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Fantastic Voyages of the Cinematic Imagination: Georges Méliès's Trip to the Moon (SUNY series, Horizons of Cinema)
by Matthew Solomon"Best moving pictures I ever saw." Thus did one Vaudeville theater manager describe Georges Méliès's A Trip to the Moon [Le Voyage dans la lune], after it was screened for enthusiastic audiences in October 1902. Cinema's first true blockbuster, A Trip to the Moon still inspires such superlatives and continues to be widely viewed on DVD, on the Internet, and in countless film courses. In Fantastic Voyages of the Cinematic Imagination, leading film scholars examine Méliès's landmark film in detail, demonstrating its many crucial connecions to literature, popular culture, and visual culture of the time, as well as its long "afterlife" in more recent films, television, and music videos. Together, these essays make clear that Méliès was not only a major filmmaker but also a key figure in the emergence of modern spectacle and the birth of the modern cinematic imagination, and by bringing interdisciplinary methodologies of early cinema studies to bear on A Trip to the Moon, the contributors also open up much larger questions about aesthetics, media, and modernity.In his introduction, Matthew Solomon traces the convoluted provenance of the film's multiple versions and its key place in the historiography of cinema, and an appendix contains a useful dossier of primary-source documents that contextualize the film's production, along with translations of two major articles written by Méliès himself.
Fantasy (Routledge Film Guidebooks)
by Claire Hines Jacqueline FurbyFantasy addresses a previously neglected area within film studies. The book looks at the key aesthetics, themes, debates and issues at work within this popular genre and examines films and franchises that illustrate these concerns. Contemporary case studies include: Alice in Wonderland (2010) Avatar (2009) The Dark Knight (2008) Edward Scissorhands (1990) Lord of the Rings (2001-2003) Pirates of the Caribbean (2003-2007) Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2010) Shrek (2001) Twelve Monkeys (1995) The authors also consider fantasy film and its relationship to myth, legend and fairy tale, examining its important role in contemporary culture. The book provides an historical overview of the genre, its influences and evolution, placing fantasy film within the socio-cultural contexts of production and consumption and with reference to relevant theory and critical debates. This is the perfect introduction to the world of fantasy film and investigates the links between fantasy film and gender, fantasy film and race, fantasy film and psychoanalysis, fantasy film and technology, fantasy film storytelling and spectacle, fantasy film and realism, fantasy film and adaptation, and fantasy film and time.
Fantasy and Mystery: 10 Authors measure themselves against the great Mysteries of our History.
by AavvFantasy and Mystery by AAVV 10 Authors measure themselves against the great Mysteries of our History. Fantamisteri, Fantastic Mysteries, Fantasy and Mystery ... many different ways (even if we recognized ourselves more in the first one) to define this collection of stories, written by ten different authors, who wanted to try to investigate the Mystery and the Fantastic, ranging from History to Fantasy, from the Yellow that is tinged with Horror to the Thriller that borders on Science Fiction, from Time Travel to Esotericism, from ancient Relics to Fantahorror, with a pinch of Eroticism ... In short, the authors have indulged themselves, each based on to one's own culture, one's creativity, one's favorite themes of inspiration, in telling stories in which the Mystery and the Fantastic are the two pivots around which the narrated events revolve. What unites these stories, albeit so different in terms of themes, style, reasons of inspiration? The fact of having chosen famous people from History, Literature, Cinema, as protagonists, and having made them interact with equally famous objects, environments, situations, places. In fact, it goes from the Alchemical Caves to the Bermuda Triangle, from the Holy Grail to the Holy Shroud, with characters such as Constantine emperor, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, D'Artagnan, the Wizard Merlin, Don Giovanni, Annibale, Agatha Marple, George Orwell, Tolkien , Wagner as protagonists and not only, because alongside the great there is also a number of characters who at first glance may seem "minor" but who, instead, are functional to the story and enrich it.
Fantasy and Social Movements
by James S. OrmrodIt is sometimes assumed that fantasizing stands in contrast to activism. This book, however, argues that fantasy plays a central role in social movements. Drawing on the psychoanalytic theories of Freud, Klein and Lacan, and psychosocial theories inspired by them, Fantasy and Social Movements examines the relationships between fantasy, reality, action, the unconscious and the collective. It makes a case for distinguishing between various 'modes of fantasy', which configure these relationships in different ways. Illustrated by a case study of activists who support the exploration, development and settlement of outer space, the book's theoretical arguments provide a platform for a critical psychosocial reworking of contemporary social movement theory. The result is a new typology of social movements that places fantasy at its core.
Fantasy/Animation: Connections Between Media, Mediums and Genres (AFI Film Readers)
by Christopher Holliday Alexander SergeantThis book examines the relationship that exists between fantasy cinema and the medium of animation. Animation has played a key role in defining our collective expectations and experiences of fantasy cinema, just as fantasy storytelling has often served as inspiration for our most popular animated film and television. Bringing together contributions from world-renowned film and media scholars, Fantasy/Animation considers the various historical, theoretical, and cultural ramifications of the animated fantasy film. This collection provides a range of chapters on subjects including Disney, Pixar, and Studio Ghibli, filmmakers such as Ralph Bakshi and James Cameron, and on film and television franchises such as Dreamworks’ How To Train Your Dragon (2010–) and HBO’s Game of Thrones (2011–).
Fantasy Farm Amusement Park
by Scott E. FowlerNot many developers would build an amusement park next door to the successful LeSourdsville Lake amusement park, but Edgar Streifthau was a one-of-a-kind man in Butler County, Ohio. Streifthau, the original owner of LeSourdsville, was forced to sell his beloved park, but he still had the amusement-park bug, and in 1963 he built Fantasy Farm directly next to LeSourdsville. Fantasy Farm's audience was young children, and the concept was successful for decades. The two parks coexisted for 28 years despite periodically appearing in court opposite each other. In 1982, Streifthau sold Fantasy Farm to local carnival owner William Johnson, who ran the park for another decade before finally becoming a victim of the economy. Johnson closed Fantasy Farm in 1991 and sold off all of its assets.
Fantasy Film Post 9/11
by Frances Pheasant-KellyExamining a range of fantasy films released in the past decade, Pheasant-Kelly looks at why these films are meaningful to current audiences. The imagery and themes reflecting 9/11, millennial anxieties, and environmental disasters have furthered fantasy's rise to dominance as they allow viewers to work through traumatic memories of these issues.
Fantasy in Greek and Roman Literature (Routledge Monographs in Classical Studies)
by Graham AndersonFantasy in Greek and Roman Literature offers an overview of Greek and Roman excursions into fantasy, including imaginary voyages, dream-worlds, talking animals and similar impossibilities. This is a territory seldom explored and extends to rarely read texts such as the Aesop Romance, The Battle of the Frogs and the Mice, and The Pumpkinification of the Emperor Claudius. Bringing this diverse material together for the first time, Anderson widens readers’ perspectives on the realm of fantasy in ancient literature, including topics such as dialogues with the dead, Utopian communities and fantastic feasts. Going beyond the more familiar world of myth, his examples range from The Golden Ass to the Late Antique Testament of a Pig. The volume also explores ancient resistance to the world of make-believe. Fantasy in Greek and Roman Literature is an invaluable resource not only for students of classical and comparative literature, but also for modern writers on fantasy who want to explore the genre’s origins in antiquity, both in the more obvious and in lesser-known texts.
Fantasy Island: Colonialism, Exploitation, and the Betrayal of Puerto Rico
by Ed MoralesA crucial, clear-eyed accounting of Puerto Rico's 122 years as a colony of the US.Since its acquisition by the US in 1898, Puerto Rico has served as a testing ground for the most aggressive and exploitative US economic, political, and social policies. The devastation that ensued finally grew impossible to ignore in 2017, in the wake of Hurricane María, as the physical destruction compounded the infrastructure collapse and trauma inflicted by the debt crisis. In Fantasy Island, Ed Morales traces how, over the years, Puerto Rico has served as a colonial satellite, a Cold War Caribbean showcase, a dumping ground for US manufactured goods, and a corporate tax shelter. He also shows how it has become a blank canvas for mercenary experiments in disaster capitalism on the frontlines of climate change, hamstrung by internal political corruption and the US federal government's prioritization of outside financial interests.Taking readers from San Juan to New York City and back to his family's home in the Luquillo Mountains, Morales shows us the machinations of financial and political interests in both the US and Puerto Rico, and the resistance efforts of Puerto Rican artists and activists. Through it all, he emphasizes that the only way to stop Puerto Rico from being bled is to let Puerto Ricans take control of their own destiny, going beyond the statehood-commonwealth-independence debate to complete decolonization.
Fantasy Islands
by Julie SzeThe rise of China and its status as a leading global factory--combined with an increasing desire worldwide for inexpensive toys, clothes, and food--are altering the way people live and consume. At the same time, the world appears wary of the real costs of this desire: toys drenched in lead paint, dangerous medicines, and tainted pet food. Examining sites in China, including the plan for a new eco-city called Dongtan on the island of Chongming, suburbanization projects, and the Shanghai World Expo, Julie Sze interrogates Chinese, European, and American eco-desire and the eco-technological fantasies that underlie contemporary development of global cities and mega-suburbs. Sze frames her analysis of these case studies in the context of the problems of global economic change and climate crisis, and she explores the flows, fears, and fantasies of Pacific Rim politics that shaped plans for Dongtan. She looks at the flow of pollution from Asia to the United States (ten billion pounds of airborne pollutants annually). Simultaneously, she considers the flow of financial and political capital for eco-city and ecological development between elite power structures in the UK and China, and charts how climate change discussions align with US fears of China's ascendancy and the related demise of the American Century. Fantasy Islands examines how fears and fantasies about China and about historical and political power change the American imagination.
The Fantasy of Feminist History
by Joan Wallach ScottIn The Fantasy of Feminist History, Joan Wallach Scott argues that feminist perspectives on history are enriched by psychoanalytic concepts, particularly fantasy. Tracing the evolution of her thinking about gender over the course of her career, the pioneering historian explains how her search for ways to more forcefully insist on gender as mutable rather than fixed or stable led her to psychoanalytic theory, which posits sexual difference as an insoluble dilemma. Scott suggests that it is the futile struggle to hold meaning in place that makes gender such an interesting historical object, an object that includes not only regimes of truth about sex and sexuality but also fantasies and transgressions that refuse to be regulated or categorized. Fantasy undermines any notion of psychic immutability or fixed identity, infuses rational motives with desire, and contributes to the actions and events that come to be narrated as history. Questioning the standard parameters of historiography and feminist politics, Scott advocates fantasy as a useful, even necessary, concept for feminist historical analysis.
Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History
by Kurt Andersen<P>A razor-sharp thinker offers a new understanding of our post-truth world and explains the American instinct to believe in make-believe, from the Pilgrims to P. T. Barnum to Disneyland to zealots of every stripe . . . to Donald Trump. <P>In this sweeping, eloquent history of America, Kurt Andersen demonstrates that what’s happening in our country today—this strange, post-factual, “fake news” moment we’re all living through—is not something entirely new, but rather the ultimate expression of our national character and path. America was founded by wishful dreamers, magical thinkers, and true believers, by impresarios and their audiences, by hucksters and their suckers. Believe-whatever-you-want fantasy is deeply embedded in our DNA. <P>Over the course of five centuries—from the Salem witch trials to Scientology to the Satanic Panic of the 1980s, from P. T. Barnum to Hollywood and the anything-goes, wild-and-crazy sixties, from conspiracy theories to our fetish for guns and obsession with extraterrestrials—our peculiar love of the fantastic has made America exceptional in a way that we've never fully acknowledged. <P>With the gleeful erudition and tell-it-like-it-is ferocity of a Christopher Hitchens, Andersen explores whether the great American experiment in liberty has gone off the rails. From the start, our ultra-individualism was attached to epic dreams and epic fantasies—every citizen was free to believe absolutely anything, or to pretend to be absolutely anybody. <P>Little by little, and then more quickly in the last several decades, the American invent-your-own-reality legacy of the Enlightenment superseded its more sober, rational, and empirical parts. We gave ourselves over to all manner of crackpot ideas and make-believe lifestyles designed to console or thrill or terrify us. <P> In Fantasyland, Andersen brilliantly connects the dots that define this condition, portrays its scale and scope, and offers a fresh, bracing explanation of how our American journey has deposited us here. <P>Fantasyland could not appear at a more perfect moment. If you want to understand the politics and culture of twenty-first-century America, if you want to know how the lines between reality and illusion have become dangerously blurred, you must read this book. <P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b> <P><b>A New York Times Bestseller</b>
Fantômas (Dover Mystery Classics)
by Robin Walz Marcel Allain Pierre SouvestreFantômas is a criminal genius, known by many nicknames, such as "the "master of everything and everyone," the "torturer" or the "elusive", whose face and true identity remain unknown. A ruthless criminal, he won't hesitate to torture and kill to achieve his goals. He is being obsessively pursued by Juve, an inspector in the Sûreté of Paris and the sworn archenemy of Fantômas. The intelligent and stubborn Juve is completely devoted to capturing or killing Fantômas.
The FANY in Peace & War: The Story of the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry 1907–2003
by Hugh PophamThe strangely named First Aid Nursing Yeomanry traces its origins to the Great War. As a mark of their outstanding service they remained in being between the wars. However, it is for their service during the Second World War that they are best known. They worked in a wide variety of roles both at home and overseas, both overt and covert and today are still making a vital contribution.
Far Above Rubies (Angel of Mercy Series #6)
by Al LacyContinuing the adventures of Old West heroine Breanna Baylor Brockman, Book Ten of the popular Angel of Mercy series incorporates several well-known historical 1860s outlaws. When eighteen-year-old Ginny Grayson moves to Missouri, she falls in love with hardware drummer Wesley Logan. But Logan's gambling debts force him to join the infamous James-Younger gang, and Ginny willingly enters the fray! When her old friend Dottie and Dottie's sister Breanna enter the picture, Ginny realizes that she wants out of the gang. But is it too late for a new start. . . as a woman whose worth is far above rubies?
Far Across the Ocean
by Suzie HullDon't miss the next achingly romantic read from Suzie Hull, winner of the RNA Joan Hessayon award 2022'A gripping story of love and loss, rich in period detail. I loved it!' CLARE MARCHANT on In this Foreign LandThe answers to her past and present lie far across the ocean...December 1913. Clara Thornton won't allow being jilted at the altar to squash her spirit. Against the wishes of her aunt and uncle, Clara decides to travel to Madagascar to learn more about the tragic shipwreck that took the lives of her missionary family, and marked her forever.Clara is escorted abroad by Xavier Mourain, a handsome young merchant who works with her uncle. The two of them start off on the wrong foot, but Clara can't help but be drawn to the mysterious Frenchman who helps her unravel the mystery that has always haunted her. But as their love blossoms, war begins. And the world will never be the same again.For Clara, all the answers seem to lie far across the ocean. But some of them might be closer than she thinks...Readers are loving Suzie Hull: 'Vivid, vibrant and beautiful!' 5*'A heartwrenchingly good read' 5*'What a gorgeous debut!' 5*'Beautiful love story' 5*' A really enjoyable and engaging book with a storyline full of twists and turns' 5*'Breathtaking' 5*'Love love loved it!' 5*'What a great read and my favourite era too ... an evocative tale of love and loss. And the settings - just wonderful. More please!' 5*
Far Across the Ocean
by Suzie HullDon't miss the next achingly romantic read from Suzie Hull, winner of the RNA Joan Hessayon award 2022'A gripping story of love and loss, rich in period detail. I loved it!' CLARE MARCHANT on In this Foreign LandThe answers to her past and present lie far across the ocean...December 1913. Clara Thornton won't allow being jilted at the altar to squash her spirit. Against the wishes of her aunt and uncle, Clara decides to travel to Madagascar to learn more about the tragic shipwreck that took the lives of her missionary family, and marked her forever.Clara is escorted abroad by Xavier Mourain, a handsome young merchant who works with her uncle. The two of them start off on the wrong foot, but Clara can't help but be drawn to the mysterious Frenchman who helps her unravel the mystery that has always haunted her. But as their love blossoms, war begins. And the world will never be the same again.For Clara, all the answers seem to lie far across the ocean. But some of them might be closer than she thinks...Readers are loving Suzie Hull: 'Vivid, vibrant and beautiful!' 5*'A heartwrenchingly good read' 5*'What a gorgeous debut!' 5*'Beautiful love story' 5*' A really enjoyable and engaging book with a storyline full of twists and turns' 5*'Breathtaking' 5*'Love love loved it!' 5*'What a great read and my favourite era too ... an evocative tale of love and loss. And the settings - just wonderful. More please!' 5*
Far Afield: French Anthropology between Science and Literature
by Vincent Debaene translated by Justin IzzoAnthropology has long had a vexed relationship with literature, and nowhere has this been more acutely felt than in France, where most ethnographers, upon returning from the field, write not one book, but two: a scientific monograph and a literary account. In Far Afield#151;brought to English-language readers here for the first time#151;Vincent Debaene puzzles out this phenomenon, tracing the contours of anthropology and literature’s mutual fascination and the ground upon which they meet in the works of thinkers from Marcel Mauss and Georges Bataille to Claude Lévi-Strauss and Roland Barthes. The relationship between anthropology and literature in France is one of careful curiosity. Literary writers are wary about anthropologists’ scientific austerity but intrigued by the objects they collect and the issues they raise, while anthropologists claim to be scientists but at the same time are deeply concerned with writing and representational practices. Debaene elucidates the richness that this curiosity fosters and the diverse range of writings it has produced, from Proustian memoirs to proto-surrealist diaries. In the end he offers a fascinating intellectual history, one that is itself located precisely where science and literature meet.
The Far Arena
by Richard Ben SapirReleased from the Arctic ice after two millennia, a former Roman gladiator must contend with his haunted memories while trying to make sense of a strange new world While conducting exploration in the frozen Arctic, Texan Lew McCardle, a geologist working for the Houghton Oil company, discovers something remarkable: a body encased in the ice. More remarkable still, the skills of Russian researcher Semyon Petrovitch bring the man miraculously back to life. This strange visitor from the distant past has an amazing story to tell. Translated from his native Latin by Nordic nun Olava, Lucius Aurelius Eugenianus reveals that in the era of Domitian he was a champion in the Roman Coliseum, a gladiator known far and wide as the greatest of all time. But now the warrior Eugeni must readjust to this new world, with its bizarre customs, hidden traps, and geopolitical and moral complexities, as he struggles to come to terms with painful memories of loves and glories lost, the bloodthirsty politics and heartbreaking betrayals that ultimately led him to this time and place. An ingenious amalgam of science fiction, fantasy, and history, Richard Ben Sapir's The Far Arena is a breathtaking work of literary invention, at once thrilling, poignant, and thought-provoking. A classic tale of strange destiny and miraculous reawakening populated by a rich cast of unforgettable characters, past and present, that will live long in the reader's memory.
A Far Away Home
by Howard FaberThis is the story of Ali, growing up in a peaceful Afghanistan, but later having to resist the control of first the Russians and later the Taliban, so he and his family could live at peace in their home. It's the story of many young Afghans, a story of the Afghanistan that was, and a story with hope for a brighter future.
Far Beyond Rubies
by Rosemary MorrisSet in 1706 during Queen Anne Stuart’s reign, Far Beyond Rubies begins when William, Baron Kemp, Juliana’s half-brother claims she and her young sister, Henrietta, are bastards. Spirited Juliana is determined to prove the allegation is false, and that she is the rightful heiress to Riverside, a great estate. On his way to deliver a letter to William, Gervaise Seymour sees Juliana for the first time in the grounds of her family estate. The sight of her draws him back to India. When “her form changed to one he knew intimately – but not in this lifetime,” Gervaise knows he would do everything in his power to protect her. Although Juliana and Gervaise are attracted to each other, they have not been formally introduced and assume they will never meet again. However, when Juliana flees from home, and is on her way to London, she encounters quixotic Gervaise at an inn. Circumstances force her to accept his kind help. After Juliana’s life becomes irrevocably tangled with his, she discovers all is not as it seems. Yet, she cannot believe ill of him for, despite his exotic background, he behaves with scrupulous propriety while trying to help her find evidence to prove she and her sister are legitimate.
Far Bright Star
by Robert OlmsteadThe year is 1916. The enemy, Pancho Villa, is elusive. Terrain is unforgiving. Through the mountains and across the long dry stretches of Mexico, Napoleon Childs, an aging cavalryman, leads an expedition of inexperienced horse soldiers on seemingly fruitless searches. Though he is seasoned at such missions, things go terribly wrong, and his patrol is suddenly at the mercy of an enemy intent on their destruction. After witnessing the demise of his troops, Napoleon is left by his captors to die in the desert.Through him we enter the conflicted mind of a warrior as he tries to survive against all odds, as he seeks to make sense of a lifetime of senseless wars and to reckon with the reasons a man would choose a life on the battlefield. Olmstead, an award-winning writer, has created a tightly wound novel that is as moving as it is terrifying.
Far China Station
by Robert Erwin JohnsonThis was the first study to put 19th century American naval and diplomatic affairs in the Far East into clear perspective. Johnson examines the origins of the East India Squadron, defines its import role in the implementation of foreign policy and describes the dangers routinely faced by the squadron's ships and sailors. Great and gallant ships move through the pages from the famous Olympia and the majestic Columbus to the plodding Palos. Naval heroes and the not-so-great, angry mobs, Japanese rebels, leaky boilers, imperious officials and infirm admirals are set against a background of uncertain anchorages, storms at sea, and the ravages of disease in the last years of the Old Navy.
A Far Corner: Life and Art with the Open Circle Tribe
by Scott EzellIn 2002, after living ten years in Asia, American poet and musician Scott Ezell used his advance from a local record company to move to Dulan, on Taiwan’s remote Pacific coast. He fell in with the Open Circle Tribe, a loose confederation of aboriginal woodcarvers, painters, and musicians who lived on the beach and cultivated a living connection with their indigenous heritage. Most members of the Open Circle Tribe belong to the Amis tribe, which is descended from Austronesian peoples that migrated from China thousands of years ago. As a “nonstate” people navigating the fraught politics of contemporary Taiwan, the Amis of the Open Circle Tribe exhibit, for Ezell, the best characteristics of life at the margins, striving to create art and to live autonomous, unorthodox lives. In Dulan, Ezell joined song circles and was invited on an extended hunting expedition; he weathered typhoons, had love affairs, and lost close friends. In A Far Corner Ezell draws on these experiences to explore issues on a more global scale, including the multiethnic nature of modern society, the geopolitical relationship between the United States, Taiwan, and China, and the impact of environmental degradation on indigenous populations. The result is a beautifully crafted and personal evocation of a sophisticated culture that is almost entirely unknown to Western readers.
Far Cry
by Alissa YorkIn a novel as compelling as the forbidden love at its heart, Alissa York, one of Canada's most distinctive writers, evokes an era of unspoken desires in which pain and longing are braided together along treacherous lines.It's 1922 at Far Cry Cannery, a quarter-mile of boardwalk and wooden buildings strung along the rocks of Rivers Inlet on the northwest coast of British Columbia. The time has come for Anders Viken, storekeeper and honorary uncle to the recently orphaned Kit, to give an account of his secret self—from his first home in Norway, another land of islands and fjords, to his escape from his family's loving grip, to his wide-open years of rough living and impossible love.As the sockeye flood up the inlet, Anders sets his secrets down for 18-year-old Kit, the only member of his chosen family he has left after her mother, Bobbie, scandalized Far Cry by running off with the camp's handsome Chinese cook, and her father, Frank, was found drowned alongside his own boat. While Anders does his reckoning, Kit fends off the attentions of the cannery manager and tries to earn her keep. Oars in hand, she glides her skiff out over the great returning school and casts her net. This, at least, makes sense to her, as opposed to the convoluted workings of love.