Representation of Farm Murders in Darrell Roodt's Treurgrond

This article is available in Print edition of KINEMA...

The Cinema of Jans Rautenbach

THE ANGUISH OF A DREAMER: ABRAHAM (2014) AND THE CINEMA OF JANS RAUTENBACH Introduction: Rautenbach's cinemaA few pioneers in the Afrikaans film industry of the sixties produced a number of films that could be labelled "involved films". The theme of these films was an examination of the cracks in apartheid ideology. They included Emil Nofal-Jans Rautenbach's films like Die Kandidaat (The Candidate, 1968) and Katrina (1968). Several film historians regard Jans Rautenbach as the pioneer of modern, bold and South African filmmaking in the 1960s and 1970s. Together with producer Emil Nofal he made ground-breaking films during a time when South African cinema hardly reflected the socio-political realities of the country. Born in 1936 in Boksburg, Jansen Delarosa Rautenbach grew up in a very poor household. His father worked in the mines. He started his school years at a primary school in Boksburg. Early influences in his life...

The Philosopher Cameo

THE PHILOSOPHER CAMEO Within current film studies a distinction is made between what are termed respectively "philosophy of film" and "film as philosophy" (or in some extreme cases "filmosophy").(1) While philosophy of film refers to a philosophical study of films, "a discussion of philosophical problems related to film, its nature, effects, and value", film as philosophy proposes the medium of film itself as a mode of philosophising, a way of doing philosophy.(2) What the film as philosophy thesis proposes, in short, is that some works of film "through means exclusive to cinema" can be understood to make concrete, epistemological contributions to philosophy that are just as rigorous as traditional philosophical propositions expressed linguistically.(3) And further, that it is not by citation of existing philosophical texts, or by having a recognised philosopher talk on screen, that a film can be said to align itself with philosophical activity:...

Clash of the Titans as a Parallel Remake

REINTERPRETING MYTH AND FILM: CLASH OF THE TITANS AS A PARALLEL REMAKE AbstractLouis Leterrier's film Clash of the Titans (2010) is a new version of both Desmond Davis's 1981 film by the same title and the Greek myth of Perseus. Categorizing Leterrier's work is nevertheless problematic because the film partly defies many definitions of cinematic remakes elaborated by the critics in the past decades. Clash of the Titans shall be examined and evaluated in relation to both its precursor texts, with specific attention to its significantly different treatment of their narrative units. Although remakes have been produced since the very creation of cinema at the end of the nineteenth century and proliferate nowadays (Forrester 89), critics consider them as "an underexplored subject" (Forrester and Koos 26), whose definition(s) and classification(s) are still being scrutinized and debated. Remakes are often examined in terms of their fidelity to the primary...

Toronto International Film Festival 2015

HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL 2015 The print ads and trailers for Toronto's 40th edition (10-20 September 2015) showed a striking motif of a powdered explosion at reduced speed varying only by colour scheme - a nice metaphor for the celebratory blast of diversity that any healthy entity turning forty ought to enjoy. But far from being complacent, Toronto humbly adapted to a competitive festival circuit by tweaking key strategies (all but retreating from 2014's decision permitting only world premieres to screen on its opening weekend), while also launching new ideas (the inauguration of a juried feature film competition eponymously named after Jia Zhangke's 2000 film Platform). On a related note, Sinophone content dominated this year's skinny selection of about two dozen Asian films, about half of which came from China, Hong Kong and Taiwan. Elsewhere, the Philippines and...

A USDA Sound Documentary about Southern African American Farmers

This article is available in Print edition of KINEMA...

Singapore International Film Festival 2014

NOTES FROM A SLIGHTLY SMALL ISLAND: SINGAPORE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL Following a two-year hiatus that included a complete revamping of its structure and organization, the Singapore International Film Festival returned for its 25th edition (4-14 December 2014) bigger and better than ever, with a re-branding effort that changed the former 'SIFF' into its current 'SGIFF'. A part of the inaugural Singapore Media Festival, SGIFF featured over 147 films from 50 countries spread over ten days and eleven sections, with a team headed by executive director Wahyuni Hadi and director-programmer Zhang Wenjie. It may be safe to say that the revitalized SGIFF heralds a new golden age of Singaporean and Southeast Asian, cinema....

P. Ramlee and Neorealism

P. RAMLEE AND NEOREALISM P. Ramlee was one of the legendary filmmakers of Southeast Asia a multifaceted artist considered to be the most important creative asset of the "golden age" of cinema of Singapore and Malaysia in the 1950s and 60s. Born Teuku Zakaria bin Teuku Nyak Puteh in Penang, the Straits Settlements (now Malaysia) in 1929, he spent most of his professional career in Singapore, then a regional film production centre, working for the Shaw Brothers' Malay Film Productions. In 1964 he returned to Malaysia to work for its fledgling Merdeka (Independence) Film Productions in Kuala Lumpur. During his lifetime, P.Ramlee directed 34 features and acted in more than 60 films. The singular contribution of P. Ramlee to the development of cinema and other art forms of Singapore and Malaysia is unquestioned. In his time, he was tremendously popular and today, four decades after his premature death in...

Installation of the Exotic

INSTALLATION OF THE EXOTIC Film and audiovisual installations have increasingly taken place in the art world in recent years extending and renewing the range of activities in the fine art domain. Tracing its origins to expanded cinema and video art in the 1970s, moving image installation is now ubiquitous in public museums and private galleries. This is at a time when access to experimental work via public service versions of television has now all but disappeared.(1) In the two decades since, as television channels have proliferated, choice has actually narrowed. Moving image installations are visible in a diversity of art environments from gallery spaces to site-specific work in urban or industrial pop-ups. Multi-screen configurations are not easily arranged in cinemas or easily watched on television sets, let alone computers. The small portable digital screens may issue a blizzard of information and imagery everyday, but their size and scale...