Performance and Spanish film

by Dean Allbritton (Editor), Alejandro Melero (Editor), Tom Whittaker (Editor)

Overview

Performance and Spanish film is the first book to provide a detailed study of screen acting in Spanish film. With fifteen original essays by leading scholars of Spanish film, the book casts light on the manifold meanings, methods and influences of Spanish screen performance, from the silent era to the present day. In doing so, the book provides bold new readings of the work of significant Spanish actors and filmmakers, from Javier Bardem, Pen lope Cruz and Alfredo Landa, to Pedro Almod var, Carlos Saura and Alejandro Amen bar. The fine-grained study of acting in each chapter also provides a means of exploring broader questions surrounding Spanish film practices, culture and society. Performance and Spanish film will be essential reading for both students and scholars of Spanish film alike, as well as to those more broadly interested in the history of screen acting.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781526107749
Publisher:	Manchester University Press
Publication date:	11/07/2016
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	296
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Tom Whittaker is Senior Lecturer in Film and Spanish Studies at the University of Liverpool

Dean Allbritton is Assistant Professor in Spanish at Colby College

Alejandro Melero is Lecturer in the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Carlos III University, Madrid

Table of Contents

Introduction: Approaching performance in Spanish film - Dean Allbritton, Alejandro Melero, Tom Whittaker
1. Acting for the camera in Spanish film magazines of the 1920s and 1930s - Eva Woods Peir
2. Performance and gesture as crisis in La aldea maldita/The Cursed Village (Flori n Rey, 1930) - Sarah Wright
3. Exaggeration and nation: the politics of performance in the Spanish sophisticated comedy of the 1940s - Stuart Green
4. The voice of comedy: Gracita Morales - Kathleen M. Vernon
5. The sounds of Jos Luis L pez V zquez: vocal performance, gesture and technology in Spanish film - Tom Whittaker
6. The influence of Argentinean acting schools in Spain from the 1980s - Carmen Ciller
7. Askance, athwart, aside: the queer plays of actors, auteurs and machines - Brad Epps
8. The future of nostalgia: re-vindicating Spanish actors and acting in and through Cine de barrio - Duncan Wheeler
9. Performing the nation: mannerism and mourning in Spanish heritage cinema - Sally Faulkner
10. Performing sex in Spanish erotic films of the 1980s - Alejandro Melero
11. Becoming Mario: performance and persona adaptation in Mario Casas's career - Alberto Mira
12. Performing fatness: oversized male bodies in recent Spanish cinema - Santiago Fouz-Hern ndez
13. Disabling Bardem's body: the performance of disability and illness - Dean Allbritton
14. Body doubles: the performance of Basqueness by Carmelo G mez and Silvia Munt - Rob Stone
15. Los amantes pasajeros/I'm So Excited! (2013): 'performing' la crisis - Maria M. Delgado
Index

Editorial Reviews

'For enthusiasts of Spanish cinema and anyone bewitched by screen acting, this is a dream book. The editors bring together some of the most exciting and imaginative experts on Spanish Cinema writing in English today, as well as presenting a substantial and brilliant introduction to the topic. The range of the chapters is spectacular and the perspectives compelling.'
Chris Perriam, Professor of Hispanic Studies at the University of Manchester

‘Performance and Spanish film is an excellent collection of essays on a subject too rarely explored. From sophisticated comedy to pornography and from Basqueness to fatness, this book offers a fascinating account of the vital contribution of acting to Spanish cinema from the 1920 to the present day.’
Paul Julian Smith, Distinguished Professor in the Hispanic and Luso-Brazilian Program at The City University of New York

‘Performance and Spanish film is the first scholarly book that gives screen acting in Spain the attention it has long deserved. This superbly edited volume is essential reading for scholars and students of Spanish film alike.’
Tatjana Pavlovic, Professor of Spanish at Tulane University, New Orleans

‘…the book is a remarkable contribution that contextualizes many questions about performance in Spanish cinema presenting them attractively to international audiences. Of interest to both academics and students, it deserves the attention of film scholars and historians working in Spanish studies or looking for comparative references, as the rich film history of Spain has much to offer.’
Panagiotis Zestanakis, University of Crete, Historical Journal of Film Radio of Television

From the Publisher