Interpreting Films - Couverture souple

Staiger, Janet

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 0691006164 ISBN 13 : 9780691006161

Editeur : Princeton University Press, 1992

Synopsis

Employing a wide range of examples from Uncle Tom's Cabin and Birth of a Nation to Zelig and Personal Best, Janet Staiger argues that a historical examination of spectators' responses to films can make a valuable contribution to the history, criticism, and philosophy of cultural products. She maintains that as artifacts, films do not contain immanent meanings, that differences among interpretations have historical bases, and that these variations are due to social, political, and economic conditions as well as the viewers' constructed images of themselves. After proposing a theory of reception study, the author demonstrates its application mainly through analyzing the varying responses of audiences to certain films at specific moments in history. Staiger gives special attention to how questions of class, gender, sexual preference, race, and ethnicity enter into film viewers' interpretations. Her analysis reflects recent developments in post-structuralism, cognitive psychology, psychoanalysis, and cultural studies, and includes a discussion of current reader-response models in literary and film studies as well as an alternative approach for thinking about historical readers and spectators.

A propos du livre

Quatrième de couverture

Cagney and Bogart, whose legends have grown over time, and Garfield, whose work has been unfortunately neglected, are portrayed here in relation not only to their films and their screen personas but also to their working environment. Sklar gives a real sense of the intensity with which each of them struggled to control his own work in the face of the power of Warner Bros., whose effort to produce socially conscious movies did not prevent it from exploiting its stars. The book also describes the involvement of the three stars with political causes and their response to attacks mounted by powerful right-wing elements against "leftists" in the entertainment industry. Moving beyond conventional film criticism, which has largely ignored the importance of performance, City Boys reveals the inseparability of actors' professional lives, American societal struggles, and media representations.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Princeton University Press
• Date d'édition: 1992
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0691006164
• ISBN 13: 9780691006161
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 292
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible