Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748618668
- eISBN:
- 9780748670802
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748618668.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This introduction to American independent cinema offers both a comprehensive industrial and economic history of the sector from the early twentieth century to the present and a study of key ...
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This introduction to American independent cinema offers both a comprehensive industrial and economic history of the sector from the early twentieth century to the present and a study of key individual films and film-makers. Readers will develop an understanding of the complex dynamic relations between independent and mainstream American cinema.The main argument revolves around the idea that American independent cinema has developed alongside mainstream Hollywood cinema with institutional, industrial and economic changes in the latter shaping and informing the former. Consequently, the term ‘independent’ has acquired different meanings at different points in the history of American cinema, evolving according to the impact of changing conditions in the American film industry. These various meanings are examined in the course of the book.The book is ordered chronologically, beginning with independent filmmaking in the studio era (examining both top-rank and low-end independent film production), moving to the 1950s and 1960s (discussing both the adoption of independent filmmaking as the main method of production for the Hollywood majors as well as exploitation filmmaking) and finishing with contemporary American independent cinema (exploring areas such as the New Hollywood, the major independent production and distribution companies and the institutionalisation of independent cinema in the 1990s). Each chapter includes a number of case studies which focus on specific films and/or filmmakers, while a number of independent production and distribution companies are also discussed in detail.Less
This introduction to American independent cinema offers both a comprehensive industrial and economic history of the sector from the early twentieth century to the present and a study of key individual films and film-makers. Readers will develop an understanding of the complex dynamic relations between independent and mainstream American cinema.The main argument revolves around the idea that American independent cinema has developed alongside mainstream Hollywood cinema with institutional, industrial and economic changes in the latter shaping and informing the former. Consequently, the term ‘independent’ has acquired different meanings at different points in the history of American cinema, evolving according to the impact of changing conditions in the American film industry. These various meanings are examined in the course of the book.The book is ordered chronologically, beginning with independent filmmaking in the studio era (examining both top-rank and low-end independent film production), moving to the 1950s and 1960s (discussing both the adoption of independent filmmaking as the main method of production for the Hollywood majors as well as exploitation filmmaking) and finishing with contemporary American independent cinema (exploring areas such as the New Hollywood, the major independent production and distribution companies and the institutionalisation of independent cinema in the 1990s). Each chapter includes a number of case studies which focus on specific films and/or filmmakers, while a number of independent production and distribution companies are also discussed in detail.
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.
Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748633685
- eISBN:
- 9780748671236
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633685.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
David Mamet’s The Spanish Prisoner is a fine example of American independent cinema in transition. Made by a playwright-turned-filmmaker with a distinctive approach to questions of narrative and ...
More
David Mamet’s The Spanish Prisoner is a fine example of American independent cinema in transition. Made by a playwright-turned-filmmaker with a distinctive approach to questions of narrative and visual style at a time (the late 1990s) when the boundaries between what was considered independent filmmaking and what mainstream cinema had been, arguably, eroding, The Spanish Prisoner achieved critical and commercial success. It also demonstrated that a place still existed for filmmakers with highly unusual takes on the art of cinema, like David Mamet. Nodding to such crowd-pleasing classics as Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, The Spanish Prisoner is a particularly idiosyncratic film that betrays its origin outside the Hollywood mainstream. Featuring a heavily convoluted narrative that is the product of an unreliable narration; an excessive, often anti-classical, visual style that draws attention to itself; and belonging to the generic category of the ‘con game film’, which actively challenges the spectator to comprehend the unfolding of the narrative, The Spanish Prisoner is a film that bridges genre filmmaking with personal visual style, independent film production with niche distribution and mainstream subject matter with unconventional filmic techniques. This book discusses The Spanish Prisoner as an example of contemporary American independent cinema while also using it as a vehicle to explore several key ideas in film studies, especially in terms of aesthetics, narrative, style and genre.Less
David Mamet’s The Spanish Prisoner is a fine example of American independent cinema in transition. Made by a playwright-turned-filmmaker with a distinctive approach to questions of narrative and visual style at a time (the late 1990s) when the boundaries between what was considered independent filmmaking and what mainstream cinema had been, arguably, eroding, The Spanish Prisoner achieved critical and commercial success. It also demonstrated that a place still existed for filmmakers with highly unusual takes on the art of cinema, like David Mamet. Nodding to such crowd-pleasing classics as Hitchcock’s North by Northwest, The Spanish Prisoner is a particularly idiosyncratic film that betrays its origin outside the Hollywood mainstream. Featuring a heavily convoluted narrative that is the product of an unreliable narration; an excessive, often anti-classical, visual style that draws attention to itself; and belonging to the generic category of the ‘con game film’, which actively challenges the spectator to comprehend the unfolding of the narrative, The Spanish Prisoner is a film that bridges genre filmmaking with personal visual style, independent film production with niche distribution and mainstream subject matter with unconventional filmic techniques. This book discusses The Spanish Prisoner as an example of contemporary American independent cinema while also using it as a vehicle to explore several key ideas in film studies, especially in terms of aesthetics, narrative, style and genre.
Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748633685
- eISBN:
- 9780748671236
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633685.003.0002
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The chapter reviews a number of debates and arguments about contemporary American independent cinema. One of these arguments involves an examination of independent cinema as an institutional ...
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The chapter reviews a number of debates and arguments about contemporary American independent cinema. One of these arguments involves an examination of independent cinema as an institutional apparatus exemplified by the huge number of film festivals (with the massively popular Sundance Film Festival at the forefront), specialized theatre circuits, distributors’ associations, and even an Independent Spirit Award body, which have created a significant marketplace for low-budget films that differ from the blockbuster films and star vehicles of the major studios. Furthermore, it presents arguments about American independent cinema from an industrial-economic perspective focusing in particular on the ‘problem’ of the studios’ classics divisions and specialty film labels. As these companies traded heavily in the American independent film market, especially since the 1990s, it became extremely difficult to distinguish between ‘truly’ independent films (i.e. made by companies without affiliations with the majors) and films made with an ‘independent style’ by companies with corporate links with the majors. For those reasons, the chapter argues, critics, industry and audiences started using the label ‘indie’ instead of ‘independent’, which suggests a qualitative difference between the two.Less
The chapter reviews a number of debates and arguments about contemporary American independent cinema. One of these arguments involves an examination of independent cinema as an institutional apparatus exemplified by the huge number of film festivals (with the massively popular Sundance Film Festival at the forefront), specialized theatre circuits, distributors’ associations, and even an Independent Spirit Award body, which have created a significant marketplace for low-budget films that differ from the blockbuster films and star vehicles of the major studios. Furthermore, it presents arguments about American independent cinema from an industrial-economic perspective focusing in particular on the ‘problem’ of the studios’ classics divisions and specialty film labels. As these companies traded heavily in the American independent film market, especially since the 1990s, it became extremely difficult to distinguish between ‘truly’ independent films (i.e. made by companies without affiliations with the majors) and films made with an ‘independent style’ by companies with corporate links with the majors. For those reasons, the chapter argues, critics, industry and audiences started using the label ‘indie’ instead of ‘independent’, which suggests a qualitative difference between the two.
Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748618668
- eISBN:
- 9780748670802
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748618668.003.0007
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
As the majors became one by one parts of multinational conglomerates in the late 1960s and 1970s, they gradually turned their attention to the production of fewer but considerably more expensive ...
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As the majors became one by one parts of multinational conglomerates in the late 1960s and 1970s, they gradually turned their attention to the production of fewer but considerably more expensive films with the potential to do spectacularly well at the box office. However, this trend created gaps in the film market which were exploited by independent distributors such as American International Pictures and the Samuel Goldwyn Company, which managed to carve a small niche, mainly for sensational /exploitation films and art-house films, respectively. The first part of the chapter discusses the effects of conglomeration on the independent film sector and cites a number of examples of exploitation and art film companies that benefited from these effects. The chapter then focuses on the development of new distribution outlets (cable television and home video in particular) and examines how they created a new demand for films in the late 1970s and early 1980s that created the conditions for the beginning of what has become known as contemporary American independent cinema. Case studies: Foxy Brown (Hill, 1974), Return of the Secaucus Seven (Sayles, 1980).Less
As the majors became one by one parts of multinational conglomerates in the late 1960s and 1970s, they gradually turned their attention to the production of fewer but considerably more expensive films with the potential to do spectacularly well at the box office. However, this trend created gaps in the film market which were exploited by independent distributors such as American International Pictures and the Samuel Goldwyn Company, which managed to carve a small niche, mainly for sensational /exploitation films and art-house films, respectively. The first part of the chapter discusses the effects of conglomeration on the independent film sector and cites a number of examples of exploitation and art film companies that benefited from these effects. The chapter then focuses on the development of new distribution outlets (cable television and home video in particular) and examines how they created a new demand for films in the late 1970s and early 1980s that created the conditions for the beginning of what has become known as contemporary American independent cinema. Case studies: Foxy Brown (Hill, 1974), Return of the Secaucus Seven (Sayles, 1980).
Anna Backman Rogers
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780748693603
- eISBN:
- 9781474412216
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748693603.003.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
American independent cinema is certainly a cinema in crisis, but it is also a cinema of crisis. A great deal of useful scholarship has been carried out on the notion of independence and the ...
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American independent cinema is certainly a cinema in crisis, but it is also a cinema of crisis. A great deal of useful scholarship has been carried out on the notion of independence and the definition of indie cinema as a hybrid industry (‘indiewood’). This study partakes of that conversation, but from the perspective of the aesthetics and poetics of crisis that figure or visualise notions of ambiguity and the in-between. The cinema of crisis delineated here is one that explores the difficulty or impossibility of progression through extended moments of liminality and threshold. In a cinema of crisis, the concept of a plot is subservient to the investigation of what it means to exist in a moment of threshold within the context of a rite of passage; this moment may usher in transformation, or it may lead to stasis and not offer any form of resolution. What the viewer sees on screen are bodies that may halt, falter, freeze and become-surface, or evolve, mutate, dissolve and merge: these are bodies in crisis because they are either atrophying or becoming-other.Less
American independent cinema is certainly a cinema in crisis, but it is also a cinema of crisis. A great deal of useful scholarship has been carried out on the notion of independence and the definition of indie cinema as a hybrid industry (‘indiewood’). This study partakes of that conversation, but from the perspective of the aesthetics and poetics of crisis that figure or visualise notions of ambiguity and the in-between. The cinema of crisis delineated here is one that explores the difficulty or impossibility of progression through extended moments of liminality and threshold. In a cinema of crisis, the concept of a plot is subservient to the investigation of what it means to exist in a moment of threshold within the context of a rite of passage; this moment may usher in transformation, or it may lead to stasis and not offer any form of resolution. What the viewer sees on screen are bodies that may halt, falter, freeze and become-surface, or evolve, mutate, dissolve and merge: these are bodies in crisis because they are either atrophying or becoming-other.
Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748633685
- eISBN:
- 9780748671236
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633685.003.0003
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The Chapter examines David Mamet’s position within the independent and indie cinema landscapes. It starts with an overview of Mamet’s work in American cinema and points to the problem that despite ...
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The Chapter examines David Mamet’s position within the independent and indie cinema landscapes. It starts with an overview of Mamet’s work in American cinema and points to the problem that despite the fact that the majority of his work has been for independent companies and studio specialty film divisions, he rarely has been examined as an independent filmmaker. This is despite the fact that as a filmmaker he has produced aesthetically distinctive films that differ considerably from mainstream Hollywood productions. Furthermore, the independent and indie film companies that have financed and distributed his films have increasingly utilised his name as an auteur brand name for the independent sector, which begs further the question of why David Mamet has rarely been discussed as an independent filmmaker. Through an examination of the trailers and other promotional material that surrounded the release of his films, the chapter explores the ways in which Mamet has been associated with American independent cinema.Less
The Chapter examines David Mamet’s position within the independent and indie cinema landscapes. It starts with an overview of Mamet’s work in American cinema and points to the problem that despite the fact that the majority of his work has been for independent companies and studio specialty film divisions, he rarely has been examined as an independent filmmaker. This is despite the fact that as a filmmaker he has produced aesthetically distinctive films that differ considerably from mainstream Hollywood productions. Furthermore, the independent and indie film companies that have financed and distributed his films have increasingly utilised his name as an auteur brand name for the independent sector, which begs further the question of why David Mamet has rarely been discussed as an independent filmmaker. Through an examination of the trailers and other promotional material that surrounded the release of his films, the chapter explores the ways in which Mamet has been associated with American independent cinema.
M. K. Cheung
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9789622099777
- eISBN:
- 9789882206953
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789622099777.003.0002
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter discusses independent cinema and the practice of independent filmmaking. It discusses the revival of Hong Kong indie cinema in the 1990s and describes Fruit Chan as a role model for many ...
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This chapter discusses independent cinema and the practice of independent filmmaking. It discusses the revival of Hong Kong indie cinema in the 1990s and describes Fruit Chan as a role model for many filmmakers. After Made in Hong Kong, Chan has been circulated in Western and Asian cinematic discourses as an “indie filmmaker.” In public discourse, Chan's debut is referred to as “the Hong Kong independent legend.” His creative use of resources in the industry and his alternative way of gathering funding from friends and international film groups are regarded as ways in which he fights for access to and participatory equity within the commercial institution of film.Less
This chapter discusses independent cinema and the practice of independent filmmaking. It discusses the revival of Hong Kong indie cinema in the 1990s and describes Fruit Chan as a role model for many filmmakers. After Made in Hong Kong, Chan has been circulated in Western and Asian cinematic discourses as an “indie filmmaker.” In public discourse, Chan's debut is referred to as “the Hong Kong independent legend.” His creative use of resources in the industry and his alternative way of gathering funding from friends and international film groups are regarded as ways in which he fights for access to and participatory equity within the commercial institution of film.
Katarzyna Paszkiewicz
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781474425261
- eISBN:
- 9781474449632
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474425261.003.0005
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
In view of the historical co-implication of popular genres and the Hollywood film industry, it might be expected that the latter should be at the vanguard of women’s genre filmmaking. Yet women ...
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In view of the historical co-implication of popular genres and the Hollywood film industry, it might be expected that the latter should be at the vanguard of women’s genre filmmaking. Yet women directors who draw on genre cinema might, in fact, be proportionally more numerous in American independent cinema. One such director who builds in various ways on popular genres (in particular, the Western and the road movie) is Kelly Reichardt. This chapter asks, thus, what it means for a woman to use a popular genre in an independent filmmaking context. It shows how Reichardt’s authorship and biographical legend are constructed in close relation to the processes of legitimisation of independent cinema, conceptualised discursively in opposition to Hollywood (and genre). The second part of the chapter focuses specifically on Meek’s Cutoff (2010) – a Western film which was incorporated into the auteurist discourse of resistance towards genre and exceptional individual achievement. It will be argued that, while Meek’s Cutoff seems to be diametrically opposed to genre cinema, since it offers a radical revision of the Western genre conventions, it also draws on the productive potential of generic logic based on variation within reiteration (Neale 1980).Less
In view of the historical co-implication of popular genres and the Hollywood film industry, it might be expected that the latter should be at the vanguard of women’s genre filmmaking. Yet women directors who draw on genre cinema might, in fact, be proportionally more numerous in American independent cinema. One such director who builds in various ways on popular genres (in particular, the Western and the road movie) is Kelly Reichardt. This chapter asks, thus, what it means for a woman to use a popular genre in an independent filmmaking context. It shows how Reichardt’s authorship and biographical legend are constructed in close relation to the processes of legitimisation of independent cinema, conceptualised discursively in opposition to Hollywood (and genre). The second part of the chapter focuses specifically on Meek’s Cutoff (2010) – a Western film which was incorporated into the auteurist discourse of resistance towards genre and exceptional individual achievement. It will be argued that, while Meek’s Cutoff seems to be diametrically opposed to genre cinema, since it offers a radical revision of the Western genre conventions, it also draws on the productive potential of generic logic based on variation within reiteration (Neale 1980).
Tilman Baumgärtel
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.003.0014
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
A short manifesto by key Indonesian independent film makers
A short manifesto by key Indonesian independent film makers
Jennifer O'Meara
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- January 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781474420624
- eISBN:
- 9781474449564
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474420624.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This book examines the centrality of dialogue to American independent cinema, arguing that it is impossible to separate small budgets from the old adage that ‘talk is cheap’. Focusing on the 1980s ...
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This book examines the centrality of dialogue to American independent cinema, arguing that it is impossible to separate small budgets from the old adage that ‘talk is cheap’. Focusing on the 1980s until the present, particularly on films by writer-directors like Jim Jarmusch, Noah Baumbach and Richard Linklater, the book demonstrates dialogue’s ability to engage audiences and bind together the narrative, aesthetic and performative elements of selected cinema. When compared to the dialogue norms of more mainstream cinema, the verbal styles of these independent writer-directors are found to be marked by alternations between various extremes, particularly those of naturalism and hyper-stylization, and between the poles of efficiency and excess. More broadly, these writer-directors are used as case studies that allow for an understanding of how dialogue functions in verbally experimental cinema, which, this book contends, is more often found in ‘independent’ or ‘art’ cinema. In questioning the association of dialogue-centred films with the ‘literary’ and the ‘un-cinematic’, the book highlights how speech in independent cinema can instead hinge on what is termed ‘cinematic verbalism’: when dialogue is designed and executed in complex, medium-specific ways. More broadly, the book provides a framework for analysing dialogue design and execution that can be readily applied to other films and filmmakers. It also highlights how speech can be central to cinema without overshadowing its medium-specific components. In so doing, the book develops new connections between film dialogue, reception studies, independent cinema and auteur studies.Less
This book examines the centrality of dialogue to American independent cinema, arguing that it is impossible to separate small budgets from the old adage that ‘talk is cheap’. Focusing on the 1980s until the present, particularly on films by writer-directors like Jim Jarmusch, Noah Baumbach and Richard Linklater, the book demonstrates dialogue’s ability to engage audiences and bind together the narrative, aesthetic and performative elements of selected cinema. When compared to the dialogue norms of more mainstream cinema, the verbal styles of these independent writer-directors are found to be marked by alternations between various extremes, particularly those of naturalism and hyper-stylization, and between the poles of efficiency and excess. More broadly, these writer-directors are used as case studies that allow for an understanding of how dialogue functions in verbally experimental cinema, which, this book contends, is more often found in ‘independent’ or ‘art’ cinema. In questioning the association of dialogue-centred films with the ‘literary’ and the ‘un-cinematic’, the book highlights how speech in independent cinema can instead hinge on what is termed ‘cinematic verbalism’: when dialogue is designed and executed in complex, medium-specific ways. More broadly, the book provides a framework for analysing dialogue design and execution that can be readily applied to other films and filmmakers. It also highlights how speech can be central to cinema without overshadowing its medium-specific components. In so doing, the book develops new connections between film dialogue, reception studies, independent cinema and auteur studies.
Tilman Baumgärtel
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.003.0003
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
The article gives an overview of the recent upsurge of independent cinema in Southeast Asia. I argue that these films are examples of a new transnational cinema forthe lack of alternative: as the ...
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The article gives an overview of the recent upsurge of independent cinema in Southeast Asia. I argue that these films are examples of a new transnational cinema forthe lack of alternative: as the political and social situation in the countries where they have been made does not allow for their inclusion into the mainstream of the national cinema, they have turned to an international market to find an audience. I argue that a new generation of film-makers has been empowered by the easy and cheap access to digital video. Thanks to digital cinema technology, film-makersfrom South East Asia have the opportunity to produce their alternative and often very personal works. Using Arjun Appadurai's influential essay ‘Disjuncture and Difference’ (1996) as a theoretical framework, I discuss some of the specific traits of recent independent films from Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Cambodia, Singapore and the Philippines, and point out their genuinely transnational nature with regard to distribution and reception.Less
The article gives an overview of the recent upsurge of independent cinema in Southeast Asia. I argue that these films are examples of a new transnational cinema forthe lack of alternative: as the political and social situation in the countries where they have been made does not allow for their inclusion into the mainstream of the national cinema, they have turned to an international market to find an audience. I argue that a new generation of film-makers has been empowered by the easy and cheap access to digital video. Thanks to digital cinema technology, film-makersfrom South East Asia have the opportunity to produce their alternative and often very personal works. Using Arjun Appadurai's influential essay ‘Disjuncture and Difference’ (1996) as a theoretical framework, I discuss some of the specific traits of recent independent films from Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, Cambodia, Singapore and the Philippines, and point out their genuinely transnational nature with regard to distribution and reception.
John A. Lent
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
To discuss Southeast Asian Independent Cinema is to encounter problems of definition, first, in trying to delineate the region itself, and second, in setting the parameters of independent film. ...
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To discuss Southeast Asian Independent Cinema is to encounter problems of definition, first, in trying to delineate the region itself, and second, in setting the parameters of independent film. Southeast Asia is a diverse mixture of many languages, cultures, and beliefs pulled together for political convenience; it is a colonial, and later, Cold War construct of Western origins. The region and in turn, its film, are not entities unto themselves; they are inseparable from their Indian, Malay, Chinese, and other roots.Less
To discuss Southeast Asian Independent Cinema is to encounter problems of definition, first, in trying to delineate the region itself, and second, in setting the parameters of independent film. Southeast Asia is a diverse mixture of many languages, cultures, and beliefs pulled together for political convenience; it is a colonial, and later, Cold War construct of Western origins. The region and in turn, its film, are not entities unto themselves; they are inseparable from their Indian, Malay, Chinese, and other roots.
Glyn Davis
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748637782
- eISBN:
- 9780748670864
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748637782.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Nominated for four Oscars, Far from Heaven earned rave reviews and won widespread cultural and critical recognition. A knowing and emotionally involving homage to the films of Douglas Sirk, this film ...
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Nominated for four Oscars, Far from Heaven earned rave reviews and won widespread cultural and critical recognition. A knowing and emotionally involving homage to the films of Douglas Sirk, this film is a key text in the canon of American independent cinema. This book offers a detailed and perceptive study of Haynes' film, with each chapter centred on a topic crucial for understanding Far from Heaven's richness and seductive pleasures (authorship, melodrama, queerness). The film is also positioned in relation to the rest of Todd Haynes' work, the New Queer Cinema movement, and the history of US independent cinema.Less
Nominated for four Oscars, Far from Heaven earned rave reviews and won widespread cultural and critical recognition. A knowing and emotionally involving homage to the films of Douglas Sirk, this film is a key text in the canon of American independent cinema. This book offers a detailed and perceptive study of Haynes' film, with each chapter centred on a topic crucial for understanding Far from Heaven's richness and seductive pleasures (authorship, melodrama, queerness). The film is also positioned in relation to the rest of Todd Haynes' work, the New Queer Cinema movement, and the history of US independent cinema.
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
Anna Backman Rogers
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9780748693603
- eISBN:
- 9781474412216
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748693603.001.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
Anna Backman Rogers argues that American independent cinema is a cinema not merely in crisis, but also of crisis. As a cinema which often explores the rite of passage by explicitly drawing on ...
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Anna Backman Rogers argues that American independent cinema is a cinema not merely in crisis, but also of crisis. As a cinema which often explores the rite of passage by explicitly drawing on American cinematic heritage, from the teen movie to the western, American independent films deal in images of crisis, transition and metamorphosis, offering a subversive engagement with more traditional modes of representation. Examining films by Gus Van Sant, Jim Jarmusch and Sofia Coppola, this study sets forth that American indie films offer the viewer an ‘art experience’ within the confines of commercial, narrative cinema by engaging with cinematic time (as a mode of philosophical thought) and foregrounding the inherent ‘crisis’ of the cinematic image (as the mode of being as change). The subject of this book is how certain American independent films appropriate ritual as a kind of power of the false in order to throw into crisis images – such as the cliché – that pertain to truth via collective comprehension. In his study of genre, Steve Neale (2000) has outlined how certain images and sound tracks can function ritualistically and ideologically; cinema, according to Neale, both creates a horizon of expectations for an audience and also draws upon existing stratifications and categories in order to shore up established identities and modes of thought.Less
Anna Backman Rogers argues that American independent cinema is a cinema not merely in crisis, but also of crisis. As a cinema which often explores the rite of passage by explicitly drawing on American cinematic heritage, from the teen movie to the western, American independent films deal in images of crisis, transition and metamorphosis, offering a subversive engagement with more traditional modes of representation. Examining films by Gus Van Sant, Jim Jarmusch and Sofia Coppola, this study sets forth that American indie films offer the viewer an ‘art experience’ within the confines of commercial, narrative cinema by engaging with cinematic time (as a mode of philosophical thought) and foregrounding the inherent ‘crisis’ of the cinematic image (as the mode of being as change). The subject of this book is how certain American independent films appropriate ritual as a kind of power of the false in order to throw into crisis images – such as the cliché – that pertain to truth via collective comprehension. In his study of genre, Steve Neale (2000) has outlined how certain images and sound tracks can function ritualistically and ideologically; cinema, according to Neale, both creates a horizon of expectations for an audience and also draws upon existing stratifications and categories in order to shore up established identities and modes of thought.
Rob Stone
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231165532
- eISBN:
- 9780231850407
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231165532.003.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter examines the role of the city of Austin in Richard Linklater's cinema. Locating Linklater in Austin is vital, for his films not only emerged from the slacker culture of the mid-1980s, ...
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This chapter examines the role of the city of Austin in Richard Linklater's cinema. Locating Linklater in Austin is vital, for his films not only emerged from the slacker culture of the mid-1980s, but enunciate the undermining of the ideologies of late capitalist materialism through the form, content, style, and themes of his filmmaking. Through this city, Linklater applied the techniques associated with representations of alienation in post-war European cinema to a specifically regional concept of American cinema that was also informed by existentialist and Marxist undercurrents. Consequently, his films associated slacker culture with the deliberate wider critical project of communal estrangement from political and national hegemonies, and reterritorialised a part of America that would find common identity and cause in the development of independent cinema.Less
This chapter examines the role of the city of Austin in Richard Linklater's cinema. Locating Linklater in Austin is vital, for his films not only emerged from the slacker culture of the mid-1980s, but enunciate the undermining of the ideologies of late capitalist materialism through the form, content, style, and themes of his filmmaking. Through this city, Linklater applied the techniques associated with representations of alienation in post-war European cinema to a specifically regional concept of American cinema that was also informed by existentialist and Marxist undercurrents. Consequently, his films associated slacker culture with the deliberate wider critical project of communal estrangement from political and national hegemonies, and reterritorialised a part of America that would find common identity and cause in the development of independent cinema.
Yannis Tzioumakis
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748633685
- eISBN:
- 9780748671236
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748633685.003.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The Introduction explains why The Spanish Prisoner is an important example of independent cinema and pays particular attention to the film’s generic specificity that has been misunderstood by ...
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The Introduction explains why The Spanish Prisoner is an important example of independent cinema and pays particular attention to the film’s generic specificity that has been misunderstood by critics. It also offers a brief overview of the four chapters that constitute it, with the first chapter examining key debates about the transition from an independent cinema to an indie cinema in the US, especially during the 1990s and the early 2000s; the second chapter looking at David Mamet’s place in the independent and indie cinema landscapes; the third one examining the film’s production and distribution history; and with the fourth and fifth scrutinising the film’s use of visual style and narrative, and of generic elements, respectively.Less
The Introduction explains why The Spanish Prisoner is an important example of independent cinema and pays particular attention to the film’s generic specificity that has been misunderstood by critics. It also offers a brief overview of the four chapters that constitute it, with the first chapter examining key debates about the transition from an independent cinema to an indie cinema in the US, especially during the 1990s and the early 2000s; the second chapter looking at David Mamet’s place in the independent and indie cinema landscapes; the third one examining the film’s production and distribution history; and with the fourth and fifth scrutinising the film’s use of visual style and narrative, and of generic elements, respectively.
Tilman Baumgärtel
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9789888083602
- eISBN:
- 9789882209114
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888083602.003.0013
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Asian Studies
This article was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer in September 2006, and caused such uproar in the local film scene, that the newspaper felt obliged to print a number of statements by ...
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This article was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer in September 2006, and caused such uproar in the local film scene, that the newspaper felt obliged to print a number of statements by directors and producers in consecutive issues, that are documented in extracts here.Less
This article was published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer in September 2006, and caused such uproar in the local film scene, that the newspaper felt obliged to print a number of statements by directors and producers in consecutive issues, that are documented in extracts here.
Trevor B. McCrisken and Andrew Pepper
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780748614899
- eISBN:
- 9780748670666
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9780748614899.003.0007
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Media Studies
If contemporary filmmakers have felt compelled to do away with the explicit racism of pre-civil rights Hollywood movie-making and make African Americans the subjects rather than the objects of their ...
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If contemporary filmmakers have felt compelled to do away with the explicit racism of pre-civil rights Hollywood movie-making and make African Americans the subjects rather than the objects of their gaze, then the vexed question of how successfully their ambitions have been realised needs to be addressed. There has been a small but growing number of films made by African-American directors (that is, Spike Lee, Mario Van Peebles) whose focus is predominantly African-American subjects and which tend to privilege conflict and confrontation rather than reconciliation and assimilation. Examples of this type of film are Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, Panther and Dead Presidents. Then there is Michael Mann's Ali (2001), a film about boxer Muhammad Ali. At stake is not only the question of how these black ‘independent’ films represent the struggle for racial equality and the emergence of black nationalism as a social, cultural and political force from the early 1960s onwards. Rather, it is also the viability of the distinction between Hollywood and this so-called black independent cinema in the first place.Less
If contemporary filmmakers have felt compelled to do away with the explicit racism of pre-civil rights Hollywood movie-making and make African Americans the subjects rather than the objects of their gaze, then the vexed question of how successfully their ambitions have been realised needs to be addressed. There has been a small but growing number of films made by African-American directors (that is, Spike Lee, Mario Van Peebles) whose focus is predominantly African-American subjects and which tend to privilege conflict and confrontation rather than reconciliation and assimilation. Examples of this type of film are Do the Right Thing, Malcolm X, Panther and Dead Presidents. Then there is Michael Mann's Ali (2001), a film about boxer Muhammad Ali. At stake is not only the question of how these black ‘independent’ films represent the struggle for racial equality and the emergence of black nationalism as a social, cultural and political force from the early 1960s onwards. Rather, it is also the viability of the distinction between Hollywood and this so-called black independent cinema in the first place.
