|
SAC Speaker Series Presents
A Talk by Professor Kristen Whissel of UC Berkeley
“Parallax Effects: Stereoscopic 3D and the Postwar Uncanny in House of Wax (André de Toth, 1953) and Dial M for Murder (Alfred Hitchcock, 1954)”
Tuesday, February 14, 2017
Osterman Room, 1st Floor Thayer Building
4:30 p.m.
|
|
|
Stereographic 3D cinema is best known for its transformation of the dimensionality of the moving image through the production of positive and negative parallax (“immersion” and “emergence” effects). Scholars tend to critique the use of negative parallax in 3D films of the 1950s, especially, as a gimmick that doomed the format to failure by disrupting narrative and and disturbing the spectator’s absorption into the fictional world of the film by foregrounding the screen as surface and threshold. This paper departs from prevailing scholarship on 3D films by situating positive and negative parallax effects along a continuum that aligns the first with the epistemological drive - the desire to see
|
|
|
and know - and the second with an affective charge that is irreducible to the provocation of shock and surprise. The association of positive parallax and negative parallax with knowledge and affect, respectively, made stereoscopic 3D an ideal format for the cinema’s investigation into the uncanny culture and experience of technological modernity in the postwar era in 3D films such as Dial M for Murder (1953) and House of Wax (1953). If, as Anthony Vidler argues, “the vicarious taste for the uncanny has been a constant in modern culture, only intensified by shifts in media,” then it makes sense that 3D’s uncanny optics and aesthetics would reemerge in a postwar era defined not just by the shock of a second world war, but also by Hollywood’s intense competition with television and by the major industrial and technological changes that characterize this era. Indeed, the resurgence of 3D within the postwar era asks that we think of 3D not in terms of its serial failure, but instead in terms of its odd historical persistence—its rather uncanny tendency to be repressed or forgotten and return again in periods of historical and technological change.
Kristen Whissel is Professor and Chair of Film & Media at the University of California, Berkeley. She is the author of two books, Spectacular Digital Effects: CGI and Contemporary Cinema (Duke IP) and Picturing American Modernity: Traffic, Technology and Silent Cinema (Duke UP) and co-editor (with Charlie Keil) of the anthology, Editing and Special/Visual Effects (Rutgers UP). She is currently writing a book titled,Parallax Effects: Epistemology, Affect and Stereoscopic 3D.
|
|
|
Winter 2017 Communication & Media Speaker Series Presents
A Talk by Associate Professor Kristen Warner of The University of Alabama
"The Difficulty Around Diversifying Hollywood's Labor Force and its Circumventions"
Thursday, February 16, 2017
Space 2435, North Quad
4:00 - 5:30 p.m.
|
|
Kristen Warner is an Associate Professor in the Department of Journalism and Creative Media at The University of Alabama. She is the author of The Cultural Politics of Colorblind TV Casting (Routledge, 2015). Professor Warner's research interests are centered at the juxtaposition of televisual racial representation and its place within the media industries, particularly within the practice of casting.
|
|
|
|
Warner's talk will address how discourses of Hollywood labor erase classed and racial identity through three key strategies creatives of color employ as a consequence of those practices.
|
|
The Center for Japanese Studies and the Michigan Theater Present
Kuro: The The Dark Edge of Japanese Filmmaking (Film Series)
Monday, February 20, 2017 - Monday, March 20, 2017
Michigan Theater
All films begin at 7:00 p.m.
|
|
|
|
The 10-week series brings the genre of Noir and its underworld of crime and suspense through the lens of some of Japan’s most prolific filmmakers who have delivered what we now consider classics to the silver screen. Select films will be introduced by professors from CJS and Screen Arts & Cultures, giving viewers insight into the captivating world of Japanese intrigue, yakuza, revenge and redemption.
|
|
|
The next film in the series, screening on February 20, 2017, is Pale Flower. Released from prison, a humbled yakuza hitman navigates the shifting influence within his former criminal domain. It is there he is snarled into the
|
|
|
|
seduction of a stunning woman, a sybarite dead set on igniting life at the edge of danger. Gambling with their passion, the two plunge together into the shadowy depths at the hands of acclaimed director MASAHIRO SHINODA. In a film adapted by the director from the pulp novel of SHINTARÔ ISHIHARA, the dark, sleek result exemplified the noir genre through the lens of the Japanese New Wave.
Additional support will be provided by Nagomi Sushi Downtown who will host monthly menu samplings on-site and advertise additional offers in the weeks ahead to help support the series.
|
|
Fascism Teach-in: Challenging Authoritarianism at Every Level
Tuesday, February 21, 2017
1014 Tisch Hall
5:00 - 7:00 p.m.
|
|
Teach-ins @ UMich is a group of academics organizing a series of teach-ins that started this winter at the University of Michigan. Please join them for their upcoming teach-in on fascism and resistance, featuring the following speakers: Kathleen Canning, History/German; Dario Gaggio, History; Joshua Rabinowitz, Psychology; and Johannes von Moltke, German/Screen Arts & Cultures.
Event is free and open to the public. Snacks and drinks will be provided.
|
|
|
|
SPOTLIGHT ON WOLV TV: JAKE FERGUSON
|
|
|
Jake Ferguson serves as Internal Affairs Director: he helps WOLV members reach their full potential by keeping track of involvement and integrating new members where their interests best align in the organization. Jake is also a producer for EBUZZ and USS on WOLV TV and
|
|
|
works with the rest of the producing team to craft weekly shows about entertainment news and sports comedy. On EBuzz last year, Jake's favorite episode was the Oscar Special, an episode that utilized set design, graphics, lots of b-roll -- and that involved getting dressed up with friends for the camera. In general, Jake enjoys on-location shoots with USS.
Jake encourages students to join WOLV-TV because [one] can gain "valuable skills" and have "lots of fun!" Jake considers his experience in this organization as "invaluable." Whether [one] wants to pursue a career in television or not, [the WOLV experience] pushes you forward as an adult." There is truly a role for everyone in WOLV-TV.
Be sure to check out new WOLV-TV shows on Vimeo and WOLV’s other social media channels. Feel free to connect via email (wolv.online@umich.edu) to learn how to get involved with WOLV-TV.
Writer Credit, Morgan Cullen
|
|
|
THIS WEEK'S FEATURED PHOTOS
|
|
|
|
photo credit, Yuri Fukazawa
Filmmaker and Visiting Professor Kazuhiro Soda brings in a large audience last Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, as he delivers his lecture "The Power of Observation: How and Why I Make 'Observational' Documentaries" in the School of Social Work Building. The lecture was part of CJS's Noon Lecture Series. For more on Soda's films, please click here.
|
|
'Tis the season to share the love...
"Tree with a Heart"
photo credit, Mary Lou Chlipala
|
|
|
|
|
