Publisher Description

Addresses the important role of remakes in film culture, from early cinema to contemporary Hollywood.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Notes on Contributors 1. Reviewing Remakes: An Introduction Jennifer Forrest and Leonard R. Koos 2. Twice Told Tales: Disavowal and the Rhetoric of the Film Remake Thomas Michael Leitch 3. Economy and Aesthetics in American Remakes of French Films Michael Harney 4. The "Personal" Touch: The Original, the Remake, and the Dupe in Early China Jennifer Forrest 5. Sound Strategies: Lang's Rearticulation of Renoir Tricia Welsch 6. The Raven and the Nanny: The Remake as Crosscultural Encounter Alan Williams 7. Sadie Thompson Redux: Postwar Reintegration of the Wartime Wayward Woman Jennifer Forrest 8. Hiring Practices: Simenon/Duvivier/Leconte Leonard R. Koos 9. Twice Two: The Fly and Invasion of the Body Snatchers Marty Roth 10. Three Takes on Motherhood, Masculinity, and Marriage: Serreau's Trois hommes et un couffin, Nimoy's Remakes, and Ardolino's Sequel Carolyn Ann Durham 11. Pretty Woman With a Gun: La Femme Nikita, Point of No Return, and the Textual Politics of "the Remake" Laura Grindstaff Appendix A Remaking Le Voile bleu: An Interview with Norman Corwin, Screenwriter for The Blue Veil Jennifer Forrest Appendix B Letter from Norman Corwin to Jerry Wald Index

Review

"Readers will find meaningful and thoughtful discussions of both historical and aesthetic perspectives." - CHOICE "Dead Ringers demonstrates that the remake is not just a lowly Hollywood form geared cynically to a debased market, but rather a formative genre in the development of international film culture. Contributors trace remakes from early cinema to contemporary Hollywood, and illuminate key issues of authorship, national cinematic styles, and historical contexts of production along the way, with particular emphasis on French/American cross-cultural transactions. In its theoretical range and practical research, the book is very useful." - James Morrison, author of Passport to Hollywood: Hollywood Films, European Directors

Promotional

Addresses the important role of remakes in film culture, from early cinema to contemporary Hollywood.

Long Description

While the popular press has criticized movie remakes as signs of Hollywood's collective lack of imagination, the essays in Dead Ringers reveal the centrality and staying power of remakes as a formative genre in filmmaking. The contributors show that the practice of remaking films dates back to the origins of cinema and the evolution of film markets. In fact, remakes were never so prevalent as during the Classic Hollywood period, when filmmaking had achieved its greatest degree of industrialization, and they continue to play a crucial role in the development of film genres generally. Offering a variety of historical, commercial, theoretical, and cultural perspectives on the remake, Dead Ringers is a valuable resource for students of film history and theory, as well as those interested in the cultural politics of the late twentieth century.

Review Quote

"Readers will find meaningful and thoughtful discussions of both historical and aesthetic perspectives." -- CHOICE "Dead Ringers demonstrates that the remake is not just a lowly Hollywood form geared cynically to a debased market, but rather a formative genre in the development of international film culture. Contributors trace remakes from early cinema to contemporary Hollywood, and illuminate key issues of authorship, national cinematic styles, and historical contexts of production along the way, with particular emphasis on French/American cross-cultural transactions. In its theoretical range and practical research, the book is very useful." -- James Morrison, author of Passport to Hollywood: Hollywood Films, European Directors

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