2007, ISBN: 9780748640744

"American Smart Cinema" examines a contemporary type of United States filmmaking that exists at the intersection of mainstream, art, and independent cinema and often gives rise … Altro …

"American Smart Cinema" examines a contemporary type of United States filmmaking that exists at the intersection of mainstream, art, and independent cinema and often gives rise to absurd, darkly comic and nihilistic effects. Tracing the emergence of smart cinema amidst the texts and debates of the 1990s "irony epidemic," this book describes the unstable tone and "double" speech of such films as: "Flirt "(1995), "The Last Days of Disco "(1998), Y "our Friends and Neighbors" (1998), "The Royal Tenenbaums "(2001), "Donnie Darko "(2001) ," " "Adaptation (2001), Ghost World "(2001), "Palindromes "(2004), "The Squid and the Whale "(2005), and "The Savages "(2007). Acknowledging the techniques of pastiche and quotation central to the loaded forms of expression employed by these films, chapters provide new directions for their study by discussing the self-conscious approach that smart cinema takes to film historical discourses of authorship, narrative, and genre. Examining the smart film's taste for "blank" style and a synchronous structure, as well as its thematic interest in the dysfunctionality of the white middle-class family, the politics of consumerism and identity, and the philosophy of random fate, this book provides a comprehensive account of smart cinema as an aesthetic category while also considering the cultural and political factors that have guaranteed it critical and popular success. Covering issues from domestic melodrama to cinephilia and popular music to utopianism, "American Smart Cinema" describes these films as a new critical tradition in American filmmaking. American Smart Cinema Perkins, Claire, Edinburgh University Press<

ISBN: 0748640746

American Smart Cinema examines a contemporary type of US filmmaking that exists at the intersection of mainstream, art and independent cinema and often gives rise to absurd, darkly comic … Altro …

American Smart Cinema examines a contemporary type of US filmmaking that exists at the intersection of mainstream, art and independent cinema and often gives rise to absurd, darkly comic and nihilistic effects. Connecting the 'smart' sensibility to issues of expressive irony, generational divide and therapeutic culture, this bold new book describes a recent critical tradition in commercial-independent American filmmaking by exploring the unstable tone and dysfunctional themes of such films as The Royal Tenenbaums, Adaptation, The Squid and the Whale, Palindromes, The Last Days of Disco, Flirt, Ghost World, Your Friends and Neighbors, Donnie Darko and The Savages. Acknowledging the loaded forms of expression employed by these films, American Smart Cinema provides new directions for their study by discussing the self-conscious approach taken to film historical discourses of authorship, narrative and genre. Examining the smart film's taste for 'blank' style and issues of middle-class identity, the book provides a comprehensive account of smart cinema as an aesthetic category while also considering the cultural and political factors that have guaranteed it critical and popular success. arts music and photography,performing arts Performing Arts, Edinburgh University Press<