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The cinema of disposal : Max Ophuls and accumulation in America
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Schoonover, Karl (2018) The cinema of disposal : Max Ophuls and accumulation in America. Differences, 29 (1). pp. 33-65. doi:10.1215/10407391-6681640 ISSN 1040-7391.
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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1215/10407391-6681640
Abstract
Max Ophuls’s Hollywood films from the late 1940s, including the noir feature The Reckless Moment, take disposability as a central problem. This essay argues that these films attribute an obdurate presence to objects, often foregrounding the dominance of clutter over the agency of characters. The films draw our attention as much to the gestures of stuff’s accumulation as they do to the frustrating impossibility of complete disposal. They depict throwing things away as an anxious activity with unstable parameters that threatens human agency and subjectivity. In the narrative space of these films, the burden of the capitalist world on human life can be felt, and in that feeling, these films gain a political—even ecological—inflection.
Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||||
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Subjects: | P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General) > PN1993 Motion Pictures | ||||||
Divisions: | Faculty of Arts > Film and Television Studies | ||||||
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): | Ophüls, Max, 1902-1957 -- Criticism and interpretation, Motion pictures | ||||||
Journal or Publication Title: | Differences | ||||||
Publisher: | Duke University Press | ||||||
ISSN: | 1040-7391 | ||||||
Official Date: | May 2018 | ||||||
Dates: |
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Volume: | 29 | ||||||
Number: | 1 | ||||||
Page Range: | pp. 33-65 | ||||||
DOI: | 10.1215/10407391-6681640 | ||||||
Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||
Publication Status: | Published | ||||||
Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access | ||||||
Date of first compliant deposit: | 5 April 2018 | ||||||
Date of first compliant Open Access: | 19 June 2018 | ||||||
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