New Transnationalisms in Contemporary Latin American Cinemas

297 Pages·2018·7.515 MB·English

by  Dolores Tierney

NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS IN
CONTEMPORARY LATIN AMERICAN CINEMAS
DOLORES TIERNEY
NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS IN
CONTEMPORARY LATIN AMERICAN CINEMAS
Traditions in World Cinema
General Editors Spanish Horror Film
Linda Badley (Middle Tennessee State Antonio Lázaro-Reboll
University)
R. Barton Palmer (Clemson University) Post-beur Cinema
Will Higbee
Founding Editor
Steven Jay Schneider (New York New Taiwanese Cinema in Focus
University) Flannery Wilson
Titles in the series include: International Noir
Traditions in World Cinema Homer B. Pettey and R. Barton Palmer
Linda Badley, R. Barton Palmer, and (eds)
Steven Jay Schneider (eds)
Films on Ice
Japanese Horror Cinema Scott MacKenzie and Anna Westerståhl
Jay McRoy (ed.) Stenport (eds)
New Punk Cinema Nordic Genre Film
Nicholas Rombes (ed.) Tommy Gustafsson and Pietari Kääpä
(eds)
African Filmmaking
Roy Armes Contemporary Japanese Cinema Since
Hana-Bi
Palestinian Cinema Adam Bingham
Nurith Gertz and George Khleifi
Chinese Martial Arts Cinema (2nd edition)
Czech and Slovak Cinema Stephen Teo
Peter Hames
Slow Cinema
The New Neapolitan Cinema Tiago de Luca and Nuno Barradas Jorge
Alex Marlow-Mann
Expressionism in Cinema
American Smart Cinema Olaf Brill and Gary D. Rhodes (eds)
Claire Perkins
French Language Road Cinema:
The International Film Musical Borders,Diasporas, Migration and
Corey Creekmur and Linda Mokdad (eds) ‘NewEurope’
Michael Gott
Italian Neorealist Cinema
Torunn Haaland Transnational Film Remakes
Iain Robert Smith and Constantine
Magic Realist Cinema in East Central Verevis
Europe
Aga Skrodzka Coming-of-age Cinema in New Zealand
Alistair Fox
Italian Post-Neorealist Cinema
Luca Barattoni New Transnationalisms in Contemporary
Latin American Cinemas
Dolores Tierney
edinburghuniversitypress.com/series/tiwc
NEW TRANSNATIONALISMS IN
CONTEMPORARY LATIN
AMERICAN CINEMAS
Dolores Tierney
Edinburgh University Press is one of the leading university presses in the UK.
We publish academic books and journals in our selected subject areas across the
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information visit our website: edinburghuniversitypress.com
© Dolores Tierney, 2018
Edinburgh University Press Ltd
The Tun – Holyrood Road
12 (2f) Jackson’s Entry
Edinburgh EH8 8PJ
Typeset in 10/12.5 pt Sabon by
Servis Filmsetting Ltd, Stockport, Cheshire
and printed and bound in Great Britain
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978 0 7486 4573 2 (hardback)
ISBN 978 1 4744 3111 8 (webready PDF)
ISBN 978 1 4744 3112 5 (epub)
The right of Dolores Tierney to be identified as author of this work has been asserted
in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 and the Copyright
and Related Rights Regulations 2003 (SI No. 2498).
Note: The Introductions to the different national film industries offered in this
book endeavour where possible to quote the most up-to-date figures using available
publications.
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vii
List of Figures x
List of Tables xii
Traditions in World Cinema xiii
Introduction: The Cultural Politics of Transnational Filmmaking 1
Mexico: Introduction 33
1. Alejandro González Iñárritu: Mexican Director Without Borders 47
2. ‘From Hollywood and Back’: Alfonso Cuarón’s Adventures
in Genre 76
3. Guillermo del Toro’s Transnational Political Horror:
Cronos (1993), El espinazo del diablo (The Devil’s Backbone
2001) and El laberinto del fauno (Pan’s Labyrinth 2006) 102
Brazil: Introduction 123
4. Fernando Meirelles as Transnational Auteur 137
5. Revolutionary Road Movies: Walter Salles’ Diarios de
motocicleta (Motorcycle Diaries 2004) and On the Road (2012) 161
Argentina: Introduction 187
6. Juan José Campanella: Historical Memory and Accountability
in El secreto de sus ojos (The Secret in Their Eyes 2009) 201
new transnationalisms
Epilogue: Gravity (Alfonso Cuarón 2013), Birdman
(Alejandro G. Iñárritu 2014), The Revenant (G. Iñárritu 2015)
and Crimson Peak (Guillermo del Toro 2015) 227
Select Filmography 240
Bibliography 248
Index 268
vi
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book would not have been possible without the help and support of
many individuals and institutions. I would like to thank Sussex University for
two terms and one part-time semester of leave, and in particular the chairs of
Media, Film and Music, Sue Thornham and Tim Jordan, and also the subject
heads in film, Thomas Austin and Frank Krutnik. I would also like to thank
the Center for Latin American and Latino Studies (CLALS) at American
University (Washington DC) where a Research Fellowship in Autumn 2016
helped me with writing the final chapters of the manuscript and also Jeffrey
Middents for help in organising the Fellowship. Some of the research for this
book has also been conducted as part of the research project: ‘Transnational
relations in Spanish-American digital cinema: the cases of Spain, Mexico and
Argentina’ (CSO2014-52750-P), funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy
and Competitiveness. I thank José Cerdán Los Arcos and Miguel Fernández-
Rodríguez Labayen for incorporating me into the project. Additionally, initial
research for this book, in Mexico City in 2005/2006, was helped by funding
from the Arts and Humanities Research Council.
I am eternally grateful to all those who have helped in some way by answer-
ing questions, providing information, materials and/or contacts, and friend-
ship and positive energy which have helped in the book writing process: Misha
MacLaird (in particular), Rielle Navtiski, Tamara Falicov, Olivia Cosentino,
Ignacio Sánchez Prado (Nacho), Antonio Lázaro-Reboll, Hoi Lun Law,
Gabriela Copertari, Gilberto Blasini, Christina Sisk, Carolina Rocha, Rosalind
Galt, Victoria Ruétalo and again Jeffrey Middents. I thank Misha MacLaird,
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new transnationalisms
Pedro Butcher and Natalia Ames Ramello who gave me their expert answers
on different aspects of filmmaking in Mexico, Brazil and Peru.
I would also like to thank those who have read and offered advice on parts
of the manuscript or helped shape it in some way: Misha MacLaird, Ana
López, Catherine Grant, Ilene Goldman, Erica Segre, Rob Stone, Alex Marlow
Mann, Niall Richardson, and my wonderful co-editors on The Transnational
Fantasies of Guillermo del Toro Deborah Shaw and Ann Davies who, in
addition to offering feedback on my writing about del Toro, helped me push
forward and finish this book.
I am also deeply thankful for my great and supportive academic com-
munity who in different ways have helped foster my research including: the
best mentor in the world Ana López, my colleagues past and present in Film
at Sussex (Catherine Grant, Niall Richardson, Thomas Austin, Glenn Ward,
Frank Krutnik, Michael Lawrence, Pam Thurschwell, Matilda Mroz, Luke
Robinson, Lawrence Webb, Alisa Lebow and Rosalind Galt) and the differ-
ent scholars in Latin American film studies and beyond in the broader areas
of transnational filmmaking in the US and Europe whose work is a constant
source of inspiration including everyone in the SCMS Latino/a Caucus (Luisela
Alvaray, Laura Podalsky, Victoria Ruétalo, Isabel Arredondo, Elissa Rashkin,
Catherine Benamou, Kathleen Newman, Nacho Rielle Navitski, Laura Isabel
Serna, Sergio de la Mora, Gilberto Blasini, Iain Robert Smith, Jamie Sexton,
Lúcia Nagib) to name just a few stellar individuals, as well as other cherished
colleagues in Ibero-American cinema (Antonio Lázaro-Reboll, Miriam Haddu,
the late and great Andrea Noble, Rob Stone, Sarah Barrow, Deborah Shaw,
Stephanie Dennison, Lisa Shaw, Tiago de Luca, Tom Whittaker, Niamh
Thornton, Belén Vidal, Christian Wehr and Friedhelm Schmidt-Welle) who
have organised conferences, symposia or other venues that have enabled me to
present and get valuable feedback for this research. I thank the participants of
an Alejandro González Iñárritu symposium held at Sussex in May 2016, and in
particular the presenters, Deborah Shaw, Niamh Thornton, Catherine Grant
and especially Paul Julian Smith and Geoffrey Kantaris, my first two tutors in
film who continue to inspire me with their work. I also thank my colleagues
Michael Lawrence and Catherine Grant for help in organising and recording
the day. Similarly, I would like to thank Catherine Grant for organising a
Lucrecia Martel symposium at Sussex in June 2011 where part of this research
was also presented and the participants of that symposium: Deborah Martin,
Joanna Page, and Jens Andermann.
I also thank my mother for practical and research help scouring the British
broadsheet newspapers for articles about Latin American cinema, my brother-
in-law David for bringing my dead computer back to life, and my brothers
Patrick and Richard for some great ideas. I thank my students on several
iterations of my courses in Latin American Cinema, Spanish Cinema, Race
viii
acknowledgements
and Ethnicity in Popular Cinema, and Gender and the Cinema at Sussex and
Tulane Universities for their enthusiasm and their insights. I am extremely
grateful to the series editors, Linda Badley and R. Barton Palmer, for their
faith in the project from its proposal stage and their help throughout, and to
Richard Strachan at Edinburgh University Press, and Jill Laidlaw for close
reading and wonderful editing.
I thank Routledge, Palgrave and Intellect for permission to reprint the parts
of this book which have already been published. An early version of Chapter
One appeared in New Cinemas: Journal of Contemporary Film 7.2 (2009), a
shorter version of Chapter Three appeared in The Transnational Fantasies of
Guillermo del Toro (2014) and a part of the Introduction to the book appears
in the Routledge Companion to World Cinemas (2017). I thank Natalie
Foster at Routledge and also the co-editors of the Routledge Companion to
World Cinemas, Rob Stone, Alex Marlow Mann, Paul Cooke and Stephanie
Dennison. Table 1 is reproduced from the article ‘National, Regional, and
Global: New Waves of Latin American Cinema’ by Luisela Alvaray from
Cinema Journal: The Journal of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies,
47:3. I also thank the national film institutes of Mexico (IMCINE), Brazil
(ANCINE) and Argentina (INCAA) and the website filmb.br.com for permis-
sion to reprint tables from their publications.
Finally, this book was written over several years during which I lost my dad
and had three little girls. I dedicate the book to Dennis Tierney, to my children
(Nancy, Dulcie and Elise) who are the best, and to Eddie for all his help but
mostly for successfully navigating the challenging task of living with someone
writing a book.
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