Film Studies
Interview with Alina Marazzi: The tactile gaze
Alina Marazzi is a well-known Italian feminist director whose explorations of women’s lives the challenges they have faced (and still face) in society and the family have had a profound impact on film and feminist studies. She has contributed to creating a new cinematic language and mode of storytelling through experimenting with the use of both collage and montage. She has also made incursions into the world of fashion with a film on international fashion icon and intellectual Anna Piaggi and later with her short film that the House of Dior commissioned: To Cut Is to Think (2020). The interview focuses on this latter film where Marazzi shares her experience in working on the film the opportunities it opened up for her creative process her collaboration with Maria Grazia Chiuri and her encounter with the work of the poet and artist Lucia Marcucci whose work is the subject of the film.
The New Made in Italy for the 21st Century: Fashion, Film, Art and Design, Eugenia Paulicelli, Claudio Napoli and Massimo Mascolo (dirs) (2022), USA: Okozoko
Review of: The New Made in Italy for the 21st Century: Fashion Film Art and Design Eugenia Paulicelli Claudio Napoli and Massimo Mascolo (dirs) (2022) USA: Okozoko
‘Film, Fashion, Costume in Italy and Beyond’
This editorial positions the study of fashion and costume against the field of film studies and the history of Italian cinema and media. Although scholarly approaches to this field of study first appeared in Anglo American literature at the beginning of the 1990s the pioneering work of Italian historian and film critic Mario Verdone has yet to be acknowledged. The anthology Verdone edited in 1950 a pivotal year of Italy’s post-war reconstruction was the first of its kind: prior to its publication the relationship between costume fashion and film had never been the subject of scholarly enquiry. The title of Verdone’s book La moda e il costume nel film (‘Fashion and costume in film’) calls attention to how these arts techniques and industries work in the actual process of making films. Verdone’s book offers a context for the articles contained in this volume.
Interview with Maria Grazia Chiuri: Women in fashion: Crafting feminisms
Maria Grazia Chiuri creative director at the House of Christian Dior talks about her current role working for the French luxury brand. She reflects on how passionate she is about highlighting and promoting women’s multifaceted manifestations of work image and creativity. Chiuri also discusses her long career in fashion starting with her mother’s atelier her studies at the European Institute of Design and then her work for the Fendi sisters and Valentino both located in Rome where she was born. Chiuri stresses certain books have been crucial for her from Ngozi’s recent bestseller We Should All Be Feminists (2015) to Clare Hunter’s Threads of Life (2019) and classical texts by Simone de Beauvoir as well as Robin Morgan’s Sisterhood Is Powerful (1970). In addition she emphasizes how beneficial it has been to be able to immerse herself in Dior’s rich archive. She finds inspiration in the history of women fashion feminism the arts cinema and how all these institutions promote necessary changes to the fashion industry of the twenty-first century.
Fashion and costumes in the work of Italian filmmaker Robert Vignola in silent Hollywood
While the influence of dive fashion on the cross-class audience of Italian silent cinema has been established the relationship between fashion and silent Hollywood stresses the class-composition of the audience. The work of director Robert G. Vignola born in Italy but active in the United States clarifies the passage from a cinema addressed to the popular audience of the nickelodeon to the middle class and specifically women in the narrative and through stars within the suggestions of fashion. There is a general consensus about Italian American culture being an extension of Italianness. In the press Vignola was always identified as an Italian and his artistic sensibility was credited to his Italian origins at a time where Italian silent cinema was incredibly popular on American screens. From a transnational perspective the role of fashion in his work both within a historical perspective and in the theoretical debate on female silent film spectatorship also points to the underestimated relations between American media and Italian culture.
Feminist genealogies, archival constellations and women’s labour in fashion films: Anna Piaggi: una visionaria nella moda (2016) and Triangle (2014)
In this article I examine how Alina Marazzi and Costanza Quatriglio deal with the world of haute couture and off-the-rack fashion and with the turn to the archive in their documentaries. They construct feminist genealogies (between maternage and spectral sisterhood) in the fashion world and adopt different modalities of montage (between gleaning and détournement). In Anna Piaggi: una visionaria nella moda (‘Anna Piaggi: A fashion visionary’) (2016) Marazzi focuses on Anna Piaggi a renowned fashion editor for Vogue Italia. In contrast Costanza Quatriglio in Triangle (2014) centres her story on the 123 women textile workers victims of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire in New York in 1911 in counterpoint to her interview with Mariella Fasanella the only survivor of a collapsed sweatshop in Barletta Italy in 2011. The two filmmakers produce a short circuit in fashion films among feminist genealogies archival constellations and women’s labour in the fashion industry activating a feminist and ethical stance.
Film, fashion, costume and Rome-based archives
This essay presents a mapping of archival sources public and private connected to the activities of the cine-theatrical tailors and costume designers in order to reconstruct a productive and cultural reality of absolute excellence that starting from the past century developed in Rome. The aim is to offer information in the context of personal archives consisting of documentary assets of various types ranging from collections of press clippings photographs notes working manuscripts and above all else collections of original sketches often accompanied by samples of fabrics produced by costume designers for the creation of cinematic televisual and theatrical costumes. The major film and theatre ateliers operating in Rome are listed and follow a focus on the archival funds of costume designers of the Chiarini Library of the Experimental Center for Cinematography Foundation. Designers include such names as Gino Carlo Sensani Piero Tosi Vera Marzot Adriana Berselli Marisa D’Andrea and Alberto Verso.
How backstory and direct address reformulate the Shakespearean character on television: The case of the missing psychological motivation for House of Cards’ Frank Underwood
This article delves into narrative elements of direct address and backstory in television focusing on House of Cards (2012–19) Shakespeare’s Richard III and Game of Thrones (2011–19). Comparing dramaturgical approaches in stage plays and TV series the study highlights House of Cards’ unique incorporation of a pragmatic use of the direct address to create ‘world-view’ for character exploration. The analysis extends to Game of Thrones emphasizing Tyrion Lannister’s self-descriptive addresses revealing a psychological struggle rooted in rejection and backstory. The article proposes a methodological framework linking first lines or direct addresses to character backstories emphasizing the role of self-descriptive asides in character creation. It introduces the concept of a ‘psychological motivational arc’ within character arcs exploring how direct addresses contribute to nonlinear character development. Concluding with an in-depth examination of House of Cards’ Frank Underwood it scrutinizes Willimon’s ‘show don’t tell’ approach questioning its potential limitations on character depth and challenging traditional screenwriting advice. The analysis unravels the interplay between direct address backstory and character development in television series offering insights into evolving narrative techniques and their implications for contemporary screenwriting.
Africa’s Lost Classics: New Histories of African Cinema, Lizelle Bisschoff and David Murphy (eds) (2014)
Review of: Africa’s Lost Classics: New Histories of African Cinema Lizelle Bisschoff and David Murphy (eds) (2014)
Oxon and New York: Modern Humanities Research Association and Routledge 217 pp.
ISBN 978-1-90797-551-6 h/bk $48.95
Scripted resonance or lost in translation?: Storytelling and Chinese reception of Everything Everywhere All at Once
This study delves into the intricate art of screenwriting by critically examining the reception of the 2023 award-winning film Everything Everywhere All at Once among Chinese audiences. Notwithstanding its international laurels Everything has sparked a divided sentiment in Mainland China. While its audacious blend of genres and the poignant depiction of Chinese–American experiences have been recognized Everything was absent from Chinese theatres owing to its explicit content. However its digital footprint on Chinese streaming platforms has painted a picture of ambivalence. Many Chinese viewers expressed reservations about the screenwriters’ frequent use of pop culture references perceived narrative clichés and the incorporation of elements that seem discordant with conventional Chinese storytelling. Yet interspersed among these critiques is admiration for its visual brilliance and inclusivity. Grounded in resonance theory this study scrutinizes Everything particularly the screenplay’s reliance on the oft-touted ‘universal’ blueprint of the Hero’s Journey. Aligning with critiques suggesting such frameworks might be culturally myopic this study connects these screenwriting choices to the lukewarm reception among Chinese audiences. Through this lens the study offers invaluable insights for screenwriters keen on crafting narratives that resonate deeply with Chinese viewers. Moreover it adds to the larger conversation about the need for diversifying screenwriting templates on the global stage challenging the dominance of western-centric paradigms such as the Hero’s Journey. At its core this study deciphers the intricate tapestry of screenwriting elements that strike a chord within the Chinese sociocultural milieu.
In Custody: From written text to audio-visual discourse through a postcolonial lens
Comparing the novel In Custody written by Anita Desai (1984) and the film adaptation In Custody (1993) directed by Ismail Merchant provides an interesting opportunity to examine how literary texts are transformed into audio-visual works through different discursive techniques. A written text is taken from the page to live on a screen and thus focusing on the main content the literary author created becomes a challenge for screenwriters filmmakers and translators. In the case of In Custody the inclusion of English subtitles in the film allows for its internationalization while respecting the language of the novel. This approach enables audiences to appreciate the sounds of Hindi and Urdu poetry and in doing so they become custodians of these rich literary traditions.
The Neoliberal Self in Bollywood
This book explores the consequences of unbridled expansion of neoliberal values within India through the lens of popular film and culture. The focus of the book is the neoliberal self which far from being a stable marker of urban liberal millennial Indian identity has a schizophrenic quality one that is replete with contradictions and oppositions unable to sustain the weight of its own need for self-promotion optimism and belief in a narrative of progress and prosperity that has marked mainstream cultural discourse in India. The unstable and schizophrenic neoliberal identity that is the concern of this book however belies this narrative and lays bare the sense of precarity and inherent inequality that neoliberal regimes confer upon their subjects.
The analysis is explicitly political and draws upon theories of feminist media studies popular culture analyses and film studies to critique mainstream Hindi cinema texts produced in the last two decades. Rele Sathe also examine a variety of other peripheral ‘texts’ in her analysis such as the film star the urban space web series YouTube videos and social media content.