Biographical Films Research Articles

Tajemnica człowieka i hagiograficzny portret — dwie filmowe biografie ojca Maksymiliana Kolbego

The mystery of human being and the hagiographic portrait — the two film biographies of father Maximilian KolbeThe article entitled “The mystery of human being and the hagiographic portrait — two film bio-graphies of Father Maksymilian Kolbe” presents a comparative analysis of two films: Życie za życie — Maksymilian Kolbe [Life for life: Maksymilian Kolbe] by Krzysztof Zanussi and Dwie korony [The two crowns] by Michał Kondrat. Both films are discussed in the context of the notion of “a religious movie”. The former film, although made on commission, may be described in the categories of per­sonal style of an eminent filmmaker who nonetheless remains baffled when confronted with a spiritual mystery of the man proclaimed saint. The latter is characterized as a hagiographic and educational text with little artistic value.

Poeta narysowany – o puszkinowskiej trylogii Andrieja Chrżanowskiego

Czaja Justyna, Poeta narysowany – o puszkinowskiej trylogii Andrieja Chrżanowskiego [A Drawn Poet – about Andrei Khrzhanovsky’s A Pushkin Trilogy]. „Przestrzenie Teorii” 32. Poznań 2019, Adam Mickiewicz University Press, pp. 357–370. ISSN 1644-6763. DOI 10.14746/ pt.2019.32.19.
 The subject of the article is an animated film A Pushkin Trilogy directed by Andrei Khrzhanovsky, dedicated to Alexander Pushkin. It comprises the films: Ya k vam lechu vospominanem, I s vami snova ya and Osen. The article attempts to answer the question about the reasons for the director’s interest in this outstanding writer and his work. It also shows the evolution of the ‘Pushkin theme’ in Khrzhanovsky’s work, changes in the content and formalism, and artistic research that led to the creation of the original animated trilogy. The poetics of the work are analyzed, in which the director looks at the work of the Russian writer through the prism of his manuscripts and sketches, while at the same time expanding the formula of the biographical film.

Forced Labor in Nazi Germany: Online Archive of Interviews and Related Educational Online Platform

Introduction.The article deals with the problem of forced labor in Nazi Germany during the Second World War. Despite the existence of profound scientific publications devoted to this problem in Russia and abroad, it still needs to be developed. The article emphasizes the urgency of its research in historical, anthropological and humanities perspective, because personal experience of those who survived after forced labor in Nazi Germany, must be stored in collective memory and comprehended by subsequent generations. Methods and materials. Digital Humanities based on the method of oral history allows to solve this problem. The article presents two options of practical implementation of the issue: the online archive of the interview Forced Labor in 1939-1945. Memories and history and related online platform Learning based on interviews. Forced labor in 1939-1945. The archive includes about 600 narrative biographical interviews with victims of Nazi forced labor in 26 countries. The site accompanying the archive is now available in English, German, Russian and Czech. The second project is based on six specially selected interviews from the archive. Broad source base and nationally-oriented concept of forced labor in Nazi Germany, presented on the platform, create the historical context necessary for using this resource primarily in the secondary educational system of the Russian Federation. Analysis and results. The article shows the possibility of using archive-interviews in science and education, and emphasizes that traditional and new methods of historical research can complement each other. The article emphasizes that biographical films created on the basis of interviews can make the memory of forced labor in Nazi Germany, first of all, of “eastern workers” and Soviet prisoners of war more visible in Russian cultural memory. Contribution of authors to writing an article. Characteristics of peculiarity of oral historical sources, online collections of interviews, compensation payments are given by D. Thousendfreund. Analytics of the project “Forced Labor 1939-1945. Memoirs and History “and online platform” Learning based on interviews. Forced labor 1939-1945”, as well as conclusions are prepared by N.P. Timofeev. Introduction, problem historiography and general editing of the article belong to T.V. Evdokimova.

The spectacle of the queer “Other”: Māori gay(zing) at the 41st Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 2019

This article will explore some of my observations of the 41st Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras 2019. I travelled to Sydney on Thursday 28 February. Rather appropriately, I selected the 2018 biographical film, Bohemian Rhapsody, as inflight entertainment, all the while contemplating what sequin-encrusted experiences I might encounter during my stay in Sydney. I had booked accommodation at the Pullman Sydney Hyde Park Hotel months in advance. Like every other surface in and around Oxford Street, the hotel had been queered-up with rainbows and a life-sized bejewelled unicorn in the foyer. While eating breakfast on Friday morning, the shimmering disco balls and background dance music seemed to be inviting me to shimmy my way to the egg station. Staff and guests alike, including entire families, were buzzing about the upcoming climax to a month-long festival of all things gay featuring over 190 floats, 12,500 participants, and thousands upon thousands of spectators from Australia and around the world (Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Limited, 2019a).

Tra realtà e racconto : la messa in forma di una vita nel cinema hollywoodiano e nella fiction italiana

The essay deals with the genre of the biographical film, and is based on one side upon theoretical research and on the other on the experience of the author as script consultant for a good number of biographical Tv miniseries that have been broadcasted in the last fifteen years in the main Italian channel RaiUno. The biopic is a genre that is very popular both in Hollywood and in Italian television. The author stresses the importance of working on the theme of the film: this is always crucial, in any genre, but it is particularly important with biographical stories, as they tend to be episodic and to lack dramatic unity. The essay also deals with two other aspects of biopics: the choice of the elements that a film can tell about the life of the protagonist, and the point of view on these facts. Following the seminal work of Wayne Booth, the author stresses that it is not the simple sequence of facts that makes the story, but it is the point of view of the author (strongly related with the theme) that can give the specific meaning and values to the facts. The essays, in its last section, explains some practical techniques to make a biopic effective for a large audience. Some of them are: to concentrate on a central event, to find a climax for the film’s ending, to deal in a clever way with the problem of the empathy of the protagonist, to create meaningful relations for the protagonist with some minor characters, to make the story visual, etc. The question of the historical accuracy is also addressed, pointing at different traditions on this issue in Hollywood and in Italian television.

POP CULTURE ROUNDUP

Two decades ago I published an article in this journal about Egyptian biographical films. It was the first study published inIJMESabout Arab/Middle East film and the first to feature photographic illustrations. The editor sent it to four reviewers, some presumably to check my history, others my cultural scope. Three approved wholeheartedly, but one protested thatIJMESshould not publish a piece that was not based upon “Arabic sources.” Admittedly, there was little critical literature in Arabic on this topic; my primary theorization came from a recent study of Hollywood “biopics.” But Stephen Humphreys, the forward-thinking editor, recognized that my “Arabic sources” were the films analyzed and disregarded the negative review.

From Biographical Text to Biopic: Adapting the Cultural Memory of the Eighteenth Century

The article investigates how recent biopics of eighteenth-century women can be seen to form and/or revise the cultural memory of the period, with a particular emphasis on how the individuals represented in biographical texts are portrayed as figures with which a modern audience can sympathize as the material is adapted for the screen. An analysis of changes that have been made in the adaptation processes of The Duchess (2009), A Royal Affair (2012), and The Scandalous Lady W (2015) shows some of the ways in which the concerns of the present are central to representations of the past. The cultural memory of eighteenth-century womanhood as constructed by and represented in biographical films of the past decade is inherently paradoxical: the almost exclusive focus on ‘scandalous’ women co-exists with consistent attempts to purge their life stories of elements that are regarded as scandalous today.

Jane Austen: uma leitura de Becoming Jane (2007)

Becoming Jane (2007), dirigida por Julian Jarrold, é uma releitura da biografia de Jane Austen que se propõe a apresentar os fatos que explicam sua incursão no mundo das letras bem como os elementos que contribuíram para a escrita de um de seus mais famosos romances – Orgulho e Preconceito (1813). Partindo do pressuposto da transcriação, como posta por Haroldo de Campos, e da proposta de leitura das narrativas em três horizontes, como apresentado por Fredric Jameson (1992), o objetivo deste artigo é o de apontar como a biografia fílmica Becoming Jane (2007) transcria ambas a vida e a obra de Jane Austen. Ao se empreender essa leitura de Becoming Jane, discutir-se-á em que medida as escolhas feitas contribuem para a construção de uma imagem da pessoa e escritora que Austen foi e revelam, mesmo que de modo velado, questões sobre o momento de produção do filme que é marcado pelo ressurgimento do interesse do público leitor/espectador por textos biográficos.

Introduction to Political Biography in Literature and Cinema

This short introduction proposes to look at the growing impact of contemporary biographical films on political life, more particularly on the collective mental representations of political figures. Compared to print biographies, biographical films focus on significant periods of the subjects' lives, and even more on specific issues or debates related to those, to propose discursive statements on certain crucial questions of general interest. Envisaging film biographies through the perspective of their more recent evolution, which goes far beyond the historically situated form still more or less implied by the term "biopic," this introduction goes on to reflect on the different aesthetic perceptions of fictionalization in film and print. Finally, it offers brief summaries of the articles gathered in this cluster.

Blood on Boylston: Digital Memory and the Dramatisation of Recent History in <em>Patriots Day</em>

Blood on Boylston: Digital Memory and the Dramatisation of Recent History in <em>Patriots Day</em>

Rock Gods of the Anthropocene: The biographical films of Elvis Presley and Jim Morrison

Reflecting on the biographical films of Elvis Presley and Jim Morrison in relation to recent eco-critical theory and notions of the Anthropocene, we consider the representation of the rock star in the biopic genre and the ways in which music and other filmic elements may communicate ecological material. We consider the links between ecology and rock music, focusing on both the representation of nature in the films and the symbolism of the body as primal, as animal, and as “creaturely poetic” (Pick, 2011: 5). In a comparison between the biopics Elvis (1979, 2010) by John Carpenter and The Doors (1991, 2009) by Oliver Stone, we examine common motifs and the ways in which these differing cultural texts foreground or repress ecological readings of the music and of the cinematic narrative. 10.5429/2079-3871(2017)v7i1.6en

‘A mí, estos pleitos no me interesan’: Carlos Saura's Llanto por un bandido and Banditry in the Ominous Decade

This article argues that Carlos Saura's 1964 film biography of the 1830s Andalusian bandit El Tempranillo, Llanto por un bandido, provides an insight into the impact of the War of Independence (1808–1814) and its aftermath on bandits in terms of physical and mental trauma, their involvement in politics and their interaction with civil society. Saura and his co-screenwriter used the French authors Théophile Gautier and Prosper Mérimée in their research on the period, thus incorporating views of Spain emanating from the culture of the Napoleonic aggressor. This, combined with the fact that the incorporation of outlaws into militia resistance was a common feature of the Napoleonic wars, produces a very complex backdrop for the film. If we add to this considerations relevant to censorship of the arts in Spain in the early 1960s, a flawed film which has not been seen as important in Saura's oeuvre becomes a very interesting witness to a century and a half of Spanish history.

Blending in and standing out: Storytelling and genre in the LGBT biopics Milk and Pedro

Abstract This article considers the deployment of self-reflexive storytelling strategies by the titular protagonists in the LGBT biopics Milk (Van Sant, 2008) and Pedro (Oceano, 2008). Written by Dustin Lance Black, both films utilize the formal and narrative conventions as well as the historiographic features of the biopic genre to legitimize its subjects in contemporary culture. Furthermore, Harvey Milk and Pedro Zamora foreground the practice and political utility of storytelling as they assert control over their tragic yet ultimately hopeful legacies. Through a textual analysis of the films, the article examines how the films intersect with the LGBT biopic as a subgenre of the contemporary biographical film and as popular queer history.

English

Kinesthesia is a transformation of mental state into physical catharsis, the embodiment of psychological pain into physical. The layers of mental disturbance are enfolded into physical actions performed through the parts of body. To Eisenstein, physical actions are always motivated by the psychological. Kinesthesia in the form of dance is the transformation of emotions into one’s self. The film ‘Bhumika-The Role’ is based on Hansa Wadkar’s autobiography ‘Sangtye Aika’ (translated into English as ‘You Ask, I Tell’). Kinesthesia of her body movements during dance and her act on stage, expresses her inside pain. Her beautiful act is presented to be an act of catharsis. ‘Bhumika’ is a beautiful transformation of physical embodiment of psychological state of mind. To understand the female version of catharsis, ‘Bhumika’ is analyzed on the basis of various elements the film is focused upon. The semiotic technique of film analysis is followed to understand the signs and symbols used in the film as metaphors. Along with the symbolic elements (title, storyline, narrative, songs and music, characters and dialogues), technical elements (camera techniques, editing, lighting, location and set) are also analyzed and discussed in the study. The film is based on a female artist and is feminist in nature so, the feminist film theory is applied on it. Key words: Biographical film, feminism, kinesthesia, catharsis.

Letter to the Editor: End-of Life Experience of Famous Artist J. M. W. Turner

Letter written to the editor of the Journal of Near-Death Studies regarding a biographical film about the life and death of J. M. W. Turner.

A Quiet Passion dir. by Terence Davies

Reviewed by: A Quiet Passion dir. by Terence Davies Jonnie Guerra (bio) A Quiet Passion. Dir. Terence Davies. Screenplay by Terence Davies. Perf. Cynthia Nixon, Jennifer Ehle, Duncan Duff, and Keith Carradine. Music Box Films, 2017. Film. Terence Davies's biopic of Emily Dickinson, A Quiet Passion, was released to movie theaters in the United States in April. Among its most striking features are imaginative cinematography, a compelling narrative, and exceptional performances by Emma Bell and Cynthia Nixon in the role of Emily Dickinson. No doubt the many liberties Davies takes with biographical facts in his screenplay will spark controversy among Dickinson scholars and other devotees. Even so, A Quiet Passion has the potential to inspire viewers to want to read or reread Dickinson's poetry and to question, perhaps even rethink, their conceptions about her life. Davies's two-hour film stands to become the most significant popular culture event in Dickinson studies since the 1977 premiere of William Luce's The Belle of Amherst, starring Julie Harris. A biographical film about Dickinson poses obvious challenges for its screenplay writer. How does one recount the story of a poet whose fame came posthumously and whose interior life of mind and heart, as evidenced by her poems and letters, was far richer and more interesting than what occurred in her outward life? In developing the screenplay, Davies employs known facts, events, and people identified in biographies of Dickinson as well as familiar elements of the legends that have sprung up around her story. However, most of the details and dialogue that flesh out the real events represented are fictional. In some instances, dramatic situations and characters are wholly imaginary. In contrast to plays and novels about the poet's life that rely on a romantic plot, A Quiet Passion foregrounds the Dickinson family and its internal dynamics, with the Homestead, its interior, and the surrounding gardens as the primary setting. At the same time, the film [End Page 80] creates a vivid context for Emily's life as a woman and writer by its attention to historical issues of nineteenth-century America, particularly evangelism, gender inequality, and the upheaval of the Civil War. Its portrayal of psychological and physical illness—especially the latter, which the film makes, in moments, visually terrifying—is a stark reminder of the limited medical knowledge and treatment options available during Dickinson's lifetime. A Quiet Passion opens with a scene at Mount Holyoke Female Academy. Headmistress Mary Lyon (Sara Vertongen) admonishes the teen-aged Dickinson (Bell) for being the school's only "no-hoper." This reprimand is Miss Lyon's response to Emily's audacious public admission that her feelings about salvation are "indefinite." Soon after, the movie segues to a chronicle of events in Dickinson's mature life, carrying the poet's story forward to her death and funeral. Although the narrative frame is linear, the sequencing of episodes, most of them short, is not entirely chronological, though probably only Dickinson insiders will perceive the departures from biographical truth. The film has a tripartite structure moving from harmony to contention and discord, and finally to ruptures in the family unit. The first block of scenes focuses on Emily and her siblings as teenagers. We meet Austin (Benjamin Wainwright), Vinnie (Rose Williams), and Mr. Dickinson (Keith Carradine) when they arrive to rescue Emily from Mount Holyoke. Returning to the sanctuary of her Amherst home and winning her father's permission to write poetry at night, Emily views her life as "wonderful" and the future as full of promise. The strong bond that exists among Emily and her brother and sister is illustrated well, especially in their comical interactions with strait-laced, opinionated Aunt Elizabeth (Annette Badland). Aunt Elizabeth is confounded by the playful mockery and precocious behavior of the sibling threesome and irate that their parents not only tolerate, but seem also to enjoy the children's high jinx. This segment of the film ends dramatically in the setting of a photography studio. The family members—minus Emily Norcross Dickinson—pose serially for their daguerreotypes to be taken. As the camera moves in slowly on each face, the character undergoes a transformation in age in...

Biophoty: The Biofilm in Biography Theory

This article aims to outline some of the main ways in which biographical film is influencing both modern print biography and the current development of biography theory. It begins by looking back to a debate going on in the 1970s and 1980s about whether film was a suitable medium for historiography and historical research, contrasting the reluctance of some American and British researchers like Robert Rosenstone, Ian Jarvie and Belen Vidal with French historian Marc Ferro’s engagement in favour of the use of cinema in history studies, and his contention that “history on film has become a force”. The term “biopic”, designating properly speaking a Hollywood invention, introduces a deleterious conceptual-cum-ideological misunderstanding that inhibits theorization. Concurring with Rosenstone to favour the word “biopic”, it suggests to go one step further by deriving from Hayden White’s “historiophoty” the term “biophoty”. With particular reference especially to examples of American and French biofilms, it shows how film has retroacted on print, especially by fostering the development of what Hans Renders has called “partial biography”.

Theorising digital personhood: a dramaturgical approach

ABSTRACTThis paper reports on findings from a study which investigates our digital identities. Through examination of the process of constructing biographical films derived from users’ social media (SM) data, we progress understanding of the digital self. Building on dramaturgical understandings of performance of self, we challenge the dominant views which argue that SM users operating as their ‘authentic selves’ can be empowered by having the potential for contemporaneous multiple selves. Through the introduction of the concepts of SM leakage and multiple temporal selves, we note the challenge of living with these digital self-representations which are sustained over time. We propose strategies for dealing with temporal shifts, as well as dispensing with the notion of the separation of these selves.

When Peter Met Sergei: Art Cinema Past, Present and Future inEisenstein in Guanajuato

Peter Greenaway has established himself as one of British cinema's most distinctive film-makers. Yet he also remains one of its most controversial and problematic figures. In the 1980s and early1990s, alongside Derek Jarman, Greenaway came to embody British art cinema. He subsequently has taken on the paradoxical status of a major film-maker who simultaneously exists on the margins. He has also become a self-imposed exile who believes that his unique brand of art cinema is best appreciated on the continent. In effect, Greenaway has become British art cinema's prodigal son. This article focuses on Eisenstein in Guanajuato (2015), a semi-fictionalised account of the ten days that Eisenstein spent in the city of Guanajuato while filming the uncompleted Que Viva Mexico! The article argues that what makes Eisenstein in Guanajuato so resonant is the way in which Greenaway both celebrates cinema's past while also daring to suggest a possible future. Indeed, while this article will show that the film is part of a new phase in Greenaway's career which is devoted to biographical films about artists, Eisenstein in Guanajuato is no simple biopic of Eisenstein. Rather, it offers a complex fusion of both the Russian and British film-makers’ theories about the cinema, particularly their shared interest in film aspect ratios and the concept of the total art work. Furthermore, it stands as a superb illustration of Greenaway's vision of cinema as an interactive and encyclopaedic medium. As this is a co-production between the Netherlands, Belgium, France, Finland and Mexico, which featured no British investment and, at the time of writing, has yet to be shown in the UK, this article will also show that we require new ways of theorising art cinema not only in British but also in international contexts.

Bobby Fischer: Chess, genius and madness at the height of the cold war

IntroductionDirected by Edward Zwick “Pawn Sacrifice” is a biographical film released on September 2015. The film stars Tobey Maguire as Bobby Fischer, the American World Chess Champion, considered one of greatest player of all time. His career's peak was in 1972 when he captured the World Chess Championship from Boris Spassky of the USSR.AimsWe tried to dig a little in the biography of Bobby Fischer who many described as mentally ill. We tried to figure out what is reality and what is just legend about Fischer. Our goal is promote chess, and also honour the great Fischer. Moreover, we wanted to explore the scientific literature published about the benefits of playing chess, especially in childhood.MethodsWe made an exhaustive review of the author's life, and also testimonies of people who knew him. Moreover, we found some articles that review the relationship between chess and IQ trying to confirm or debunk some myths about this legendary game.ResultsIt was incomprehensible to everyone that the top of the career of Bobby Fischer at the same time meant an abrupt and complete fall. One possible explanation for this attitude would be a mentally unbalance not specified disorder throughout his lifespan.ConclusionsNot all geniuses are crazy, neither all crazy are geniuses. A genius is a person with extraordinary capabilities, that focused on a topic, has the ability to enlight new ways to explain this complex world, whether it is to create a symphony, paint masterpiece or the next move on the chessboard.Disclosure of interestThe authors have not supplied their declaration of competing interest.