Hip hop on film : performance culture, urban space, and genre transformation in the 1980s / Kimberly Monteyne.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Monteyne, Kimberley.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Hip-hop in motion pictures.

Motion pictures--United States.

Motion pictures.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (x, 277 pages) : illustrations (black and white)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Jackson : University Press of Mississippi, 2013.

Summary:

"Early hip hop film musicals have either been expunged from cinema history or excoriated in brief passages by critics and other writers. Hip Hop on Film reclaims and reexamines productions such as Breakin', Beat Street, and Krush Groove in order to illuminate Hollywood's fascinating efforts to incorporate this nascent urban culture into conventional narrative forms. Such films presented musical conventions against the backdrop of graffiti-splattered trains and abandoned tenements in urban communities of color, setting the stage for radical social and political tranformations. Hip hop musicals are also part of the broader history of teen cinema, and films such as Charlie Ahearn's Wild Style are here examined alongside other contemporary youth-oriented productions. Breakdancing, a central element of hip hop musicals, is also reconsidered. It gained widespread acclaim at the same time that these films entered theaters, but the nation's newly discovered dance from was embattled--caught between a multitude of institutional entities such as the ballet academy, advertising culture, and dance publications that vied to control its meaning. As street-trained breakers were enticed to join the world of professional ballet, this newly forged relationship was recast by dance promoters as a way to reinvigorate and "remasculinize" European dance, while young women simultaneously critiqued conventional masculinities through an appropriation of breakdance. These multiple and volatile histories influenced the first wave of hip hop films, and even structured the sleeper hit Flash dance. Monteyne places these films within the wider context of their cultural antecedents and reconsiders the genre's influence"-- Provided by publisher.

"Early hip hop film musicals have either been expunged from cinema history or excoriated in brief passages by critics and other writers. Hip Hop on Film reclaims and reexamines productions such as Breakin' (1984), Beat Street (1984), and Krush Groove (1985) in order to illuminate Hollywood's fascinating efforts to incorporate this nascent urban culture into conventional narrative forms. Such films presented musical conventions against the backdrop of graffiti-splattered trains and abandoned tenements in urban communities of color, setting the stage for radical social and political transformations. Hip hop musicals are also part of the broader history of teen cinema, and films such as Charlie Ahearn's Wild Style (1983) are here examined alongside other contemporary youth-oriented productions. As suburban teen films banished parents and children to the margins of narrative action, hip hop musicals, by contrast, presented inclusive and unconventional filial groupings that included all members of the neighborhood. These alternative social configurations directly referenced specific urban social problems, which affected the stability of inner city families following diminished governmental assistance in communities of color during the 1980' s. Breakdancing, a central element of hip hop musicals, is also reconsidered. It gained widespread acclaim at the same time that these films entered the theaters, but the nation's newly discovered dance form was embattled--caught between a multitude of institutional entities such as the ballet academy, advertising culture, and dance publications that vied to control its meaning, particularly in relation to delineations of gender. As street-trained breakers were enticed to join the world of professional ballet, this newly forged relationship was recast by dance promoters as a way to invigorate and "remasculinize" European dance, while young women simultaneously critiqued conventional masculinities through an appropriation of breakdance. These multiple and volatile histories influenced the first wave of hip hop films, and even structured the sleeper hit Flash dance. This forgotten, ignored, and maligned cinema is not only an important aspect of hip hop history, but is also central to the histories of teen film, the postclassical musical, and even institutional dance. Kimberley Monteyne places these films within the wider context of their cultural antecedents and reconsiders the genre's influence"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction

The Case for the Hip Hop Musical

The Sound of the South Bronx: Wild Style Reinvents the Urban Musical

Hip Hoppers and Valley Girls: The Economic and Racial Structuring of Youth Cinema in the 1980s

Flashdance: Breaking, Ballet, and the Representation of Race and Gender

Conclusion.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (ebrary, viewed October 18, 2013).

ISBN:

1-62103-999-4

OCLC:

843228811