Research Catalog

Title

Endings in the cinema : thresholds, water and the beach / Michael Walker.

Author

Walker, Michael

Publication

• Cham, Switzerland : Palgrave Macmillan, [2020]
• ©2020

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xvi, 316 pages : illustrations (black and white, and colour); 22 cm

Summary

This book offers a new way of thinking about film endings. Whereas existing works on the subject concentrate on narrative resolution, this book explores the way film endings blend together a complex of motifs, tropes and other elements to create the sense of an ending ; that is, it looks at endings as endings. Drawing on a wide range of examples taken from films of different periods and national cinemas, the author identifies three key features which structure the work: thresholds and boundaries, water, and, above all, the beach. The beach combines water and a boundary and is the most resonant of the key sites to which film endings gravitate. Although beach endings go back to at least 1910, they have increased markedly in post-classical cinema, and can be found across all genres and in films from many different countries. As the leading example of the book's argument, they illustrate both the aesthetic richness and the structural complexity of film endings.

Subjects

• History
• Water in motion pictures
• Boundaries in motion pictures
• Beaches in motion pictures
• Motion pictures > History

Genre/Form

History.

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents

Introduction -- THRESHOLDS AND BOUNDARIES -- Stations -- i. The station as stage -- ii. Lovers separations -- iii. World War 2 -- Wartime homecoming -- iv. Stations and death -- WATER -- i. The waterside -- Ship and boat departure -- ii. On water -- iii. In and under water -- KEY ENDING TROPES AND MOTIFS -- i. Sunsets -- ii. Voice-overs -- iii. 'Lets go home -- iv. Looking at or addressing the camera -- v. Emblematic shots -- vi. Theatricality -- BEACHES -- Introduction -- Early History -- i. Silent Cinema -- ii. The 1930s -- iii. World War 2 -- Concepts and development -- i. The Woman on the Beach -- 1954 and after -- ii. Beach holidays -- iii. Tabula rasa -- iv. Empty beach -- v. Renewal -- Auteurist inflections -- i. La nouvelle vague and after -- ii. Beach auteurs: Fellini, Kurys, Ozon, Kitano -- Themes and motifs -- i. Death -- Dying -- Suicides -- ii. War -- iii. Hallucination, breakdown and insanity -- iv. The family and childhood -- v. Mourning and solitary reflection -- vi. Home movies -- vii. Fantasy -- viii. Apocalypse and post-apocalypse -- ix. Paradise and lost paradise -- x. Other categories and Conclusion -- Appendix: Films with beach endings -- Bibliography.

Call Number

MFL 21-1063

ISBN

• 9783030316563
• 3030316564
• 9783030316570 (canceled/invalid)

OCLC

1198233404

Author

Walker, Michael, author.

Title

Endings in the cinema : thresholds, water and the beach / Michael Walker.

Publisher

Cham, Switzerland : Palgrave Macmillan, [2020]

Copyright Date

©2020

Type of Content

text

still image

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Form:

ebook version : 9783030316570

Research Call Number

MFL 21-1063