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- Volume 16, Issue 3, 2019
Studies in Spanish & Latin American Cinemas - Volume 16, Issue 3, 2019
Volume 16, Issue 3, 2019
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‘Las sombras llaman a mi puerta’: John Alton y el melodrama en Puerta cerrada (1939)
By Iván MoralesEste artículo estudia el trabajo de John Alton en Puerta cerrada (Saslavsky, 1939). En la última interpretación musical de la película, Alton fotografía a Libertad Lamarque en plena oscuridad, logrando una impactante escena donde anticipa el estilo de iluminación que desarrolló en los film noirs realizados en Hollywood tiempo después. Partiendo de esta escena, analizaré el diálogo que se produce entre el peculiar estilo fotográfico de Alton, el uso del melodrama que hace Saslavsky, y la performance de Lamarque.
This article studies the work of John Alton in Puerta cerrada (Saslavsky, 1939). In the film’s last musical performance, Alton photographs Libertad Lamarque in deep darkness, achieving a dazzling scene that foreshadows the lighting style he later developed in Holywood film noirs made. Starting with this scene, the article analyses the dialogue generated by Alton’s peculiar photographic style, Saslavsky’s use of melodrama and Lamarque’s performance.
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(Un)Building the nation’s body: Disabled citizenship in Huevos de oro (1993) and Cinco metros cuadrados (2011)
More LessThis article analyses Huevos de oro/Golden Balls (Luna, 1993) and Cinco metros cuadrados/Five Square Meters (Lemcke, 2011) as contrasting examples of the complex relationship between the transformations of place and space and the emergence of forms of marginal subjectivities shaped by notions of precarity and disability. I propose to call the cinematic translation of this coalescence ‘disabled citizenship’, which understands the experience of precarity through a conflicting interaction with the built environment that has profound physical and affective consequences.
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Dispositivos de enunciación del film-ensayo español contemporáneo: Evolución de la subjetividad ensayística y su pensamiento en acto
More LessEl presente artículo analiza los dispositivos de enunciación del film-ensayo español contemporáneo. Para ello, realizamos un itinerario por sus obras más significativas, a partir de la evolución de los dispositivos de enunciación textuales y sus diferentes funciones: voz off, voz in, subtítulos, intertítulos, y la desaparición del texto. Este recorrido nos permite analizar la relación entre estos dispositivos y: las formas intermediales (la carta, el diario, el auotorretrato, etc.); los materiales audiovisuales (imágenes propias, found footage, animación, fotografía, pintura, etc.); los elementos retóricos utilizados (yuxtaposición, pantalla en negro, fundido, sobreimpresión, ralentización, pantalla dividida, etc.). Se evidencia entonces cómo el film-ensayo español contemporáneo genera una progresiva deconstrucción de la subjetividad ensayística mediante procedimientos asociados a los dispositivos de enunciación analizados – ficcionalización, sustracción, desautomatización, objetivación, desintensificación, descentramiento y borrado – que oscilan entre los polos de la reflexión racional y la emocional.
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Reality matters: Transnational realist crime film and television in Spain
More LessThis article argues that contemporary Spanish crime film and television has adapted to an economic crisis and has embraced a transnational crime film and television ‘realism’, introspection and pathos that reconciles commercial success with the cultural need to address Spain’s recent history. El niño/The Kid (Monzón, 2014), La isla mínima/Marshland (Rodríguez, 2014), El Príncipe/The Prince (Telecinco, 2014–16) and Mar de plástico/Sea of Plastic (Antena 3, 2015–16) represent an attempt to reach out to audiences by gaining international recognition for Spanish audio-visual productions and honouring local issues and spaces. Their diverse configurations point to the country’s ambiguity about its historical legacy and suggest the emergence of a new, gentler version of Spanish nationalism.
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The Permanencia Voluntaria archive and the historical study of Mexican cinema
More LessThis article provides an overview of the archival materials held at the Permanencia Voluntaria collection in Tepoztlán, Mexico. Focusing on the documents of the production company Cinematográfica Calderón, in operation from the late 1930s to the 1990s, the article makes a case for using such material to construct critical industrial histories of Mexican cinema. Drawing on concepts from media industry studies, the article examines three intertwined aspects of the production company’s operations during the 1950s and 1960s: marketing, censorship negotiations and transnational distribution. Accordingly, it proposes that these factors be placed in conversation with cinematic texts as a way of reconsidering the place of the nation in Mexican film studies, expanding the objects of analysis in this field and re-evaluating a period of film history whose significance has largely remained overlooked.
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An interview with Guillermo Calderón
Authors: Viviana García-Besné and Alistair TrempsThis is an edited excerpt of an interview that García-Besné and Tremps conducted with Guillermo Calderón Stell (1919–2018) for their 2009 documentary Perdida/Lost about the Calderón family’s history in Mexican cinema.
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Interview with Viviana García-Besné
More LessIn this interview, filmmaker and archivist Viviana García-Besné discusses her work as the founder of the Permanencia Voluntaria archive and the Baticine microcinema in Tepoztlán, Mexico. As the descendent of a family involved in various areas of the Mexican film industry since the early twentieth century, García-Besné has become an advocate for Mexican popular cinema that has long been dismissed by critics and institutions adopting class-based conceptions of cultural value and ‘quality’ cinema. Accordingly, the central mission of Permanencia Voluntaria includes both restoring films produced by her family and advocating for increased appreciation and institutional support for popular cinema and the audiences who enjoy it.
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Reviews
Authors: Olivia Cosentino, Niamh Thornton, Natália Pinazza, Sharonah Fredrick and Marc RipleyLa India María: Mexploitation and the Films of María Elena Velasco, Seraina Rohrer (2018) Austin: University of Texas Press, 220 pp., ISBN 978-1-47731-345-9, p/bk, $29.95 USD
Mexican Transnational Cinema and Literature, Maricruz Castro Ricalde, Mauricio Díaz Calderón and James Ramey (eds) (2017) Oxford and Bern: Peter Lang, 312 pp., ISBN 978-1-78707-066-0, p/bk, $69.95
The Latin American (Counter-)Road Movie and Ambivalent Modernity, Nadia Lie (2017) Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 260 pp., ISBN: 9783319435534, h/bk, £57.65, p/bk, £71.96
Evolvi ng Images: Jewish Latin American Cinema, Norah Glickman and Ariana Huberman (eds) (2018) Austin: University of Texas Press, 264 pp., ISBN 978-1-47731-471-5, p/bk $29.95 USD
The Spanish Fantastic: Contemporary Filmmaking in Horror, Fantasy and Sci-Fi, Shelagh Rowan-Legg (2016) London and New York: I. B. Tauris, 214 pp., ISBN 978 1 78453 677 0, h/bk, $103.50; e-book, $82.80
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