First problem: the history is forgotten. For example, a 'New Latin American
Cinema' first arrived on world screens in the 1960s, and was integrally
associated with the internationalist political ethos of the decade. African
cinema began to emerge in the 80s. Then there was a wave of Chinese Cinema,
and now Iranian cinema is the centre of attention. (This is just a
simplified version. A more comrehensive account would have to talk about the
Western reception from the 1950s on also of individual directors like
Kurosawa, Satyajit Ray, Chahine, etc.)
Second: what does this history suggest? It needs interrogating from several
angles. For a start, the political economy of cinema. Cinema was a model of
transnational operation from very early on - long before the term
transnational came into use in economics - Hollywood began its overseas
operations in the closing years of the First World War. Cinema in
underdeveloped countries was late starting, since the technology came from
the First World, and was always at a disadvantage. Several countries
nonetheless established sizeable industries primarily serving local cultural
needs, whose products remain unknown beyond their own linguistic region.
The films which surface internationally, mainly through festivals, represent
only a certain type of cinema which appeals to arthouse audiences in the
First World (inevitably mediated by the critics' circles.) The movements
they represent began largely in the process of cultural and/or political
decolonisation and nationalism after the second world war, but nowadays they
occur in the context of globalisation, which allows them tentative entry
into a world market. But their distribution remains extremely limited, and
this pattern repeats the underlying and age-old syndrome of Western
hegemony, and its universalist claims, in which cultural production and
values from the periphery are treated as entirely marginal to a value system
which is structured to keep them so.
Another thing this history therefore raises is the question of how these
films get used in the First World, what they are taken to represent, how
their Otherness is perceived. The Cuban director had a word for this
problem. When praised for all the wrong reasons by the New York critic
Andrew Sarris, he criticised what he called Sarris's 'tendentious
ignorance'. To move beyond this sorry position (which also crops up from
time to time on this list) all that is needed is to see how the critic's
functions (and certain theoretical positions) are embedded in structures of
power and authority which are contested in certain ways in the films
themselves. And to pursue this will eventually lead almost anyone to a
re-evaluation of cinema and its history - and of assumptions about the
dominant examples which, as some correspondents have been observing, tend to
monopolise this list.
Michael Chanan
-----Original Message-----
From: Film-Philosophy Salon [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of fili houtman
Sent: 12 May 2001 11:01
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Cinema, World Cinema and Foreign Films
its true Panini, there used to b a wave a thirll worl cinema in the start
approx.89, then dicreased probably because of capitalis, i dont know where
all these are coming now. but it's stange this wave is over. just because
the relations between script guilds and hollywood blockbusters are no that
rainy, but when it start raining man, ho ho!. after a while it be better.
but relying on critics won't help the tiles. better collab.between the sets
is a good foggy magnetic athmosphere.
(my two cents).
FiliH;
>From: Panini Gupt <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: Film-Philosophy Salon <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Cinema, World Cinema and Foreign Films
>Date: Sat, 12 May 2001 00:27:08 MDT
>
>
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