Diary Dates

Thursday 4th February 5.15 pm, Lecture Room 1, 20 Chambers Street. Professor Laura Mulvey (Film and Media Studies, Birkbeck College,  University of London): “Rear Projection: the work of contemporary artist  Mark Lewis”. [History of Art Research Seminar/Film Studies] Friday 5th February 4.30 pm, Faculty Room South, David Hume Tower. Peter Decherney (Pennsylvania): “Gag Orders: Chaplin, [...]

Botanising on the Asphalt

Following our discussion of the figure of the flaneur, here are some links you might like to explore when thinking about the contemporary legacy of the flaneur figure: The website of contemporary street photographer and self-styled flaneur John Matthews is here (thanks to Irina for finding this link) Details of the basic moves involved in [...]

Department Store-y

Following our discussion of Emile Zola’s The Ladies’ Paradise, it might be worth chasing up the filmed versions – Julien Duvivier’s of 1930, and Andre Cayatte’s of 1943, both released under the title Au Bonheur des Dames. However, here I’m succumbing to temptation and posting a clip from Michael Gottlieb’s 1987 film Mannequin. The film [...]

Literary Training

As will have been clear from our screening on Tuesday, trains are a particular fascination of early cinema. Both Walter Ruttman’s Symphony of a Great City and Dziga Vertov’s Man with a Movie Camera include shots of trains within their opening scenes. Vertov’s depiction of the cameraman struggling to set up his camera in time to film [...]