Out Of The Fire,
2012
University of Nebraska at Omaha
Out Of The Fire, William Blizek
Journal of Religion & Film
This is a film review of Out of the Fire (2010), directed by Jeanette Reedy Solano.
Melancholia,
2012
Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia
Melancholia, Jon Pahl
Journal of Religion & Film
This is a film review of Melancholia (2011) directed by Lars Von Trier.
Slamdance Film Festival 2012 Report,
2012
University of Nebraska at Omaha
Slamdance Film Festival 2012 Report, William Blizek, Dereck Daschke
Journal of Religion & Film
This is the report on films reviewed at the Slamdance Film Festival, held in Park City, Utah in January 2012.
Sundance Film Festival 2012 Report,
2012
Grand View University, Des Moines, Iowa
Sundance Film Festival 2012 Report, John C. Lyden, William Blizek, Dereck Daschke, Kutter Callaway, Jeanette Reedy Solano
Journal of Religion & Film
This is the report of our editors from the Sundance Film Festival, held in Park City, Utah from January 19-29, 2012.
From The Editor,
2012
Grand View University, Des Moines, Iowa
From The Editor, John C. Lyden
Journal of Religion & Film
The Editor introduces the April 2012 issue of the Journal of Religion and Film.
Ironic Faith In Monty Python’S Life Of Brian,
2012
Meredith College, Raleigh, North Carolina
Ironic Faith In Monty Python’S Life Of Brian, Steven A. Benko
Journal of Religion & Film
Monty Python’s Life of Brian tells the story of Brian, a contemporary of Jesus whose life becomes chaotic when he is mistaken for a messiah. Standard comedic devices are used to mock and ridicule those who use their authority or office to claim that they are more than human. In this case, laughter humbles those individuals and brings them back to the human community. Second, an ironic faith perspective allows the Pythons to assert that it is up to each individual to define the meaning of his/her own life. While some interpretations of ironic faith suggest the possibility of an …
King Of Masks: The Myth Of Miao-Shan And The Empowerment Of Women,
2012
Watkins College of Art, Design, and Film, Nashville, Tennessee
King Of Masks: The Myth Of Miao-Shan And The Empowerment Of Women, Kevin Dodd
Journal of Religion & Film
King of Masks represents a particular type of mythic film that includes within it references to an ancient sacred story and is itself a contemporary recapitulation of it. The movie also belongs to a further subcategory of mythic cinema, using the double citation of the myth—in its original integrity and its re-enactment—to critique the subordinate position of women to men in the narrated world. To do this, the Buddhist myth of Miao-shan, which centralizes the Confucian value of filiality, is re-applied beyond its traditional scope and context. Thereby two prominent features of contemporary China are creatively addressed: the revival of …
Irruptions Of The Sacred In A “World Of Shit”: Profanity, Sacred Words, And Cinematic Hierophanies In Stanley Kubrick’S Full Metal Jacket (1987),
2012
San Joaquin Delta College, Stockton, California
Irruptions Of The Sacred In A “World Of Shit”: Profanity, Sacred Words, And Cinematic Hierophanies In Stanley Kubrick’S Full Metal Jacket (1987), Joseph E. Bisson
Journal of Religion & Film
Full Metal Jacket remains embedded in the consciousness of the popular culture mainly because of its abundance of profane language, violent imagery, and salacious set pieces. The juxtaposition of profane language and imagery with sacred language and religious symbolism reveals that Kubrick’s Vietnam film has powerful religious overtones that comprise an important element of the film’s critique of homo religiosus and the modern human condition. By continually juxtaposing the sacred and profane, Kubrick created “cinematic hierophanies” that advanced a cultural critique that inventively integrated ideas from some of the mid-20th Century’s greatest interpreters of myths -- Carl Jung, Joseph …
There’S No Place Like Home: From Oz To Antichrist,
2012
Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas
There’S No Place Like Home: From Oz To Antichrist, J. Sage Elwell
Journal of Religion & Film
This article explores the dialectic of the uncanny in The Wizard of Oz (Victor Flemming, 1939) and Antichrist (Lars von Trier, 2009), treating the latter as a sequel to the former such that we encounter Dorothy first as a young girl and then as a grown woman. I observe that the uncanny entails a repressive and expressive moment that is cinematically rendered in these two films, and drawing on Freud and Žižek, I argue that in Dorothy’s evolution from Oz to Antichrist we see that the witches and wizards and gods and devils of our own minds are known to …
Scapegoats And Redemption On Shutter Island,
2012
University of Denver
Scapegoats And Redemption On Shutter Island, Cari Myers
Journal of Religion & Film
The themes of redemptive violence, scapegoating, and ritual in the films of Martin Scorsese have provided much grist for critical scholarship. While it is going too far to claim that Scorsese is intentionally interpreting Girardian themes (which are themselves borrowed from a rich mythological tradition), the comparisons between the theorist and the director are compelling. My goal here is to establish the primary themes of scapegoating, mimesis, the cycle of violence, and feuding identities that occur in both Girard’s works and Scorsese’s films and pull them forward into a more recent work of Scorsese, Shutter Island.
Menstruation As Heroine’S Journey In Pan’S Labyrinth,
2012
Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley, California
Menstruation As Heroine’S Journey In Pan’S Labyrinth, Richard Lindsay
Journal of Religion & Film
I propose that the Guillermo del Toro film, Pan's Labyrinth (2006) follows the narrative outline of Joseph Campbell's hero's journey as experienced through the biological process of onset of menstruation in its young protagonist. I suggest a reading of the film that takes into account the visual and mythological symbolism of the figure of Pan, as well as the cultural context of menstruation in mythology and religion. I offer interviews from the director that support this interpretation, but ultimately I value a folk interpretation, or a "viewer's hunch" that the strange and fertile symbolism of the film represents a coming-of-age …
Blood In The Grass,
2012
University of New Orleans
Blood In The Grass, James Trent Davis
LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
This paper thoroughly examines the thesis film, Blood in the Grass. Each area of the film's production is carefully analyzed, including writing, directing, production design, cinematography, editing, sound, and technology and workflow. In addition to these areas, the background and ideology of the filmmaker provides a context for the choices made in production. This overall analysis discusses the effectiveness of the goals set by the filmmaker for the film to be an emotionally effective commentary on capital punishment, and to be conducive to the short film medium.
The Persistence Of Vengeance From Early Modern England To Postmodern New York,
2012
The University of New Orleans
The Persistence Of Vengeance From Early Modern England To Postmodern New York, Dominic M. Sevieri
LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
As a passing glance at the popular texts of any given period reveals, the subject of vengeance is nearly inescapable; on billboards, websites, and year end lists, revenge represents a curious constant even amid disparate media. This study explores the cultural commonalities that align revenge texts of the English Renaissance and exploitation films of late 20th century America. As in-depth inquiry reveals, numerous ideas and narrative tropes popularized during the Early Modern period are pushed to their logical extremes in these films. The central factor that aligns London during the Renaissance and New York at the cusp of the 1990s …
Lost In Space No Longer: The Visionary Union Of 'The Wire',
2012
University of New Orleans
Lost In Space No Longer: The Visionary Union Of 'The Wire', Brett Dupré
LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
In its serial space, David Simon’s The Wire season two relates the seemingly “disconnected” union men, foreign sex worker women, and African-American drug traders and crosses constructed boundaries of race, gender, sexuality, and geography to evoke the possibility of a transnational working class. The Wire’s serialized narrative trespasses the limitations of money and numbers games and of individual characters to build, scene by scene, what Roderick Ferguson calls in Aberrations in Black: Toward a Queer of Color Critique “the location for new and emergent identifications and social relations” (108).
The Woodshed,
2012
LSU New Orleans
The Woodshed, Catherine R. Amond
LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
In this paper, I will share in detail the entire process of creating my thesis film, The Woodshed. I will cover each step from writing and pre-visualization to producing, directing, production design, cinematography, editing, and sound. I will mainly focus on the style of directing I employed and the key decisions I made as an editor to best tell my story. I will then evaluate my decisions to determine the success of the project.
Lost In The Fire,
2012
University of New Orleans
Lost In The Fire, Nicholas Isom
LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
In this paper, I will discuss the production of my thesis film, Lost In The Fire. The main subjects of this paper are Writing, Directing, Production Design, Cinematography, Editing, Sound, and Technology. I will also be talking about the ways the Graduate Film program at UNO prepared me to accomplish this project. In addition, I will share my process and reflect on the failures and successes of making this film.
Politique De La Traduction: Le Sous-Titrage De Références Liées À La Culture,
2012
Scripps College
Politique De La Traduction: Le Sous-Titrage De Références Liées À La Culture, Rebecca J. Marion
Scripps Senior Theses
Cette analyse examine la problématique du sous-titrage des références liées à la culture (RLC). On s’intéresse à une question fondamentale : Comment le sous-titrage des RLC oriente-t-il un film vers la culture cible et quelles sont les conséquences possibles de cette orientation? Dans le premier chapitre, je vais faire une étude de l’histoire de la traduction du cinéma. En analysant comment les distributeurs et les exploitants ont abordé la traduction audiovisuelle, je vais exposer l’influence importante des motivations nationalistes sur le développement des processus de traduction. Le deuxième chapitre traite des contraintes posées par le sous-titrage des références liées à …
Women And Video Games: Pigeonholing The Past,
2012
Scripps College
Women And Video Games: Pigeonholing The Past, Allison Perry
Scripps Senior Theses
Academic work dealing with the overlap between video games and female representation is limited in both volume and proper research. Most texts agree on three supposed flaws with video games: they alienate female participants, there are no games for female players, and female players cannot relate to female characters. This thesis sheds light on these points, not only citing specific counter-examples, but also showing how many of these issues reflect on a larger societal problems.
Protecting The Last Tree: Environmental Education In The United States, 1990-2012,
2012
Pitzer College
Protecting The Last Tree: Environmental Education In The United States, 1990-2012, Liza R. Baskir
Pitzer Senior Theses
Having already been hired as an environmental organizer, I reflect on how my childhood experiences impacted me. I embark upon this vocational journey with youthful optimism, a good dose of realism, and just a touch of cynicism. An environmental organizer is someone who works mobilizing individuals around targeted environmental issues. They create policy changes that are environmentally positive… generally for little pay. What has motivated me, and scores of others, to willingly take on this seemingly impossible task? For me: was it the summer vacations to Yellowstone and The Rocky Mountains with my brothers and parents? Maybe it was being …
La Réconciliation De La Tradition Et De La Modernité Dans L’Adaptation Cinématographique Contemporaine Du Conte De Fées En France Et En Allemagne,
2012
Scripps College
La Réconciliation De La Tradition Et De La Modernité Dans L’Adaptation Cinématographique Contemporaine Du Conte De Fées En France Et En Allemagne, Mirabelle Korn
Scripps Senior Theses
This thesis examines the adaptation of fairy tales in ten recent French and German films. It looks specifically at narrative structures, representations of magic, portrayals of childhood, and manifestations of good and evil. This thesis asks how and why contemporary French and German filmmakers choose, consciously or not, to update some of the central motifs of fairy tales for a modern audience and what attitudes toward the reconciliation of tradition and modernity those choices express.
