Sleaze Artists

by Sconce, Jeffrey

• ISBN13: 9780822339649
• ISBN10: 0822339641
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-10-30
• Publisher: Duke Univ Pr

Summary

Bad Girls Go to Hell. Cannibal Holocaust.Eve and the Handyman. Examining film culturers"s ongoing fascination with the low, bad, and sleazy faces of cinema,Sleaze Artistsbrings together film scholars with a shared interest in the questions posed by disreputable movies and suspect cinema. They explore the ineffable quality of "sleaze" in relation to a range of issues, including the production realities of low-budget exploitation pictures and the ever-shifting terrain of reception and taste.Writing about horror, exploitation, and sexploitation films, the contributors delve into topics ranging from the place of the "Aztec horror film" in debates about Mexican national identity to a cycle of 1960s films exploring homosexual desire in the military. One contributor charts the distribution saga of Mario Bavars"s 1972 filmLisa and the Devilthrough the highs and lows of art cinema, fringe television, grindhouse circuits, and connoisseur DVD markets. Another offers a new perspective on the work of Doris Wishman, the New York housewife turned sexploitation director of the 1960s who has become a cult figure in bad-cinema circles over the past decade. Other contributors analyze the relation between image and sound in sexploitation films and Italian horror movies, the advertising strategies adopted by sexploitation producers during the early 1960s, the relationship between art and trash in Todd Haynesrs"s oeuvre, and the ways that theFriday the 13thseries complicates the distinction between "trash" and "legitimate" cinema. The volume closes with an essay on why cinephiles love to hate the movies.Contributors. Harry M. Benshoff, Kay Dickinson, Chris Fujiwara, Colin Gunckel, Joan Hawkins, Kevin Heffernan, Matt Hills, Chuck Kleinhans, Tania Modleski, Eric Schaefer, Jeffrey Sconce, Greg Taylor

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Sleazy Histories

Pandering to the "Goon Trade": Framing the Sexploitation Audience through Advertising

Women's Cinema as Counterphobic Cinema: Doris Wishman as the Last Auteur

Representing (Repressed) Homosexuality in the Pre-Stonewall Hollywood Homo-Military Film

Pornography and Documentary: Narrating the Alibi

El signo de la muerte and the Birth of a Genre: Origins and Anatomy of the Aztec Horror Film

Art House or House of Exorcism? The Changing Distribution and Reception Contexts of Mario Bava's Lisa and the Devil

Sleazy Afterlives

Troubling Synthesis: The Horrific Sights and Incompatible Sounds of Video Nasties

The Sleazy Pedigree of Todd Haynes

Para-Paracinema: The Friday the 13th

Film Series as Other to Trash and Legitimate Film Cultures

Boredom, Spasmo, and the Italian System

Pure Quidditas or Geek Chic? Cultism as Discernment

Movies: A Century of Failure

Selected Bibliography

Contributors

Index

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