"Wars in films are […] always more than just the staging or presentation of a historical event; they offer an interpretation of these events that usually corresponds with other aspects, e. g. society's evaluation of war per se, or wishes about how specific events related to war should be commemora...ted within the public conscience. Of course, films can also act as a medium to criticize war, but the functionality of the filmic stagings of collective violence is usually determined by the interaction between producers and the audience of the film.The following chapters try to provide a variety of insights into these relationships, and although they focus on different time periods and aspects related to the semiotics, narratives, and perceptions of war in film, they all circle around certain questions related to war films in general. These are:1. To what extent do war films present historical events that are already socio-culturally embedded within national narratives, and to what extent do their semiotics support or challenge common views about wars and collective violence?2. Which conscious or subconscious images or visual semiotics are used within war films to connect the audience to the film and its narrative?3. How do films create, transport, or intensify the perception and interpretation of wars within societies?To answer these, each of the contributions of the present volume engages with specific war films and connects their respective war-related motifs and narratives with these questions." (Introduction, 7-11)
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"Die Geschichte des dokumentarischen Films in Deutschland ist mehr als bloße Filmgeschichte. In ihr spiegelt sich auch die Medien-, Mentalitäts- und Gesellschaftsgeschichte. So thematisiert der Dokumentarfilm seit seinen Anfängen im ausgehenden 19. Jahrhundert die politischen, kulturellen und soz...ialen Auseinandersetzungen und Umbrüche. Die dokumentarischen Formen, ob in Kino, Fernsehen oder im Internet, haben die gesellschaftlichen Entwicklungen aus unterschiedlichen Perspektiven beobachtet, Missstände und Konflikte aufgezeigt und eine Vielfalt filmischer und erzählerischer Innovationen hervorgebracht. Trotz ihres Anspruchs, wirklichkeitsgetreue Abbilder der Realität zu vermitteln, standen sie im Laufe der Jahrzehnte aber immer wieder auch im Dienst von Werbung, Manipulation und Propaganda." (Verlag)
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"[Der Autor] skizziert die Filmgeschichte in 13 Kapiteln, die jeweils eine Dekade beleuchten. Pro Kapitel legt er das Hauptaugenmerk auf filmgeschichtliche Besonderheiten aus den USA, Europa und Deutschland. Auch auf globale Phänomene geht er ein, etwa aus Asien, Südamerika oder Afrika. Wichtige f...ilmwissenschaftliche Begriffe aus den Dekaden erklärt er am Kapitelende. Dort finden sich auch Tipps zu sehenswerten Filmen aus der Zeit." (Buchrücken)
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"Comprised of 31 chapters authored by some of the world's leading experts in their respective fields, the book's contributors synthesize existing literature, introduce the historical and conceptual dimensions of the field, illustrate innovative methodologies and techniques, survey traditional and ne...w technologies, reflect on ethics and moral imperatives, outline ways to work with people, objects, and tools, and shape the future agenda of the field. With a particular focus on making ethnographic film and video, as opposed to analysing or critiquing it, from a variety of methodological approaches and styles, the handbook provides both a comprehensive introduction and up-to-date survey of the field for a vast variety of audio-visual researchers, such as scholars and students in sociology, anthropology, geography, communication and media studies, education, cultural studies, film studies, visual arts and related social science and humanities. As such, it will appeal to a multidisciplinary and international audience, and features a dynamic, forward-thinking, innovative, and contemporary focus oriented toward the very latest developments in the field, as well as future possibilities." (Publisher)
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"Focusing in particular on Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, Tamara Falicov examines commonalities among Latin American film industries, such as the challenges of procuring funding, competition from Hollywood, state funding battles, and the fickle nature of audiences, as well as censorship issues, compe...tition from television, and the transnational nature of Latin American film. She addresses production, exhibition, and distribution contexts and financing and co-production with Europe and the United States, as well as the role of film festivals in funding and circulating films both within and outside of Latin America. Newer trends such as the revival of protectionist measures like the screen quota are framed in contrast to the U.S.'s push for trade policy liberalization and issues of universal concern such as film piracy, and new technologies and the role of television in helping and hindering Latin American cinema." (Publisher)
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"Wie wird koloniale Gewalt historisch thematisiert? Wie gehen dokumentarische Filme und geschichtspolitische Diskurse mit ihr um? Robert Stock nähert sich diesen Fragen mit kritischem Blick auf den Kolonialkrieg Portugals in Afrika und den nationalen Befreiungskampf Mosambiks. Dabei fokussiert er s...eine Untersuchung auf die Gestaltung, Funktion und Reflexion historischer Zeugenschaft. Am Material von bislang wenig beachteten Filmproduktionen über die Dekolonisierungsprozesse zwischen Mosambik und Portugal seit den 1970er Jahren analysiert er die sich verändernden Deutungsweisen der kolonialen Vergangenheit." (Verlag)
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"Children, defined internationally as under-18s, account for some 40 per cent of Arab populations and the proportion of under-fives is correspondingly large. Yet studies of children's media and child audiences in the region are as scarce as truly popular locally produced media content aimed at child...ren. At the very time when conflict and uncertainty in key Arab countries have made local development and diversification of children's media more remote, it has become more urgent to gain a better understanding of how the next generation's identities and worldviews are formed. This interdisciplinary book is the first in English to probe both the state of Arab screen media for children and the practices of Arabic-speaking children in producing, as well as consuming, screen content. It responds to the gap in research by bringing together a holistic investigation of institutions and leading players, children's media experiences and some iconic media texts.With children's media increasingly linked to merchandising, which favours US-based global players and globalizing forces, this volume provides a timely insight into tensions between differing concepts of childhood and desirable media messages." (Publisher)
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"Combining approaches from the social sciences and the humanities, the book provides an interdisciplinary perspective while outlining a transnational history of films that either document or fictionalise the favelas, shantytowns, Elendsviertel, gecekondu, barrios populares or chawls of our diverse '...planet of slums', exploring the way accelerated urbanisation has intersected with an increasingly interconnected global film and media culture. From Jacob Riis's How The Other Half Lives (1890) to Danny Boyle's Slumdog Millionaire (2008), the volume provides a number of close readings of slum representations of different historical periods and regions to outline how contemporary film and media practices relate to their past predecessors. It focuses thereby particularly on the way filmmakers, both north and south of the equator, have repeatedly grappled with, rejected or continuously modified documentary and realist modes of representation to convey life in our 'planet of slums'." (Publisher)
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"Die Fallanalyse hat gezeigt, dass eine Erzählung vom Krieg 1992-93 propagiert wird, die einer abchasischen Version des Narrationsschemas 'Die Vertreibung von fremden Feinden' entspricht. Ein zentrales Element der Erzählung ist zudem, so ergab die Interpretation, eine betont positive Darstellung d...es Kriegsalltags. Durch sie wird einerseits das bereits existierende Bild der heldenhaften Soldaten gestützt. Andererseits wird der Nachkriegsgeneration 20 Jahre nach Kriegsende eine gewissermaßen harmlose Version des Kriegsgeschehens angeboten, mittels Film und Konzerten werden begleitend affektive Erlebnisse ermöglicht. So soll die Identifikation der Nachgeborenen mit diesem Teil des abchasischen Gründungsmythos, den sie selbst nicht erlebt haben, angeregt werden." (S. 37)
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"La selección de términos que recogemos en el Diccionario de conceptos y términos audiovisuales, necesariamente sesgada y parcial, se articula en torno a una serie de perspectivas conceptuales diferenciadas, aunque complementarias entre sí: conceptos y términos relacionados con las teorías del... cine y las metodologías de análisis del texto filmico; conceptos y expresiones relativos a las corrientes estéticas, movimientos cinematográficos y a la historia del medio filmico; conceptos y términos relacionados con el estudio del cine desde el punto de vista industrial y de la economía del cine, lo que se conoce como el negocio del cine; conceptos y términos relacionados con la producción cinematográfica, incluyendo aspectos como los oficios del cine y la organización de la producción; conceptos y términos relacionados con el campo de la tecnología del cine, del vídeo y del sonido, considerando que el medio cinematográfico se encuentra subsumido actualmente en el mundo del vídeo digital; conceptos y términos relacionados con la enunciación filmica, que permiten asociar la práctica fílmica a sus bases de conocimiento; conceptos y términos relativos a los recursos expresivos y narrativos ligados al lenguaje audiovisual y al lenguaje filmico, desde el tratamiento del profílmico y los elementos filmográficos hasta la cadena sintagmática, esto es, el montaje y el espacio y tiempo fílmicos; finalmente, conceptos y términos relacionados con las hibridaciones y transmutaciones del cine por la imagen digital, siempre relacionados de forma directa e indirecta con el medio fílmico, desde el punto de vista de las relaciones entre el cine y la televisión, entre el cine y la publicidad, y entre el cine, los videojuegos e Internet. Por razones prácticas, todas las entradas del diccionario, más allá de la perspectiva conceptual de que se trate, están ordenadas alfabéticamente, y su extensión varía entre 500 y 1.500 palabras, aproximadamente. Buen número de estas entradas hacen referencia a otros términos cuya relevancia es menor, y que hemos definido como "secundarios" con entradas de breve definición." (Introducción, p.12-13)
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"Despite the growing field of media memory studies, the impact from film and media studies has been scarce within memory studies. This unique study offers new theorizations of three crucial concepts for media memory studies: remediation, transculturality and the archive. This book takes a closer loo...k at the media specificity of archival footage and how it is adapted, translated and appropriated. In its original approach this work reflects upon the role of documentary film images for the construction of memory. By merging film and media studies with memory studies the work offers multiple theoretical and methodological approaches for everyone interested in the heritage of audiovisual media: film and media scholars, memory scholars, historians, art historians, social scientists, librarians or archivists, curators and festival programmers alike." (Publisher)
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"Cinema in Central Asia is the first comprehensive and up-to-date account of the cinema of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan from its origins to the present day. Bringing together specialists from Central Asia, Russia, Europe and the United States, this companion to the... cinema of the region combines serious scholarly study with practical accessibility to construct an historical narrative, discuss aspects of film production and consider the impact of film. The book also offers a deeper understanding of Central Asian culture that is invaluable with the geopolitical and economic emergence of this exciting region. The book opens with a broad history, paying particular attention to the emergence and expansion of the film industry, competing visions of nationalism and distinct phases of the post-Soviet film experience. A series of incisive articles written by specialists on Central Asian film follows. They explain early film institutions and themes, the impact of the Second World War, expressions of identity and protest during the Soviet era, as well as regional variations of post-Soviet filmmaking and political involvement. The final section comprises biographical and filmographical entries on the principal figures of Central Asian cinema that offer a much-needed reference for scholars and filmgoers." (Publisher)
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»Die Khmer mögen keine Dokumentarfilme. Hier geht es nur um Unterhaltung.« Das haben mir lokale Filmemacher und TV Produzenten gesagt, als ich Kambodschas erstes unabhängiges Medien- und Kunstzentrum Meta House (www.meta-house.com) 2007 in der Hauptstadt Phnom Penh eröffnete. Ich wollte zu Kamb...odschas kultureller Renaissance beitragen, nachdem es 30 Jahre lang unter Bürgerkrieg und dem Genozid Pol Pots gelitten hatte. Kambodschas eigene Filmindustrie wurde durch die Khmer Rouge 1975 zerstört. In den 80er und 90er Jahre erlebte es eine Art Wiederauferstehung, bis es dann durch steigende Produktionskosten, die Verfügbarkeit von billigen DVD Raubkopien und das Schließen vieler Kinos wieder zerstört wurde. Heute entsteht aber eine neue und spannende Filmszene um junge Filmemacher_ innen, die preisgekrönte Dokumentarfilme produzieren." (S.18)
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"The article presents the main results of the investigation, ‘Current Situation and Prospects of Spanish Cooperation in Culture and Communication with the Rest of Ibero-America, 1997–2007’. The text offers an overview of the initiatives which took place during the period studied, by country, c...ultural and media sectors, agents involved, and type of activity. Spain’s role in terms of cooperation in culture and communication is analysed, and a reflection on the possibility of building an Ibero-American cultural space appropriate to the new digital scene is also included. Although Ibero-America has traditionally been a privileged geopolitical space for Spanish cooperation policy, this was not developed until well into the new millennium, evolving from simplistic and rhetorical visions based on instrumental conceptions of culture and communication to a gradual recognition of the fact that cooperation is much more than the classical actions of dissemination and promotion of Spanish cultural products." (Abstract)
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"Esta investigación aporta a la comprensión del contexto histórico-social de la construcción del cine documental en Ecuador desde una visión que valora y entiende al cine documental como parte de la cultura visual ecuatoriana, el mundo de las imágenes, su vida social y las representaciones que... éstas originan. La principal contribución radica en encaminar una comprensión crítica sobre la mirada que el Ecuador, como nación, construye sobre sí mismo, pues, mediante la interpretación de la representación de “lo indígena” se advierte a partir de qué visión están construyendo el mundo los hacedores de éstas imágenes, qué tipo de visión del mundo proponen esas imágenes y qué nociones sobre identidad están siendo discutidas o cuestionadas en este campo." (Editorial)
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" ... Roy Armes examines the political and cultural context of the films and the film industry in the post-independence era. Since the birth of cinema, North Africa has been the site of countless European and U.S. film productions. This book, however, focuses on the postcolonial period, when indigen...ous filmmaking in each of the three Maghreb countries--Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia--arose with the newly independent nations. Comparative analyses of each country's filmmaking in the decades following independence provide a historical portrait of the conditions and environment for the development of a postcolonial cinema. Armes then turns his attention to an in-depth examination of 10 key films produced between the 1970s and the 1990s, including Omar Gatlato, La Nouba, Halfaouine, Silences of the Palace, and Ali Zaoua. The book includes a dictionary of more than 135 North African filmmakers and a chronological filmography." (Publisher)
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