Description
Book SynopsisCinemulacrum, a conflation of cinema, the art of the Hollywood film, and simulacrum, a reality counterfeit, was coined to designate contemporary media culture. This period is distinguished by the advent of digital film/video, an ideology of fantasy as the central narrative of movies and television, and a ruling audience demographic of the young adult. A pre-cinemulacrum era (1960-1980) and Age of Cinemulacrum (1980 to the present day) are demarcated to examine the falland riseof classical Hollywood and the hegemony of television in a media dyad of movies and television.Cinemulacrum argues that the convergence of technology, ideology, and audience represent the primary factors surrounding the social immediacy of movies and television, and that video, fantasy, and the young adult have replaced film, realism, and the family as the outstanding attributes of contemporary media culture.A contemporary vision of media culture emerges in the 1980s. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg lead a popul
Trade ReviewSultanik proposes a theory of contemporary cinema by drawing together two current bodies of knowledge: traditional cinema studies and Baudrillard's postmodern idea of the simulacrum. ... He develops the argument through a history and commentary on film and television from 1960-2010. . . it remains thought provoking. * Communication Research Trends *
Table of ContentsPreface: Cinemulacrum: A Definition Chapter 1: The Fall–and Rise–of Classical Hollywood: Ben-Hur (1959)–The Godfather (1972) Chapter 2: Neoclassicism and Postmodernism in American Cinema of the Seventies Chapter 3: The Age of Cinemulacrum Afterword: Jean-Luc Godard and the Death of Cinema: Notre Musique (2005)–Avatar(2009) Addenda Index About the Author
