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William Thomas McClain
William Thomas McClain
University of Southern California
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Hollywood Accounting
Technologies of Surveillance, Knowledge and Power in Paramount Budget
Documents, 1927–58
in
Film Studies
Film production at Paramount Pictures during the so-called classical era required the mobilisation of massive material and human capital that depended on institutional systems of surveillance, knowledge creation and control ranging from departmental affiliations to the pre-printed budget forms. This article focuses on those pre-printed budget forms as technologies of knowledge and power, revealing that the necessities of creating and managing coalitions of expert labourers created alternative power centres and spaces where being the object of surveillance was itself a source of power. It concludes by discussing the implications of this ecology for the historiography of Hollywood.
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‘All the evidence is that Cobargo is slipping’
An ecological approach to rural cinema-going
Author:
This paper considers the impact of extra-filmic elements on the cultural decision-making behaviours of a small rural Australian cinema audience, focusing on the rural New South Wales village of Cobargo in the late 1920s. In considering how why such fragile rural picture show operations either failed or became successful, it is critical to take account of rural geographies, particularly in terms of early road development, and the nature and state of road bridges in flood-prone areas. The paper argues that these elements are part of a broad ecosystemic framework for cultural decision-making which can assist in our interpretation of early newspaper advertising and promotion for picture show programs.
Cinemas in the City
Berlin‘s Public Space in the 1910s and 1920s
Author:
In the early years of the cinema and into the 1910s and 1920s, it was less the film than cinema-going itself that attracted urban publics. In this era, people were enthusiastic about technology and the achievements of modernity; while at the same time they felt anxious about the rapid and radical changes in their social and economic life. In Germany, this contradictory experience was especially harsh and perceptible in the urban metropolis of Berlin. The article demonstrates how within city life, Berlin cinemas – offering the excitement of innovation as well as optimal distraction and entertainment – provided an urban space where, by cinema-going, appeal and uncertainty could be positively reconciled.
Kissing and Killing
A Short History of Brighton on Film
Author:
Over fifty feature films have been made either in or about Brighton and they have all contributed to popular understandings of Brighton‘s history and its character. Collectively, they present the city as a site for extreme emotions and conflicts found within narratives that are always set either on the seafront or at the Royal Pavilion. It can be argued that these Brighton films are not about Brighton at all but instead serve as vehicles for the expression of popular anxieties, concerns and desires. As such, they transcend the specificities of place and history and become projections of what could be described as a national unconscious.