Film Nation

Film Nation PDF Author: Robert Burgoyne
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780816642922
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 235

Get Book Here

Book Description
Events of the past decade have dramatically rewritten the American national narrative, bringing to light an alternate history of nation, marked since the country's origins by competing geopolitical interests, by mobility and migration, and by contending ethnic and racial groups. In this revised and expanded edition of Film Nation, Robert Burgoyne analyzes films that give shape to the counternarrative that has emerged since 9/11--one that challenges the traditional myths of the American nation-state. The films examined here, Burgoyne argues, reveal the hidden underlayers of nation, from the first interaction between Europeans and Native Americans (The New World), to the clash of ethnic groups in nineteenth-century New York (Gangs of New York), to the haunting persistence of war in the national imagination (Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima) and the impact of the events of 9/11 on American identity (United 93 and World Trade Center). Film Nation provides innovative readings of attempts by such directors as Martin Scorsese, Clint Eastwood, and Oliver Stone to visualize historical events that have acquired a mythical aura in order to open up the past to the contemporary moment.

Film Nation

Film Nation PDF Author: Robert Burgoyne
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780816642922
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 235

Get Book Here

Book Description
Events of the past decade have dramatically rewritten the American national narrative, bringing to light an alternate history of nation, marked since the country's origins by competing geopolitical interests, by mobility and migration, and by contending ethnic and racial groups. In this revised and expanded edition of Film Nation, Robert Burgoyne analyzes films that give shape to the counternarrative that has emerged since 9/11--one that challenges the traditional myths of the American nation-state. The films examined here, Burgoyne argues, reveal the hidden underlayers of nation, from the first interaction between Europeans and Native Americans (The New World), to the clash of ethnic groups in nineteenth-century New York (Gangs of New York), to the haunting persistence of war in the national imagination (Flags of Our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima) and the impact of the events of 9/11 on American identity (United 93 and World Trade Center). Film Nation provides innovative readings of attempts by such directors as Martin Scorsese, Clint Eastwood, and Oliver Stone to visualize historical events that have acquired a mythical aura in order to open up the past to the contemporary moment.

The Epic Film in World Culture

The Epic Film in World Culture PDF Author: Robert Burgoyne
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135855358
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 404

Get Book Here

Book Description
With the recent release of spectacular blockbuster films from Gladiator to The Lord of the Rings trilogy, the epic has once again become a major form in contemporary cinema. This new volume in the AFI Film Readers series explores the rebirth of the epic film genre in the contemporary period, a period marked by heightened and conflicting appeals to national, ethnic, and religious belonging.The orginal essays in this volume explore the tension between the evolving global context of film production and reception and the particular provenance of the epic as an expression of national mythology and aspirations, challenging our understanding of epics produced in the present as well as our perception of epic films from the past. The contributors will explore new critical approaches to contemporary as well as older epic films, drawing on ideas from cultural studies, historiography, classics, and film studies.

Before and After Roswell

Before and After Roswell PDF Author: David A. Clary
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1462841295
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 282

Get Book Here

Book Description
The flying saucer has been the most vivid and persistent image in American life of the last half century. It has also generated more controversy and rancor than anything else that might be characterized as a fantasy. It is malleable, suiting a wide variety of beliefs and outlooks, touching nearly every public concern. It arrived as a mysterious threat from above, a metaphor for The Bomb. It transformed swiftly into a hope from above, promising to save us from ourselves. Renamed UFO, it became a symbol for those who distrusted the government. Along its way through the postwar skies, it acquired a cargo that included every species of hoax, craziness, lunacy, and even sexual fantasy, along with a fair amount of scientific and political baggage. The flying saucer myth says much about how Americans react to the unexpected. Before and After Roswell: The Flying Saucer in America, 1947-1999 places the flying saucer idea in the context of history, politics, entertainment, and science to arrive at an explanation of what it is all about and how it got that way. Because the Roswell incident--the story that a flying saucer crashed near Roswell, New Mexico, in 1947 and that the government has hidden the truth about it ever since--has dominated the subject recently, the book is anchored around that particular story while demonstrating that the flying saucer did exist before and after Roswell. It corrects some misconceptions, including one that holds that because a majority of people say they believe in UFOs, they therefore believe in a conspiracy to cover up the truth about them. After detailing what actually happened in Roswell in 1947, the book takes up the birth of the flying saucer earlier that year, underscoring the fact that the name originally denoted its movement, not its shape. The text then examines the Air Forces and CIAs responses to the phenomenon, and the rise of competing bands of ufologists, true believers and skeptics, to dominate debate over it. The book also addresses Cold War contributions to the UFO issue, and the role of Hollywood in providing the images that defined it. Along the way it describes the crashed-saucer tradition, the contactees, abductions, men in black, the Bermuda Triangle, ancient astronauts, cattle mutilations, the little gray alien, SETIs Drake Equation, sex and the flying saucer, and the rise of a new ufology emanating from the conspiracy culture growing out of the Kennedy assassination mythology and the Watergate scandal. Part Two of Before and After Roswell begins with the invention of the incident in 1980, then traces the history of the flying saucer idea to the end of the century. Important here are the submersion of the saucer into the larger anti-government conspiracy tradition of that period, and the increasing domination of the subject by television, including Area 51, a myth invented on a TV show, and the combined influence of reality-based cable documentaries and the amazingly popular series The X-Files. Also addressed are such things as crop circles, the MAJIC hoax, the face on Mars, UFO conspiracy fiction, and the explosion of the abduction belief. A chapter on The Battle of Roswell traces the evolution of that controversy through a succession of books by ufologists; in the end it broke down into disputed orthodoxies and feuds over who had the real crash site to charge admission to. When boosters tried to turn Roswell into a tourist attraction, their quarrels and mercenary outlook alienated the town and made the annual UFO Encounter a flop. The book concludes that the flying saucer is not a thing, but an idea, and one that will overcome the burden of

Deforming American Political Thought

Deforming American Political Thought PDF Author: Michael J. Shapiro
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317294459
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 274

Get Book Here

Book Description
Deforming American Political Thought offers an alternative to the dominant American historical imagination, treating issues that range from the nature of Thomas Jefferson's vision of an egalitarian nation to the persistence of racial inequality. Presenting multifaceted arguments that transcend the myopic scope of traditional political discourses, Michael J. Shapiro summons disparate disciplines and genres – architecture, crime stories, novels, films, and jazz/blues music (among others) to provide approaches to the comprehension of diverse facets of American political thought from the founding to the present. The book’s various investigations disclose that there have always been dissenting voices, articulated in diverse genres of expression that cast doubt on the moral purpose and exceptionalism of the American mind. This highly anticipated updated second edition features a preface focusing on aesthetic theory and the contributions of artistic genres for political analysis, and a completely new chapter on critical thinking about the US western and urban encounters afforded by the two HBO series, Deadwood and The Wire respectively.

History on Film/Film on History

History on Film/Film on History PDF Author: Robert A. Rosenstone
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 100096339X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 226

Get Book Here

Book Description
History on Film/Film on History has established itself as a classic treatise on the historical film and its role in bringing the past to life. In the fourth edition of this widely acclaimed text, Robert A. Rosenstone argues that to leave history films out of the discussion of the meaning of the past is to ignore a major means of understanding historical events. This book examines what history films convey about the past and how they convey it, demonstrating the need to learn how to read and understand this new visual world and integrating detailed analysis of films such as Schindler’s List, Glory, October, and Reds. Advocating for the dramatic feature as a legitimate way of doing history, this edition includes a new Preface and a new chapter that focuses on films produced in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, India, and East Asia. Examining the codes and conventions of how these films tell us about the past and providing guidance on how to effectively analyse films as historical interpretations, this book is an essential introduction to the field for students of history and film.

Ken Burns's America

Ken Burns's America PDF Author: G. Edgerton
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 1137054824
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 276

Get Book Here

Book Description
This is the first book-length study to critically examine the work of Ken Burns, the innovative producer-director as a television auteur, a pivotal programming influence within the industry, and a popular historian who portrays a uniquely personal and compelling version of the country's past for tens of millions of viewers nationwide. Ken Burns's America has a three-fold agenda: First it looks at the ideas and individuals that have influenced Burns in the creation of his easily-recognized style, as well as in the development and maturation of his ideological outlook. Second, the book gives readers a window on the Ken Burns production machine. Gary Edgerton shows us the inner working of Florentine Films. Finally, he looks at Burns as a popular historian who reevaluates the nation's historical legacy from a new generational perspective and, in the process, becomes one of the major cultural commentators of our era. The volume finally takes the full measure of the man and the industry he has helped to create.

History by HBO

History by HBO PDF Author: Rebecca Weeks
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
ISBN: 0813195314
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 300

Get Book Here

Book Description
The television industry is changing, and with it, the small screen's potential to engage in debate and present valuable representations of American history. Founded in 1972, HBO has been at the forefront of these changes, leading the way for many network, cable, and streaming services into the "post-network" era. Despite this, most scholarship has been dedicated to analyzing historical feature films and documentary films, leaving TV and the long-form drama hungry for coverage. In History by HBO: Televising the American Past, Rebecca Weeks fills the gap in this area of media studies and defends the historiographic power of long-form dramas. By focusing on this change and its effects, History by HBO outlines how history is crafted on television and the diverse forms it can take. Weeks examines the capabilities of the long-form serial for engaging with historical stories, insisting that the shift away from the network model and toward narrowcasting has enabled challenging histories to thrive in home settings. As an examination of HBO's unique structure for producing quality historical dramas, Weeks provides four case studies of HBO series set during different periods of United States history: Band of Brothers (2001), Deadwood (2004–2007), Boardwalk Empire (2012–2014), and Treme (2010–2013). In each case, HBO's lack of advertiser influence, commitment to creative freedom, and generous budgets continue to draw and retain talent who want to tell historical stories. Balancing historical and film theories in her assessment of the roles of mise-en–scène, characterization, narrative complexity, and sound in the production of effective historical dramas, Weeks' evaluation acts as an ode to the most recent Golden Age of TV, as well as a critical look at the relationship between entertainment media and collective memory.

Bringing History to Life through Film

Bringing History to Life through Film PDF Author: Kathryn Anne Morey
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1442229640
Category : Performing Arts
Languages : en
Pages : 300

Get Book Here

Book Description
Whether re-creating an actual event or simply being set in a bygone era, films have long taken liberties with the truth. While some members of the audience can appreciate a movie without being distracted by historical inaccuracies, other viewers are more discerning. From revered classics like Gone with the Wind to recent award winners like Argo, Hollywood films often are taken to task for their loose adherence to the facts. But what obligation do filmmakers have to the truth when trying to create a two-hour piece of entertainment? In Bringing History to Life through Film: The Art of Cinematic Storytelling, Kathryn Anne Morey brings together essays that explore the controversial issue of film as a purveyor of history. Examining a range of films, including highly regarded features like The Last of the Mohicans and Pan’s Labyrinth, as well as blockbuster franchises like Pirates of the Caribbean, chapters demonstrate that the debate surrounding the role of history on film is still as raw as ever. Organized in five sections, these essays discuss the myths and realities of history as they are portrayed on film, from “Nostalgic Utopias” to “Myths and Fairy Tales.” The fourteen chapters shed light on how films both convey and distort historical realities to capture the “essence” of the past rather than the past itself. Ultimately, they consider what role cinema plays as the quintessential historical storyteller. In addition to cinema and media studies, this book will appeal to scholars of history and fans of a wide range of cinematic genres.

Film Nation: Hollywood Looks at U. S. History, Revised Edition

Film Nation: Hollywood Looks at U. S. History, Revised Edition PDF Author: Robert Burgoyne
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781299944794
Category : Historical films
Languages : en
Pages : 254

Get Book Here

Book Description
Events of the past decade have dramatically rewritten the American national narrative, bringing to light an alternate history of nation, marked since the country's origins by competing geopolitical interests, by mobility and migration, and by contending ethnic and racial groups. This book analyses films that give shape to the counternarrative that has emerged since 9/11 - one that challenges the traditional myths of the American nation-state.

Cinema & Counter-History

Cinema & Counter-History PDF Author: Marcia Landy
Publisher: Indiana University Press
ISBN: 0253016193
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 324

Get Book Here

Book Description
Despite claims about the end of history and the death of cinema, visual media continue to contribute to our understanding of history and history-making. In this book, Marcia Landy argues that rethinking history and memory must take into account shifting conceptions of visual and aural technologies. With the assistance of thinkers such as Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, Cinema and Counter-History examines writings and films that challenge prevailing notions of history in order to explore the philosophic, aesthetic, and political stakes of activating the past. Marshaling evidence across European, African, and Asian cinema, Landy engages in a counter-historical project that calls into question the certainty of visual representations and unmoors notions of a history firmly anchored in truth.