Sound, image, Gabin: Duvivier and the 1930s

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ben McCann ◽  
Ben McCann
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Structure ◽  
Popular Front ◽  
French Society ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
Sound Image ◽  
Mise En Scene

This chapter will begin with an examination of Duvivier’s first ‘talkie’, David Golder (1930) and its central figure of the Jew. It will also discuss whether, consciously or not, Duvivier’s film – along with his two other 1930s so-called ‘Jewish’ films Golgotha (1935) and Le Golem (1935), are anti-Semitic. The chapter will place Duvivier’s work within the generic and aesthetic framework of poetic ealism, for three of his films in particular – La Bandera (1935), La Belle Equipe (1936) and Pépé le Moko (1937) – combine elements of populism and melodrama with an expressionistic mise en scène and a pessimistic narrative structure. The chapter will also look at the importance of the actor Jean Gabin, who starred in all three aforementioned films, and demonstrate how Duvivier uses Gabin’s star aura, as well as the defining traits that can be traced across many of his characters – alienation, helplessness, assertive masculinity, romanticism – to amplify the feelings of hopelessness and stalemate that afflicted large portions of French society after the collapse of the Popular Front in 1937. Duvivier is part of this landscape, and the chapter will explore the interactions between his favoured collaborators like Henri Jeanson, Jacques Krauss, Charles Spaak, and Maurice Jaubert on other technically accomplished and visually impeccable films.

scholarly journals Queer representation in Arab and Middle Eastern Films

2021 ◽  
pp. 71-86
Author(s):  
Maria Abdel Karim
Keyword(s):  
Middle East ◽  
Middle Eastern ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The State ◽  
Audience Reception ◽  
Queer Identity ◽  
Cultural Contexts ◽  
Mise En Scene ◽  
Queer Representation ◽  
Women's Cinema

Queer representations have been present since the 1930s in Arab and Middle Eastern cinema, albeit always in coded forms. However, the idea of homosexuality or queerness in the Middle East is still not tolerated due to religious, political, social and cultural reasons. Middle Eastern filmmakers who represent homosexual relations in their films could face consequences ranging from censorship to punishment by the State or religious extremists. This article explores the representation of lesbians in three transnational Middle Eastern women’s films: Caramel (Sukkar banat, 2007) by Nadine Labaki, set in Lebanon, Circumstance (2011) by Maryam Keshavarz, set in Iran, and In Between (Bar Bahar, 2016) by Maysaloun Hamoud, set in Israel/Palestine. It analyses the position the female lesbian protagonists occupy in the narrative structure and their treatment within the cinematic discourse. The article will examine mise-en-scène elements and compare each director’s stylistic and directorial approach in representing homosexuality within different social and cultural contexts. It will also prompt discussions related to queer identity, queer feminism, women’s cinema, audience reception and spectatorship within the Middle East.

Céline, Louis-Ferdinand (1894–1964)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Neushwander
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Literary Canon ◽  
World War ◽  
French Society ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
Interwar France ◽  
Unique Style ◽  
Style Of Writing ◽  
Modern Warfare

Louis-Ferdinand Céline was one of the most controversial and innovative authors of the twentieth century. Known for his use of insults, slang, and ellipses in hallucinatory narratives, Céline became a central figure of modernism in interwar France. He gained notoriety from his first novels, Voyage au bout de la nuit (Journey to the End of the Night, 1932) and Mort à Crédit (Death on the Instalment Plan, 1936), which examine modern warfare as well as everyday suffering in French society. Following World War II, Céline’s anti-Semitic pamphlets and collaboration with the Nazis caused many to reject his inventive novels and to question his place in the French literary canon. Nevertheless, Céline’s unique style of writing and his innovative storytelling have permanently influenced the modern literary landscape.

scholarly journals The Dream of a Journey to the East: Mystery, Ritual and Education in Hermann Hesse’s Penultimate Novel

Paideusis ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-58
Author(s):  
Peter Roberts
Keyword(s):  
Detailed Analysis ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
Simple Narrative

The Journey to the East is Hermann Hesse’s most deeply personal book. This enigmatic novel, with its deceptively simple narrative structure, lends itself well to multiple interpretations. To date, however, little attention has been paid by educationists to the book. This paper attempts to address this lacuna in the literature, beginning with an examination of the autobiographical and dream-like qualities of the novel. This is followed by a detailed analysis of the ritual of confession undertaken by H.H., the narrator and central figure in the book. H.H. lives in despair following the apparent dissolution of the League of Journeyers to the East. He seeks to overcome his despair, and learns the League is alive and well, through the character of Leo. At the end of the book H.H., having confessed his ‘sins’ and faced both his League brothers and himself, believes he has found the answer to his troubles. This paper argues that in his solution, H.H. fails to grasp of the importance of education, questioning and critique in self understanding and development. This being so, it is suggested, he will be unable to make the most of the knowledge available to him through the League archives, and his reflections on himself, Leo and the purpose of his existence will have only limited lucidity. He will, the paper concludes, have a long way to go on his journey to ‘the East’.

Alberto Ginastera's ‘Don Rodrigo’

Tempo ◽  
1965 ◽  
pp. 11-18
Author(s):  
Pola Suares Urtubey
Keyword(s):  
Buenos Aires ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
Alberto Ginastera ◽  
Mise En Scene ◽  
Alejandro Casona ◽  
The City

In 1962 the Municipality of the City of Buenos Aires commissioned Alberto Ginastera to compose an opera for the Colon Theatre, to have its first performance during the season of 1964. For some time before that Ginastera had been discussing with the Spanish poet and playwright, Alejandro Casona (who at that time was living in Argentina) the idea of writing an opera whose central figure would be Don Rodrigo, the last Visigoth King of Spain. This very beautiful legend has been related in hundreds of sagas throughout the centuries (in English literature Scott, among others, recreated it in ‘The Vision of Don Roderick’), and it has also been used operatically before, in Handel's Rodrigo. Ginastera's Don Rodrigo, his first opera, calls for a monumental mise-en-scène. It has four main characters: a dramatic soprano (Florinda, daughter of Count Don Julián); a dramatic tenor, (Don Rodrigo, King of Spain); a baritone (Don Julián, the governor of Ceuta); and a bass (Teudiselo, Rodrigo's tutor).

scholarly journals Beneath sci-fi sound

2012 ◽  
pp. 49-63
Author(s):  
Nessa Johnston
Keyword(s):  
Science Fiction ◽  
Time Travel ◽  
Sound Design ◽  
Independent Cinema ◽  
Surround Sound ◽  
Industry Standard ◽  
Sound Image ◽  
Mise En Scene ◽  
The Aesthetic

Primer is a very low budget science-fiction film that deals with the subject of time travel; however, it looks and sounds quite distinctively different from other films associated with the genre. While Hollywood blockbuster sci-fi relies on “sound spectacle” as a key attraction, in contrast Primer sounds “lo-fi” and screen-centred, mixed to two channel stereo rather than the now industry-standard 5.1 surround sound. Although this is partly a consequence of the economics of its production, the aesthetic approach to the soundtrack is what makes Primer formally distinctive. Including a brief exploration of the role of sound design in science-fiction cinema more broadly, I analyse aspects of Primer’s soundtrack and sound-image relations to demonstrate how the soundplays around with time rather than space, substituting the spatial playfulness of big-budget Hollywood sci-fi blockbuster sound with temporal playfulness, in keeping with its time-travel theme. I argue that Primer’s aesthetic approach to the soundtrack is “anti-spectacle”, working with its mise-en-scène to emphasise the mundane and everyday instead of the fantastical, in an attempt to lend credibility and “realism” to its time-travel conceit. Finally, with reference to scholarship on American independent cinema, I will demonstrate how Primer’s stylistic approach to the soundtrack is configured as a marketable identifier of its “indie”-ness.

scholarly journals Ekphrasis in the Poem «Snakecharmer» by S. Plath

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (4) ◽  
pp. 128-136
Author(s):  
Anna E. Vorotnikova
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Structure ◽  
Sylvia Plath ◽  
Cultural Tradition ◽  
Main Character ◽  
Central Figure ◽  
New Meanings

The article studies singularity of the ekphrasis in the poem «Snakecharmer» by the American poetess Sylvia Plath inspired by the same-name picture by the French painter Henri Rousseau. Plath gives new meanings to the painting and creates her own version of cosmogonic and eschatological myth entering into a dialogue and a contest with the previous cultural tradition. Verbally transformed Rousseau’s images manifest their multi-layered ambivalent character. The main character in the picture by H. Rousseau is depicted with masculine features in the poem. The gender metamorphosis happening to the Snakecharmer is analysed in the context of the whole writer’s biography of S. Plath. It is concluded that the central figure, symbolically embodying the idea of creativity as it is, has androgynal nature. The narrative structure of the poem is defined by the root principle of the ekphrastic conception of «Snakecharmer» – the principle of dialectical unity of polar beginnings: orderliness and chaos, the Apollonian statics and the Dionysian dynamics, scenic formalization and musical fluidity.

scholarly journals Two Mulan Films - Same Source, but Different Story: Comparisons on Camera Shot and Colour Styles

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 177-194
Author(s):  
Sogu Hong ◽  
Ejun Hong
Keyword(s):  
Narrative Structure ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Mise En Scene ◽  
Main Message ◽  
The Relationship

“Lady General Hua Mulan” and Disney “Mulan” are created from the same source “Ballad of Mulan”, which is the oldest known version of Mulan’s story. Nevertheless, these two works differ in many ways, such as the characters, Mulan's personality, narrative structure, theme, etc. These differences also affect the mise-en-scène of the work, resulting in a different use of camera techniques and colours. In the process of developing the narrative structure, the director uses various camera techniques and colours to effectively convey specific messages and emotions to the audience. This work examines what the artist intends to present to the audience while changing the distance, angle, or the relationship between the camera and the object, which are the basic elements of the objective point-of-view shot. Regarding the study of colour, this study focuses on the influence of the differences in the narrative structure of the two films on the choice of colour. Also, this study explains how the director uses colour to effectively convey the main message of the narrative.

Toxicity in Themes of Control: An Analysis of the Anglo-Western Cancer Rhetoric in A Monster Calls

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 117-129
Author(s):  
Natali Cavanagh
Keyword(s):  
Western Culture ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The World

While infection has always haunted civilizations around the world, there are very few diseases that have had as much of an impact on Western culture as cancer has. The abundance of bereavement literature about characters with cancer begs the question; why cancer? This paper discusses ways in which cancer narratives reinforce Western obsession with control, through the lens of rhetoric and narrative structure. The author will specifically discuss how Patrick Ness’ 2011 novel, A Monster Calls, combats modern illness and cancer narratives and challenges themes of control threaded into Western culture

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