Cinematic Vision Research Articles

Filming industrial Japan: Kitakyushu, rise and decline of the iron town

This paper investigates how cinema has represented the two sides of the industrial expansion and contraction process in the context of a peripheral shrinking region. It explores how the cinematic vision of regions helps one to understand the processes of spatial development that resulted from socio-economic changes. Classic and contemporary filmmakers have shown the social problems associated with industrialization as well as deindustrialization. The paper focuses on the Northern Kyushu Region in Japan, which due to its own history epitomizes the problematic that affects Japan’s peripheral territories – those outside the Pacific Industrial Belt. Through this analysis, it is argued that films can reveal aspects that other kinds of data cannot convey and, therefore, the cinematic analysis of regions has the potential to identify and reveal problems that otherwise would have remained unnoticed.

“Everything depends on reaching the coast”: Inscriptions of Placelessness in John Hillcoat’s Adaptation of The Road

Inscriptions of Placelessness in John Hillcoat’s Adaptation of The Road ” John Hillcoat’s cinematic adaptation (2009) of Cormac McCarthy’s novel The Road (2006) takes as its subject the horror of a postapocalyptic world in which all semblance of order has been reduced to an ephemeral absent presence that haunts the nameless protagonist and his young son. Ironically, their only means of survival and source of solace is a desolate road strewn with the wreckage of civilization. Central to the Hillcoat’s film is the multivalent use of this road as a simultaneous symbol of refuge and desolation. This article addresses the various ways in which notions of ecological catastrophe and biopolitics help to inform conceptions of landscape and placelessness in order to create a cinematic vision of a not-so-distant future in which the world is, perhaps, just as we have made it to be.

V-v-Vertov R-r-Re-Made

Abstract The seminal work of pioneering avant-garde filmmaker Dziga Vertov, The Man with the Movie Camera (Chevolek s kino-apparatom, 1929) has given rise to a number of discussions about the documentary film genre and new digital media. By way of comparison with American artist Perry Bard’s online movie project entitled Man With a Movie Camera: The Global Remake (2007), this article investigates the historical perspective of this visionary depiction of reality and its impact on the heralded participatory culture of contemporary digital media, which can be traced back to Russian Constructivism. Through critical analysis of the relation between Vertov’s manifest declarations about the film medium and his resulting cinematic vision, Bard’s project and the work of her chief theoretical inspiration Lev Manovich are examined in the perspective of ‘remake culture,’ participatory authorship and the development a documentary film language. In addition to this, possible trajectories from Vertov and his contemporary Constructivists to recent theories of ‘new materialism’ and the notion of Man/Machine-co-operation is discussed in length.

Truffaut, Rivette et la femme au portrait : Traces, fragments et survivances du dix-neuvième siècle

This article proposes to examine traces of the nineteenth century in two films by directors emblematic of the New Wave; François Truffaut and Jacques Rivette. It begins with the observation that, though nineteenth-century texts and images are omnipresent in the works of directors affiliated with this movement of the cinematographic avant-garde, this topic has nonetheless not yet been subjected to systematic critical analysis. This article specifically studies the esthetic motif of the woman's portrait in two films: La Chambre verte (1978) and La Belle Noiseuse (1991). An analysis of this underlying theme reveals that these films are part of a reactivation, often implicit, of the literary and visual heritage of the nineteenth century. This article analyzes how these persisting themes function as materializations of the phenomenon of the relic or legacy defined by Aby Warburg as a specific trace, at once symptom and cultural phantom. Particular attention is given to the role played by the shorts stories of Henry James and Honoré de Balzac in affirming a romantic and spectral vision of cinema. This exploration of two singular films provides a glimpse of cinematographic modernity through the prism of the nineteenth century and “against the grain,” according to Walter Benjamin's famous formulation.

The Becoming of Age: Cinematic Visions of Mind, Body and Identity in Later Life Pamela H.Gravagne. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2013.

The Becoming of Age: Cinematic Visions of Mind, Body and Identity in Later Life Pamela H. Gravagne. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2013.The introduction of The Becoming of Age: Cinematic Visions of Mind, Body, and Identity in Later Life recounts an anecdote about author Pamela H. Gravagne's grandmother, who defied her family's expectations by dating after her husband's death. This memorable introduction suggests Gravagne's personal commitment to debunking the narrative of (13), her term for age-related myths which marginalize senior citizens by characterizing them as subhuman creatures whose physical, emotional, and psychological capabilities have deteriorated with age. To debunk these myths, Gravagne analyzes such recent movies as Gran Torino (2009), Up (2009), Calendar Girls (2003), Something's Gotta Give (2003), Beginners (2011), Away from Her (2007), The Straight Story (1999), and Howl's Moving Castle (2005), among others, which attempt to free age from the attitudinal, cultural, and material constraints that hobble its exuberant expression (5). Criticizing traditional film theories which stress the medium's representative faculties, Gravagne instead argues that popular cinema can alter the world by replacing the socially and culturally constructed myths which justify a persistently negative attitudes toward growing (10) with counternarratives about aging which would empower senior citizens to grow, learn, and remake themselves throughout their lives. Her goal is to discover if these movies fulfill this utopian potential or reinforce ageist stereotypes, and, with one significant exception, she succeeds.The first chapter, which establishes the theoretical groundwork for Gravagne's argument, engages such prominent age scholars and critical theorists as Judith Butler, Stuart Hall, Stephen Katz, Margaret Gullette, and Michel Foucault whose works expose how socially and culturally constructed normalizing systems that masquerade as naturalized discourses regulate seniors. The author suggests that these normalizing systems coerce seniors into upholding societal expectations about aging which harm them physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually; these normalizing systems also prevent seniors from exploring alternative modes of aging which would emphasize the opportunities (instead of the obstructions) which accompany old age (45).The remaining chapters expand these observations by analyzing specific control mechanisms which discipline and marginalize specific subpopulations of seniors. The second, third, and fourth chapters concentrate upon gender-specific narratives of decline which constrain older men and women, and they reveal how popular movies (such as Gran Torino, Up, Saving Grace (2000), and Calendar Girls) attempt to dramatize the pain that these myths inflict upon seniors. …

André Bazin, Film Critic for Le Parisien libéré (1944–1958): An Enlightened Defender of French Cinema

This article examines a neglected dimension of Bazin's work, namely his writings for the daily newspaper Le Parisien libéré. Four key points emerge from this corpus. First, Bazin goes beyond the film-reviewing norms of the day (plot summary and evaluation of actors' performances) to analyse the intentions and achievements of the film-makers. Second, Bazin foregrounds the capacity of cinema to address the concerns of contemporary society. Third, as a result, he ascribes a particular value to films that actively engage with the new social realities of post-war France. Four, Bazin remains blind to the misogynistic dimension of post-war French cinema, with its tendency to culpabilize women for the national disgrace of the Occupation. Ultimately, Bazin's newspaper reviewing represents a more socially aware vision of cinema than that promoted by more specialized cinema journals, yet his criticism remains caught within the gender ideology of his time.

Lady Blue Shanghai: The strange case of David Lynch and Dior

The American independent film-maker David Lynch and the French fashion house Dior would seem to make for strange bedfellows. Lynch is the director of some of the most uniquely disturbing cinematic visions of the past four decades. His work is delivered through the popular medium of cinema but appeals to a very specific audience. Dior markets exclusivity to the masses, using widespread recognition to sell a line of products that includes clothing, handbags and perfume. Yet in 2009, Dior sponsored the production of Lynch’s short film Lady Blue Shanghai, a sixteen-minute noir mystery starring French actress Marion Cotillard. The backer allowed the director complete creative control of the Shanghai-set production, providing that three conditions were met: a particular Dior accessory had to be featured prominently, the Oriental Pearl Tower had to be seen, and some scenes had to be shot in old Shanghai. Although it promotes a brand, Lady Blue Shanghai is a ‘short’ rather than a conventional commercial, albeit a short that contractually features a luxury product. Lady Blue Shanghai was made available via the Dior website, reaching audiences through new media while attracting the attention of the mainstream press due to the reputation of its director. This article will examine the dual status of Lady Blue Shanghai as a film by David Lynch and as a Dior project through reference to the director’s narrative and stylistic signatures, while assessing such authorial elements alongside the manner in which the brand is conveyed through his aesthetic sensibility.

From Maycomb to Nuremberg: cinematic visions of law, legal actors and American ways

AbstractThis article examines the representations of law and legal actors offered within two classic American films:To Kill a MockingbirdandJudgment at Nuremberg. It has previously been argued that these films belong to a ‘heroic tradition’ within American cinema; one that idealises both men of law and man-made law and that had its golden age from the mid-1950s through to the end of the 1960s. It is argued here that these films offer a more complex and far less certain portrayal of the law and legal actors. This is examined first by considering the context in which these films were made, and second, the depictions of law and legal actors that they offer.

A Dangerous Method: Sight Unseen

In A Dangerous Method, David Cronenberg turns his cinematic method inside out. By shifting his attention to the absence, loss, and emptiness of repression triumphant as intensively as he usually focuses on the shock, horror, and ambivalent ecstasy of repression overturned, Cronenberg sharpens the pain that characterizes his cinematic vision.

“Personal in My Memory”: The South in Popular Film

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] If you're ever inclined to doubt importance of South to American movies--or vice versa--consider that David Wark Griffith's The Birth of a Nation (1915), foundation stone upon which whole edifice of American movie industry is built, and itself still perhaps (depending on whose figures you believe) most successful ever made, is a radically atavistic epic purporting to explain entire sweep of history. A key document of cinematic literature, it is set mainly in and was directed, brilliantly, by one native southerner (from writings of another, novelist-racialist Thomas Dixon Jr.), but was filmed in a place whose fame, at time, was yet to come: California. Thereafter, we have two imaginary kingdoms. One, the South, exists primarily in song, oral traditions and folkways, native art and literature. The other, Hollywood, creates mass-produced audiovisual entertainments for American and world audiences, and develops its own mythology. Occasionally, sometimes frequently, two kingdoms interact, but their relations are uneasy because they are not equals. colonizer, is happy to exploit tales, myths, culture, and sometimes great talents (see: W. Faulkner, screenwriter) of but invariably imposes its own language and concerns on raw material, feeling no particular obligation to get it right. For its part, South nervously contemplates resulting distortions of its self-image(s), though it will swoon (along with rest of world) at appearance of a romantic, Hollywoodized such as that in David O. Selznick's 1939 production of Gone With Wind (another with a claim to be history's highest-grosser). Among moviegoers, there are as many Souths as there are individual sensibilities to discern them in theater's darkness. Nevertheless, certain patterns become evident. For some viewers, as essays below indicate, films that impress derive from valued literary sources; here, Hollywood's translators have presumably not distorted those sources too greatly. Two writers, on other hand, find wonderment in films that come from pre-existing sources, a pop song and a best-selling novel, precisely because of way cinema's magic has transformed them; here, Hollywood is an unwitting agent of personal revelation. For one northern-born critic, there's a late-dawning realization of how movies confuse real South and its fictional apparitions; he confesses that two Hollywood films have long made him avoid region. And as if to prove that any southern film is ultimately personal, one writer names a quintessential New York-set simply because it offers a few glimpses of Florida, a place that many southerners don't even consider part of South. Finally, there's an essay that points us toward startling notion that, while most cinematic visions of South from The Birth of a Nation till now have come to us filtered through aesthetic/industrial lenses of they don't have to be. From time they began appearing 1970s, documentaries of North Carolina-born Ross McElwee have posited and exemplified an idea of as an equivalent of literature: personal, idiomatic, made from a native's point of view, untouched by Hollywood motives or money. If many of films discussed here belong to a past where movies in general were property of it could be that McElwee's work points toward a future in which some visions of South can genuinely be called films. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] ALICE WALKER ON COLD MOUNTAIN I was probably last person on earth to see movie Cold Mountain, but I finally saw it and valued it for three reasons: it cured me of my inability to feel compassion for soldiers who fought on Confederate side in Civil War; it made one young soldier come vulnerably alive, showing how important it was in those days for a family during winter to have a hog to kill and eat (they were like my own family); and it showed a wise woman living in woods with her goats and how she killed one of them while its head was in her lap and she was stroking and lovingly murmuring to it. …

“It’s Just Not Turning Up”: Cinematic Vision and Environmental Justice in Todd Haynes’s Safe

This essay argues that Todd Haynes’s queer visual techniques have a unique political purchase in Safe: they draw attention to the film’s literally and figuratively marginal figures, and to the environmental health risks they face. The film thus represents, without reproducing, the ways that the working poor are rendered invisible.

The film paintings of David Lynch: challenging film theory

One of the most distinguished filmmakers working today, David is a director whose vision of cinema is firmly rooted in fine art. He was motivated to make his first film as a student because he wanted a painting that 'would really be able to move'. Most existing studies of Lynch, however, fail to engage fully with the complexities of his films' relationship to other art forms. The Film Paintings of David Lynch fills this void, arguing that Lynch's cinematic output needs to be considered within a broad range of cultural references. Aimed at both fans and film studies specialists, Allister Mactaggart addresses Lynch's films from the perspective of the relationship between commercial film, avant-garde art, and cultural theory. Individual works - The Elephant Man, Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks, Lost Highway, The Straight Story, Mulholland Drive, and Inland Empire - are discussed in relation to other films and directors, illustrating that the solitary, or seemingly isolated, experience of film is itself socially, culturally, and politically important. The Film Paintings of David Lynch offers a unique perspective on an influential director, weaving together a range of theoretical approaches to Lynch's films to make exciting new connections among film theory, art history, psychoanalysis, and cinema.

"Two Roads to Middle Earth": Comparing Visualization of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings and Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings Cinematic Trilogy

When comparing a much-loved novel to a cinematic adaptation, many people will say, “the book was better.” Even so, some of the same people remember scenes from the movie more vividly. Why? Building on Martin Barker’s (2006) study of audience visualization, this paper examines Peter Jackson’s film adaptation of J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings through DVD “making-of documentaries,” and compares Jackson’s cinematic vision with Tolkien’s original work. The nature of film means adapting a textual work relies more on maintaining certain essential qualities of the original story, rather than a “page by page” rendering. Film may solidify a reader’s visualization of these essential qualities by reinforcing similar images, or by forcing the reader to choose between their own images and those suggested in film adaptation.

The Study of dying: from autonomy to transformation

Preface 1. What the social and behavioural studies say about dying Allan Kellehear 2. The dying animal: a perspective from veterinary medicine Siri K. Knudsen 3. The dying human: a perspective from biomedicine Marie-Aurelie Bruno, Didier Ledoux and Steven Laureys 4. The dying human: a perspective from palliative medicine Michael Ashby 5. The demography of dying Glennys Howarth 6. Historical approaches to dying Julie-Marie Strange 7. Dying and philosophy Geoffrey Scarre 8. The art of dying Clare Gittings 9. Dying in Western literature John Skelton 10. Cinematic visions of dying Fran McInerney 11. Dying in Judaeo-Christian thought Douglas Davies 12. Near-death experiences and deathbed visions Bruce Greyson.

Roman Polanski: a life in exile

This book offers an examination of the films of Roman Polanski, focusing on the impact that his life as an exile has had upon his work. * A bibliography of books, periodicals, DVD materials, and Internet sources relating to Polanski are referenced in the book * Includes film stills that draw the reader in to Polanski's unique cinematic vision

From magician to metal brain: the embodiment of illusion in early European film theory

This article engages with a pervasive leitmotif within the criticism and theory of early European cinema: the increasingly corporeal situation of cinematic illusion. In particular, this text investigates a crucial shift from the mode of the ‘cinema of attractions’, into an account of film which demands a much more comprehensive implication of the human perceiver into the diegesis of the film. By first examining the broad terrain of illusion of the former tradition exemplified by cinemagician Georges Méliès and his deployment of the precedent of the phantasmagoric deceptions of the nineteenth century, this investigation turns to the case study of a crucial but largely neglected film by Jean Renoir, La Petite Marchande d'Allumettes/The Little Match Girl (1928), a work which seems, in startlingly innovative ways, to dramatise and ground in cinematic production the transformation of bodily realities so central to contemporary theoretical debates. This remarkable film, suffused with archaic and modern modes of cinematic trickery, serves as an historically aware conduit between early cinema and the avantgarde, and helps us to navigate the progressively sophisticated account of the relationship between human and cinematic vision that was to form a central preoccupation of the most innovative film production of the 1920s.

How does the digital matter? Envisioning corporeality through Christian Volckman's Renaissance

Existential phenomenology addresses the idea of vision as an embodied and meaningful activity. Within this schema, perception is already informed by the sensory intentionality of the living being that is setting itself within a dialectical and dialogical relation to the world. In such an understanding of experience, cinematic vision is positioned within the individual and historical person who interacts with a screen that itself reflects an existential relation between body and world. But what happens when digital images present entities and spaces that are physically not part of this world? How, in other words, do computational structures affect cinema's relation with reality? This article examines arguments concerned with the relation between digital media and corporeality, filtering them through the work of André Bazin, Roland Barthes, and Gilles Deleuze. From the point of view exhibited by Christian Volckman's Renaissance (2006), it questions the idea that digital cinema is a one-way ticket to incorporeality, suggesting that the new technology does in fact retain the ability to matter through nuances specific to its own constructions.

From the Black Death to AIDS: Cinematic Visions and Community in Book of Days

From the Black Death to AIDS: Cinematic Visions and Community in <i>Book of Days</i>

Indigenous Media Gone Global: Strengthening Indigenous Identity On‐ and Offscreen at the First Nations/First Features Film Showcase

For 12 days in May 2005, the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York and the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), as well as several other screening venues in Washington, D.C., hosted a group of renowned indigenous filmmakers from around the globe for the groundbreaking film showcase, “First Nations/First Features: A Showcase of World Indigenous Film and Media.” This film showcase highlighted the innovative ways in which indigenous filmmakers draw on indigenous storytelling practices to create cinematic visions that honor their long‐standing indigenous cultural worlds while reaching local and world audiences. In this essay, I highlight the onscreen impact through an analysis of several films featured in First Nations/First Features, as well as the offscreen impact emphasizing how the indigenous directors used this opportunity to strengthen social networks and share experience in this industry, which may develop into future collaborative film projects.

Hollywood's Noir Detours: Unease in the Mental Megalopolis

AbstractHollywood cinema entertained urban audiences, but it also encapsulated their experiences in a paradoxical way. The us film noir cycle, commonly seen as downbeat B‐movies made between 1941 and 1958, presented negative counterpoints to the advantages of modern life. Graham Barnfield argues that film noir is nothing if not a mental megalopolis, originating a sensibility that continues to underpin cinematic visions of the future in our age of blinding computer‐generated imagery (CGI).