The Ves Handbook of Virtual Production
The VES Handbook of Virtual Production is a comprehensive guide to everything about virtual production available today - from pre-production to digital character creation, building a stage, choosing LED panels, setting up Volume Control, in-camera compositing of live action and CG elements, Virtual Art Departments, Virtual Previs and scouting, best practices and much more.Current and forward-looking, this book covers everything one may need to know to execute a successful virtual production project - including when it is best to use virtual production and when it is not. More than 80 industry leaders in all fields of virtual production share their knowledge, experiences, techniques, and best practices. The text also features charts, technical drawings, color images, and an extensive glossary of virtual production terms.The VES Handbook of Virtual Production is a vital resource for anyone wishing to gain essential knowledge in all aspects of virtual production. This is a must-have book for both aspiring and veteran professionals. It has been carefully compiled by the editors of The VES Handbook of Visual Effects.
The Gofast Guide to Screenwriting
Creator of the GoFaSt Model, author Greg Takoudes introduces a comprehensive study of the structural models of screenwriting and provides readers with an adaptive framework for writing successful scripts. With a new approach which reframes discussions and offers alternatives to students and writers who find conventional models creatively constricting, Takoudes draws from both teaching and professional experience to provide a new model of screenwriting that is designed to be adaptive to various types of scripts. The book is structured in three parts. First, it introduces the GoFast Model - allowing for less orthodox writers to keep their unique voices by breaking scripts down into smaller parts and encouraging more flexibility to write in an organized way, without feeling stifled. Second, the book explores several writing scenarios - featuring the practical uses of the model and a step-by-step script structure spanning chapters on a horror, superhero, and heist movie. Third, it concludes with detailed case studies exploring how the GoFaSt Model can be applied to break down scripts including Get Out, The Marvelous Mrs Maisel, and Portrait of a Lady on Fire. It is an ideal text for screenwriting students and aspiring screenwriters interested in learning how working writers put structural models into practice, as well professional screenwriters, producers, and development executives looking for new ways to think about writing, feedback, and development.
Monstrous Possibilities
This book focuses on how the abject spectacle of the 'monstrous feminine' has been reimagined by recent and contemporary screen horrors focused on the desires and subjectivities of female monsters who, as anti-heroic protagonists of revisionist and reflexive texts, exemplify gendered possibility in altered cultures of 21st century screen production and reception. As Barbara Creed notes in a recent interview, the patriarchal stereotype of horror that she named 'the monstrous-feminine' has, decades later, 'embarked on a life of her own'. Focused on this altered and renewed form of female monstrosity, this study engages with an international array of recent and contemporary screen entertainments, from arthouse and indie horror films by emergent female auteurs, to the franchised products of multimedia conglomerates, to 'quality' television horror, to the social media-based creations of horror fans working as 'pro-sumers'. In this way, the monograph in its organisation and scope maps the converged and rapidly changing environment of 21st century screen cultures in order to situate the monstrous female anti-hero as one of its distinctive products.
Film History for the Anthropocene
From its beginnings, some of German film's most prominent genres and directors have focused on the natural world and its transformations by humans. Heimat films, "city symphonies," mountain films, and rubble films all blend the boundary between landscape documentary and fiction film. Yet German film studies has been slow to adopt an environmental focus, concentrating (understandably) on its subject matter's political implications. This book reveals critical connections between German film, sociopolitical context, and environment, showing it to have been a creative catalyst for the social and ecological transformation of the Anthropocene. The book first considers the interplay between German film and environmental history in films and discourses of Heimat. Weimar-era films such as E. A. Dupont's Die Geierwally (1921), Carl Ludwig Achaz-Duisberg's Sprengbagger 1010 (1929), and Phil J羹tzi's Hunger in Waldenburg (1929) document and create a forum for discussing environmental change. The book then looks at film as a visual archive of and catalyst for infrastructure development, focusing on Metropolis (Fritz Lang, 1927), the mountain films of Arnold Fanck, and the Berlin films Stadt der Millionen (Adolf Trotz, 1925), Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Gro?stadt (Walter Ruttmann, 1927), and Menschen am Sonntag (1930). Nazi-era and postwar films are also examined. By exploring German film history alongside environmental history and theory, this book provides a case study of the power of film within processes of environmental transformation.
Transatlantic Cinephilia
In the two decades after World War II, a vibrant cultural infrastructure of cineclubs, archives, festivals, and film schools took shape in Latin America through the labor of film enthusiasts who often worked in concert with French and France-based organizations. In promoting the emerging concept and practice of art cinema, these film-related institutions advanced geopolitical and class interests simultaneously in a polarized Cold War climate. Seeking to sharpen viewers' critical faculties as a safeguard against ideological extremes, institutions of film culture lent prestige to Latin America's growing middle classes and capitalized on official and unofficial efforts to boost the circulation of French cinema, enhancing the nation's soft power in the wake of military defeat and occupation. As the first book-length, transnational analysis of postwar Latin American film culture, Transatlantic Cinephilia deepens our understanding of how institutional networks have nurtured alternative and nontheatrical cinemas.
Transatlantic Cinephilia
In the two decades after World War II, a vibrant cultural infrastructure of cineclubs, archives, festivals, and film schools took shape in Latin America through the labor of film enthusiasts who often worked in concert with French and France-based organizations. In promoting the emerging concept and practice of art cinema, these film-related institutions advanced geopolitical and class interests simultaneously in a polarized Cold War climate. Seeking to sharpen viewers' critical faculties as a safeguard against ideological extremes, institutions of film culture lent prestige to Latin America's growing middle classes and capitalized on official and unofficial efforts to boost the circulation of French cinema, enhancing the nation's soft power in the wake of military defeat and occupation. As the first book-length, transnational analysis of postwar Latin American film culture, Transatlantic Cinephilia deepens our understanding of how institutional networks have nurtured alternative and nontheatrical cinemas.
Marvel Studios the Marvel Cinematic Universe an Official Timeline
Become a master of the Marvel Cinematic Universe! The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is vast, incredibly varied, and richly complex. Different worlds, different timelines, countless characters. This is the guide to that universe. Created in close collaboration with Marvel Studios, it will answer the biggest questions: what happened, when, and where. Follow the entire story of the MCU from before the Big Bang to the Blip and beyond. Along the way, learn more about the evolution of the Iron Man armors, the hunt for the Infinity Stones, and the formation of the Multiverse. Want to know how many times aliens have invaded Earth, or the complete history of Cap's shield? Look no further! A treasured keepsake for any movie buff, filled with exclusive infographics, illuminating timelines, and amazing movie stills, this book will have pride of place on any MCU fan's shelf. (c) 2023 MARVEL
Ghibliotheque Film Korea
Explore the magical, mysterious world of Korean cinema, in this new book from the authors of Ghibliotheque. From smash hits such as Parasite to cult favourites Oldboy, The Handmaiden and Train to Busan, Korean cinema is a hotbed of creative talent and the force behind the most exciting, captivating filmmaking in the world right now. In this essential guide to the country's cinematic story, Michael Leader and Jake Cunningham - authors and hosts of the hit podcast Ghibliotheque - guide you through the must-see films from a century of Korean movies. Exploring 30 movies, from the breakout hits to deeper cuts, hidden gems and future classics, Film Korea is a gateway to everything you need to know about the white-hot world of Korean cinema. Combining reviews and director biographies with recommended further viewing and a catalogue of beautiful film stills and movie posters, this is your one-stop guide to an incredible, captivating artform.
Agatha Christie, She Watched
Care to match wits with Hercule Poirot? Take tea and gossip with Miss Marple? Chase spies with Tommy and Tuppence? Agatha Christie, She Watched will introduce you to must-see movies (and must-avoid dogs) that depict the hopeful and dark sides of human nature. These movies will tantalize you, mystify you, and make you laugh at the folly of humanity. For more than a century, Agatha Christie has been thrilling readers with her classic mystery stories as well as dark thrillers that explore the heart of evil such as And Then There Were None and Endless Night. Christie has also been a huge part of the world's movie and television culture with more than 200 adaptations made from her stories. Teresa Peschel watched and reviewed 201 adaptations, from the German silent movie Adventures, Inc. (1929) to See How They Run and Why Didn't They Ask Evans? (2022). Each one was rated for fidelity to the original material and its overall quality. Each review takes up two pages and is accompanied by a banner image, six cast photos, a list of the major actors, the locations where they were filmed. Foreign movies with English subtitles from India, France, Russia, China, Japan, and Germany are also represented. Finally, there are eight movies in which the fictional Agatha Christie appears. Watch her debate Hercule Poirot about killing him in Curtain, battle a space wasp with Doctor Who, and plot to kill her husband's mistress. Agatha Christie, She Watched is the only comprehensive collection of reviews about Agatha Christie adaptations. Use it to find the movies made from the novels and stories you love, fill in your movie collection, or hold an Agatha Christie festival of your own. Learn why Christie's stories of passion and pain still grip the imaginations of her readers.
Describing Cinema
In Describing Cinema, award-winning film scholar Timothy Corrigan explores the art and poetics of writing about film. Part theory, part rhetoric, and part pedagogy, the text examines and demonstrates acts of describing scenes, shots, and sequences in films as the most common and most underestimated way viewers respond to movies. Describing Cinema represents a global range of movies from Hollywood to Morocco to Rome, made from the 1940s to the present. As Corrigan shows, energetic and careful descriptions can serve as exceptionally rich ways to demonstrate and celebrate the activities, varieties, and challenges of a central generative movement in the viewing and interpretation of films. At its best, the act of describing films never simply denotes actions, images, sounds, or styles but rather produces the orchestration of one or more of those dimensions as an often creative and intersubjective movement between images, viewers, and a rhetorical language. Providing an invaluable exploration of the challenges and rewards film scholars face in describing movies, Corrigan insists that writing about film becomes thinking about film.
Research-Based Art Practices in Southeast Asia
This book is the first overall study of research-based art practices in Southeast Asia. Its objective is to examine the creative and mutual entanglement of academic and artistic research; in short, the Why, When, What and How of research-based art practices in the region. In Southeast Asia, artists are increasingly engaged in research-based art practices involving academic research processes. They work as historians, archivists, archaeologists or sociologists in order to produce knowledge and/or to challenge the current established systems of knowledge production. As artists, they can freely draw on academic research methodologies and, at the same time, question or divert them for their own artistic purpose. The outcome of their research findings is exhibited as an artwork and is not published or presented in an academic format. This book seeks to demonstrate the emancipatory dimension of these practices, which contribute to opening up our conceptions of knowledge and of art, bestowing a new and promising role to the artists within the society.
The Screenwriter’s Workshop
Through a series of carefully designed writing workshops, this book guides the screenwriter through the messy creativity of screenwriting, providing readers with a path to screenwriting that values reflection, critique, and exploration.
Cinema of the 70s
A celebration of the cinema of the 70s. What a decade!Today, over half a century later, great films are measured by those of the 70s. Has there been a more impactful 10-year period? For the first time, cinema reflected life and society, presenting both on the big screen with a compelling and penetrating truth. Directors became household names, often overnight, and films routinely broke box office records.With censorship relaxed, the subject matter could include alienation, descents into madness, drug addiction, dysfunctional relationships, promiscuity, alcoholism, PTSD, and any big news story of the day. Audiences gladly absorbed this new, shocking reality; in fact, they avoided films that candy-coated the truth.Musicals evolved, westerns all but died for several years, science fiction and fantasy made an incredible resurgence, and horror dominated the box office along with disaster films. But by and large, films about social issues were the best draw.
Yes You Can
If you've been trying to sell a spec script, attach a star, raise financing, or even just get someone to return your email, you already know it might take a while. So why not do something while you're waiting for other people to do something?This practical, no-nonsense guide to indie filmmaking will provide you with the tools and insider tips you need to make your movie with little to no budget. Written by an experienced and successful filmmaker who has paved her own way despite the odds, this book can help anyone-regardless of experience, education, or funding-to follow their dreams and actually DO IT. YES YOU CAN will lead you through every step of the low- to no-budget filmmaking process, from writing, casting, and pre-production, to lighting, directing actors, post-production, distribution, and more. Author Courtney Daniels shares everything she's learned, providing expert insight and personal anecdotes that will prove invaluable for any filmmaker who wants to do things their way. This book will give you the tools you need to make a super low-budget film-for yourself, by yourself-without waiting for anyone's permission or blessing. What are you waiting for?
Gesture in French Post-New Wave Cinema
竄This fascinating study of gesture makes an original contribution to film studies through the persuasive insights it offers into the significance of gesture in its different manifestations in post-New Wave cinema. Meticulous analysis of an eclectic choice of examples and compelling meditations on wider questions of social conditioning, human memory and gender make this book essential reading.罈 (Dr Albertine Fox, Senior Lecturer in French Film, University of Bristol) Since the invention of cinema in the late nineteenth century, gesture has been a central preoccupation and source of innovation for early film pioneers and avant-garde filmmakers. A non-verbal form of expression and communication characterised by movement, gesture is a key theoretical concept in film analysis that raises crucial questions about the medium specificity of cinema. This book uses an interdisciplinary and intermedial approach to read gesture in terms of its interplay with film technology and its relations with the visual and performing arts. The author examines the aesthetics of gesture in a selection of films made during a complex historical and cultural period marked by the disintegration of the French New Wave, the uprisings of May 1968 and the decline of postwar economic prosperity. The book offers an in-depth study of the works of major and often under-explored French and Francophone filmmakers, artists, writers and intellectuals, including Chantal Akerman, Fernand Deligny, Jean-Luc Godard, Pierre Klossowski, Anne-Marie Mi矇ville, Georges Perec, Bernard Queysanne, Jacques Rivette, Renaud Victor and Pierre Zucca. While revitalising the expression of gesture in modern sound cinema, their films developed radical ways of representing and revealing the impact of sociocultural conditioning on the body.
Genndy Tartakovsky
Genndy Tartakovsky is widely regarded as a pioneer in contemporary Western animation of the 20th and 21st centuries. His groundbreaking and prolific output, ranging from Dexter's Laboratory to Samurai Jack and Sym-Bionic Titan, has become a mainstay of contemporary animated programming, and collectively, the cornerstone of both titans of the industry such as Cartoon Network and Adult Swim. This open access book draws attention to the comparatively mysterious figure of this creator, while simultaneously celebrating his singular vision, mastery of formal technique, genre sensitivity, personal stylistic flair, and how these aesthetic and narrative elements combine to produce what the author calls an 'animation of sincerity' in all his works. The ebook editions of this book are available open access under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence on www.bloomsburycollections.com.
The American Abroad
Drawing on cinema and media studies, art history, American studies, and postcolonial studies, this innovative book offers a fresh way of thinking about Hollywood film aesthetics. It explores how eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Western colonial formations of vision influenced classical Hollywood film style, and thus provides a new and unique perspective on the origins of the cinematic gaze. Classical Hollywood cinema constructs global spaces as an imaginative dreamworld, subsuming geographical and cultural differences into utopian fantasy. Yet, this characteristically Hollywoodian aesthetic has rarely been explored in detail. How are such representations constructed within film texts? Is this utopian aesthetic really as uniform and transparent as it appears? What is its relationship to the United States' status as an imperial power? In The American Abroad, Anna Cooper explores how postwar Hollywood cinema adopted elements of British and French imperial visual culture, transforming them to suit a new United Statesian context. Cooper argues that four visual discourses in particular-the sublime, the ethnographic, the picturesque, and glamour-became building blocks in the development of a new American visual language.
Marvelous Names in Literature and Cinema
MARVELOUS NAMESIN LITERATURE AND CINEMABy P. Adams SitneyA new collection of essays from P. Adams Sitney, author of Visionary Film, an important and influential early study of American experimental cinema. P. Adams Sitney explores topics such as Herman Melville and the novel Moby-Dick, Charlie Chaplin, the early cinema of G矇orges M矇li癡s, Vertigo (Alfred Hitchcock, 1958), Wavelength (Michael Snow, 1967), the avant-garde cinema of Stan Brakhage, Andy Warhol and Harry Smith, modern poetry (St矇phane Mallarm矇, Hart Crane), and the sonnet. Sitney also looks back over his contributions to the world of structural/ avant-garde film and his encounters with some of its leading lights in the last essay. P. Adams Sitney is Professor of Visual Arts at Princeton University. He previously taught at the Cooper Union, Chicago's Art Institute, and New York University. He co-founded the Anthology Film Archives in New York in 1970. Sitney was an important teacher of cinema studies at Princeton and elsewhere. David James (University of Southern California) dubs Sitney 'the dean of American film historiography'. In 2008, P. Adams Sitney received the Logos-Siegfried Kracauer Award from Anthology Film Archives. He was awarded the President's Award for Distinguished Teaching in 2010. In 2011 he was awarded the Anna-Maria Kellen Berlin Prize from the American Academy in Berlin. He was admitted to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2011. P. Adams Sitney's books include: Visionary Film: The American Avant-Garde, 1943-2000, Vital Crises In Italian Cinema, Eyes Upside Down: Visionary Filmmakers and the Heritage of Emerson, The Cinema of Poetry, and Modernist Montage: The Obscurity of Vision In Cinema and Literature. Illustrated. Hardcover, with a full colour cover.www.crmoon.com
Transformation of Contemporary Film Genre
This book is the first one focusing on Chinese mainstream films from a cross-disciplinary perspective. Based on case studies, it discusses three subgenres of mainland Chinese commercial mainstream films and offers an approach to studying the transformation of Chinese mainstream film within the theoretical frameworks of "genre theory" and "screenwriting method". It helps professionals understand the genres and narratives of Chinese mainstream films, and also serves as a must-read for non-professionals interested in Chinese cinema.
Counterfeit Worlds
Dive into the worlds of Philip K. Dick who inspired some of the most famous sci-fi movies of all time!Philip K. Dick, the visionary author behind Blade Runner, is the most adapted science fiction writer in cinema history. Though he struggled to make a living during his lifetime, his work has since served as a deep seam of ideas to be mined by filmmakers such as Ridley Scott, Paul Verhoeven, Steven Speilberg, John Woo and Richard Linklater, resulting in some of the most successful and influential SF movies of all time. For the still-unequalled future world of Blade Runner to the mind-bending A Scanner Darkly, via the blockbusting action/adventure of Total Recall, Paycheck and Minority Report - not to mention the debt of gratitude films like The Matrix and The Truman Show owe to his work - the legacy of Philip K. Dick has revolutionised Hollywood.Illustrated with rare photos, Counterfeit Worlds is the first book to trace the history of Philip K. Dick screen adaptations, both in cinema and on television.
Precarity in European Film
This volume brings together renowned scholars and early career-researchers in mapping the ways in which European cinema --whether arthouse or mainstream, fictional or documentary, working with traditional or new media-- engages with phenomena of precarity, poverty, and social exclusion. It compares how the filmic traditions of different countries reflect the socioeconomic conditions associated with precarity, and illuminates similarities in the iconography of precarious lives across cultures. While some of the contributions deal with the representations of marginalized minorities, others focus on work-related precarity or the depictions of downward mobility. Among other topics, the volume looks at how films grapple with gender inequality, intersectional struggle, discriminatory housing policies, and the specific problems of precarious youth. With its comparative approach to filmic representations of European precarity, this volume makes a major contribution to scholarship on precarity and the representation of social class in contemporary visual culture. Watch our book talk with the editors Elisa Cuter, Guido Kirsten and Hanna Prenzel here: https: //youtu.be/lKpD1NFAx2o
Maverick Movies
A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. Maverick Movies tells the improbable story of New Line Cinema, a company that cut a remarkable path through the American film industry and movie culture. Founded in 1967 as an art film distributor, New Line made a small fortune running John Waters's Pink Flamingos at midnight screenings in the 1970s and found reliable returns with the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise in the 1980s. By 2001, the company competed with the major Hollywood studios and reached global box office success with the Lord of the Rings franchise. Blurring boundaries between high and low culture, between independent film and Hollywood, and between the margins and the mainstream, New Line Cinema epitomizes Hollywood's shift in focus from the mass audience fostered by the classic studios to the multitude of niche audiences sought today.
Anime, Philosophy and Religion
Anime is exploding on the worldwide stage! Anime has been a staple in Japan for decades, strongly connected to manga. So why has anime become a worldwide sensation? A cursory explanation is the explosion of online streaming services specializing in anime, like Funimation and Crunchyroll. Even more general streaming services like Netflix and Amazon have gotten in on the game.Anime is exotic to Western eyes and culture. That is one of the reasons anime has gained worldwide popularity. This strange aesthetic draws the audience in only to find it is deeper and more sophisticated than its surface appearance. Japan is an honor and shame culture. Anime provides a platform to discuss "universal" problems facing human beings. It does so in an amazing variety of ways and subgenres, and often with a sense of humor. The themes, characters, stories, plotlines, and development are often complex. This makes anime a deep well of philosophical, metaphysical, and religious ideas for analysis.International scholars are represented in this book. There is a diversity of perspectives on a diversity of anime, themes, content, and analysis. It hopes to delve deeper into the complex world of anime and demonstrate why it deserves the respect of scholars and the public alike.
Rebecca on Film & TV
This is a reference book on the film and television adaptations that have been made from Daphne Du Maurier's novel Rebecca. There are a dozen productions included, along with complete cast listings, directorial credits, numerous photographs, running times, and a story synopsis for each production.
Media and the War in Ukraine
This volume aims to deepen our understanding of the dynamic intersections of war and media in the rapidly transforming media ecology and the reordered geopolitical context. Since Russia's fullscale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, a new set of media practices and actors have entered the field of contemporary war. The volume examines the ways in which the digital media and communication environment is involved in and shape the war in Ukraine. The chapters in the volume analyse the expanding mesh of media--from mainstream broadcasting and press to social media platforms, and the latest digital technologies--and address four key themes: media infrastructures and the interplay between platforms, technologies, institutions and civic actors; open-source intelligence contributing to (dis)information about the war; the everyday life of war performed and documented on social media; and different interplays between the local and the global in the news coverage of the war. Open Access Chapter 8 is available here. Open Access Chapter 3 is available here.
Media and the War in Ukraine
This volume aims to deepen our understanding of the dynamic intersections of war and media in the rapidly transforming media ecology and the reordered geopolitical context. Since Russia's fullscale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, a new set of media practices and actors have entered the field of contemporary war. The volume examines the ways in which the digital media and communication environment is involved in and shape the war in Ukraine. The chapters in the volume analyse the expanding mesh of media--from mainstream broadcasting and press to social media platforms, and the latest digital technologies--and address four key themes: media infrastructures and the interplay between platforms, technologies, institutions and civic actors; open-source intelligence contributing to (dis)information about the war; the everyday life of war performed and documented on social media; and different interplays between the local and the global in the news coverage of the war. Open Access Chapter 8 is available here. Open Access Chapter 3 is available here.
Movies on a Mission
This investigation into the little-known genre of mission-oriented films uncovers how Protestant missionaries overseas sought to bring back motion picture footage from remote parts of the world. In the broader religious community, mission films aimed to educate congregants back home about efforts to evangelize communities around the world. This book, however, demonstrates the larger impact of mission films on American visual culture. The evolution and development of the genre is highlighted from an early emphasis on "foreign views" in the 1910s, to interwar films providing a more detailed look at how mission stations functioned in far-flung lands, to Cold War productions which at times functioned as veritable propaganda tools parroting anti-communist discourse emanating from the CIA.
Cinemas of the Global South
This book engages with the idea of the Global South through cinema as a concept of resistance; as a space of decolonialisation; and as an arena of virtuality, creativity and change. It opens up a dialogue amongst scholars and filmmakers from the Global South: India, Nigeria, Colombia, Brazil, South Africa, and Egypt.The essays in the volume approach cinema as an intertwined process of both production and perception not divorced from the economic, social, political and cultural. They emphasise film as a visual medium where form, structure and content are not separable. Through a wide array of film-readings, the authors explore the concept of a southern cinematic esthetics, in particular, and the concept of the Global South in general.The volume will be of interest to scholars, students and researchers of film and media studies, critical theory, cultural studies and Global South studies.
Animated Mischief
Over the last century, the medium of animation has served as an expression of childhood as well as a method of subverting the expectations of what society has promised for the future. Separated into three parts, this work assembles various explorations of taste, culture and passion through animation. Section I features essays that outline the historical changes in art and society that gave rise to an outsider culture that found a home in animation. In the second section, essays examine the practical use of animation as a voice for the underserved. Finally, in Section III, essays analyze the ways in which animation has reshaped the acceptance of outsider status to embrace otherness. Featuring everything from feature-length films to self-produced YouTube videos, the essays in this text reflect a shared love of animation and its unique ability to comment on society and culture.
The Sinful Maternal
Pregnancy, birth, and postpartum recovery are challenging experiences that impact women's physical, mental, and emotional health in ways that have been historically minimalized, dismissed, or neglected. A mother's body becomes a public body, physically and politically not her own, instead shared by her spouse, her children, and those around her. Her body, therefore, makes the perfect vessel for an invasive presence--or possession. The Sinful Maternal: Motherhood in Possession Films examines the role of mothers and motherhood in ten possession films, including Rosemary's Baby, The Exorcist, The Babadook, and Hereditary. Chapters discuss the work of such directors as James Wan, Jennifer Kent, Robert Eggers, and Ari Aster to address how their cinematic approaches to these films produce rich possession narratives that explore different facets of motherhood and women's agency. Working at the intersections of gender studies, architectural theory, trauma studies, and monster theory, with a particular focus on the treatment of (often unruly) female bodies, author Lauren Rocha investigates the ways in which motherhood is a fertile state for possession and how possession acts to influence, destabilize, and reshape identity and the self. Placing the films in chronological order, she closely analyzes the ways in which sociocultural influences create different roles women and mothers are expected to perform. Ultimately, Rocha demonstrates how possession offers a way to challenge performative motherhood to free the self.
Freaks and Freakishness as an Element of Horror. The Example of ”American Horror Story
Seminar paper from the year 2022 in the subject Film Science, grade: 1,3, University of Cologne (Department of English), course: Thinking (about) the Human. Meanings, Tensions, and Contradictions in U.S. History, language: English, abstract: Looking at movies like "Freaks" or "American Horror Show", the question is how this concept can be understood in the context of 'freaks' and 'freakishness', whether it is sorely related to physical deformity, how this concept is expressed culturally, what "horror" is and how it works. Above all, there is the question of how 'freaks' and 'freakishness' are associated with horror. How they are supposed to generate fear in the viewer, and how this could be concretely illustrated by an example. The series "American Horror Show: Freak Show" and the episode "Rosa Cubcakes" are approached from the perspective of these questions. In order to find basic answers to these questions, the first part of this work roughly deals with 'freaks' in American history and culture, terms are explained and the understanding of freaks and their representation in films is discussed. This is followed by a reference to monsters and their connection to the horror genre, which is outlined in its early development in America. In order to understand the effect of horror in films better, basic, typical film techniques of the horror genre are discussed. In the second part a short introduction of the series follows and then the analysis of the episode Rosa Cupcakes where the focus lies on the representation of 'freaks' and 'freakishness' with their connection to horror. Finally, the insights gained are related to the questions mentioned at the beginning and put into the overall context.
Wicked Becomes Her
It was on Friday, May 6, 1988 that Bette Davis walked off the set of her last film Wicked Stepmother. Her exit for reported health reasons created a media stir when writer and director Larry Cohen decided to finish the film without her, using the footage he captured during her time on the set and rewriting the film to explain her absence. Davis blasted the film and its director, but when she died months after the film's release, Wicked Stepmother would become forever connected with the legendary star, marking her final big screen appearance. Wicked Becomes Her revisits the later years of Bette Davis' illustrious film career, including the collection of horror films that kept her in the public eye, but through the lens of her final film - Wicked Stepmother. Though Davis abandoned the film shortly after production began, the story behind the making of the film gives readers a new look at the person behind the star. By looking at her work on features like What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?; Hush, Hush ... Sweet Charlotte; Dead Ringer; The Nanny, Burnt Offerings and more, readers will discover the drive of a movie star, whose desire to remain active in her later years was so strong that she would justify a film for no other reason than the fact that her name was on the marquee as its star. Filled with photos and new details behind the production of some of her most beloved films, Wicked Becomes Her offers a new glimpse into the final years of one of the most iconic and successful actresses of the 20th Century.
Guide, The Film
The Guide, the book written by RK Narayan, fired the imagination of Dev Anand to bring that story to celluloid. The film Guide brought maximum success and fame to Navketan. It justifiably bagged several Filmfare awards for that year; after all, it was an epic film, which was at once radical and traditional. Genius always provokes admiration and curiosity. Why did Guide succeed when others failed? Was there a workable formula that others could use for subsequent films? What made Guide a classic? Guide lovers have asked themselves and each other these questions from time to time. Finally, when a few of them saw the terribly tedious English version of Guide, they realised that the Hindi film needed study, because both had the same plot, almost the same cast and crew, and yet the difference was stunning. They then decided to do a study of this classic and bring it in the form of a book to be read by lovers of great cinema. This urge to redefine and analyse the extraordinariness of the cult film led to this collection of essays. The fourteen writers attempt to focus on different aspects of the film, even if there are overlaps, which are inevitable in a project such as this. The book also intends to be a tribute to the masters, Vijay Anand, Dev Anand, Waheeda Rehman, Fali Mistry, SD Burman, Shailendra, Lata Mangeshkar, Mohammed Rafi, Kishore Kumar and Manna Dey. Not to forget the other members of the cast and crew who reached for the apex of their talents and produced a chef d'oeuvre. This book is a unique collaborative study, fuelled by lovers of cinema and its music. The fourteen writers are Lata Jagtiani, Manek Premchand, Ajay Kanagat, Antara Nanda Mondal, Bobby Sing, Deepa Buty, Dharmakirthi, Gaurav Sahay, Kalpana Swamy, Monica Kar, MV Devraj, Pisharoty Chandran, Sundeep Pahwa and Vijay Kumar. It's a book that all Guide lovers must possess.
The Disney Book New Edition
Celebrate more than 100 years of magical Disney storytelling. The ideal gift for Disney, animation, and movie fans! From Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs to Wish, Mary Poppins to The Little Mermaid, Disneyland to Tokyo DisneySea, and fireworks to fan clubs, explore the captivating worlds and creations of Disney and Pixar. Now including more than 50 new pages and updated with ten more years of magic for Disney's special 100th anniversary, The Disney Book: New Edition features groundbreaking and record-breaking creations--including Encanto, Moana, and Turning Red--and explores theme parks, experiences, memorabilia, and more. Marvel at beautiful art and artefacts from The Walt Disney Company's vast historical collections, and discover live-action and animated movie-making, enchanting parks, and fascinating collectibles. Follow Disney's history using the timeline, and delve into the incredible archives. Perfect for fans who want to know all about the magical worlds of Disney. (c) 2023 Disney
The Sinful Maternal
Pregnancy, birth, and postpartum recovery are challenging experiences that impact women's physical, mental, and emotional health in ways that have been historically minimalized, dismissed, or neglected. A mother's body becomes a public body, physically and politically not her own, instead shared by her spouse, her children, and those around her. Her body, therefore, makes the perfect vessel for an invasive presence--or possession. The Sinful Maternal: Motherhood in Possession Films examines the role of mothers and motherhood in ten possession films, including Rosemary's Baby, The Exorcist, The Babadook, and Hereditary. Chapters discuss the work of such directors as James Wan, Jennifer Kent, Robert Eggers, and Ari Aster to address how their cinematic approaches to these films produce rich possession narratives that explore different facets of motherhood and women's agency. Working at the intersections of gender studies, architectural theory, trauma studies, and monster theory, with a particular focus on the treatment of (often unruly) female bodies, author Lauren Rocha investigates the ways in which motherhood is a fertile state for possession and how possession acts to influence, destabilize, and reshape identity and the self. Placing the films in chronological order, she closely analyzes the ways in which sociocultural influences create different roles women and mothers are expected to perform. Ultimately, Rocha demonstrates how possession offers a way to challenge performative motherhood to free the self.
Adr and Post-Sync Dialogue
Written by industry expert, R.J. Kizer, this is the first book to provide a comprehensive overview of post-sync dialogue replacement, popularly known as ADR. It explores how this seldom recognised, but essential, technology is used in motion pictures and in fictional narrative television programs, with many examples from past and recent movies to explain approaches and techniques. It is intended primarily as an intuitive book, allowing readers to develop their own interpretation of ADR application, with both historical and procedural background provided throughout. It identifies the many different procedures and mechanical systems invented and used to accomplish the task of ADR, some from as long ago as the early 1920s. The text also details the many different steps, tasks, and routines that must be followed to identify (spot), program, record, edit, and mix the ADR lines into the final sound track of a show. Intended for the sound professional, it is also suitable for students and entry-level editors wishing to master audio dialogue replacement. Film historians and theorists will also find it both informative and enlightening by illustrating the many avenues used to affect and manipulate the recorded spoken word in motion pictures.
Never-Ending Watchmen
What began with Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons' landmark graphic novel, Watchmen (1987) is no longer a single story, but rather a cross-platform, multi-media franchise, including a role-playing game and video game, a motion comic, a Zack Snyder movie, and a series of comic book prequels and sequels, as well as a prestige HBO TV series. Will Brooker explores the way that Watchmen expanded over time from the mid-1980s to the present day, drawing on theories of adaptation, intertextuality and deconstruction to argue that each addition subtly changes our understanding of the original. Does it matter whether these adaptations are 'faithful'? Can they ever be, as they cross over into another medium? How does each version enter a dialogue with the others? And as Damon Lindelof's series ran parallel to an entirely distinct comic book Watchmen sequel, Doomsday Clock, how do readers and viewers make sense of these conflicting narratives? Can we relate the unstable, shifting stories of Watchmen to our contemporary climate of post-truth, where we have to weigh up contradictory versions of the facts and decide which we believe?
Hollywood and the Movies of the Fifties
A fascinating look at Hollywood's most turbulent decade and the demise of the studio system--set against the boom of the post-World War II years, the Cold War, and the atomic age--and the movies that reflected the seismic shifts "The definitive book on 1950s Hollywood." --Booklist "Lavish. . . insightful, rich, expansive, penetrating." --Kirkus Hollywood in the 1950s was a period when the film industry both set conventions and broke norms and traditions--from Cinerama, CinemaScope, and VistaVision to the epic film and lavish musical. It was a decade that saw the rise of the anti-hero; the smoldering, the hidden, and the unspoken; teenagers gone wild in the streets; the sacred and the profane; the revolution of the Method; the socially conscious; the implosion of the studios; the end of the production code; and the invasion of the ultimate body snatcher: the "small screen" television. Here is Eisenhower's America--seemingly complacent, conformity-ridden revealed in Vincente Minnelli's Father of the Bride, Walt Disney's Cinderella, and Brigadoon, among others. And here is its darkening, resonant landscape, beset by conflict, discontent, and anxiety (The Man Who Knew Too Much, The Asphalt Jungle, A Place in the Sun, Touch of Evil, It Came From Outer Space) . . . an America on the verge of cultural, political and sexual revolt, busting up and breaking out (East of Eden, From Here to Eternity, On the Waterfront, Sweet Smell of Success, The Wild One, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Jailhouse Rock). An important, riveting look at our nation at its peak as a world power and at the political, cultural, sexual upheavals it endured, reflected and explored in the quintessential American art form.
Televisual Shared Universes
This book presents a variety of televisual shared universes to open up discussion and critically engage with the extensive storyworlds possible in the medium. Scholars of film studies, media studies, and popular culture will find this book of particular interest.
Liminal Noir in Classical World Cinema
While few can deny its incalculable influence on popular filmmaking during and after World War II, film noir has been and remains one of the most contentious categories of cinema, involving more debates than consensus about what constitutes a noir. This collection explores the amorphous parameters of this dark cinematic phenomenon by utilising an expanded, nuanced definition of film noir, which reaches beyond traditional conceptions of genre, style, and cycle to examine its complex international origins and emphasis on issues of liminality. Through illuminating case studies of single films from nations including Argentina, the former Czechoslovakia, France, Great Britain, Poland, Spain, and the US, authors consider elements of genre hybridity, border crossing, boundary breaching, and other signifiers of liminality to reassess classical-era films that defy conventional generic and stylistic categorisation.
Filming Modernity and Islam in Colonial Egypt
This book studies the rise of cinema in colonial Egypt as a supplemental secular public sphere that is not anti-religion. To this end, it investigates the reception of film by three centers of powers: the colonial authorities, the Muslim clergy, and the Cairene bourgeoisie. It inquires about the representations of modernity in films produced during the time and the place filmmakers assigned to Islam in these representations. The result is a story of survival and coexistence told through the lens of cinema as modern art and popular culture negotiating its overt and covert censorship in the public sphere, despite colonization and war.
Refocus: The Films of Yim Soon-Rye
Korean cinema, though currently established as one of the most successful international film industries, has never been a fair ground for women filmmakers. Amidst the heavily male dominated Korean cinema and the film industry, Yim has consistently produced critically and commercially influential films and has been recognized at numerous film festivals/awards both in and outside of Korea. Yim has produced/directed over a dozen films including shorts - the highest number that any female director has ever achieved in Korea. Also, Yim is the only female director with a blockbuster (Gyoseop, 2023) under her belt, which was always considered to be the arena for male directors.ReFocus: The Films of Yim Soon-rye will be the very first English-language book that showcases critical readings of Yim's work and simultaneously, this volume will address and position Yim in the larger historical context of Korean cinema and women filmmakers in the world.
Transgressive Art Films
Transgressive Art Films offers a holistic approach to the way we consider controversial and extreme cinema - not just as individual or grouped texts for analysis - but as artefacts that ought to be considered within a complex network of social factors. This book provides a rigorous framework for understanding some of the most controversial films of the past twenty-five years. The term 'transgressive art film' designates the phenomenon of a small number of controversial films recuperated each year by the cinema art world as part of an expansion of the definition of film art. Rather than seeing controversial films as aberrations, this book suggests that transgressive art films should be understood as a socio-cultural phenomenon and a central plank of cinema's need for newness, innovation, and renewal. By paying attention to all scales of cinema, from close analysis of individual frames, through the discourse constructed around them, up to global distribution and film-festival networks, Transgressive Art Films details how certain kinds of cinematic transgression gain wide-ranging institutional support rather than being ignored or forgotten.
States of Danger and Deceit
States of danger and deceit places key films (Z (1969), The Mattei Affair (1972), State of Siege (1972), The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum (1975), Illustrious Corpses (1976)) and filmmakers (Costa-Gavras, Elio Petri, Francesco Rosi, Volker Schl繹ndorff) from across Europe into their historical, political and social contexts before considering the ways they have impacted upon politically engaged filmmakers since. Presented in a dossier format, made up of shorter engaging pieces, this volume offers a series of contextualisations and detailed explorations of significant examples of the political thriller from across Europe.
Refocus: The Films of Susan Seidelman
This first collection devoted to Susan Seidelman -- director, producer and visionary of feminist American cinema and television - includes never-before-published archival material and an interview with insights into her process and thoughts on #timesup and the future of the industry. Her debut feature, Smithereens, was the first American independent film to compete for the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Her knack for casting saw her insist on Madonna for Desperately Seeking Susan before Madonna was famous. Seidelman directed Meryl Streep and John Malkovich in their first comedy features, Roseanne Barr in her first feature film and Laverne Cox in one of her earliest features. Seidelman also directed the Sex and the City pilot, kickstarting a global phenomenon. Seidelman's career is one of firsts, yet little is written about her. This collection begins filling that gap while opening the door for additional scholarship, making this a valuable text for years to come.
Refocus: The Films of Claire Denis
ReFocus: The Films of Claire Denis comprises 14 original works of criticism from world leading Denis scholars and early career researchers.With contributors from as far afield as Canada and Australia, the collection offers a global perspective on Denis' films. It includes an accessible introduction for those new to Denis studies, providing biographical details, an overview of thematic interests, and a brief survey of the most salient and influential trends in Denis scholarship. The first collection of scholarly essays on Denis, and the first major work of criticism on one of the contemporary period's most influential and renowned directors for almost a decade, ReFocus: The Films of Claire Denis is a timely and important contribution to Denis studies and to transnational cinema studies more broadly.
Refocus: The Films of Steve McQueen
Working across a range of formats, from video art and gallery installations to independent cinema to Hollywood to the BBC, Steve McQueen's prodigious output has been marked by formal ambition and political urgency. This vital collection interrogates his body of work, its political, aesthetic and institutional dimensions, and the interfaces between them. It offers critical insights into McQueen's engagements with race, gender, the body, love and pain, and his abiding self-reflexive interest in the potential of multiple audio-visual forms. The first director to win both the Turner Prize and an Oscar for best picture, McQueen is probably the most important working British film maker. This book explores the controversies as well as the achievements in his stellar career so far.
States of Danger and Deceit
States of danger and deceit places key films (Z (1969), The Mattei Affair (1972), State of Siege (1972), The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum (1975), Illustrious Corpses (1976)) and filmmakers (Costa-Gavras, Elio Petri, Francesco Rosi, Volker Schl繹ndorff) from across Europe into their historical, political and social contexts before considering the ways they have impacted upon politically engaged filmmakers since. Presented in a dossier format, made up of shorter engaging pieces, this volume offers a series of contextualisations and detailed explorations of significant examples of the political thriller from across Europe.
