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British Cinema and a Divided Nation
by John White
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Book Presentation:
Offers contemporary context of Britain as a deeply divided society as reflected in film
• Analyses Britain’s contested understandings of its past, present and future
• Examines the various ways recent mainstream films have approached the concept of nationhood
• Explores the ways in which the contest of ideologies always at work within media representations has played out post-2016
• Focuses on historical and contemporary drama films, with each chapter offering detailed readings of either an individual film, or a pair of films
British Cinema and a Divided Nation examines representations of the nation found within contemporary British cinema, against a backdrop of rising political tensions and deepening social divisions following the ‘Brexit’ referendum of June 2016. Exploring ways in which the contest of ideologies within media representations has played out post-2016, the book identifies divisions within society that have been given narrative shape and cultural form within recent British films. With case studies of major films such as Mary Queen of Scots, Peterloo, Darkest Hour, Sorry We Missed You and Downton Abbey, this book questions whether we are seeing the negotiation of a new relationship with the wider world, or simply a re-iteration of a long-standing British, or English, understanding of national identity.
About the Author:
John White teaches film studies at Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge. He is co-editor of Fifty Key British Films (Routledge, 2008), Fifty Key American Films (Routledge, 2009) and The Routledge Encyclopedia of Films (Routledge, 2014). He recently contributed chapters to books on Budd Boetticher and Delmer Daves in the Edinburgh University Press ReFocus series, and is the author of Westerns (Routledge, 2011) and European Art Cinema (Routledge, 2017).
Press Reviews:
John White unfurls an ambitious tapestry of five hundred years of history, politics, economics and culture as related to us by a selection of twenty-first-century British feature films. Moreover, interweaving itself through their tall and terrible tales of wealth, poverty, love and war is a myth which millions of us still believe in today; ‘the United Kingdom’ is a quaint oxymoron for which tens of thousands are still prepared to die. British Cinema and a Divided Nation makes you feel strangely patriotic, that through passion, persistence and protest there is still something worth fighting for. As a result, it is highly recommended.– Brett Gregory, Counterfire
"This thoughtful and thought-provoking study of contemporary British film situates its case studies firmly within their social, political, historical and cultural contexts, reading them collectively as expressive of a fractured national psyche. Whether mobilising the past or exploring the present, dealing with conflict or community, the films discussed in this book, ranging from wartime biopics to costume drama, art cinema to social realism, are compellingly presented as an especially incisive way of accessing and understanding the state of the nation."– Melanie Williams, University of East Anglia
See the publisher website: Edinburgh University Press
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