Proposed collection
EDITORS: Tom Brown (University of Reading) & Belén Vidal
(King’s College, London)
Email: [log in to unmask]
The Biopic in Contemporary
Film Culture
A genre that continues to be a staple of film industries
around the world, the ‘biopic’ (or biographical picture) remains relatively
under-examined and under-valued in contemporary film studies. While Hollywood
biopics have received some sustained attention, this proposed collection will
look at the ‘life’ of the biopic internationally.
The collection will be divided into three parts, each
becoming more specific in its focus.
The first part will
comprise essays surveying the biopic’s place within a range of industrial and
cultural contexts, offering some historical overview but focusing primarily on
contemporary production. Parts two and three will focus on particular aspects
of the biopic through analysis of selected case studies.
The contributors to all sections, but particularly parts two
and three, will be encouraged to investigate the aesthetic, ideological and/or
theoretical implications of particular cycles, narratives and representations. We
especially welcome proposals that engage imaginatively with the boundaries of
the genre.
We intend that the three sections to the book will look
roughly as follows:
Part One: CONTEXTS
American biopics from the post-classical period and from a
range of European, Asian and other World cinemas.
Some informing frameworks might comprise: national contexts and international
circulation; auteur, producer or star-driven product?; between film and
television; the role of the biopic in cultural industries; hybrid
formats (documentary footage, animation, docudrama).
Part Two: REPRESENTATIONS
Representations of certain types of figure: artists,
writers, sportsmen, politicians and statesmen, journalists, musicians,
inventors, film stars, terrorists, revolutionaries, etc.
Possible approaches: co-existence
of fictional and historical figures; celebrity and popular culture; politics of gender, race and sexuality in
relation to cycles (the woman writer, the gay icon, the national hero, etc.);
recurring motifs, such as performance in the musician’s biopic, the moment of
creation, the artistic couple, the life of the artwork, labour and artistry,
etc.
Part Three: PERSONALITIES
To include recurrent characters such as Christopher
Columbus, Napoléon Bonaparte, Abraham Lincoln, Elizabeth I, Jane Austen, Vincent
Van Gogh, Adolf Hitler, Ché Guevara, etc.
Approaches: hagiographic
and revisionist biopics; life
narratives versus reconstruction of an event; fictions of origins (‘the early
years of…’); ‘exceptional individuals’ versus social determinants; acting and impersonation.
The divisions between these sections and their areas of
focus are necessarily fluid and the list of suggested critical frameworks is by
no means exhaustive. We would also welcome proposals that suggest approaches
beyond those listed above.
However, we would
particularly welcome proposals in the following areas:
Theorising performance in the biopic: embodying and incarnating
‘real-life’ figures.Entries for the ‘Representations’ section with a focus on approaches
to figures or cycles - e.g. musicians, writers, etc.Post-1989 revisions of European national histories and their
figures (on the political biopic; memory and World War II, the Cold War,
etc.)Local/global address in world cinema biopics.
We envisage 1st of September 2011 as the final deadline
for the submission of chapters.
Deadline for receipt
of 300 words (max.) proposals and a brief bio (100 words max.): 1st
October 2010
Please send your proposals and any enquiries to: [log in to unmask]
Best,
Tom Brown (University
of Reading) and Belén Vidal (King’s College London)
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