Introduction. "History of the most graphic and thrilling sort" : the history of the newsreel, the newsreel as history -- News parade : the logic of the newsreel system -- Newsreel realism : redefining the real in motion picture news -- "Heroes of the lens" : newsreel cameramen, the Sino-Japanese War, and looking as action -- "Come along. We're going to the Trans-Lux to hiss Roosevelt" : modernity, virtual travel and the newsreel cinema as public forum -- Double vision : World War Two, racial uplift, and politics of visibility in the all-American newsreel -- Conclusion. News parade's gone by?
Summary:
"This book combines an examination of the newsreel's methods of production, distribution, and reception with an analysis of the form's representational strategies in order to understand the newsreel's place in the history of 20th-Century American culture and film history. It argues that the newsreel represents a crucial moment in the development of a spectacular society where media representations of reality became more fully integrated into commodity culture. Using several case studies, including the newsreel's coverage of Charles Lindbergh's trans-Atlantic flight and the Sino-Japanese War, this project shows how news film transformed the relationship between its audience and current events, as well as the social and political consequences of these changes. It pays particular attention to how discourses of race and gender worked together with the rhetoric of speed, mobility, and authority to establish the power and privilege of newsreel spectatorship"-- Provided by publisher.
This resource is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services under the provisions of the Library Services and Technology Act as administered by State Library of Iowa.