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Saturday, January 3, 2015

Screen caps from What is Academic Video by Inge Ejbye Sørensen
for Audiovisual Thinking

Film Studies For Free predicted at the beginning of this year that 2010 would be the year of the video essay. And thus it has come to pass... Woohoo!

Audiovisual Thinking -- an online video journal about "audiovisuality, communication and media" -- has just launched and it looks to FSFF to be a very worthwhile venture indeed. All relevant information has been pasted in below to tempt you to the excellent AT website. There are lots of introductory videos embedded there which will inform you audiovisually about the Audiovisual Thinking ethos.

Audiovisual Thinking has issued its first call for videos for its first proper issue which will explore the "legacy and merit of the use of audiovisual material in academic thinking, research and teaching, in the past, present and in the future" (deadline: June 15, 2010; do note: according to the submission form (as of April 22) the videos should be no longer than seven minutes and a maximum of [an as yet quite tiny] 10 Mb [Update: The editors reported to FSFF that they are working on achieving a larger, automated, upload volume. If you have larger submissions, these can be uploaded manually, so just get in touch with the editors via the websites contact page].

If you dont yet completely understand why FSFF is so pleased with this development, you should check out the following propaganda piece that it published last July: Video Essays on Films: A Multiprotagonist Manifesto. Also, do have a peruse of all the video essays embedded at FSFF, including this little one we prepared earlier (sadly, its just a little longer than seven minutes and larger than 10Mb or 100Mb...).

About Audiovisual Thinking
Audiovisual Thinking is a pioneering forum where academics and educators can articulate, conceptualize and disseminate their research about audiovisuality and audiovisual culture through the medium of video.
     International in scope and multidisciplinary in approach, the purpose of Audiovisual Thinking is to develop and promote academic thinking in and about all aspects of audiovisuality and audiovisual culture.
    Advised by a board of leading academics and thinkers in the fields of audiovisuality, communication and the media, the journal seeks to set the standard for academic audiovisual essays now and in the future.
    Video submissions are welcome from all fields of study and, as one would expect, the main criteria for submissions are that the discussion and thinking are conveyed through audiovisual means.

Audiovisual Thinking Issues
Each issue of Audiovisual Thinking will call for and then showcase academic videos around a specific theme within audiovisual culture and the media. The journal also accepts ‘opinion’ or ‘reflective’ audiovisual pieces on any area of audiovisual research or pedagogy.
Submissions are welcome from the areas of the Arts, Journalism, Media and Communication studies, as well as Education and the Social Sciences where audiovisual material is routinely used, or is gaining ground, as an academic research tool or teaching method.
This first issue will explore the legacy of audiovisual content in contemporary academic research and thinking. Submit your video here.

Friday, January 2, 2015

Publicity shot of the celebratedly "eternally young"
(boyishly middle-aged) film star Jackie Chan

Film Studies For Free is delighted to flag up Routledges new journal Celebrity Studies as its inaugural issue is available free to download online. A quick glance at the names of editors and contributors will show that this is a highly worthwhile new venture. A detailed examination of its rationale and its contents underscores that very positive first impression.

Celebrity Studies focuses on the critical exploration of celebrity, stardom and fame. It seeks to make sense of celebrity by drawing upon a range of (inter)disciplinary approaches, media forms, historical periods and national contexts.

FSFFs increasingly ancient author particularly enjoyed the most film studies oriented article in this issue: Chris Holmlunds wonderful essay Celebrity, Ageing, And Jackie Chan: Middle-Aged Asian In Transnational Action. Below is the abstract for that contribution, and below that are direct links to all the issues contents:

Assessing ageing is one of the key tasks confronting celebrity and star studies today. If film could reflect upon its own relation to death only from the 1950s on, in films such as Sunset boulevard (1950) and Whatever happened to Baby Jane (1962), where the aging process of the first generation of stars exposed a glamour worn thin on screen, today the allure of the star is most definitely inseparable from his or her heroism and ruin (Celeste 2005, Journal of Popular Film and Television, 33, pp. 32, 29). Today, moreover, middle age increasingly matters. With 78 million people in the US aged 44-62, internet and print marketing, movies, television and more tout rejuvenation through Botox, steroids, plastic surgery and wardrobe/cosmetic make-overs. Hollywood stars and celebrities point us towards a brave new world where mature adulthood is seen primarily in chronological, biological and medical terms. It is no coincidence that photographs of healthy, wealthy stars grace each issue of AARP Magazine. Trainers, nips, tucks, lighting, make-up and digital retouching all help. Nor is it coincidence that roughly half are men - most white; a goodly number black. What, however, of middle-aged, Asian, male celebrities? Global mega-star Jackie Chan offers the perfect opportunity to explore ageing, race and masculinity in transnational action. Drawing upon Gina Marchettis analysis of Chans flexible masculinity in the Rush hour trilogy (2009), I study the nine films released theatrically post-2000 featuring the middle-aged star. In conclusion, I speculate upon what the future will bring, remembering that we are all aged by culture. Screen Actors Guild (SAG) statistics chillingly indicate just how few roles are available to actors (if especially to actresses) of all races after 40. Asians in particular are marginalised. Might other models of ageing be possible? How do film stars and celebrities impact upon conceptions and experiences of ageing today in our increasingly mediagenic culture? Jackie Chan serves here as special case and as test case.

Volume 1, Issue 1: Table of Contents