“Fine Arts and Ugly Arts: Blue is the Warmest Color, Abdellatif Kechiche’s Corporeal State of the Nation,” in Lindsay Coleman and Carol Siegel, (eds.), Sex and Excess on Film: Intercourse in Television, Documentary, Queer Cinema, Arthouse (Lexington Press, 2018)., 2018
A study of Abdellatif Kechiche's polarizing and quintessential French film, Blue is the Warmest ... more A study of Abdellatif Kechiche's polarizing and quintessential French film, Blue is the Warmest Color (2013). The paper approaches Kechiche's production from multiple perspectives: as a syptomatic corporeal-focused production, part of a vanguard cinema du corps; as a controversial yet highly representative work of the contemporary French film ecosystem; as an adapation of a groundbreaking graphic novel; and as a penetrating examination of same-sex desire through bravura film style.
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Books by Tim Palmer
This first book-length study of Irreversible situates Noé’s work in the ecosystem of contemporary French media, exploring how Irreversible and a larger-scale cinéma du corps actually inspired France’s film resurgence in the early twenty-first century. From there, Palmer shows Irreversible to be one of the most subversive star vehicles in recent world cinema, in the form of its iconic lead performers, Vincent Cassel, Monica Bellucci, and Albert Dupontel. Investigating the spectrum of reactions created by Noé’s film — through its pugnacious stylistic design, its on-screen deconstruction of Paris, its international critical reception, its unexpectedly utopian counterpoints to violence and despair — the book generates a new rational dialogue about Irreversible that challenges any instinct simply to reject or condemn it.
"This is a comprehensive, multi-modal study of an important, if difficult film. Anyone interested in contemporary French cinema should read this intelligent, well-written book--even if they don't like Irreversible." --- Alan Williams, Professor of Cinema Studies, Rutgers University, USA
"Irreversible is as scandalous and indispensable as any movie of our time. Palmer's outstanding study reveals it as both a consummation of contemporary French film and a profoundly original achievement in cinematic shock and awe." --- David Sterritt, Adjunct Professor, Maryland Institute College of Art, USA
IB - Directory of World Cinema
Artistic, intellectual, and appreciably avant-garde, the French film industry has, perhaps more than any other national cinema, been perennially at the center of international filmmaking. With its vigorous business and wide-ranging film culture, France has also been home historically to some of the most influential filmmakers and movements – and, indeed, the very first motion picture was screened in Paris in 1895.
This volume addresses the great directors and key artistic movements, but also ventures beyond these well-established films and figures, broadening the canon through an examination of many neglected but intriguing French films. Framing essays explore the salient stylistic elements, cultural contexts, and the various conceptions of cinema in France, from avant-gardes to filmmaking by women, from documentary and realism to the Tradition of Quality, as well as genres like comedy, crime film, and horror. Illustrated by screen shots, film reviews by leading international experts offer original approaches to both overlooked titles and acknowledged classics. Readers wishing to explore particular topics in greater depth will be grateful for the book’s reading recommendations and comprehensive filmography.
A visually engaging journey through one of the most dynamic, variegated, and idiosyncratic film industries, Directory of World Cinema: France is a must-have for Francophiles and cinema savants.
Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: The Contemporary French Film Ecosystem
• 5x1: Young Cinema and First-Timers
• The Cinéma du Corps
• Popular Cinema, Pop-Art Cinema
• Feminine Cinema
• Conclusion: Instructive Cinephilia: Film Literacy and La Fémis
• Appendix: “The 156 Films That You Must Have Seen”: The List
• Notes
• Select Filmography
• Select Bibliography
• Index
Papers by Tim Palmer
marginal factor in French filmmaking. But in recent years the format
has permeated the French media ecosystem. This article studies this
phenomenon by way of a vital modern French cultural conversation
― that of frontier horror poetry, espoused by Claire Denis, influentially
advocating for ephemeral beauty to be studied alongside
savagery, for musicality and artistic expression to flourish onscreen
in even the direst of horror genre situations. Exploring this
paradoxical frontier horror poetry idiom, this article finds its manifestations in many leading French horror case studies, such as
Denis’s Trouble Every Day (2001), Robin Campillo’s Les Revenants
(2004), Gaspar Noé’s Climax (2018), and Dominique Rocher’s La Nuit
a dévoré le monde (2018).
received fitful critical attention. This article argues that Paris 1900
warrants systematic reappraisal as a pivotal and influential protoessay
film – galvanising for essay filmmakers that followed, in the
post-war period and after, including Agnès Varda and Chris Marker,
and many others. To make this case, the article uses archival materials
to explore Paris 1900’s mode of production as a commissioned
project, a compendium of media texts about Belle Époque Paris, a
brief that Vedrès soon exceeded. From there, the article analyses
Paris 1900 by way of the emergent critical consensus about how
essay films behave, their particular design parameters. In this context,
across Paris 1900’s suite of specific textual attributes – its fusion
of fiction and non-fiction, its embrace of multi-media, its open and
multifarious socio-political engagements, its alignment with minority
figures and women, its configuration of thought processes onscreen,
its advocacy for media literacy – the film re-emerges as a
catalytic French post-war test case, and Vedrès as a figure of historical
significance today.
est declarée, 2011), in the context of the contemporary French film
ecosystem. The article argues that Donzelli’s film exemplifies the
French miniaturist mode of production; demonstrates the modern
conceptual notion of applied cinephilia; highlights the idiosyncratic
uses possible for French popular genres, particularly the comedy and
the musical; and embodies the French film industry’s export mission
by representing on-screen the French national healthcare system.
La Dérive, its stylistic and temporal agitations, its considerations of
female-centred domestic binds in 1960s France, versus better-known
New Wave texts. Third, the essay contrasts La Dérive’s polarised
reception, especially its censorship and distribution problems, with
Delsol’s enfranchised status at Cahiers du cinéma, emphasising her
many published contributions to the New Wave’s agenda. In sum, we discover the full embattled range of Delsol's long-repressed career, and finally correct the often reproduced line that Agnès Varda was the only woman associated with the French New Wave.
in stark yet intimate terms. Using personal interviews and trade discourses, it then charts the cultural, professional and institutional contexts to de Van’s career, emphasizing her foundational experiences in film school. Finally, it analyses
Dans ma peau’s use of avant-garde style, de Van’s experimental techniques as a performer, and the film’s array of social critiques.