Ben Kooyman

Book review: Recycled Stars: Female Film Stardom in the Age of Television and VideoDesjardinsMary R, Recycled Stars: Female Film Stardom in the Age of Television and Video. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2015; 308 pp. ISBN: 9780822358022,

Filipino souls. Hence, the drive to make the country return to a native identity – which did not yet exist in movies. When 3 years later the Americans returned victoriously, the intrinsically valid idea of Pan-Asianism had been discredited; instead of a regional cinema, national cinemas started blossoming, and in the Philippines, ‘the enthusiasm to attain independence and nationalism was spoiled by exhaustion and despair brought about by the nation’s debilitating war experience’. This publication thoroughly researches the mechanisms, successes and failures in trying to conquer a country and win the hearts of its people (by way of film) at the same time. This feeble attempt lasted just 3 years (1942–1945). And the failure of the cultural/entertainment side forebodes the political/military failure of this gigantic self-delusional grandstanding of Japan. While Filipinos in the controlled press officially were addressed as ‘brothers’, reality looked much more horrid. So that ironically, after the war, the Japanese became the choice of villain in the films that were produced in the whole SE Asian region. But make no mistake: once the Americans re-took the country from the Japanese, hardly ever was the fierce resistance of the Filipinos and their essential contribution towards the final victory mentioned in the steady flow of the American propaganda films. Around 300 persons worked for the Japanese Propaganda Corps in charge of film in the Philippines, with 250 soldiers assigned for their security. They worked under the ideology of Eigasen, literally, ‘Film War’, which worked much smoother and more effectively in planning offices in Tokyo than on the ground in occupied countries. Propaganda instead of entertainment was the foremost goal with all creative work under strict military scrutiny. It took almost a year before the first locally produced film appeared in cinemas, particularly as film materials remained in extreme short supply in Japan. Cinema-going used to be a national pastime that attracted millions, and in 1939, the Philippines ranked fifth worldwide in producing film titles. In order to keep up with this demand, the Japanese were forced to re-screen Hollywood (!) movies endlessly – as Filipinos did not understand Japanese and the occupying forces could not produce or import English language films. On top of that, the harsh censorship led to gaps in the plot and often complete mutilations of the films. No wonder audiences looked at other entertainment once watching movies became stale and cinemas started closing down. Many were converted to accommodate life stage shows that now blossomed up. In total, only one feature-length documentary (Victory Song) was produced during occupation, as well as two features (Dawn of Freedom; Tatlong Maria). In this publication, you can read about them in detail, about collaboration and resistance, and many minor developments in the film industry in general. Particularly considering the obstacles of most of the source language and the disinclination of Japanese society in general to deal with their misdoings during the war, this book is a jewel of achievement in multifaceted details. In case there ever was a doubt: if not earlier, at least after this third volume in his ongoing saga of becoming Filipino, it is blatantly obvious that for a long time to come, Deocampo must be called the Master Chronicler of 100 years of Philippine cinema.

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ground and at times can be disjunct due to, I assume, the limited space available. However, it does provide an interesting entry point into the corporeal qualities of sound (considering that this is an area which is often overlooked), all the while demonstrating to the reader how these ideas have practical, analytical applications in a non-Western context. The chapter on ‘language’, by David Samuels and Thomas Porcello, again, feels like it tries to cover too much ground in a short space. The chapter touches on linguistics, semiotics, poetics and performatives – all of which are relevant to the keyword ‘language’ and, of course, to sound studies, but they are also intricate epistemologies in their own right which, in the short space of a few pages, cannot be skimmed across and navigated easily by uninitiated readers. The editors rightly scrutinise Eurocentric versions of the history of sound and music, which have become self-evident and have functioned to normalise particular approaches to sound. With this, the book goes to great lengths to be inclusive of non-Western sound cultures and this is evidenced across several of its chapters and should be commended. Overall, the book offers a unique contribution to the field of sound studies through its cross-disciplinary approach to sound. Michelle Stead Western Sydney University, Australia

Book Review: Joseph Cornell Versus CinemaPigottMichael, Joseph Cornell Versus Cinema. London: Bloomsbury, 2013; 129 pp. ISBN: 9781780934150, AUD

Clocking-in at only 128 pages, the book features six maps pinpointing the geographic locations of key films named in the book, 46 short scene analyses from 46 individual films and half a dozen short essays. The films covered are diverse, beginning with the silent feature The Sentimental Bloke (1919) and concluding with Jon Hewitt’s gritty Kings Cross drama, X: Night of Vengeance (2011). Each analysis focuses on a scene in which location plays a significant role, giving a brief historical overview of the place in question and considering its importance to film as a whole. Each analysis is accompanied by a page of good quality stills from the scene and, for any eager film tourists, a photograph of the location as it looks today. Locations considered include the iconic, such as Cronulla Beach in Bruce Beresford’s Puberty Blues (1981), and stretch to the banal: Bankstown Square in Michael Thornhill’s suburban drama The F.J. Holden (1977) or a nondescript Westleigh house in Don’s Party (1976). The most engaging component of the book is its six short essays detailing aspects of Sydney’s film history. Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and Jane Mills contribute pieces on international filmmakers drawn to Sydney, including the unofficial ‘king of Ozploitation’, British director Brian TrenchardSmith. Deb Verhoeven, Gemma Blackwood and Jack Sargeant concentrate on locations that have proved particularly popular in Australian film: the beach, the Opera House and seedy Kings Cross. Lisa French gives a brief history of Ubu Films, the underground counter-culture movement of the mid-1960s whose members included the likes of Bruce Beresford, Philip Noyce and Peter Weir. Film Locations: Sydney is not a book of detailed scholarship, but serves as a highly readable, visually compelling reminder of Australia’s excellent cinematic output.

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and best conveys her own theoretical alacrity, even as she suggests that comics studies’ lack of theoretical girth is its ultimate undoing. The future of the field rests at the heart of Comics as Language. So, even though several of Miodrag’s arguments fall short, she accomplishes her goal of situating the field of comics studies into a larger, interdisciplinary theoretical tradition. Thus the success of this text should not be judged purely on its own theoretical merits, which are lacking. Instead, Miodrag’s book succeeds because it creates a landing space for future comics scholars who seek to position the field inside of other theoretical traditions.

Book Review: Merchants of Menace: The Business of Horror CinemaNowellRichard, Merchants of Menace: The Business of Horror Cinema. London: Bloomsbury, 2014; 280 pp. ISBN: 9781623564209,

The collection of articles in the eleventh volume of Protest, Culture and Society Series explores the complex interrelations between social movements and the mass media from 1968 to the present day. The starting point of the timeframe represents the period when media, and particularly television, ‘discovered the attractiveness of protest events’, and the end-point is marked by the period when digital technologies created new opportunities for protest movements to communicate their agenda (p. 1). The collection consists of four parts: ‘Systematic Approaches to Protest and Media’, ‘Protest and Mass Media Around 1968’, ‘Professional Strategies Across the Media After 1968’ and ‘Protest in the Digital Age’. It offers perspectives from sociology, social psychology, history and media studies. Two themes unite those different disciplinary approaches: the concept of media framing, and professional media strategies applied by protest movements. The first chapter explores conceptual aspects of protest and media relations, such as classification of protest groups’ media strategies and multiple facets of the framing process. Part 2 focuses on how such forms of media as print journalism, photo journalism, television and film constructed the image of protests in Europe and North America. Part 3 focuses on media strategies of particular groups and organisations: the Red Army Faction, Greenpeace, the Black Panthers and European Social Forums. The last chapter, dedicated to the protest in the digital age, tries to define how protest and media scenes were changed by the digital shift. It contributes to the debate around the potential of digital media to disrupt usual relations between media, authorities, activists and the public. The cases of the Zapatistas and the Punk movement challenge the argument of those scholars, such as Shirky and Castells, who see social media influence on democracy and social movements as overly positive. The volume offers a much-needed diachronic perspective on the relations between media and social movements. While current debates about the role of the internet tend to deal with predominantly recent events such as the Arab Spring or Indignados movement in Spain, Media and Revolt emphasises the importance of understanding the continuity of those relations. Even though direct comparison between 1968 and the present day cannot be made due to the different contexts and methodologies of the studies, the volume invites the reader to reflect on how these relations are affected by historic forms of social movements and mass media. The collection makes a timely contribution to the field, and will be of interest to scholars in the mass media, and those studying social movements and history.

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No. 156 — August 2015 Jon Stewart’s strategic intervention in the circulation of news with the mainstream media. This discussion works best when she uses specific examples to support her examination of Stewart’s use of irony, satire and incongruity as a way of getting the semiotic upper hand. However, this kind of analysis is unfortunately embedded in lengthy disquisitions that remain disconcertingly abstract. Webber’s primary point in exploring the ‘cultural set-up’ of comedy is that comedy is not an agency for change, but rather has the role of mediating hegemonic norms and engaging with an established cultural and political script. In this context, in her chapter about the comedic redeployment of the word ‘faggot’ to purportedly free it of its homophobic history, she argues that this gambit actually works to reinforce a patriarchal valuing of manliness. This discussion is followed by a chapter on female comedians, in which she considers ‘how women manage to be funny without challenging dominant forms of humour’ (p. 77). Focusing on the comedy hit Bridesmaids, Webber identifies its progressive features, not least its representation of diverse female subjectivities and questioning of the centrality of marriage, but suggests that the film still works within the existing structure of privilege. Webber’s eclectic and not particularly coherent choice of case studies includes an exploration of the role of satire during the events that have become known as the Arab Spring. It is fascinating to discover that The Daily Show directly inspired the Egyptian satirical program Al Bernameg, created and hosted by Bassem Youssef, which is similarly intent on breaking into the carefully managed view of the world and society offered by mainstream media, particularly, in this case, television. A distinctive and unsettling element of Webber’s critique is the definitive and uncompromising nature of her description of the torpor and decay of present-day American society. Along with her loss of faith in public institutions, she also envisages an American ‘public who lack critical skills or the ability to define their interests or recognise basic unfairness and ethical violations’ (p. 19). From this perspective, she has no time for media theorists such as Amber Day, who make a case for the dynamic social possibilities of comedy. Instead, ‘When we are laughing with TDS, we have to laugh at ourselves because comedians and satirists are confronting us (the viewer) with our own lack of agency and deception by the media’ (pp. 175–6). This book is not well structured and often loses sight of its subject. Moreover, Webber’s uncompromising vision of the ‘dumb’ audience is unappealing and problematic. At the same time, she draws together and engages with a stimulating range of ideas and arguments and, although limited, her textual examples and analysis are perceptive. – Susan Bye, Australian Centre for the Moving Image

Hergé, son of Tintin, by Benoît Peeters translated by Tina A. Kover

No. 152 — August 2014 ‘present tense’ and possesses the attributes of both ‘fast’ and ‘slow’ media. Subsequent chapters develop Rettberg’s insights about the changing distribution of blogs, and the increasing use of the genre in journalism and business. The author adroitly deploys Axel Bruns’ theories of ‘gatewatching’ to compare blogging and professional journalism. She also invokes Mark Andrejevic’s take on Marx’s notions of worker alienation to explore how easy it is for the loving labours of bloggers to be exploited by their employers and business generally. Perhaps the greatest strength of Rettberg’s text is its recognition that blogging is ultimately about humans, not metrics. The book is peopled with real bloggers, who fall in and out of love with other bloggers, marry, get divorced, get sacked, change the topic about which they blog, go freelance, move to the country and hesitantly shuck off their amateur status by inviting advertising to their blogs. They are analogues for every phase of blogging, from the far-sighted, often quirky individualism of the early 2000s to the rise of business bloggers on LinkedIn. – Sybil Nolan, Culture and Communication, University of Melbourne

Book Review: QuadropheniaStephenGlynn, Quadrophenia, Columbia University Press (Wallflower), London, 2014, ISBN 978 0 231 16741 3, 155 pp., A

Media International Australia above to introduce the reader to complex theory in an engaging and easy-to-understand way. Moral panics surrounding the Sex Pistols in the 1970s are a clear favourite of Bowman’s, and he uses the example to explain both the way the media communicate culture and critiques of (popular) culture as far back as Arnold’s 1869 Culture and Anarchy, which also embraced the Sex Pistols’ key themes of anarchy, rejection and destruction. I especially liked Bowman’s comparison of Adorno and Horkheimer to Waldorf and Statler of the Muppets – the two grumpy men who showed up to every performance only to criticise it. Culture, like the weather, is a process that is only noticed in extremes (p. 9), and the high versus popular culture debates rage as critiques seek to establish an insider and outsider status of acceptable and unacceptable culture. For Bowman: ‘It is significant that so many supposedly “shocking” texts activate and reactivate generalised debates about the terrible state of culture and society.’ (p. 11) At the conclusion of the discussion, it is easy to see how the same argument could be applied to video games, the World Wide Web or even Miley Cyrus’s performance at the recent VMAs. Bowman’s book, which begins with the assertion that textbooks are boring and introductions are patronising, is incredibly readable. While I concede that the book may be too basic for some, they are probably not the target market. This book works as an excellent refresher for those already in the know and is essential reading for first-year media and cultural studies students. – Katie Ellis