a comprehensive study and appraisal of the career of Todd Solondz, one of the key figures of independent cinema in the 1990s, whose box office fortunes have been in decline ever since that heyday. The book argues that this decline is a fitting analogue for the story of American independent cinema more generally and the declining rate of US corporate profit at large. Tracking the long arc of Solondz's seven major feature-length films, the book isolates certain persistent motifs and themes—the fascination with suburban “junkspace,” the logic of repetition with disappointing variations, the stylistic and formal category of “left classicism,” the indulgence of subjective fantasy counterpointed by an insistence on discomfiting long takes, and the thematic obsession with the “gift of shit”—to account for Solondz's art of diminishing returns under the rubric of satire. The book is more than a simple auteur study in that it establishes a new understanding of the stakes of independent cinema in today's context of economic crisis and decline. It argues that no other contemporary film artist has explored as astutely and perversely the contradictions of aesthetics under the conditions of senile capitalism.Less
This book is a comprehensive study and appraisal of the career of Todd Solondz, one of the key figures of independent cinema in the 1990s, whose box office fortunes have been in decline ever since that heyday. The book argues that this decline is a fitting analogue for the story of American independent cinema more generally and the declining rate of US corporate profit at large. Tracking the long arc of Solondz's seven major feature-length films, the book isolates certain persistent motifs and themes—the fascination with suburban “junkspace,” the logic of repetition with disappointing variations, the stylistic and formal category of “left classicism,” the indulgence of subjective fantasy counterpointed by an insistence on discomfiting long takes, and the thematic obsession with the “gift of shit”—to account for Solondz's art of diminishing returns under the rubric of satire. The book is more than a simple auteur study in that it establishes a new understanding of the stakes of independent cinema in today's context of economic crisis and decline. It argues that no other contemporary film artist has explored as astutely and perversely the contradictions of aesthetics under the conditions of senile capitalism.
Carol O'Sullivan and Jean-François Cornu (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780197266434
- eISBN:
- 9780191884191
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- British Academy
- DOI:
- 10.5871/bacad/9780197266434.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This rich collection of essays by film historians, translation scholars, archivists, and curators presents film translation history as an exciting and timely area of research. It builds on the last ...
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This rich collection of essays by film historians, translation scholars, archivists, and curators presents film translation history as an exciting and timely area of research. It builds on the last 20 years of research into the history of dubbing and subtitling, but goes further, by showing how subtitling, dubbing, and other forms of audiovisual translation developed over the first 50 years of the 20th century.
This is the first book-length study, in any language, of the international history of audiovisual translation to include silent cinema. Its scope covers national contexts both within Europe and beyond. It shows how audiovisual translation practices were closely tied to their commercial, technological, and industrial contexts. The Translation of Films, 1900–1950 draws extensively on archival sources and expertise, and revisits and challenges some of the established narratives around film languages and the coming of sound. For instance, the volume shows how silent films, far from being straightforward to translate, went through a complex process of editing for international distribution. It also closely tracks the ferment of experiments in film translation during the transition to sound from 1927 to 1934 and later, as markets adjusted to the demands of synchronised film.
The Translation of Films, 1900–1950 argues for a broader understanding of film translation: far from being limited to language transfer, it encompasses editing, localisation, censorship, paratextual framing, and other factors. It advocates for film translation to be considered as a crucial contribution not only to the worldwide circulation of films, but also to the art of cinema.Less
This rich collection of essays by film historians, translation scholars, archivists, and curators presents film translation history as an exciting and timely area of research. It builds on the last 20 years of research into the history of dubbing and subtitling, but goes further, by showing how subtitling, dubbing, and other forms of audiovisual translation developed over the first 50 years of the 20th century.
This is the first book-length study, in any language, of the international history of audiovisual translation to include silent cinema. Its scope covers national contexts both within Europe and beyond. It shows how audiovisual translation practices were closely tied to their commercial, technological, and industrial contexts. The Translation of Films, 1900–1950 draws extensively on archival sources and expertise, and revisits and challenges some of the established narratives around film languages and the coming of sound. For instance, the volume shows how silent films, far from being straightforward to translate, went through a complex process of editing for international distribution. It also closely tracks the ferment of experiments in film translation during the transition to sound from 1927 to 1934 and later, as markets adjusted to the demands of synchronised film.
The Translation of Films, 1900–1950 argues for a broader understanding of film translation: far from being limited to language transfer, it encompasses editing, localisation, censorship, paratextual framing, and other factors. It advocates for film translation to be considered as a crucial contribution not only to the worldwide circulation of films, but also to the art of cinema.
Yoshiharu Tezuka
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083329
- eISBN:
- 9789882209282
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083329.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Japan's film industry has gone through dramatic changes in recent decades, as international consumer forces and transnational talent have brought unprecedented engagement with global trends. With ...
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Japan's film industry has gone through dramatic changes in recent decades, as international consumer forces and transnational talent have brought unprecedented engagement with global trends. With careful research and unique first-person observations drawn from years of working within the international industry of Japanese film, this book aims to examine how different generations of Japanese filmmakers engaged and interacted with the structural opportunities and limitations posed by external forces, and how their subjectivity has been shaped by their transnational experiences and has changed as a result. Having been through the globalization of the last part of the twentieth century, are Japanese themselves and overseas consumers of Japanese culture really becoming more cosmopolitan? If so, what does this mean for Japan's national culture and the traditional sense of national belonging among Japanese people?Less
Japan's film industry has gone through dramatic changes in recent decades, as international consumer forces and transnational talent have brought unprecedented engagement with global trends. With careful research and unique first-person observations drawn from years of working within the international industry of Japanese film, this book aims to examine how different generations of Japanese filmmakers engaged and interacted with the structural opportunities and limitations posed by external forces, and how their subjectivity has been shaped by their transnational experiences and has changed as a result. Having been through the globalization of the last part of the twentieth century, are Japanese themselves and overseas consumers of Japanese culture really becoming more cosmopolitan? If so, what does this mean for Japan's national culture and the traditional sense of national belonging among Japanese people?
Viola Shafik
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789774160653
- eISBN:
- 9781936190096
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- American University in Cairo Press
- DOI:
- 10.5743/cairo/9789774160653.003.0005
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Middle Eastern Studies
Arab film making was only partly able to compete with “First World” cinema. It has remained greatly dependent on Western imports, technical know-how, evaluation, and partly even on Western financial ...
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Arab film making was only partly able to compete with “First World” cinema. It has remained greatly dependent on Western imports, technical know-how, evaluation, and partly even on Western financial support. The so-called Third-Worldist anti-colonial cinema did not succeed in resolving the contradiction between cultural promotion, political commitment, and rentability, and was soon eclipsed either by entirely mainstream-oriented cinema or by the rather anti-authoritarian, deconstructive, and stylistically innovative, yet regionally marginalized, cinéma d'auteur. Nonetheless, mainstream as well as individualist cinema was able to convey elements of native art and culture, and became actively involved in the creation of specific national or cultural identities. Although the medium became part of a mass-mediated culture and functioned as a means of mass entertainment, commercialism, the obligation to rentability, and competition with Western products did not result in a complete imitation of Western cinema, but initiated the reformation of the imported film language according to the needs of local audiences.Less
Arab film making was only partly able to compete with “First World” cinema. It has remained greatly dependent on Western imports, technical know-how, evaluation, and partly even on Western financial support. The so-called Third-Worldist anti-colonial cinema did not succeed in resolving the contradiction between cultural promotion, political commitment, and rentability, and was soon eclipsed either by entirely mainstream-oriented cinema or by the rather anti-authoritarian, deconstructive, and stylistically innovative, yet regionally marginalized, cinéma d'auteur. Nonetheless, mainstream as well as individualist cinema was able to convey elements of native art and culture, and became actively involved in the creation of specific national or cultural identities. Although the medium became part of a mass-mediated culture and functioned as a means of mass entertainment, commercialism, the obligation to rentability, and competition with Western products did not result in a complete imitation of Western cinema, but initiated the reformation of the imported film language according to the needs of local audiences.
Olivia Khoo
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622098794
- eISBN:
- 9789882207516
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622098794.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This concluding chapter employs the metaphor of the heliotrope to characterize the Chinese exotic's regional turn towards a self-conscious Asian region. It also attempts to situate the Chinese exotic ...
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This concluding chapter employs the metaphor of the heliotrope to characterize the Chinese exotic's regional turn towards a self-conscious Asian region. It also attempts to situate the Chinese exotic in relation to the larger systems that give it meaning and value, such as the cinema, popular fiction, food, and fashion cultures, and increasingly, the intra-regional interactions constructing the modern formation of Asia.Less
This concluding chapter employs the metaphor of the heliotrope to characterize the Chinese exotic's regional turn towards a self-conscious Asian region. It also attempts to situate the Chinese exotic in relation to the larger systems that give it meaning and value, such as the cinema, popular fiction, food, and fashion cultures, and increasingly, the intra-regional interactions constructing the modern formation of Asia.
SooJeong Ahn
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083589
- eISBN:
- 9789882209268
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083589.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book provides a political and cultural exploration of the Pusan International Film Festival in South Korea since its inception in 1996. Paying particular attention to the organizers' use of an ...
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This book provides a political and cultural exploration of the Pusan International Film Festival in South Korea since its inception in 1996. Paying particular attention to the organizers' use of an Asian regionalization strategy, the book reveals how the festival staked out a unique and influential position within a rapidly changing global landscape. Little empirical research has been conducted to date on non-Western film festivals, though PIFF and Tokyo and Hong Kong have swiftly grown more exciting and influential as testing grounds for global cinema innovations. The initiation, development and growth of PIFF should be understood as resulting from productive tensions in the festival's efforts to serve local, regional and national constituencies. The book also reflects the complexities of rapid transformation in the South Korean film industry as it has reached out to the global market since the late 1990s.Less
This book provides a political and cultural exploration of the Pusan International Film Festival in South Korea since its inception in 1996. Paying particular attention to the organizers' use of an Asian regionalization strategy, the book reveals how the festival staked out a unique and influential position within a rapidly changing global landscape. Little empirical research has been conducted to date on non-Western film festivals, though PIFF and Tokyo and Hong Kong have swiftly grown more exciting and influential as testing grounds for global cinema innovations. The initiation, development and growth of PIFF should be understood as resulting from productive tensions in the festival's efforts to serve local, regional and national constituencies. The book also reflects the complexities of rapid transformation in the South Korean film industry as it has reached out to the global market since the late 1990s.
Carolyn Jess-Cooke
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748626038
- eISBN:
- 9780748670895
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748626038.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The film sequel has been much maligned in popular culture as a vampirish corporative exercise in profit-making and narrative regurgitation. Drawing upon a wide range of filmic examples from early ...
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The film sequel has been much maligned in popular culture as a vampirish corporative exercise in profit-making and narrative regurgitation. Drawing upon a wide range of filmic examples from early cinema to the twenty-first century, this book reveals the increasing popularity of, and experimentation with, film sequels as a central dynamic of Hollywood cinema. Now creeping into world cinemas and independent film festivals, the sequel is persistently employed as a vehicle for cross-cultural dialogue and as a structure by which memories and cultural narratives can be circulated across geographical and historical locations. This book aims to account for some of the major critical contexts within which sequelisation operates by exploring sequel production beyond box office figures. Its account ranges across sequels in recent mainstream cinema, art-house and ‘indie’ sequels, non-Hollywood sequels, the effects of the domestic market on sequelisation and the impact of the video game industry on Hollywood.Less
The film sequel has been much maligned in popular culture as a vampirish corporative exercise in profit-making and narrative regurgitation. Drawing upon a wide range of filmic examples from early cinema to the twenty-first century, this book reveals the increasing popularity of, and experimentation with, film sequels as a central dynamic of Hollywood cinema. Now creeping into world cinemas and independent film festivals, the sequel is persistently employed as a vehicle for cross-cultural dialogue and as a structure by which memories and cultural narratives can be circulated across geographical and historical locations. This book aims to account for some of the major critical contexts within which sequelisation operates by exploring sequel production beyond box office figures. Its account ranges across sequels in recent mainstream cinema, art-house and ‘indie’ sequels, non-Hollywood sequels, the effects of the domestic market on sequelisation and the impact of the video game industry on Hollywood.
Khavn de la Cruz
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.003.0010
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
Four Manifestos by Filipino Independent Director Khavn de la Cruz
Four Manifestos by Filipino Independent Director Khavn de la Cruz
Ágnes Petho (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781474435499
- eISBN:
- 9781474481076
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474435499.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This collection of essays explores intermediality as a new perspective in the interpretation of the cinemas that have emerged after the collapse of the former Eastern Bloc. As an aesthetic based on a ...
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This collection of essays explores intermediality as a new perspective in the interpretation of the cinemas that have emerged after the collapse of the former Eastern Bloc. As an aesthetic based on a productive interaction of media and highlighting cinema's relationship with the other arts, intermediality always implies a state of in-betweenness which is capable of registering tensions and ambivalences that go beyond the realm of media. The comparative analyses of films from Hungary, Romania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Russia demonstrate that intermediality can be employed in this way as a form of introspection dealing with complex issues of art and society. Appearing in a variety of sensuous or intellectual modes, intermediality can become an effective poetic strategy to communicate how the cultures of the region are caught in-between East and West, past and present, emotional turmoil and more detached self-awareness. Through different theoretical approaches and thematic focuses, the book attempts to contribute to the understanding of intermedial phenomena in contemporary cinema as a whole by mapping meaningful areas of in-betweenness including the intermedial and interart relations in-between cinema, music, theatre, photography, painting, sculpture, literature, language and the new, digital technologies of the moving image.Less
This collection of essays explores intermediality as a new perspective in the interpretation of the cinemas that have emerged after the collapse of the former Eastern Bloc. As an aesthetic based on a productive interaction of media and highlighting cinema's relationship with the other arts, intermediality always implies a state of in-betweenness which is capable of registering tensions and ambivalences that go beyond the realm of media. The comparative analyses of films from Hungary, Romania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Russia demonstrate that intermediality can be employed in this way as a form of introspection dealing with complex issues of art and society. Appearing in a variety of sensuous or intellectual modes, intermediality can become an effective poetic strategy to communicate how the cultures of the region are caught in-between East and West, past and present, emotional turmoil and more detached self-awareness. Through different theoretical approaches and thematic focuses, the book attempts to contribute to the understanding of intermedial phenomena in contemporary cinema as a whole by mapping meaningful areas of in-betweenness including the intermedial and interart relations in-between cinema, music, theatre, photography, painting, sculpture, literature, language and the new, digital technologies of the moving image.
Simon Morrison
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- January 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780195181678
- eISBN:
- 9780199870806
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195181678.003.0005
- Subject:
- Music, History, Western
The chapter begins with a chronicle of the breakup of Prokofiev's marriage to Lina Codina, his estrangement from his children, and his affair with the literary student and translator Mira Mendelson. ...
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The chapter begins with a chronicle of the breakup of Prokofiev's marriage to Lina Codina, his estrangement from his children, and his affair with the literary student and translator Mira Mendelson. The core of the chapter concerns Prokofiev's wartime evacuation from Moscow to the Northern Caucuses (Nalchik and Tbilisi), the conception of the first version of the opera War and Peace, and Prokofiev's arch-propagandistic work for Soviet cinema. The chapter describes the composer's earnest efforts to support his wife and children, who remained in Moscow during the war, as well as his relationship with Mikhaíl Khrapchenko, the Chairman of the Committee on Arts Affairs from 1939-48. Khrapchenko ordered the rewriting of War and Peace in an effort to make it more relevant to the Soviet struggle against Hitler.Less
The chapter begins with a chronicle of the breakup of Prokofiev's marriage to Lina Codina, his estrangement from his children, and his affair with the literary student and translator Mira Mendelson. The core of the chapter concerns Prokofiev's wartime evacuation from Moscow to the Northern Caucuses (Nalchik and Tbilisi), the conception of the first version of the opera War and Peace, and Prokofiev's arch-propagandistic work for Soviet cinema. The chapter describes the composer's earnest efforts to support his wife and children, who remained in Moscow during the war, as well as his relationship with Mikhaíl Khrapchenko, the Chairman of the Committee on Arts Affairs from 1939-48. Khrapchenko ordered the rewriting of War and Peace in an effort to make it more relevant to the Soviet struggle against Hitler.
