Description
Book SynopsisTraces the intertwined history of British and Indian cinema in the late colonial period, revealing how popular film styles and controversial film regulations in the politically linked territories of Britain and India reconfigured imperial relations. This book presents a way to track historical change through cinema.
Trade Review“
Cinema at the End of Empire adds immeasurably to the fields of film, cultural, and colonial studies. Priya Jaikumar produces a whole new set of fascinating insights into the cultural expression of the demise of colonialism.”—Sarah Street, author of
British National Cinema“
Cinema at the End of Empire offers a sparkling account of the intertwined histories of British imperial and Indian colonial films. Challenging the frame of national cinema, it situates the cinematic representations of both empire and the nation in the conjuncture of late colonialism, and shows how films dealt with the pressures, anxieties, and challenges of decolonization. At once attentive to films and history, this is a truly remarkable book.”—Gyan Prakash, author of
Another Reason: Science and the Imagination of Modern India“Extremely insightful and thought provoking . . . . The montage of tantalizing glimpses that Jaikumar offers into a complex and fascinating but underexplored domain of Indian cinema and the creative and significant connections that she makes (between, as well as within, national film cultures) will no doubt catalyze other important and much-needed work on the film cultures of colonial India and, more generally, in comparative film studies.” -- Manashita Dass * Screen *
“Jaikumar skillfully navigates treacherous theoretical waters to produce a book that is both historically rigorous and thoughtfully engaged in the study of form. . . . As the first book of a young scholar,
Cinema at the End of Empire is impressive and promising. Jaikumar’s self-avowed ambition to “link form and history in a manner that actively resists universalization as well as notions of complete temporal rupture” (p.37) is not merely gestured toward but convincingly deployed.” -- Bulbul P. Tiwari * Journal of Asian Studies *
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations xi
Acknowledgments xii
Introduction 1
1. Film Policy and Film Aesthetics as Cultural Archives 13
Part One. Imperial Governmentality
2. Acts of Transition: The British Cinematographic Films Acts of 1927 and 1938 41
3. Empire and Embarassment: Colonial Forms of Knowledge about Cinema 65
Part Two. Imperial Redemption
4. Realism and Empire 107
5. Romance and Empire 135
6. Modernism and Empire 165
Part Three. Colonial Autonomy
7. Historical Romances and Modernist Myths in Indian Cinema 195
Notes 239
Bibliography 289
Index of Films 309
General Index 313
