Italy in Early American Cinema

Giorgio Bertellini is Assistant Professor of Screen Arts and Cultures and of Romance Languages and Literatures at the University of Michigan. He is author of Emir Kusturica. His edited and co-edited volumes include The Cinema of Italy and (with Richard Abel and Rob King) Early Cinema and the "National."

"Bertellini situates early cinema within a broad geopolitical framework that 'calls for a reconsideration of race as a long-lasting visual form' and invites the film scholar to reexamine the medium's specificity. This makes Italy in Early American Cinema a seminal contribution to the field of cinema studies. June 2011, Vol. 31:2"—Historical Journal of Film, Radio, and Television"The book is beautifully illustrated and its sources are often spectacular. Bertellini finds historical evidence where previous researchers found none. . . . Unlike much of recent film historical research, which remains confined to a rather empirical presentation of previously unknown documents, Bertellini wants to insert these archives into a rich interdisciplinary, long-term development. July - December 2010"—Altreitalie"Bertellini's Italy in Early American Cinema is simply an extraordinary achievement. . . . He has been meticulous and indefatigable in discovering a wealth of original historical source material and honed and re-honed the text into an exemplary model of lucid, sophisticated, critical historical analysis. Vol. 22, 2010"—Film History"Bertellini's sophisticated interdisciplinary study addresses questions of race moving between Italy and America in the prehistory and early history of film. . . . Bertellini's persuasive thesis that identity-formation works, among other things, through the picturesque, provides a further explanation for our persistent need for a local aura of realist 'authenticity' in our idea of what Italian cinema should give us. July 2011"—Times Literary Supplement"Bertellini has done a great service not just to scholars of American film, but also to the Italian-American citizen, by concentrating on this overlooked, but rich vein of American culture. August 2010"—Fra Noi"Italy in Early American Cinema is a terrific book: erudite, wide-ranging, and eye-opening. This is a must-read for anyone interested in the early cinema or in the complex history of Italy's relations to the wider world."—Donna R. Gabaccia, University of Minnesota"To read Bertellini's superb book is to enter into an intense, rich, and intricately layered experience of Italian immigrant culture in the New York of the 1900's and 1910's."—Millicent Marcus, Yale University"Bertellini moves with ease through social history, art history, anthropology, and theories and histories of cinema. . . . His work offers an important and unique scholarly treatment . . . fascinating reading for Italians, Italian-Americans, and general readers interested in the history, culture, and ideology of immigration."—Marcia Landy, University of Pittsburgh

• AcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Transatlantic Racial Culture and Modern Visual ReproductionsPart 1. Picturing Italy's Natural and Social Landscapes1. Picturesque Mode of Difference2. The Picturesque Italian South as Transnational CommodityPart 2. Picture-Perfect America3. Picturesque Views and American Natural Landscapes4. Picturesque New York5. Black Hands, White Faces 6. White Hearts7. Performing GeographyAfterword: "A Mirror with a Memory"NotesFilmographyBibliographyIndex