Download or read book The Makeover in Movies written by Elizabeth A. Ford and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2004-04-14 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The plots of many films pivot on the moment when a dowdy girl with bad hair, ill-fitting outdated clothing, and thick glasses is changed into an almost unrecognizable glamour girl. Makeover scenes such as these are examined beginning with 1942's Now, Voyager. The study examines whether the film makeover is voluntary or involuntary, whether it is always successful, how much screen time it takes up, where in the narrative structure it falls, and how the scene is actually filmed. Films with a Pygmalion theme, such as My Fair Lady, Vertigo, and Shampoo, are examined in terms of gender relations: whether the man is content with his creation and what sort of woman is the ideal. Some films' publicity capitalizes on a glamorous star's choice to play an unattractive character, as discussed in a chapter examining stars like Bette Davis, Meryl Streep, and Cameron Diaz. Topics also include folk literature's Cinderella tale, men as the inspiration for makeovers in teen flicks films like Clueless, She's All That, and Me, Natalie, and class repositioning in such movies as Working Girl, Pretty Woman, and Grease. Photographs are presented in a before/after format, showing the change in the madeover character.
Download or read book Actor Network Theory at the Movies written by Björn Sonnenberg-Schrank and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-01-29 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is one of the first to apply the theoretical tools proposed by French philosopher Bruno Latour to film studies. Through the example of the Hollywood Teen Film and with a particular focus on Actor-Network Theory (ANT), the book delineates how Teen Film has established itself as one of Hollywood’s most consistent and dynamic genres. While many productions may recycle formulaic patterns, there is also a proliferation of cinematic coming-of-age narratives that are aesthetically and politically progressive, experimental, and complex. The case studies develop a Latourian film semiotics as a flexible analytical approach which raises new questions, not only about the history, types and tropes of teen films, but also about their aesthetics, mediality, and composition. Through an exploration of a wide and diverse range of examples from the past decade, including films by female and African-American directors, urban and rural perspectives, and non-heteronormative sexualities, Actor-Network Theory at the Movies demonstrates how the classic Teen Film canon has been regurgitated, expanded, and renewed.
Download or read book The Movies written by Greg Kramer and published by Random House Digital, Inc.. This book was released on 2005 with total page 130 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Take Your Studio, Movies, and Stars to the Top of the Charts! · Details on every employee, facility, set, ornament, and technology · Complete step-by-step walkthrough for winning the elusive Platinum Lifetime Honor · How to turn a three-star script into a five-star blockbuster · Tactics for managing your Stars, their relationships, and their careers · How to make your own movies with the Advanced Movie Maker and Post Production facility · Filmmaking 101 from Lionhead designers
Download or read book Hollywood Catwalk written by Tamar Jeffers McDonald and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2010-06-22 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The High School outsider takes off her glasses, puts on a dress, and becomes the Prom Queen; the dowdy woman has her hair done, buys some chic new clothes and starts to attract the men. Cinderella and Pygmalion stories still provide inspiration for the plots of Hollywood romantic comedies, dramas, and even action films. Their perennial use prompts a series of questions: is, for example, male agency necessary to effect the transformation, or can the woman change herself? Can she ever change him? Most pressingly, what do these images of change and transformation, of improvement and transcendence tell us, the viewers, about what we should be doing? Investigating these questions, this book examines a key but frequently overlooked aspect of film style: the costume. Across all the films discussed, costume and the body it covers becomes the crucial element in the transformation scene, exemplifying the 'before' and 'after' of the successful change. Exploring the fantasies of transcendence and transformation sold through these films and exemplified in the costumes, this book examines "Calamity Jane", "Midnight Cowboy", "Clueless", "The Long Kiss Goodnight", "The Devil Wears Prada", and many other examples from both classic and contemporary Hollywood.
Download or read book Makeover TV written by Brenda R. Weber and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 2009-11-20 with total page 339 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 2004, roughly 25 makeover-themed reality shows aired on U.S. television. By 2009, there were more than 250, from What Not to Wear and The Biggest Loser to Dog Whisperer and Pimp My Ride. In Makeover TV, Brenda R. Weber argues that whether depicting transformations of bodies, trucks, finances, relationships, kids, or homes, makeover shows posit a self achievable only in the transition from the “Before-body”—the overweight figure, the decrepit jalopy, the cluttered home—to the “After-body,” one filled with confidence, coded with celebrity, and imbued with a renewed faith in the powers of meritocracy. The rationales and tactics invoked to achieve the After-body vary widely, from the patriotic to the market-based, and from talk therapy to feminist empowerment. The genre is unified by its contradictions: to uncover your “true self,” you must be reinvented; to be empowered, you must surrender to experts; to be special, you must look and act like everyone else. Based on her analysis of more than 2,500 hours of makeover TV, Weber argues that the much-desired After-body speaks to and makes legible broader cultural narratives about selfhood, citizenship, celebrity, and Americanness. Although makeovers are directed at both male and female viewers, their gendered logic requires that feminized subjects submit to the controlling expertise wielded by authorities. The genre does not tolerate ambiguity. Conventional (middle-class, white, ethnically anonymous, heterosexual) femininity is the goal of makeovers for women. When subjects are male, makeovers often compensate for perceived challenges to masculine independence by offering men narrative options for resistance or control. Foregoing a binary model of power and subjugation, Weber provides an account of makeover television that is as appreciative as it is critical. She reveals the makeover show as a rich and complicated text that expresses cultural desires and fears through narratives of selfhood.
Download or read book Neo Feminist Cinema written by Hilary Radner and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-11-01 with total page 493 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What lies behind current feminist discontent with contemporary cinema? Through a combination of cultural and industry analysis, Hilary Radner’s Neo-Feminist Cinema: Girly Films, Chick Flicks and Consumer Culture shows how the needs of conglomerate Hollywood have encouraged an emphasis on consumer culture within films made for women. By exploring a number of representative "girly films," including Pretty Woman, Legally Blonde, Maid in Manhattan, The Devil Wears Prada, and Sex and the City: The Movie, Radner proposes that rather than being "post-feminist," as is usually assumed, such films are better described as "neo-feminist." Examining their narrative format, as it revolves around the story of an ambitious unmarried woman who defines herself through consumer culture as much as through work or romance, Radner argues that these films exemplify neo-liberalist values rather than those of feminism. As such, Neo-Feminist Cinema offers a new explanation as to why feminist-oriented scholars and audiences who are seeking more than "labels and love" from their film experience have viewed recent "girly films" as a betrayal of second-wave feminism, and why, on the other hand, such films have proven to be so successful at the box office.
Download or read book Feminism at the Movies written by Hilary Radner and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-03-22 with total page 351 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Feminism at the Movies: Understanding Gender in Contemporary Popular Cinema examines the way that contemporary film reflects today’s changing gender roles. The book offers a comprehensive overview of the central issues in feminist film criticism with analyses of over twenty popular contemporary films across a range of genres, such as chick flicks, teen pics, hommecoms, horror, action adventure, indie flicks, and women lawyer films. Contributors explore issues of femininity as well as masculinity, reflecting on the interface of popular cinema with gendered realities and feminist ideas. Topics include the gendered political economy of cinema, the female director as auteur, postfeminist fatherhood, consumer culture, depictions of professional women, transgender, sexuality, gendered violence, and the intersections of gender, race, and ethnic identities. The volume contains essays by following contributors: Taunya Lovell Banks, Heather Brook, Mridula Nath Chakraborty, Michael DeAngelis, Barry Keith Grant, Kelly Kessler, Hannah Hamad, Christina Lane (with Nicole Richter), JaneMaree Maher, David Hansen-Miller (with Rosalind Gill), Gary Needham, Sarah Projansky, Hilary Radner, Rob Schaap, Yael D Sherman, Michele Shreiber, Janet Staiger, Peter Stapleton, Rebecca Stringer, Yvonne Tasker, and Ewa Ziarek.
Download or read book Transforming Bodies written by H. Steinhoff and published by Springer. This book was released on 2015-05-26 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the turn of the twenty-first century, American media abound with images and narratives of bodily transformations. At the crossroads of American, cultural, literary, media, gender, queer, disability and governmentality studies, the book presents a timely intervention into critical debates on body transformations and contemporary makeover culture.
Download or read book Chick Flicks written by Suzanne Ferriss and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2008-03-03 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With 11 original essays, this edited volume examines 'chick flicks' within the larger context of 'chick culture' as well as women's cinema. The essays consider chick flicks from a variety of angles, touching on issues of film history, female sexuality, femininity, age, race, ethnicity, and consumerism.
Download or read book Feminist Film Theory and Pretty Woman written by Mari Ruti and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2016-10-20 with total page 213 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An overview of feminist film theory and how it explicates Pretty Woman.
Download or read book Movie Lists written by Paul Simpson and published by Profile Books. This book was released on 2011-05-26 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Action, African greats, alcohol, Robert Aldrich, aliens, Woody Allen, Pedro Almodovar, Robert Altman, animated, anime, apocalypses, Argentina, art, Asia minor, avant garde... And that's just A for you. A taste of this fabulously quirky and enjoyable book which is both a celebration of movies - and movie trivia - and a handy, entertaining guide to films that we know you will enjoy. It is fantastically functional. The lists are well conceived and easy to understand - mostly assembled by genre, actor, director, theme or country of origin - and the reviews are witty and informative. Oddly enough, most movie guides are not full of recommendations. But Movie Lists is, in spades, leaving readers in no doubt that the films reviewed are the business. Oh - and you don't have to watch them all before you die. There is no premise of death in this book. You just need to get down to the local Blockbusters or flick your remote to Movies on Demand. Only the popcorn is not supplied.
Download or read book The films of Luc Besson written by Susan Hayward and published by Manchester University Press. This book was released on 2019-01-25 with total page 209 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This fascinating collection looks at the career and films of Luc Besson, one of the most acclaimed figures in international cinema. Contributions have been assembled from all over the world, and their different approaches reflect this geographical diversity. Films covered range from Besson’s first feature, La Dernier Combat, to the international blockbusters The Fifth Element and Joan of Arc. The essays range from looking at costume design to musical scores, and the final chapter offers a transcript of a previously unpublished interview with the man himself. He is the only French director to have crossed over successfully during the 1990s into the blockbuster spectacular we associate with Hollywood cinema and yet this is only the second book in English on this major international director. The films of Luc Besson will make fascinating reading for anyone interested in the career and films of the ‘master of spectacle’.
Download or read book Feminist Film Studies written by Karen Hollinger and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-08-21 with total page 322 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Feminist Film Studies is a readable, yet comprehensive textbook for introductory classes in feminist film theory and criticism. Karen Hollinger provides an accessible overview of women’s representation and involvement in film, complemented by analyses of key texts that illustrate major topics in the field. Key areas include: a brief history of the development of feminist film theory the theorization of the male gaze and the female spectator women in genre films and literary adaptations the female biopic feminism and avant-garde and documentary film women as auteurs lesbian representation women in Third Cinema. Each chapter includes a "Films in Focus" section, which analyzes key texts related to the chapter’s major topic, including examples from classical Hollywood, world cinema, and the contemporary period. This book provides students in both film and gender/women’s studies with a clear introduction to the field of feminist film theory and criticism.
Download or read book Life Moves Pretty Fast written by Hadley Freeman and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2016-06-14 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "An earlier edition of this work was published in Great Britain in 2015."--Title page verso.
Download or read book My Life as a Goddess written by Guy Branum and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2018-07-31 with total page 283 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Smart, fast, clever, and funny (As f*ck!)” (Tiffany Haddish), this collection of side-splitting and illuminating essays by the popular stand-up comedian, alum of Chelsea Lately and The Mindy Project, and host of truTV’s Talk Show the Game Show is perfect for fans of the New York Times bestsellers Why Not Me? by Mindy Kaling and We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby. From a young age, Guy Branum always felt as if he were on the outside looking in. From a stiflingly boring farm town, he couldn’t relate to his neighbors. While other boys played outside, he stayed indoors reading Greek mythology. And being gay and overweight, he got used to diminishing himself. But little by little, he started learning from all the sad, strange, lonely outcasts in history who had come before him, and he started to feel hope. In this “singular, genuinely ballsy, and essential” (Billy Eichner) collection of personal essays, Guy talks about finding a sense of belonging at Berkeley—and stirring up controversy in a newspaper column that led to a run‑in with the Secret Service. He recounts the pitfalls of being typecast as the “Sassy Gay Friend,” and how, after taking a wrong turn in life (i.e. law school), he found stand‑up comedy and artistic freedom. He analyzes society’s calculated deprivation of personhood from fat people, and how, though it’s taken him a while to accept who he is, he has learned that with a little patience and a lot of humor, self-acceptance is possible. “Keenly observant and intelligent, Branum’s book not only offers uproarious insights into walking paths less traveled, but also into what self-acceptance means in a world still woefully intolerant of difference” (Kirkus Reviews, starred review). My Life as a Goddess is an unforgettable and deeply moving book by one of today’s most endearing and galvanizing voices in comedy.
Download or read book The Modern Temper written by Lynn Dumenil and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 1995-06-30 with total page 439 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lynn Dumenil's The Modern Temper provides a unique perspective into the American Jazz Age. When most of us take a backward glance at the 1920s, we may think of prohibition and the jazz age, of movies stars and flappers, of Harold Lloyd and Mary Pickford, of Lindbergh and Hoover--and of Black Friday, October 29, 1929, when the plunging stock market ushered in the great depression. But the 1920s were much more. Lynn Dumenil brings a fresh interpretation to a dramatic, important, and misunderstood decade. As her lively work makes clear, changing values brought an end to the repressive Victorian era; urban liberalism emerged; the federal bureaucracy was expanded; pluralism became increasingly important to America's heterogeneous society; and different religious, ethnic, and cultural groups encountered the homogenizing force of a powerful mass-consumer culture. The Modern Temper brings these many developments into sharp focus.
Download or read book Pictures of Girlhood written by Sarah Hentges and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-01-09 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although the "coming of age" story has been a popular film plot for decades, producers have only recently realized the commercial potential of targeting films to adolescent girls. Movies like Clueless, Legally Blonde and Mean Girls have been successfully marketed to teenage girls, as have several well-known independent films. Important as both cultural indicators and catalysts, these films simultaneously demonstrate pop culture's influence on girls' films, and the ability of girls' films to affect pop culture and perceptions of girlhood. This critical survey of film and the modern girl concentrates largely on films of the last two decades, addressing key themes for girls within "coming of age" films, the changing (but not always improving) young feminine paradigm, and the ways these films can be powerful determinants of culture. The first chapter explores the ways in which girls' films construct, reinforce, challenge and dismantle mainstream conceptualizations of sexuality, race and power. The second chapter discusses mainstream limitations of "coming of age" narratives, including recycled plots and stars, treatments of parental and male authority, and adult conceptualizations of adolescence. The third chapter describes girls' experiences within these narratives through such conventions as attitude, teen fashion, music and dance, unsanctioned rites of passage, and race. The fourth chapter covers the negotiation of sex and sexuality, virginity and sexual empowerment. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.
