A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho'

2017-10-24 Performing Arts

Author : Raymond Durgnat
Release : 2017-10-24
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 608/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' by : Raymond Durgnat

Download or read book A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' written by Raymond Durgnat. This book was released on 2017-10-24. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Upon its release in 1960, Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho divided critical opinion, with several leading film critics condemning Hitchcock's apparent encouragement of the audience's identification with the gruesome murder that lies at the heart of the film. Such antipathy did little to harm Psycho's box-office returns, and it would go on to be acknowledged as one of the greatest film thrillers, with scenes and characters that are among the most iconic in all cinema. In his illuminating study of Psycho, Raymond Durgnat provides a minute analysis of its unfolding narrative, enabling us to consider what happens to the viewer as he or she watches the film, and to think afresh about questions of spectatorship, Hollywood narrative codes, psycho-analysis, editing and shot composition. In his introduction to the new edition, Henry K. Miller presents A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' as the culmination of Durgnat's decades-long campaign to correct what he called film studies' 'Grand Error'. In the course of expounding Durgnat's root-and-branch challenge to our inherited shibboleths about Hollywood cinema in general and Hitchcock in particular, Miller also describes the eclectic intellectual tradition to which Durgnat claimed allegiance. This band of amis inconnus, among them William Empson, Edgar Morin and Manny Farber, had at its head Durgnat's mentor Thorold Dickinson. The book's story begins in the early 1960s, when Dickinson made the long hard look the basis of his pioneering film course at the Slade School of Fine Art, and Psycho became one of its first objects.

A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho'

2019-07-25 Performing Arts

Author : Raymond Durgnat
Release : 2019-07-25
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 200/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' by : Raymond Durgnat

Download or read book A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' written by Raymond Durgnat. This book was released on 2019-07-25. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Upon its release in 1960, Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho divided critical opinion, with several leading film critics condemning Hitchcock's apparent encouragement of the audience's identification with the gruesome murder that lies at the heart of the film. Such antipathy did little to harm Psycho's box-office returns, and it would go on to be acknowledged as one of the greatest film thrillers, with scenes and characters that are among the most iconic in all cinema. In his illuminating study of Psycho, Raymond Durgnat provides a minute analysis of its unfolding narrative, enabling us to consider what happens to the viewer as he or she watches the film, and to think afresh about questions of spectatorship, Hollywood narrative codes, psycho-analysis, editing and shot composition. In his introduction to the new edition, Henry K. Miller presents A Long Hard Look at 'Psycho' as the culmination of Durgnat's decades-long campaign to correct what he called film studies' 'Grand Error'. In the course of expounding Durgnat's root-and-branch challenge to our inherited shibboleths about Hollywood cinema in general and Hitchcock in particular, Miller also describes the eclectic intellectual tradition to which Durgnat claimed allegiance. This band of amis inconnus, among them William Empson, Edgar Morin and Manny Farber, had at its head Durgnat's mentor Thorold Dickinson. The book's story begins in the early 1960s, when Dickinson made the long hard look the basis of his pioneering film course at the Slade School of Fine Art, and Psycho became one of its first objects.

Dark Dreams 2.0

2009-12-21 Performing Arts

Author : Charles Derry
Release : 2009-12-21
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 957/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Dark Dreams 2.0 by : Charles Derry

Download or read book Dark Dreams 2.0 written by Charles Derry. This book was released on 2009-12-21. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Greatly expanded and updated from the 1977 original, this new edition explores the evolution of the modern horror film, particularly as it reflects anxieties associated with the atomic bomb, the Cold War, 1960s violence, sexual liberation, the Reagan revolution, 9/11 and the Iraq War. It divides modern horror into three varieties (psychological, demonic and apocalyptic) and demonstrates how horror cinema represents the popular expression of everyday fears while revealing the forces that influence American ideological and political values. Directors given a close reading include Alfred Hitchcock, Brian De Palma, David Cronenberg, Guillermo Del Toro, Michael Haneke, Robert Aldrich, Mel Gibson and George A. Romero. Additional material discusses postmodern remakes, horror franchises and Asian millennial horror. This book also contains more than 950 frame grabs and a very extensive filmography.

The Rebirth of Suspense

2024-09-17 Performing Arts

Author : Rick Warner
Release : 2024-09-17
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : 526/5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis The Rebirth of Suspense by : Rick Warner

Download or read book The Rebirth of Suspense written by Rick Warner. This book was released on 2024-09-17. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Typically, films are suspenseful when they keep us on the edge of our seats, when glimpses of a turning doorknob, a ticking clock, or a looming silhouette quicken our pulses. Exemplified by Alfred Hitchcock’s masterworks and the countless thrillers they influenced, such films captivate viewers with propulsive plots that spur emotional investment in the fates of protagonists. Suspense might therefore seem to be a curious concept to associate with art films featuring muted characters, serene landscapes, and unrushed rhythms, in which plot is secondary to mood and tone. This ambitious and wide-ranging book offers a redefinition of suspense by considering its unlikely incarnations in the contemporary films that have been called “slow cinema.” Rick Warner shows how slowness builds suspense through atmospheric immersion, narrative sparseness, and the withholding of information, causing viewers to oscillate among boredom, curiosity, and dread. He focuses on works in which suspense arises where the boundaries between art cinema and popular genres—such as horror, thriller, science fiction, and gothic melodrama—become indefinite, including Chantal Akerman’s La captive, Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Memoria, Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, Kelly Reichardt’s Night Moves, Lucrecia Martel’s Zama, Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s Creepy, and David Lynch’s Twin Peaks: The Return. Warner investigates the pivotal role of sound in generating suspense and traces how the experience of suspense has changed in the era of digital streaming. The Rebirth of Suspense develops a fresh theory, history, typology, and analysis of suspense that casts new light on the workings of films across global cinema.

Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Taxidermy

2024-01-25 Performing Arts

Author : Subarna Mondal
Release : 2024-01-25
Genre : Performing Arts
Kind : eBook
Book Rating : /5 ( reviews)

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Book Synopsis Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Taxidermy by : Subarna Mondal

Download or read book Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho and Taxidermy written by Subarna Mondal. This book was released on 2024-01-25. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There are numerous scholarly works on Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho (1960). Some of these works have explored its Gothic potentials. However, no detailed effort has yet been made to explore one of its major motifs – taxidermy. Taxidermy as an art of corporeal preservation has effectively been used in mainstream body horror films years after Psycho was released. Yet Psycho was one of the first films to explore its potentials in the Gothic genre at a time when it was relegated to a low form of art. Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho and Taxidermy focuses on taxidermy as a cultural practice in both Victorian and modern times and how it has been employed both metaphorically and literally in Hitchcock's films, especially Psycho. It also situates Psycho as a crucial film in the filmic continuum of body horrors where death and docility share a troubled relationship.

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