A wide-ranging survey of the subject that celebrates the variety and complexity of film comedy from the ‘silent’ days to the present, this authoritative guide offers an international perspective on the popular genre that explores all facets of its formative social, cultural and political contextA wide-ranging collection of 24 essays exploring film comedy from the silent era to the presentInternational in scope, the collection embraces not just American cinema, including Native American and African American, but also comic films from Europe, the Middle East, and KoreaEssays explore sub-genres, performers, and cultural perspectives such as gender, politics, and history in addition to individual worksEngages with different strands of comedy including slapstick, romantic, satirical and ironicFeatures original entries from a diverse group of multidisciplinary international contributors
Arvustused
And of course, it very much is. An important subject needs an important companion. This is it. Thats all, folks. (Reference Reviews, 1 January 2014)
This work is indispensible for any student or scholar who, in the spirit of Rabelais, Swift, and Chesterton, will laugh while studying film images. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Lower-division undergraduates and above; general readers. (Choice, 1 July 2013)
| Notes on Editors and Contributors |
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ix | |
| Comic Introduction: "Make 'em Laugh, make 'em Laugh!" |
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1 | (14) |
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Part I Comedy Before Sound, and the Slapstick Tradition |
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1 The Mark of the Ridiculous and Silent Celluloid: Some Trends in American and European Film Comedy from 1894 to 1929 |
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15 | (24) |
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2 Pie Queens and Virtuous Vamps: The Funny Women of the Silent Screen |
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39 | (22) |
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3 "Sound Came Along and Out Went the Pies": The American Slapstick Short and the Coming of Sound |
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61 | (26) |
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Part II Comic Performers in the Sound Era |
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4 Mutinies Wednesdays and Saturdays: Carnivalesque Comedy and the Marx Brothers |
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87 | (24) |
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5 Jacques Tati and Comedic Performance |
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111 | (19) |
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6 Woody Allen: Charlie Chaplin of New Hollywood |
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130 | (21) |
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7 Mel Brooks, Vulgar Modernism, and Comic Remediation |
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151 | (24) |
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Part III New Perspectives on Romantic Comedy and Masculinity |
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8 Humor and Erotic Utopia: The Intimate Scenarios of Romantic Comedy |
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175 | (21) |
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9 Taking Romantic Comedy Seriously in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) and Before Sunset (2004) |
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196 | (21) |
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10 The View from the Man Cave: Comedy in the Contemporary "Homme-com" Cycle |
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217 | (19) |
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11 The Reproduction of Mothering: Masculinity, Adoption, and Identity in Flirting with Disaster |
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236 | (15) |
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Part IV Topical Comedy, Irony, and Humour Noir |
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12 It's Good to be the King: Hollywood's Mythical Monarchies, Troubled Republics, and Crazy Kingdoms |
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251 | (22) |
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13 No Escaping the Depression: Utopian Comedy and the Aesthetics of Escapism in Frank Capra's You Can't Take it with You (1938) |
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273 | (20) |
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14 The Totalitarian Comedy of Lubitsch's To Be or Not To Be |
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293 | (22) |
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15 Dark Comedy from Dr. Strangelove to the Dude |
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315 | (28) |
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Part V Comic Perspectives on Race and Ethnicity |
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16 Black Film Comedy as Vital Edge: A Reassessment of the Genre |
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343 | (22) |
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17 Winking Like a One-Eyed Ford: American Indian Film Comedies on the Hilarity of Poverty |
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365 | (22) |
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18 Ethnic Humor in American Film: The Greek Americans |
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387 | (22) |
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Part VI International Comedy |
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19 Alexander Mackendrick: Dreams, Nightmares, and Myths in Ealing Comedy |
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409 | (23) |
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20 Tragicomic Transformations: Gender, Humor, and the Plastic Body in Two Korean Comedies |
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432 | (22) |
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21 Comedy "Italian Style" and I soliti ignoti (Big Deal on Madonna Street, 1958) |
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454 | (20) |
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22 "Laughter that Encounters a Void?": Humor, Loss, and the Possibility for Politics in Recent Palestinian Cinema |
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474 | (23) |
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23 Laughter is Ten Times More Powerful than a Scream: The Case of Animated Comedy |
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497 | (24) |
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24 Theatrical Cartoon Comedy: From Animated Portmanteau to the Risus Purus |
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521 | (24) |
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| Index |
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545 | |
Andrew Horton is the Jeanne H. Smith Professor of Film and Media Studies at the University of Oklahoma, USA. An award-winning screenwriter, he is also the author of twnty-eight books on film, screenwriting and cultural studies, including Screenwriting for a Global Market (2004), Writing the Character-Centered Screenplay (2nd edition, 2000), and The Films of Theo Angelopoulos (2nd edition, 1999). His screenplays include Brad Pitts first feature film, The Dark Side of the Sun (1988), and the award-winning Something in Between (1983), directed by Srdjan Karanovic. He has led screenwriting workshops around the world as well as across the United States.
Joanna E. Rapf is Professor of English and Film & Media Studies at the University of Oklahoma, USA. She writes regularly about film comedy, with recent essays on Woody Allen, Jerry Lewis, Roscoe Arbuckle, Harry Langdon, and Marie Dressler, and has edited books on a range of subjects including Sidney Lumet, On the Waterfront, and Buster Keaton.
