[ecrea] CFP The Contract in English-Speaking Cinema

18th SERCIA international conference

Université Montesquieu-Bordeaux IV

4-7 septembre 2013



CALL FOR PAPERS



The Contract in English-speaking Cinema

The 18th annual SERCIA conference (September 4th – 7th 2013) will be 
hosted by the University Montesquieu (Bordeaux IV), and the Institute of 
Business and Patrimonal Law (ITRDAP). It is this unique entry of film 
scholars into a law school that has suggested the topic of the contract 
in cinema.

According to the article 1101 of French Civil Law, “the contract is a 
convention through and by which one or several persons have an 
obligation towards one or several persons to give, do or not do 
something.” The contract is, then, the result of a willed written or 
unwritten agreement, and becomes the source of dues and obligations: 
hence, the obligatory force of the contract. Some contracts respect 
legal rules amongst which a compulsory formalism (or a solemn ritual); 
others are informal. Subject to the existence of special regulations 
(which may sometimes be confined to contractual directives or state 
intervention), the principle of contractual freedom enacts that each 
party is free to contract or not, that each party may choose the type of 
agreement passed and determine its contents. Behind the statutory 
definition, a philosophical, moral or religious conception can be 
identified which imposes the deference to the given word and, more 
generally, grants fundamental value to individual commitment.

 Drawing on this general approach, it seems obvious that the cinematic 
medium abundantly reconfigures the contractual relationship as it is 
prepared through negotiations and protocol, as it is formed and 
formalised, or not. Papers can thus address:

- the formation drawing of the contract or its. The implementation of 
the contract can also be examined, just as the sanctions for the lack of 
implementation.

In this question, all domains or objects are possible realms of 
investigation:

- buying and selling,

- work relationships (Blue Collar, Swimming With Sharks), sometimes 
temporary (The Navigators) or lack of contract of employment (Riff-Raff),

- insurance contracts (Lloyd’s of London, Double Indemnity…),

- commercial contracts,

- marriage contracts (Pride and Prejudice, The War of the Roses), etc.

Another field of investigation is the content of contractual 
obligations: convergent or antagonistic, the determining of a common 
goal (company or institution), financial and economic consequences… The 
contract can be explored from a historical perspective through the 
specificity of certain systems such as legal settlements widely 
portrayed in English-speaking cinema. More largely, the notion of 
contract can be approached from a wide variety of angles, from the 
Faustian pact to the contract killer or hitman.

Please note that this conference does not address film contracts, those 
applicable to cinematic production from a legal viewpoint. However, 
these specific contracts may be addressed as they are depicted within 
the diegesis of a film, but also through various legal situations (the 
intervention of contracted individuals, for example, co-productions) if 
they are of incidence regarding the content or aesthetics of the 
cinematic work itself.

The manner in which cinema takes issue with the contractual relationship 
should also be addressed: simplifying effects or delving into the 
intricacies of legality, critical distance, symbolic approach, etc. The 
representation of contractual relationships and their elaboration can be 
questioned, just as the individuals concerned by the contract, the legal 
representatives who intervene, the environments in which the contracts 
are written.

Naturally, behind the contract is the human dimension of the 
agreement—the emotional and family ties in which the social dimension of 
the contract is grounded—and, on a formal level, the spectatorial 
contract, either implicit or the result of precise specifications, that 
accompanies the act of cinematic creation, based on a set of norms, 
which govern the practical relationship between filmmaker and audience, 
between actor and spectator, between character and viewer. These norms 
can either be respected, rejected, bypassed, subverted or transgressed 
by the filmmaker, thereby becoming part of the process of cinematic 
creation (Scream is an example of the mise en abyme of a generic 
contract whose rules are both given and criticised during the film.)

*

A 250 word summary of your proposal (with 3 or 4 keywords) with a short 
biography and bibliography should be sent to :

(lecontrataucinema /at/ u-bordeaux4.fr)

Deadline: February, 18th , 2013



----------------
ECREA-Mailing list
----------------
This mailing list is a free service from ECREA.
---
To unsubscribe, please visit http://www.ecrea.eu/mailinglist
---
ECREA - European Communication Research and Education Association
Postal address:
ECREA
Université Libre de Bruxelles
c/o Dept. of Information and Communication Sciences
CP123, avenue F.D. Roosevelt 50, b-1050 Bruxelles, Belgium
Email: (info /at/ ecrea.eu)
URL: http://www.ecrea.eu
----------------