Italian Silent Cinema

Italian Silent Cinema

Author: Giorgio Bertellini

Publisher: JOHN LIBBEY PUBLISHING

Published: 2013

Total Pages: 401

ISBN-13: 9780861966707

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Despite the wealth of studies of silent cinema in the English language, knowledge of the medium's first decades has remained attached to a canon in which Italian silent cinema appears deceptively familiar but largely absent. With 30 essays written by leading scholars in the field, 'Italian Silent Cinema' illuminates this understudied area of film history. Featuring over 100 illustrations, the reader brings into focus individual film companies, stars and genres and seeks to place the Italian production of dramas, comedies, serials, newsreels, and avant-garde works in dialogue with international film culture.


The Maciste Films of Italian Silent Cinema

The Maciste Films of Italian Silent Cinema

Author: Jacqueline Reich

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2015-10-19

Total Pages: 456

ISBN-13: 0253017483

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Italian film star Bartolomeo Pagano's "Maciste" played a key role in his nation's narratives of identity during World War I and after. Jacqueline Reich traces the racial, class, and national transformations undergone by this Italian strongman from African slave in Cabiria (1914), his first film, to bourgeois gentleman, to Alpine soldier of the Great War, to colonial officer in Italy's African adventures. Reich reveals Maciste as a figure who both reflected classical ideals of masculine beauty and virility (later taken up by Mussolini and used for political purposes) and embodied the model Italian citizen. The 12 films at the center of the book, recently restored and newly accessible to a wider public, together with relevant extra-cinematic materials, provide a rich resource for understanding the spread of discourses on masculinity, and national and racial identities during a turbulent period in Italian history. The volume includes an illustrated appendix documenting the restoration and preservation of these cinematic treasures.


The Cinema of Italy

The Cinema of Italy

Author: Giorgio Bertellini

Publisher: Wallflower Press

Published: 2004

Total Pages: 294

ISBN-13: 9781903364987

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Giorgio Bertellini examines the historical and aesthetic connections of some of Italy's most important films with both Italian and Western film culture.


A Companion to Italian Cinema

A Companion to Italian Cinema

Author: Frank Burke

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2017-04-10

Total Pages: 825

ISBN-13: 1119006171

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Written by leading figures in the field, A Companion to Italian Cinema re-maps Italian cinema studies, employing new perspectives on traditional issues, and fresh theoretical approaches to the exciting history and field of Italian cinema. Offers new approaches to Italian cinema, whose importance in the post-war period was unrivalled Presents a theory based approach to historical and archival material Includes work by both established and more recent scholars, with new takes on traditional critical issues, and new theoretical approaches to the exciting history and field of Italian cinema Covers recent issues such as feminism, stardom, queer cinema, immigration and postcolonialism, self-reflexivity and postmodernism, popular genre cinema, and digitalization A comprehensive collection of essays addressing the prominent films, directors and cinematic forms of Italian cinema, which will become a standard resource for academic and non-academic purposes alike


The Italian Cinema Book

The Italian Cinema Book

Author: Peter Bondanella

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Published: 2019-07-25

Total Pages: 392

ISBN-13: 1839020253

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THE ITALIAN CINEMA BOOK is an essential guide to the most important historical, aesthetic and cultural aspects of Italian cinema, from 1895 to the present day. With contributions from 39 leading international scholars, the book is structured around six chronologically organised sections: THE SILENT ERA (1895–22) THE BIRTH OF THE TALKIES AND THE FASCIST ERA (1922–45) POSTWAR CINEMATIC CULTURE (1945–59) THE GOLDEN AGE OF ITALIAN CINEMA (1960–80) AN AGE OF CRISIS, TRANSITION AND CONSOLIDATION (1981 TO THE PRESENT) NEW DIRECTIONS IN CRITICAL APPROACHES TO ITALIAN CINEMA Acutely aware of the contemporary 'rethinking' of Italian cinema history, Peter Bondanella has brought together a diverse range of essays which represent the cutting edge of Italian film theory and criticism. This provocative collection will provide the film student, scholar or enthusiast with a comprehensive understanding of the major developments in what might be called twentieth-century Italy's greatest and most original art form.


The History of Italian Cinema

The History of Italian Cinema

Author: Gian Piero Brunetta

Publisher: Princeton University Press

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 412

ISBN-13: 9780691119885

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Discusses renowned masters including Roberto Rossellini and Federico Fellini, as well as directors lesser known outside Italy like Dino Risi and Ettore Scola. The author examines overlooked Italian genre films such as horror movies, comedies, and Westerns, and he also devotes attention to neglected periods like the Fascist era. He illuminates the epic scope of Italian filmmaking, showing it to be a powerful cultural force in Italy and leaving no doubt about its enduring influence abroad. Encompassing the social, political, and technical aspects of the craft, the author recreates the world of Italian cinema.


A History of Italian Cinema

A History of Italian Cinema

Author: Peter Bondanella

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published: 2017-10-19

Total Pages: 753

ISBN-13: 1501307649

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A History of Italian Cinema, 2nd edition is the much anticipated update from the author of the bestselling Italian Cinema - which has been published in four landmark editions and will celebrate its 35th anniversary in 2018. Building upon decades of research, Peter Bondanella and Federico Pacchioni reorganize the current History in order to keep the book fresh and responsive not only to the actual films being created in Italy in the twenty-first century but also to the rapidly changing priorities of Italian film studies and film scholars. The new edition brings the definitive history of the subject, from the birth of cinema to the present day, up to date with a revised filmography as well as more focused attention on the melodrama, the crime film, and the historical drama. The book is expanded to include a new generation of directors as well as to highlight themes such as gender issues, immigration, and media politics. Accessible, comprehensive, and heavily illustrated throughout, this is an essential purchase for any fan of Italian film.


Italian Fascism's Empire Cinema

Italian Fascism's Empire Cinema

Author: Ruth Ben-Ghiat

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2015-02-11

Total Pages: 421

ISBN-13: 0253015669

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Ruth Ben-Ghiat provides the first in-depth study of feature and documentary films produced under the auspices of Mussolini’s government that took as their subjects or settings Italy’s African and Balkan colonies. These "empire films" were Italy's entry into an international market for the exotic. The films engaged its most experienced and cosmopolitan directors (Augusto Genina, Mario Camerini) as well as new filmmakers (Roberto Rossellini) who would make their marks in the postwar years. Ben-Ghiat sees these films as part of the aesthetic development that would lead to neo-realism. Shot in Libya, Somalia, and Ethiopia, these movies reinforced Fascist racial and labor policies and were largely forgotten after the war. Ben-Ghiat restores them to Italian and international film history in this gripping account of empire, war, and the cinema of dictatorship.


Italy in Early American Cinema

Italy in Early American Cinema

Author: Giorgio Bertellini

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 465

ISBN-13: 0253221285

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Giorgio Bertellini traces the origins of American cinema's century-long fascination with Italy and Italian immigrants to the popularity of the pre-photographic aesthetic—the picturesque. Once associated with landscape painting in northern Europe, the picturesque came to symbolize Mediterranean Europe through comforting views of distant landscapes and exotic characters. Taking its cue from a picturesque stage backdrop from The Godfather Part II, Italy in Early American Cinema shows how this aesthetic was transferred from 19th-century American painters to early 20th-century American filmmakers. Italy in Early American Cinema offers readings of early films that pay close attention to how landscape representations that were related to narrative settings and filmmaking locations conveyed distinct ideas about racial difference and national destiny.


Landscape and Memory in Post-Fascist Italian Film

Landscape and Memory in Post-Fascist Italian Film

Author: Giuliana Minghelli

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2014-06-11

Total Pages: 264

ISBN-13: 1135104816

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This study argues that neorealism’s visual genius is inseparable from its almost invisible relation to the Fascist past: a connection inscribed in cinematic landscapes. While largely a silent narrative, neorealism’s complex visual processing of two decades of Fascism remains the greatest cultural production in the service of memorialization and comprehension for a nation that had neither a Nuremberg nor a formal process of reconciliation. Through her readings of canonical neorealist films, Minghelli unearths the memorial strata of the neorealist image and investigates the complex historical charge that invests this cinema. This book is both a formal analysis of the new conception of the cinematic image born from a crisis of memory, and a reflection on the relation between cinema and memory. Films discussed include Ossessione (1943) Paisà (1946), Ladri di biciclette (1948), and Cronaca di un amore (1950).