Experimental Latin American cinema : history and aesthetics / by Cynthia Tompkins.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Tompkins, Cynthia, 1958-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Experimental films--Latin America--History and criticism.

Experimental films.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (305 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Austin : University of Texas Press, 2013.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

While there are numerous film studies that focus on one particular grouping of films—by nationality, by era, or by technique—here is the first single volume that incorporates all of the above, offering a broad overview of experimental Latin American film produced over the last twenty years. Analyzing seventeen recent films by eleven different filmmakers from Argentina, Brazil, Cuba, Mexico, Paraguay, and Peru, Cynthia Tompkins uses a comparative approach that finds commonalities among the disparate works in terms of their influences, aesthetics, and techniques. Tompkins introduces each film first in its sociohistorical context before summarizing it and then subverting its canonical interpretation. Pivotal to her close readings of the films and their convergences as a collective cinema is Tompkins’s application of Deleuzian film theory and the concept of the time-image as it pertains to the treatment of time and repetition. Tompkins also explores such topics as the theme of decolonization, the consistent use of montage, paratactically structured narratives, and the fusion of documentary conventions and neorealism with drama. An invaluable contribution to any dialogue on the avant-garde in general and to filmmaking both in and out of Latin America, Experimental Latin American Cinema is also a welcome and insightful addition to Latin American studies as a whole.

Contents:

Introduction: mise-en-scene, a seemingly international staging

A neonoir skew to the action-image. A shimmering suture: Fabián Bielinsky's epileptic El aura

Slippery criminal pleasures: intermediality and voyeurism in Jorge Furtado's O homem que copiava

Endless quest: chasing sex, lies, and money at the gates of hell in Heitor Dhalia's O cheiro do ralo

Road movies. The paradoxical effect of the documentary: Walter Salles's Central do Brasil

Twin piques: the double discourse of Carlos Sorín's El camino de San Diego

Orphans' solidarity: María Victoria Menis's El cielito

Drama. Sculpting time: Inês de Oliveira Cézar's Como pasan las horas

The past engulfs the present: Josue Mendez's Días de Santiago

Experimental auteurism. Whether or not to end one's life: Carlos Reygadas's Japón

Crime and self-inflicted punishment: Carlos Reygadas's Batalla en El cielo

Experimental auteurism and intertextuality. The miracle of female bonding in patriarchal society: Carlos Reygadas's Stellet licht (2008)

Cyclical scapegoating: Inês de Oliveira Cézar's Extranjera

The irrevocable nature of curses: Inês de Oliveira Cézar's El recuento de Los Daños

Splintered mirrors, echoes, and reverberations: Fernando Pérez Valdés's Madrigal

Experimental pseudo-documentary. Room with a view: Fernando Pérez Valdés's Suite Habana

Life is and is not: Paz Encina's Hamaca Paraguaya

Conclusion: possible futures.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0-292-74416-1

OCLC:

827944895