Living Screens

Melodrama and Plasticity in Contemporary Film and Television

AvMonique Rooney

Häftad, Engelska, 2015

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Beskrivning

Through original analysis of three contemporary, auteur-directed melodramas (Matthew Weiner’s Mad Men, Lars von Trier’s Melancholia and Todd Haynes’s Mildred Pierce), Living Screens reconceives and renovates the terms in which melodrama has been understood. Returning to Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s foundational, Enlightenment-era melodrama Pygmalion with its revival of an old story about sculpted objects that spring to life, it contends that this early production prefigures the structure of contemporary melodramas and serves as a model for the way we interact with media today. Melodrama is conceptualized as a “plastic” form with the capacity to mould and be moulded and that speaks to fundamental processes of mediation. Living Screens evokes the thrills, anxieties, and uncertainties accompanying our attachment to technologies that are close-at-hand yet have far-reaching effects. In doing so, it explores the plasticity of our current situation, in which we live with screens that melodramatically touch our lives.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum:2015-08-28
Mått:142 x 217 x 15 mm
Vikt:281 g
Format:Häftad
Språk:Engelska
Antal sidor:208
Förlag:Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
ISBN:9781783480470

Utforska kategorier

Television inom Kultur
Film inom Kultur

Mer om författaren

Monique Rooney is a lecturer in the English Program, School of Literature, Languages and Linguistics at the Australian National University.

Recensioner i media

Think of metamophoses that cannot consent to be apprehended only as reformations of the same shape, but as sudden ruptures. Think of ruptures that reveal the radical overturning of the logic of reformation itself. Think of unstable essences. Think of an ontological versatility. You will then discover the melodramatic power of transposition. Between Rousseau and McLuhan, Rooney presents here a series of brilliant readings that explore the surprising capacity of all media to transpose "old into new form". Her book is a stunningly beautiful speaking sculpture.

Innehållsförteckning

Acknowledgments / Chapter 1: Living Screens: Introduction / 2. Mad Men (2007-2015): Melodrama and Metamorphosis / 3. Turned Back: Advertising, Televisual Melodrama and Metamorphosis in Mad Men (2007–2015) / 4. Earth-Object: Melodrama and Plasticity in Lars von Trier’s Melancholia (2011) / 5. Melodrama and Plasticity in Todd Haynes’ Mildred Pierce (2011) /Bibliography / Index