George Wilson
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198159216
- eISBN:
- 9780191673566
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198159216.003.0010
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
This chapter gives a study on film narrative and narrative meaning. The study is divided in three categories: explicative interpretation, bigger than life, and meaning as significance. The first ...
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This chapter gives a study on film narrative and narrative meaning. The study is divided in three categories: explicative interpretation, bigger than life, and meaning as significance. The first category is concerned with how Bordwell constructed a broad challenge to what has been the dominance of interpretative work in the interpretation of film studies. The second category concerns how Wilson concentrated initially upon the enigmatic scene. He discussed how ‘meaning’ arises in a narrative setting. The last category is about the meaning as signification and the meaning as significance. There is a familiar sense in which the meaning of an event or action is fundamentally constructed in terms of its place within a relevant network or casuality. It is important to point out that the liabilities of linguistic models of narrative meaning and alternative conception are available.Less
This chapter gives a study on film narrative and narrative meaning. The study is divided in three categories: explicative interpretation, bigger than life, and meaning as significance. The first category is concerned with how Bordwell constructed a broad challenge to what has been the dominance of interpretative work in the interpretation of film studies. The second category concerns how Wilson concentrated initially upon the enigmatic scene. He discussed how ‘meaning’ arises in a narrative setting. The last category is about the meaning as signification and the meaning as significance. There is a familiar sense in which the meaning of an event or action is fundamentally constructed in terms of its place within a relevant network or casuality. It is important to point out that the liabilities of linguistic models of narrative meaning and alternative conception are available.
TERESA HUBEL
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198075981
- eISBN:
- 9780199081523
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198075981.003.0017
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
This chapter comments on the relative insignificance of whiteness to Hindi film narratives, with white characters turning up, when they do, often as peripheral figures to create the effect of ...
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This chapter comments on the relative insignificance of whiteness to Hindi film narratives, with white characters turning up, when they do, often as peripheral figures to create the effect of historical accuracy. It argues that in Hindi cinema, whiteness cannot function as it does in the West, where the legacy of imperialism has made it an unmarked category, whose invisibility allows it to function as a norm against which the aberration of racial others may be measured. In Indian films, whiteness is marked; and it is, increasingly, markedly white—to be resisted, or desired, or dismissed.Less
This chapter comments on the relative insignificance of whiteness to Hindi film narratives, with white characters turning up, when they do, often as peripheral figures to create the effect of historical accuracy. It argues that in Hindi cinema, whiteness cannot function as it does in the West, where the legacy of imperialism has made it an unmarked category, whose invisibility allows it to function as a norm against which the aberration of racial others may be measured. In Indian films, whiteness is marked; and it is, increasingly, markedly white—to be resisted, or desired, or dismissed.
Andrea Capstick and Katherine Ludwin
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781447341895
- eISBN:
- 9781447341970
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781447341895.003.0005
- Subject:
- Business and Management, Knowledge Management
This chapter explores the use of images from local history archives in the co-construction of short individual films with people with dementia. The study on which the chapter is based was carried out ...
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This chapter explores the use of images from local history archives in the co-construction of short individual films with people with dementia. The study on which the chapter is based was carried out with two men and eight women living in a housing-with-care facility in the northern United Kingdom. The chapter finds that archive images quickly took on a central role in the film narratives of several of the participants. In the process, the archive materials themselves were also transformed, memorialising the everyday spaces and places in which the participants had lived. In this study, archive images were often used to elicit memories of people, or places that no longer look the same in the present day. The chapter reveals that such images were often more recognisable to the participants than were contemporary photographs. This corresponds with research into the ‘reminiscence bump’, which suggests that autobiographical memory for the period between about five and thirty years of age remains well preserved in people living with dementia.Less
This chapter explores the use of images from local history archives in the co-construction of short individual films with people with dementia. The study on which the chapter is based was carried out with two men and eight women living in a housing-with-care facility in the northern United Kingdom. The chapter finds that archive images quickly took on a central role in the film narratives of several of the participants. In the process, the archive materials themselves were also transformed, memorialising the everyday spaces and places in which the participants had lived. In this study, archive images were often used to elicit memories of people, or places that no longer look the same in the present day. The chapter reveals that such images were often more recognisable to the participants than were contemporary photographs. This corresponds with research into the ‘reminiscence bump’, which suggests that autobiographical memory for the period between about five and thirty years of age remains well preserved in people living with dementia.
Katherine Spring
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199842216
- eISBN:
- 9780199369584
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199842216.001.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
In the late 1920s, Hollywood's conversion from silent to synchronized-sound film production not only instigated the convergence of the film and music industries but also gave rise to an extraordinary ...
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In the late 1920s, Hollywood's conversion from silent to synchronized-sound film production not only instigated the convergence of the film and music industries but also gave rise to an extraordinary period of song use in American cinema. This book considers how the increasing interdependence of Hollywood studios and Tin Pan Alley music publishing firms influenced the commercial and narrative functions of popular songs in a variety of non-musical film genres, including melodramas, romantic comedies, Westerns, prison dramas, and action-adventure films, and shows how filmmakers tested and refined their approach to songs in order to reconcile the tension produced by three competing forces: the spectacle of song performance, the classical norms of storytelling, and the established conventions of background orchestral scoring inherited from the period of silent cinema. The resulting strategies for incorporating songs into narrative films ranged from the foregrounding of entire, discrete song presentations that disrupted narrative coherence to the more narratively plausible integration of popular music. By 1931, a so-called “song glut” led the studios to curtail the use of songs in favor of a growing alternative—the classical film score—but popular songs continued to fulfill critical functions of narration in Hollywood films of subsequent decades.Less
In the late 1920s, Hollywood's conversion from silent to synchronized-sound film production not only instigated the convergence of the film and music industries but also gave rise to an extraordinary period of song use in American cinema. This book considers how the increasing interdependence of Hollywood studios and Tin Pan Alley music publishing firms influenced the commercial and narrative functions of popular songs in a variety of non-musical film genres, including melodramas, romantic comedies, Westerns, prison dramas, and action-adventure films, and shows how filmmakers tested and refined their approach to songs in order to reconcile the tension produced by three competing forces: the spectacle of song performance, the classical norms of storytelling, and the established conventions of background orchestral scoring inherited from the period of silent cinema. The resulting strategies for incorporating songs into narrative films ranged from the foregrounding of entire, discrete song presentations that disrupted narrative coherence to the more narratively plausible integration of popular music. By 1931, a so-called “song glut” led the studios to curtail the use of songs in favor of a growing alternative—the classical film score—but popular songs continued to fulfill critical functions of narration in Hollywood films of subsequent decades.
Katherine Spring
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780199842216
- eISBN:
- 9780199369584
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199842216.003.0001
- Subject:
- Music, Popular, History, Western
The Introduction posits the book's guiding question: How did popular songs influence the industrial organization and narrative form of Hollywood cinema during the conversion to sound, from 1927 ...
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The Introduction posits the book's guiding question: How did popular songs influence the industrial organization and narrative form of Hollywood cinema during the conversion to sound, from 1927 through 1931? A case is presented for studying the use of songs in non-musical films, a loose category of genre consisting of films that tended to showcase, motivate, and integrate songs in ways that could not always be explained by appealing to the conventions of Broadway musical genres. Over the course of the transition to sound, the status of the popular song performance in non-musical films shifted from modular attraction to integrated narrative device. A study of this shift and its industrial context illuminates a rich period of heterogeneity of film form and style. The Introduction closes with brief summaries of the book's five chapters.Less
The Introduction posits the book's guiding question: How did popular songs influence the industrial organization and narrative form of Hollywood cinema during the conversion to sound, from 1927 through 1931? A case is presented for studying the use of songs in non-musical films, a loose category of genre consisting of films that tended to showcase, motivate, and integrate songs in ways that could not always be explained by appealing to the conventions of Broadway musical genres. Over the course of the transition to sound, the status of the popular song performance in non-musical films shifted from modular attraction to integrated narrative device. A study of this shift and its industrial context illuminates a rich period of heterogeneity of film form and style. The Introduction closes with brief summaries of the book's five chapters.
Emily Hughes
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781906733438
- eISBN:
- 9781800342026
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781906733438.003.0010
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter studies the genre and narrative of Pedro Almodóvar's Talk to Her (2002). The narrative of Talk to Her flits between a double- and single-stranded plot line, plays with time with ...
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This chapter studies the genre and narrative of Pedro Almodóvar's Talk to Her (2002). The narrative of Talk to Her flits between a double- and single-stranded plot line, plays with time with sometimes careless abandon, and contains coincidences that verge of the ridiculous. But yet, far from alienating the spectator, the narrative of Talk to Her pleasingly draws one in and lures the spectator into a position where they are able to suspend their disbelief, enjoy and engage with the plot. The spectator familiar with Almodóvar's films somewhat expects an unconventional narrative and thus is likely to find it unobtrusive. Meanwhile, like most Almodóvar's films, Talk to Her is hard to classify in terms of genre. Unlike the Hollywood system that relies heavily on either star or genre marketing, the marketing for Almodóvar's films relies heavily on his own status as an award-winning auteur film-maker. Talk to Her is thus not bound by generic convention in the way that many Hollywood films are.Less
This chapter studies the genre and narrative of Pedro Almodóvar's Talk to Her (2002). The narrative of Talk to Her flits between a double- and single-stranded plot line, plays with time with sometimes careless abandon, and contains coincidences that verge of the ridiculous. But yet, far from alienating the spectator, the narrative of Talk to Her pleasingly draws one in and lures the spectator into a position where they are able to suspend their disbelief, enjoy and engage with the plot. The spectator familiar with Almodóvar's films somewhat expects an unconventional narrative and thus is likely to find it unobtrusive. Meanwhile, like most Almodóvar's films, Talk to Her is hard to classify in terms of genre. Unlike the Hollywood system that relies heavily on either star or genre marketing, the marketing for Almodóvar's films relies heavily on his own status as an award-winning auteur film-maker. Talk to Her is thus not bound by generic convention in the way that many Hollywood films are.
Kathrina Glitre
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- July 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780719070785
- eISBN:
- 9781781700990
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719070785.003.0010
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
It is difficult or impossible to define what a romantic comedy is because all Hollywood films (except some war films) have romance and all have comedy. While the pervasive presence of romance and ...
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It is difficult or impossible to define what a romantic comedy is because all Hollywood films (except some war films) have romance and all have comedy. While the pervasive presence of romance and comedy is undeniable, there are different levels of representational convention. All Hollywood genres implicitly belong to the broader traditions of American narrative film; romance and comedy are common narrative conventions, hence their ubiquity. This chapter describes the genre, cycle and critical traditions of Hollywood romantic comedies. On the basis of the dominant concept of a film, particular genres can be characterized not only as the only genres in which given elements, devices and features occur, but also as the ones in which they are dominant, in which they play an overall organizing role. Thus, the formation of a couple takes place in many fictional texts as a narrative convention, but it plays the dominant, organizing role in two genres: romance and romantic comedy.Less
It is difficult or impossible to define what a romantic comedy is because all Hollywood films (except some war films) have romance and all have comedy. While the pervasive presence of romance and comedy is undeniable, there are different levels of representational convention. All Hollywood genres implicitly belong to the broader traditions of American narrative film; romance and comedy are common narrative conventions, hence their ubiquity. This chapter describes the genre, cycle and critical traditions of Hollywood romantic comedies. On the basis of the dominant concept of a film, particular genres can be characterized not only as the only genres in which given elements, devices and features occur, but also as the ones in which they are dominant, in which they play an overall organizing role. Thus, the formation of a couple takes place in many fictional texts as a narrative convention, but it plays the dominant, organizing role in two genres: romance and romantic comedy.
C. Scott Combs
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231163477
- eISBN:
- 9780231538039
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231163477.003.0002
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter examines posthumous motion as a staple for the movie death scene. Posthumous motion may be defined as the use of the cutaway to another image—usually one that reframes the body or else ...
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This chapter examines posthumous motion as a staple for the movie death scene. Posthumous motion may be defined as the use of the cutaway to another image—usually one that reframes the body or else infuses part of the environment—to extend the scene after the death moment has apparently occurred, that is, after registration. Whether or not the camera is itself moving, the image is. Seen in various forms throughout American film history, the posthumous shot has become one of the more interpretive shots in genre films, often indicating the solemn passage of time. This chapter discusses the posthumous markings found in the early narrative film and how the techniques of narrative film portend an emergent cinematics around the death shot—or the image of apparent loss of embodied vitality. Focusing on films such as Behind the Scenes, The Mothering Heart, The Birth of a Nation, and The Country Doctor, it discusses the ways that narrative editing “performs on the material of the film the operations that death performs on life”.Less
This chapter examines posthumous motion as a staple for the movie death scene. Posthumous motion may be defined as the use of the cutaway to another image—usually one that reframes the body or else infuses part of the environment—to extend the scene after the death moment has apparently occurred, that is, after registration. Whether or not the camera is itself moving, the image is. Seen in various forms throughout American film history, the posthumous shot has become one of the more interpretive shots in genre films, often indicating the solemn passage of time. This chapter discusses the posthumous markings found in the early narrative film and how the techniques of narrative film portend an emergent cinematics around the death shot—or the image of apparent loss of embodied vitality. Focusing on films such as Behind the Scenes, The Mothering Heart, The Birth of a Nation, and The Country Doctor, it discusses the ways that narrative editing “performs on the material of the film the operations that death performs on life”.
David Bordwell
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- May 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199862139
- eISBN:
- 9780199332755
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199862139.003.0002
- Subject:
- Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience
This chapter traces the history of how filmmakers, critics, and theorists have conceived the viewer’s psychological activity. Throughout, these conceptions are treated as responses to changing trends ...
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This chapter traces the history of how filmmakers, critics, and theorists have conceived the viewer’s psychological activity. Throughout, these conceptions are treated as responses to changing trends in filmmaking across the history of cinema. For most creators, a common-sense or folk psychology has governed their creative decisions, but a few filmmakers developed more explicit appeals to schools of scientific psychology. The chapter considers how psychoanalysis has provided critics and filmmakers both an interpretive tool and a basis for assessing the viewer’s response. In particular, the chapter considers how American critics of the 1940s blended psychoanalysis with social psychology and how French theorists of the 1960s-1980s adapted ideas of Jacques Lacan to explain the role of cinema in reinforcing social constructs of identity. Other schools of scientific or philosophical psychology are considered: Hugo Münsterberg’s neo-Kantian view that cinema manifests essential processes of mind, the influence of Gestalt theory on Rudolf Arnheim, and the materialist reflexology of Eisenstein. The chapter concludes with a survey of the emergence of film theory that draws from the cognitive sciences in an effort to mount naturalistic explanations of film art and viewer response.Less
This chapter traces the history of how filmmakers, critics, and theorists have conceived the viewer’s psychological activity. Throughout, these conceptions are treated as responses to changing trends in filmmaking across the history of cinema. For most creators, a common-sense or folk psychology has governed their creative decisions, but a few filmmakers developed more explicit appeals to schools of scientific psychology. The chapter considers how psychoanalysis has provided critics and filmmakers both an interpretive tool and a basis for assessing the viewer’s response. In particular, the chapter considers how American critics of the 1940s blended psychoanalysis with social psychology and how French theorists of the 1960s-1980s adapted ideas of Jacques Lacan to explain the role of cinema in reinforcing social constructs of identity. Other schools of scientific or philosophical psychology are considered: Hugo Münsterberg’s neo-Kantian view that cinema manifests essential processes of mind, the influence of Gestalt theory on Rudolf Arnheim, and the materialist reflexology of Eisenstein. The chapter concludes with a survey of the emergence of film theory that draws from the cognitive sciences in an effort to mount naturalistic explanations of film art and viewer response.
Omar Ahmed
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781906733681
- eISBN:
- 9781800342088
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781906733681.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book traces the historical evolution of Indian cinema through a number of key decades. The book is made up of 14 chapters with each chapter focusing on one key film, the chosen films are ...
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This book traces the historical evolution of Indian cinema through a number of key decades. The book is made up of 14 chapters with each chapter focusing on one key film, the chosen films are analysed in their wider social, political and historical context whilst a concerted engagement with various ideological strands that underpin each film is also evident. In addition to exploring the films in their wider contexts, the book analyses selected sequences through the conceptual framework common to both film and media studies. This includes a consideration of narrative, genre, representation, audience and mise en scène. The case studies run chronologically from Awaara (The Vagabond, 1951) to The Elements Trilogy: Water (2005) and include films by such key figures as Satyajit Ray (The Lonely Wife), Ritwick Ghatak (Cloud Capped Star), Yash Chopra (The Wall) and Mira Nair (Salaam Bombay!).Less
This book traces the historical evolution of Indian cinema through a number of key decades. The book is made up of 14 chapters with each chapter focusing on one key film, the chosen films are analysed in their wider social, political and historical context whilst a concerted engagement with various ideological strands that underpin each film is also evident. In addition to exploring the films in their wider contexts, the book analyses selected sequences through the conceptual framework common to both film and media studies. This includes a consideration of narrative, genre, representation, audience and mise en scène. The case studies run chronologically from Awaara (The Vagabond, 1951) to The Elements Trilogy: Water (2005) and include films by such key figures as Satyajit Ray (The Lonely Wife), Ritwick Ghatak (Cloud Capped Star), Yash Chopra (The Wall) and Mira Nair (Salaam Bombay!).
Gina Marchetti
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789888028566
- eISBN:
- 9789882206991
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888028566.003.0014
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Yau Ching's Ho Yuk: Let's Love Hong Kong is the first narrative feature film about Hong Kong lesbians told from a lesbian/feminist perspective. Yau Ching's road to filmmaking shows how Hong Kong's ...
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Yau Ching's Ho Yuk: Let's Love Hong Kong is the first narrative feature film about Hong Kong lesbians told from a lesbian/feminist perspective. Yau Ching's road to filmmaking shows how Hong Kong's vibrant alternative film and video culture can nurture innovation, strengthen ties to the world filmmaking community, and involve Hong Kong filmmakers in the expansion of the public sphere for the marginalized, maligned, and dispossessed. The story of its production also highlights the connections between Hong Kong independent cinema and international trends in queer counter-cinemas. In this interview, Yau Ching talks about her development as a filmmaker, her inspiration for Ho Yuk, its production, and its impact on local as well global audiences. Yau Ching talks about her experience of making films began long before her film education began.Less
Yau Ching's Ho Yuk: Let's Love Hong Kong is the first narrative feature film about Hong Kong lesbians told from a lesbian/feminist perspective. Yau Ching's road to filmmaking shows how Hong Kong's vibrant alternative film and video culture can nurture innovation, strengthen ties to the world filmmaking community, and involve Hong Kong filmmakers in the expansion of the public sphere for the marginalized, maligned, and dispossessed. The story of its production also highlights the connections between Hong Kong independent cinema and international trends in queer counter-cinemas. In this interview, Yau Ching talks about her development as a filmmaker, her inspiration for Ho Yuk, its production, and its impact on local as well global audiences. Yau Ching talks about her experience of making films began long before her film education began.
Glenn Man
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231165655
- eISBN:
- 9780231850438
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231165655.003.0008
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter examines Clint Eastwood’s 2006 films Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima in light of postclassical narration and multi-protagonist plots. Both Flags of Our Fathers and Letters ...
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This chapter examines Clint Eastwood’s 2006 films Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima in light of postclassical narration and multi-protagonist plots. Both Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima exhibit several characteristics of the multiple narrative film. Eastwood’s use of multiple narratives in both films is an example of a trend in contemporary cinema and also a continuation of his Mystic River (2003), but at the same time it represents a bold experiment of its own in postmodern war cinema. The essay analyzes the differences in the narrative structures of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima as well as their impact on viewers’ understanding.Less
This chapter examines Clint Eastwood’s 2006 films Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima in light of postclassical narration and multi-protagonist plots. Both Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima exhibit several characteristics of the multiple narrative film. Eastwood’s use of multiple narratives in both films is an example of a trend in contemporary cinema and also a continuation of his Mystic River (2003), but at the same time it represents a bold experiment of its own in postmodern war cinema. The essay analyzes the differences in the narrative structures of Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima as well as their impact on viewers’ understanding.
K. J. Donnelly
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780719095863
- eISBN:
- 9781526121066
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719095863.003.0011
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Hitchcock and Herrmann had a symbiotic and complementary artistic relationship. However, as this chapter contends, rather than necessarily synergic in their understanding of the unified requirements ...
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Hitchcock and Herrmann had a symbiotic and complementary artistic relationship. However, as this chapter contends, rather than necessarily synergic in their understanding of the unified requirements of drama, sometimes their complementary relationship took on a different character. In Marnie, Herrmann’s music attempted to ameliorate Hitchcock’s dark interests, in an attempt to romanticize Hitchcock’s bleak and grotesque story about a psychologist’s fantasy about possessing a disturbed kleptomaniac killer, which includes a deeply disquieting rape scene. The music moves to make these elements bearable, with a ‘sleight of hand’ that misdirects us from the utter darkness and irredeemable characters and obscene aspects of the film narrative.Less
Hitchcock and Herrmann had a symbiotic and complementary artistic relationship. However, as this chapter contends, rather than necessarily synergic in their understanding of the unified requirements of drama, sometimes their complementary relationship took on a different character. In Marnie, Herrmann’s music attempted to ameliorate Hitchcock’s dark interests, in an attempt to romanticize Hitchcock’s bleak and grotesque story about a psychologist’s fantasy about possessing a disturbed kleptomaniac killer, which includes a deeply disquieting rape scene. The music moves to make these elements bearable, with a ‘sleight of hand’ that misdirects us from the utter darkness and irredeemable characters and obscene aspects of the film narrative.
Andrew Kahn
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780198857938
- eISBN:
- 9780191890505
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780198857938.003.0008
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, World Literature
One area of experimentation in Mandelstam’s poetics was the visual. As a young modernist, he wrote poems about new technologies like the telephone and the cinema. During the 1920s he dabbled in ...
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One area of experimentation in Mandelstam’s poetics was the visual. As a young modernist, he wrote poems about new technologies like the telephone and the cinema. During the 1920s he dabbled in writing film scripts. In the early 1930s, beset by the class warfare, Mandelstam dramatized his feelings of urban alienation in the Moscow poems. ‘I’m still far from being a patriarch’ is the focus of a reading that looks at the development of new representational strategies in his work. More Futurist than Acmeist, the poem’s creative vigour lies in its layering of visual material and its use of cinematic techniques of focalization rather than subtextual allusion. While its Chaplinesque hero provides a timely alter ego for a writer famously seen as steeped in high culture, the lyric is also full of ironic self-questioning about its own devices, the mechanization of art, and about the mimetic regime of Socialist Realism.Less
One area of experimentation in Mandelstam’s poetics was the visual. As a young modernist, he wrote poems about new technologies like the telephone and the cinema. During the 1920s he dabbled in writing film scripts. In the early 1930s, beset by the class warfare, Mandelstam dramatized his feelings of urban alienation in the Moscow poems. ‘I’m still far from being a patriarch’ is the focus of a reading that looks at the development of new representational strategies in his work. More Futurist than Acmeist, the poem’s creative vigour lies in its layering of visual material and its use of cinematic techniques of focalization rather than subtextual allusion. While its Chaplinesque hero provides a timely alter ego for a writer famously seen as steeped in high culture, the lyric is also full of ironic self-questioning about its own devices, the mechanization of art, and about the mimetic regime of Socialist Realism.
Paul Elliott
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- February 2021
- ISBN:
- 9781906733742
- eISBN:
- 9781800342125
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781906733742.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Ever since its inception, British cinema has been obsessed with crime and the criminal. One of the first narrative films to be produced in Britain, the Hepworth's 1905 short Rescued by Rover, was a ...
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Ever since its inception, British cinema has been obsessed with crime and the criminal. One of the first narrative films to be produced in Britain, the Hepworth's 1905 short Rescued by Rover, was a fast-paced, quick-edited tale of abduction and kidnap, and the first British sound film, Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail (1930), centred on murder and criminal guilt. For a genre seemingly so important to the British cinematic character, there is little direct theoretical or historical work focused on it. The Britain of British cinema is often written about in terms of national history, ethnic diversity, or cultural tradition, yet very rarely in terms of its criminal tendencies and dark underbelly. This volume assumes that, to know how British cinema truly works, it is necessary to pull back the veneer of the costume piece, the historical drama, and the rom-com and glimpse at what is underneath. For every Brief Encounter (1945) there is a Brighton Rock (2010), for every Notting Hill (1999) there is a Long Good Friday (1980).Less
Ever since its inception, British cinema has been obsessed with crime and the criminal. One of the first narrative films to be produced in Britain, the Hepworth's 1905 short Rescued by Rover, was a fast-paced, quick-edited tale of abduction and kidnap, and the first British sound film, Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail (1930), centred on murder and criminal guilt. For a genre seemingly so important to the British cinematic character, there is little direct theoretical or historical work focused on it. The Britain of British cinema is often written about in terms of national history, ethnic diversity, or cultural tradition, yet very rarely in terms of its criminal tendencies and dark underbelly. This volume assumes that, to know how British cinema truly works, it is necessary to pull back the veneer of the costume piece, the historical drama, and the rom-com and glimpse at what is underneath. For every Brief Encounter (1945) there is a Brighton Rock (2010), for every Notting Hill (1999) there is a Long Good Friday (1980).
Vincent LoBrutto
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780813177083
- eISBN:
- 9780813177090
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813177083.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This, the first biography of film director Ridley Scott, investigates the life and moving-image work of a major cinema artist. Ridley Scott is a supreme visualist who applies artistry to telling ...
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This, the first biography of film director Ridley Scott, investigates the life and moving-image work of a major cinema artist. Ridley Scott is a supreme visualist who applies artistry to telling motion picture narratives. The influence of his early work in commercials, television projects, short films, and music videos is explored. The arc of his life experience is examined to provide a total picture of the man, with emphasis on the look and content of his films. Each Ridley Scott film is presented from a series of views: conception, production, postproduction, critical and social reactions, box office results, and impact on his long and continuing career. Scott’s ability to make and release feature films on a regular timetable and run a multifaceted production company at the same time reveals his stamina and work ethic. Thematic patterns in Ridley Scott’s filmography give further insight into his artistic personality; he repeatedly examines subjects such as war, the nature of the male of the species, and the strength of women. Scott deals with these themes through hands-on collaboration with screenwriters and film craft artists such as the director of photography, production designer, and editor. The book embraces the concept that Ridley Scott is a complex artist driven to apply his art in a constant flow of projects. This biography will fill in many gaps of the life and films of this British-born director, who is known and respected by audiences, film critics, and scholars all over the globe.Less
This, the first biography of film director Ridley Scott, investigates the life and moving-image work of a major cinema artist. Ridley Scott is a supreme visualist who applies artistry to telling motion picture narratives. The influence of his early work in commercials, television projects, short films, and music videos is explored. The arc of his life experience is examined to provide a total picture of the man, with emphasis on the look and content of his films. Each Ridley Scott film is presented from a series of views: conception, production, postproduction, critical and social reactions, box office results, and impact on his long and continuing career. Scott’s ability to make and release feature films on a regular timetable and run a multifaceted production company at the same time reveals his stamina and work ethic. Thematic patterns in Ridley Scott’s filmography give further insight into his artistic personality; he repeatedly examines subjects such as war, the nature of the male of the species, and the strength of women. Scott deals with these themes through hands-on collaboration with screenwriters and film craft artists such as the director of photography, production designer, and editor. The book embraces the concept that Ridley Scott is a complex artist driven to apply his art in a constant flow of projects. This biography will fill in many gaps of the life and films of this British-born director, who is known and respected by audiences, film critics, and scholars all over the globe.
Lisa Tatonetti
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- August 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780816692781
- eISBN:
- 9781452949642
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816692781.003.0004
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Native American Studies
This chapter assesses the images that have been used to depict queer Native people in contemporary narrative film. Contemporary narrative film, which offers the most widely viewed representations of ...
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This chapter assesses the images that have been used to depict queer Native people in contemporary narrative film. Contemporary narrative film, which offers the most widely viewed representations of queer Native people, often reenacts fragmenting visions of the erotic. Films like Big Eden, Johnny Greyeyes, and The Business of Fancydancing replicate the legacies of settler colonialism in their depictions of Two-Spirit Native people, leaving queer Indigenous people with an untenable choice in which they are “forced to choose.” They must either embrace family and nation in the silence of desire, or embrace sexuality at the expense of tribal and familial alliances.Less
This chapter assesses the images that have been used to depict queer Native people in contemporary narrative film. Contemporary narrative film, which offers the most widely viewed representations of queer Native people, often reenacts fragmenting visions of the erotic. Films like Big Eden, Johnny Greyeyes, and The Business of Fancydancing replicate the legacies of settler colonialism in their depictions of Two-Spirit Native people, leaving queer Indigenous people with an untenable choice in which they are “forced to choose.” They must either embrace family and nation in the silence of desire, or embrace sexuality at the expense of tribal and familial alliances.
Kimberly Chabot Davis
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- April 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780252038433
- eISBN:
- 9780252096310
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Illinois Press
- DOI:
- 10.5406/illinois/9780252038433.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Film, Media, and Cultural Studies
Critics often characterize white consumption of African American culture as a form of theft that echoes the fantasies of 1950s-era bohemians, or “White Negroes,” who romanticized black culture as ...
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Critics often characterize white consumption of African American culture as a form of theft that echoes the fantasies of 1950s-era bohemians, or “White Negroes,” who romanticized black culture as anarchic and sexually potent. This book claims such a view fails to describe the varied politics of racial crossover in the past fifteen years. The book analyzes how white engagement with African American novels, film narratives, and hip-hop can help form anti-racist attitudes that may catalyze social change and racial justice. Though acknowledging past failures to establish cross-racial empathy, the book focuses on examples that show avenues for future progress and change. Its study of ethnographic data from book clubs and college classrooms shows how engagement with African American culture and pedagogical support can lead to the kinds of white self-examination that make empathy possible. The result is a book that challenges the trend of focusing on society's failures in achieving cross-racial empathy and instead explores possible avenues for change.Less
Critics often characterize white consumption of African American culture as a form of theft that echoes the fantasies of 1950s-era bohemians, or “White Negroes,” who romanticized black culture as anarchic and sexually potent. This book claims such a view fails to describe the varied politics of racial crossover in the past fifteen years. The book analyzes how white engagement with African American novels, film narratives, and hip-hop can help form anti-racist attitudes that may catalyze social change and racial justice. Though acknowledging past failures to establish cross-racial empathy, the book focuses on examples that show avenues for future progress and change. Its study of ethnographic data from book clubs and college classrooms shows how engagement with African American culture and pedagogical support can lead to the kinds of white self-examination that make empathy possible. The result is a book that challenges the trend of focusing on society's failures in achieving cross-racial empathy and instead explores possible avenues for change.
George Kouvaros
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- September 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780816695560
- eISBN:
- 9781452953540
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816695560.003.0007
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The introduction outlines Robert Frank’s life and development as a filmmaker and photographer. His works always depicted a narrative in one way or another. He also used striking images and a ...
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The introduction outlines Robert Frank’s life and development as a filmmaker and photographer. His works always depicted a narrative in one way or another. He also used striking images and a documentary point of view to capture the way of life for everyday Americans. Kouvaros connects Frank’s film The Americans to contemporary Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. Finally, the introduction explains how being a photographer impacted Frank’s filmmaking style and decisions.Less
The introduction outlines Robert Frank’s life and development as a filmmaker and photographer. His works always depicted a narrative in one way or another. He also used striking images and a documentary point of view to capture the way of life for everyday Americans. Kouvaros connects Frank’s film The Americans to contemporary Jack Kerouac’s On the Road. Finally, the introduction explains how being a photographer impacted Frank’s filmmaking style and decisions.
Keith Williams
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781846310591
- eISBN:
- 9781781380574
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5949/liverpool/9781846310591.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter examines Wells's The Invisible Man (IM). It argues that in IM Wells developed something just as aesthetically ahead of its time as any of the optical speculations of his earlier fiction: ...
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This chapter examines Wells's The Invisible Man (IM). It argues that in IM Wells developed something just as aesthetically ahead of its time as any of the optical speculations of his earlier fiction: the generation of a whole fiction from a single trope – metonymy – in a way that created a brilliantly reflexive match between form and theme. IM also brought him closest to the editorial basis of film narrative and, in turn, created one of his most intriguing commentaries on, and opportunities for, cinema itself.Less
This chapter examines Wells's The Invisible Man (IM). It argues that in IM Wells developed something just as aesthetically ahead of its time as any of the optical speculations of his earlier fiction: the generation of a whole fiction from a single trope – metonymy – in a way that created a brilliantly reflexive match between form and theme. IM also brought him closest to the editorial basis of film narrative and, in turn, created one of his most intriguing commentaries on, and opportunities for, cinema itself.