This feminist study explores the intricate mood, texture, and tone of Sofia Coppola's cinematic aesthetic, delving into the multifaceted meanings behind her most influential films. It analyzes how her unique style and thematic choices reflect and challenge societal norms, offering a critical examination of her contributions to contemporary cinema.
Peter Weir's haunting and allusive Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975), set in 1900, tells the story of the mysterious disappearance of three schoolgirls and their teacher on a trip to a local geological formation. The film is widely hailed as a classic of new Australian cinema, seen as exemplary of a peculiarly Australian style of heritage filmmaking.Anna Backman Rogers' study considers Picnic from feminist, psychoanalytic and decolonialising perspectives, exploring its setting in a colonised Australian bushland in which the Aboriginal people are a spectral presence in a landscape stolen from them in pursuit of the white man's 'terra nullius'. She delves into the film's production history, addressing director Weir's influences and preoccupations at the time of its making, its reception and its lasting impact on visual culture more broadly. Rogers addresses the film's treatment of the young schoolgirls and their teachers, seemingly, as embodiments of an archetype of the 'eternal feminine', as objects of the male gaze, and in terms of ideas about female hysteria as a protest against gender norms. She argues that Picnic is, in fact, highly a film that requires its viewers to read its seductive surfaces against the grain of the image in order to uncover its psychological depths.
Exploring the intersections of film and other media, this collection delves into the evolving landscape of intermediality. It examines how different artistic forms interact, influence, and reshape one another within contemporary culture. Featuring diverse essays, the volume offers insights into both theoretical frameworks and practical applications, making it a valuable resource for scholars and students interested in media studies, film theory, and interdisciplinary approaches to art.