Mark Bould

Alex Woloch

Cynthia Baron

Martin F. Norden

Maureen Turim

Greg M. Smith

Susan Felleman

Klaus Rieser

Rebecca M. Gordon

Laura Barrett

Hamilton Carroll

Mika Turim-Nygren

The first collection of original essays on the work of writer-director John Sayles, this book addresses the full range of his films from a variety of critical viewpoints.

New Perspectives on Independent Filmmaker John Sayles

Sayles Talk

Real Objects in Unreal Situations is a lucid account of a much-neglected subject in art and cinema studies: the material significance of the art object incorporated into the fiction film. By examining the historical, political, and personal realities that situate the artworks, Susan Felleman offers an incisive account of how they operate not as mere objects but as powerful players within the films, thereby exceeding the narrative function of props, copies, pastiches, or reproductions. The book consists of a series of interconnected case studies of movies, including The Trouble with Harry, An Unmarried Woman, The Player, and Pride & Prejudice, among others, ultimately showing that when real art works enter into fiction films, they often embody themes and discourses in ways that other objects cannot.

Modern Art in Fiction Films

Real Objects in Unreal Situations

Bringing an art historical perspective to the realm of American and European film, Art in the Cinematic Imagination examines the ways in which films have used works of art and artists themselves as cinematic and narrative motifs. From the use of portraits in Vertigo to the cinematic depiction of women artists in Artemisia and Camille Claudel, Susan Felleman incorporates feminist and psychoanalytic criticism to reveal individual and collective perspectives on sex, gender, identity, commerce, and class. Probing more than twenty films from the postwar era through contemporary times, Art in the Cinematic Imagination considers a range of structurally significant art objects, artist characters, and art-world settings to explore how the medium of film can amplify, reinvent, or recontextualize the other visual arts. Fluently speaking across disciplines, Felleman's study brings a broad array of methodologies to bear on questions such as the evolution of the "Hollywood Love Goddess" and the pairing of the feminine with death on screen. A persuasive approach to an engaging body of films, Art in the Cinematic Imagination illuminates a compelling and significant facet of the cinematic experience.

Art in the Cinematic Imagination

Susan Felleman

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