La ciudadela (1938) de King Vidor: luces y sombras en el ejercicio de la profesionalidad

La ciudadela (1938) de King Vidor, es una película que narra la vida profesional del doctor Andrew Manson, desde su entusiasmado inicio como médico recién graduado en un pueblo minero en Gales, donde labora apasionadamente en diferentes casos sin importar las circunstancias, hasta su llegada a Londres donde ve distorsionado su propósito al adentrarse en la élite de la ciudad. Con la ayuda de su esposa Christine, tratará de recobrar el significado de la medicina. A través del filme se exhibe la ligera línea que divide el buen ejercicio de la profesionalidad. Por ello, en el presente trabajo se reflexiona sobre la medicina como profesión, su relación con la sociedad y se destaca la importancia de la educación en humanidades para el fortalecimiento del discernimiento ético en los futuros profesionales en salud

Sexuality, Stoning, and Supersessionism in Biblical Epic Films of the Post–World War II Era

Several biblical epics from the 1950s and 1960s with strong female heroes contain a narrative thread involving the stoning or threat of stoning of these protagonists. Notably, this motif is entirely absent from the biblical stories on which the films are based. This essay examines this feature in three films: David and Bathsheba (Henry King, 1950), Solomon and Sheba (King Vidor, 1959), and The Story of Ruth (Henry Koster, 1960). I argue that the motif of stoning is adopted from the New Testament story of the woman caught in adultery (John 7:53–8:11), and that this use contributes both to the subtle denigration of traditional Judaism and the reinforcement of gender hierarchies that are evident in many Bible films from the post–World War II period.

Mostrando y ocultando Nueva York: cine, cultura y realidad en los dorados veinte

En este trabajo se busca comprender la importancia que adquiere Nueva York como paradigma de la ciudad moderna en los años veinte por medio del análisis de una serie de películas rodadas en esa ciudad durante los años veinte, entre las que destacan obras como The Crowd de King Vidor, Speedy de Ted Wilde y Lonesome de Paul Fejos. En esta investigación tratará de descubrir cómo el cine clásico de Hollywood trató de hacer frente a los retos de la modernidad construyendo una imagen positiva del ciudadano medio, un ciudadano capaz de sobrevivir en un contexto dominado por la cultura de masas.

Plumes Agonistes

The chapter assesses the Great War rehabilitation program’s effectiveness by focusing on screenwriter-novelist Laurence Stallings, whose 1924 novel Plumes is a semi-autobiographical account of his treatment for a leg wound. Initially protagonist Richard Plume refuses amputation, choosing instead a bone graft that requires a painful brace. The brace assumes a liminal prosthetic identity that reflects Richard’s own confused sense of resolve: he both refuses amputation and the support of family back home because he is afraid that accepting both would, as the pages of Carry On had warned a few years earlier, allow his prosthesis to overshadow his personality. The pain-inducing brace itself takes on a malevolent spirit, which sours Richard’s personality and threatens his relationship with his family. Only after amputation and committing to a prosthesis does Richard receive the spiritual rejuvenation that Stallings otherwise depicts in his 1925 silent film The Big Parade, directed by King Vidor.

The Magnificent Ambersons

Orson Welles offers Dolores the role of Isabel Minifer in The Magnificent Ambersons. John Barrymore dies and the surviving Costellos attend his funeral, save for Dolores. She and Vruwink buy a ranch in Fallbrook, California, and raise rabbits for the war effort. Maurice and Helene appear as extras together in a King Vidor film but don’t make the final cut. Because of Helene’s illness and Le Blanc’s war involvement, Dolores agrees to care for Deirdre full time. Her relationship with Le Blanc sours when he reneges on his promise to pay her child support. Helene discovers Le Blanc is only using her to go to bat for him with Zanuck at Fox, where he is working as a cartoonist, and leaves him.

Transcending Categories, Staging Autonomy: Marion Davies’s Transitions from Showgirl to Screen Star and Producer-Manager

Marion Davies (1897–1961) transitioned from showgirl and musical theatre performer in the 1910s to silent screen star and actress-producer in the 1920s. In addition to her comedic talents, she multitasked as producer-manager of her production unit, ‘Marion Davies Productions’ at Cosmopolitan Productions. She used her professional collaborations with screenwriter-friend Frances Marion and strong directors such as King Vidor to make appealing pictures that also transformed her star image. This paper argues that her years of discipline and professionalism on the stage and in show business contributed to her subsequent screen successes and as actress-producer of the films in which she starred. Her career complicates the notions of stardom and creative agency in the ‘lively arts’ of the late 1910s–1930s.

The Lubitsch Touch

Hopkins’s secret affair with director King Vidor is revealed when Ernst Lubitsch leaves her a handwritten note on the last page of her Design for Living script. Regardless of the film’s critical success, Hopkins is frustrated with how her career is going. With her walkouts at Paramount making front page news, she looks forward to the day her contract ends. Hopkins finally gets a diversion when she steps in for an ailing Tallulah Bankhead in the title role of the Broadway play Jezebel.

This Southern Advent

Chapter 1 surveys the contributions of southerners to film with an emphasis on activity within the South. Linking the early development of the medium to post-Reconstruction “New South” ideology and grounding it in the efforts of several early innovators from Virginia, this chapter covers a number of important events and movements: the Spanish-American War of 1898, the emergence of Jacksonville, Florida as a major production center in the 1910s, the diverse history of North Carolina’s early film cultures (Asheville as a production center, Karl Brown’s Stark Love, diverse filmmaking ventures throughout the state, the state’s popular education film program, the brilliant career of town documentarian H. Lee Waters), and the long career of King Vidor.

A TEORIA CONTEMPORÂNEA DO CINEMA

O presente ensaio pretende discutir as vicissitudes da teoria contemporânea do cinema diante do fenômeno pós-estruturalista conhecido como Teoria. Para isso, partimos de uma problematização das grandes correntes que moldaram o pensamento teórico sobre o cinema ao longo do século XX e cujas temáticas refletem as duas correntes de pensamento que vem dominando o debate e a produção dos escritos sobre cinema após 1970: a teoria de posição subjetiva e culturalismo. Em relação à primeira vertente, os ensaios “Prazer visual e cinema narrativo” (1975) e “Reflexões sobre ‘Prazer visual e cinema narrativo’ inspiradas por Duelo ao sol, de King Vidor” (1981) de Laura Mulvey serão tomados como base para uma reflexão dessa questão. Já na última seção, o ensaio O “A alegoria histórica”, de Ismail Xavier, e o livro Crítica da imagem eurocêntrica (1994), dos críticos norte-americanos Robert Stam e Ella Shohat nos permitirão problematizar a questão das representações culturais e políticas do cinema — especialmente o não eurocêntrico — a partir de uma concepção multiculturalista.