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[ecrea] Photogénie Issue 1: Just the Facts - A New Realist Cinema?

Fri Jan 10 15:35:08 GMT 2014




We are proud to announce the first issue of our on-line journal /Photogénie/: "Just the Facts – A New Realist Cinema?"

It is freely available and can be found through this link <http://www.photogenie.be/photogenie_blog/topic/1-just-facts-%E2%80%93-new-realist-cinema>.

/Photogénie/ (www.photogenie.be <http://www.photogenie.be>) wants to combine a sense of wonderment with keen analyses. The connecting principle is the intense perception of cinema. The articles that are published on the website – on films old and new, cinema past and present – will not try and force this perception to fit preconceived frameworks, but will endeavour to make the viewer receptive to what films can make us see, in an attempt to put the allure of cinema into words.

In a 1977 essay on Lumet’s /Dog Day Afternoon/, Fredric Jameson addressed a perceived appetite for documentary fact in American culture, a distinct longing for “the anecdotal, the /vécu/, the /fait divers/, the true story in all its sociological freshness and unpredictability.” This appetite he saw expressed in the rise and prominence of non-fiction and historical novels, the primacy of non-fiction over fiction on the best-seller lists, the prominence of fictional documentaries or ‘docudramas’ [drama based on real events but re-enacted] on television, and the popularity of both procedural cop drama and political-conspiracy thrillers on the big screen. Over the years, this appetite has become only more pronounced: reality-based TV is complemented by both HBO realism and Youtube /vérité/, while docudrama has dominated the Oscars (if not the box office). Filmmakers like Steven Soderbergh and David Fincher have shown a particular fondness not only for fact-based narrative but for absolute fidelity to historical fact in their dramaturgy and /mise en scène/.

The aim of this issue is to look at these films and the perceived return of realism from a variety of angles, which are discussed in the introduction <http://www.photogenie.be/photogenie_blog/article/just-facts-%E2%80%93-new-realist-cinema> by editor Tom Paulus.

The issue includes articles by Adrian Martin, Tom, Paulus, Pieter-Jan Decoster, Stefaan Decostere, Michael Guarneri, David Gunzburg, Drehli Robnik, Nancy Vansieleghem and Christophe Van Eecke.

We are grateful to all authors for having contributed these excellent papers and we hope you will enjoy reading them as much as we did.

Yours faithfully,

Bart Versteirt / VDFC vzw

02/ 551.19.61  (VOX) / 02/ 551.19.55 (FAX) / 0474/ 38.87.80 (MOBILE)

www.vdfc.be <http://www.vdfc.be/>

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vzw Vlaamse Dienst voor Filmcultuur / company registration number BE 0452067708
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