FILM 216: Postmodern Cinemas of the 1980s and 1990s

Comprehensive practice flashcards for FILM 216 covering historiographical methodologies, postmodern aesthetics, Jean Baudrillard's simulacra, New Queer Cinema, Third Wave feminism, women's mobility, and course-specific film analyses.

How is film historiography defined in the lecture materials?

The study of how film history is written, interpreted, and understood, including the critical examination of authentic sources, the selection and synthesis of evidence into a narrative, and the theoretical frameworks used to analyze films within their historical context.

What are the four primary methodologies utilized in film historiography?

1. Archival Research

2. Textual and Contextual Analysis

3. Oral Histories

4. Comparative Analysis

What core reasons justify the academic study of postmodern cinema?

It subverts classical film genre conventions, reflects a historical turning point in politics and technology, investigates the nature of reality and identity outside traditional institutions, and examines major movements of the $1980\text{s}$ and $1990\text{s}$ such as Dogme 95, New Queer Cinema, and Indigenous cinemas.

What are the three conventional phases of modernity outlined in the lecture?

1. Early modernity: $1500\text{--}1789$

2. Classic modernity: $1789\text{--}1900$

3. Late modernity: $1900\text{--}1980$

How do Anthony Giddens and the course materials distinguish between 'postmodernity' and 'postmodernism'?

Postmodernity is a societal condition or state of being marked by institutional, socioeconomic, and technological changes globally (especially in the West since the $1960\text{s}$), whereas postmodernism is an aesthetic, cultural, literary, and philosophical movement in the arts developing since the $1920\text{s}$.

What are the five key characteristics of a postmodern society according to Revise Sociology?

1. Global

2. Media-saturated and hyperreal

3. Fragmented

4. Consumerist

5. Culturally diverse and hybrid

What is Gilles Lipovetsky's thesis on 'neo-narcissism' and consumerism in The Era of Emptiness (1986)?

Neo-narcissism frees individuals from coercive traditional rites and collective ensembles, while consumer society and purchasing power deregulate class cultures and replace traditional value systems as the primary determinant of distinction.

Why did Jean Baudrillard break away from a strictly Marxist economic framework?

Marx focused almost exclusively on production (the ownership of means of production and extraction of surplus value), whereas Baudrillard argued that in late capitalist society, consumption and 'sign value' (communicating social status through a coded system of meanings) replaced production as the organizing logic of society.

According to Jean Baudrillard's theory of simulation, what do the four stages illustrated in this diagram represent?

The four orders of simulacra:

• Stage 1: The sign faithfully reflects basic reality (cows).

• Stage 2: The sign masks and distorts basic reality (grilled burger patties).

• Stage 3: The sign masks the absence of basic reality (commercial fast-food Whoppers).

• Stage 4: The sign bears no relation to any reality whatsoever, existing as a pure simulacrum (flame-grilled Whopper-flavored Doritos).

How does Jean Baudrillard define 'hyperreality'?

A condition occurring when simulations become so pervasive, polished, and convincing that they feel more real to human consciousness than reality itself, rendering consciousness unable to distinguish reality from a simulation.

How does Jean-François Lyotard characterize knowledge and grand narratives in the postmodern condition?

Knowledge is no longer pursued for truth but is commodified and judged by its performance and exchange value. Furthermore, universal 'grand narratives' (metanarratives) collapse and are replaced by fragmented, localized 'mini-narratives.'

How does Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers (1994) employ postmodern aesthetic techniques to critique the nuclear family?

It uses kinetic pastiche, alternating black-and-white and color footage, animation, and superimpositions. Notably, Mallory's flashbacks of severe incestuous abuse are filmed in the style of an I Love Lucy sitcom, satirizing television's false, sanitized promise of domestic happiness.

What is the etymology and historical background of the word 'nostalgia'?

It originates from the Greek words nostos (homecoming) and algos (pain). Originally classified as a medical illness in ancient Greece characterized by sadness and insomnia, it evolved in contemporary sociology into a longing for identity, security, and familiarity amid rapid societal transitions.

What is 'manufactured nostalgia' according to consumer and cultural theorists?

A synthetic emotional longing or affection for an idealized past, lifestyle, or cultural era that an individual did not personally live through, often produced through mass media, pop iconography, and consumer artifacts.

How did Twin Peaks demonstrate manufactured nostalgia in the scene where Major Briggs speaks to his son Bobby?

Major Briggs recounts a vision of a grand marble palazzo where he was born and raised and where he embraces Bobby. This invocation of an idealized, fictional 'homecoming' instantly transforms Bobby from an oppositional, rebellious youth into a deeply moved, wide-eyed son.

What ratings and viewership did the two-hour pilot of Twin Peaks achieve on April 8, 1990?

It earned a $22$ rating and a $33$ share, drawing over $30\text{ million}$ viewers and becoming the highest-rated television movie of the $1989\text{--}1990$ season.

What four socioeconomic and technological factors catalyzed the emergence of New Queer Cinema in the late 1980s and early 1990s?

1. The arrival of the AIDS epidemic

2. The conservative policies of the Reagan administration

3. The availability of inexpensive consumer camcorders

4. Access to cheap urban rent (notably in New York City)

What are the core aesthetic and thematic characteristics of New Queer Cinema?

A rejection of mainstream assimilation, focus on marginalized communities (LGBTQ+ people of color, working-class, and HIV-positive individuals), non-linear and experimental formal strategies, irreverent pastiche and irony, and a direct focus on queer desire and pleasure over victimization.

What primary critique does Cathy J. Cohen articulate regarding mainstream queer politics in 'Punks, Bulldaggers, and Welfare Queens' (1997)?

Instead of destabilizing sexual binaries, queer politics has frequently reinforced a simplistic dichotomy between the heterosexual monolith and everything 'queer,' failing to account for how intersecting systems of power, race, and class distribute privilege and marginalization on both sides.

Why is Gus Van Sant's My Own Private Idaho (1991) considered a landmark entry in New Queer Cinema?

It brought queer subject matter to mainstream prominence by casting rising Hollywood heartthrobs (Keanu Reeves and River Phoenix) as street hustlers without moralizing, while simultaneously elevating queer cinema into high art through painterly visuals and poetic structure.

How does Cheryl Dunye's The Watermelon Woman (1996) disrupt Hollywood history and the stereotypical 'mammy' trope?

By fabricating a fictional historical film archive around 1930s actress Fae Richards, Dunye reclaims erased Black queer histories, replacing the white male gaze and making the 'mammy' figure an active subject of queer female desire and agency.

What are the five key issues defining the Third Wave of Feminism?

1. Intersectionality

2. Reproductive rights

3. Individual empowerment

4. Violence against women

5. Individualized activism and media usage

Match the major Third Wave feminist texts to their respective authors: Naomi Wolf, Patricia Hill Collins, Judith Butler, Lee Maracle, and Kimberlé Crenshaw.

• Naomi Wolf: The Beauty Myth (1990)

• Patricia Hill Collins: Black Feminist Thought (1990)

• Judith Butler: Gender Trouble (1990)

• Lee Maracle: I Am Woman (1988)

• Kimberlé Crenshaw: 'Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex' (1989)

What cultural barrier regarding women's physical mobility in urban space is highlighted by Rebecca Solnit?

Historically, wandering urban streets was deemed unrespectable, and women walking alone were frequently categorized as prostitutes; walking for independent thought, pleasure, or freedom was viewed as a male prerogative.

How did the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 illustrate the connection between mobility and social power according to Maya Ricca-McCarthy?

By instituting indoor relief through workhouses, the ruling classes forced impoverished citizens to surrender their physical mobility and freedom of movement in exchange for bare economic survival.

How did the classical Hollywood Western construct physical mobility along gendered lines according to Karine Bertrand?

Vast landscapes were reserved for men demonstrating aggression and conquering frontiers on horseback, whereas female characters were systematically confined to domestic spaces to rationalize subordination.

What is the 'lesbian mammy' concept identified by Katie Hogan in Herbert Ross's Boys on the Side (1995)?

A cinematic device where a Black lesbian character (played by Whoopi Goldberg) comforts and nurtures white women dying of AIDS, reassuring white heteronormative audiences by neutralizing Black female sexuality while preserving racial boundaries.

What did David Bordwell mean by the 'Basic story' established in early film historiography?

A dominant narrative model formulated between the $1910\text{s}$ and $1930\text{s}$ that charts film history through national stylistic schools, linear technological progress, and exceptional creative auteurs.

What three influential film history books published between 1925 and 1935 marked the formal emergence of medium-specific film historiography?

1. Iris Barry: Let's Go to the Pictures (1926)

2. Paul Rotha: The Film till Now (1930)

3. Maurice Bardèche and Robert Brasillach: Histoire du cinéma (1935)

What did Hagener and Zimmermann discover when conducting topic modelling on 77 pre-1940 film books?

The distinct topic of 'world film history' (focusing on national styles and auteurs) emerged only in the late $1920\text{s}$ and $1930\text{s}$ after the arrival of synchronized sound rendered silent cinema an obsolete, historical medium.

What controversial claim regarding film viewing did Robert C. Allen and Douglas Gomery state in Film History: Theory and Practice (1985)?

'For certain investigations, film viewing is really an inappropriate research method,' emphasizing that historical inquiry often centers on industrial, legal, exhibition, and economic records rather than screen aesthetics.

How does product placement in Peter Weir's The Truman Show (1998) anticipate contemporary social media marketing?

Instead of relying on commercial breaks, corporate sponsors script Truman's friends and family to incorporate products into everyday dialogue, anticipating modern influencer marketing, paid social, and native advertising.