Author Archive for: ‘Alexandra Heller-Nicholas’
A Grammar of Murder: Violent Scenes and Film Form
Karla Oeler, A Grammar of Murder: Violent Scenes and Film Form. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009 ISBN: 978-0-226-61795-5 US$30.00 (pb) 304pp (Review copy supplied by University of Chicago Press http://www.press.uchicago.edu) The logic upon which Karla Oeler’s critical union of montage and the murder scene hinges is contained within the violence of the word ‘cut’ itself. A Grammar of Murder: Violent …
Read MoreRape: A History from 1860 to the Present
Joanna Bourke, Rape: A History from 1860 to the Present. Virago Press, 2007 ISBN-13: 978 184408154 7 UK£12.99 (pb) 576pp In the introduction to her exhaustive Rape: A History from 1860 to the Present (2007), history professor and self-defined “socialist feminist”[1] Joanna Bourke presents statistics that chillingly demonstrate just how pervasive the reality of rape is. She cites evidence claiming approximately 47,000 …
Read MoreSilence and Fury: Rape and The Virgin Spring
Abstract This article is a reconsideration of The Virgin Spring that focuses upon the rape at the centre of the film’s action, despite the film’s surface attempts to marginalise all but its narrative functionality. While the deployment of this rape supports critical observations that rape on-screen commonly underscores the seriousness of broader thematic concerns, it is argued that the visceral impact of …
Read MoreStudies in the Horror Film: Night of the Living Dead
Jerad Walters and Marco Lanzagorta (eds), Studies in the Horror Film: Night of the Living Dead. Lakewood: Centipede Press, 2010 ISBN: 978-1-933618-32-6 US$125 (hb) 368pp (Review copy supplied by Centipede Press) Centipede Press’ Studies in the Horror Film series shows little signs of losing the momentum propelling its rigorous dedication to the genre with the release of this volume on George A. …
Read MoreThe Routledge Companion to Gothic
Catherine Spooner and Emma McEvoy (eds.), The Routledge Companion to Gothic. London; New York: Routledge, 2007. ISBN: 978 0 415 39843 5 $US30.95 (pb) 290pp (Review copy supplied by Routledge) Showing no signs of releasing its grasp on the popular or critical imagination, the Gothic has confirmed its longevity with a spate of academic titles over the past few years. …
Read MoreDark Places: The Haunted House in Film
Barry Curtis, Dark Places: The Haunted House in Film. London: Reaktion Books, 2009 ISBN: 9 781 86189389 5 US$16.00 (pb) 256pp (Review copy supplied by Footprint Books http://www.footprint.com.au/) Even a preliminary venture into the field of horror scholarship suggests that filmic manifestations of the haunted house function as much as characters as they do as mere locations or hackneyed plot …
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