Alternative Realities

Carl Plantinga

Published by Rutgers University Press 2021

Alternative Realities

Carl Plantinga

In the series Quick Takes: Movies and Popular Culture

https://doi.org/10.36019/9780813599854

Overview
Contents

About this book

From their very inception, movies have served two seemingly contradictory purposes. On one hand, they transport us to fantastical worlds and display mind-boggling special effects. On the other, they can document actual events and immerse us in scenarios that feel so realistic, we might forget we are watching a work of fiction.

Alternative Realities explores how these distinctions between cinematic fantasy and filmic realism are more porous than we might think. Through a close analysis of CGI-heavy blockbusters like Wonder Woman and Guardians of the Galaxy, it considers how even popular fantasies are grounded in emotional and social realities. Conversely, it examines how mockumentaries like This is Spinal Tap satirically call attention to the highly stylized techniques documentarians use to depict reality.

Alternative Realities takes us on a journey through many different genres of film, from the dream-like and subjective realities depicted in movies like Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Memento, to the astonishing twists of movies like Shutter Island and The Matrix, which leave viewers in a state of epistemic uncertainty. Ultimately, it shows us how the power of cinema comes from the unique way it fuses together the objective and the subjective, the fantastical and the everyday.

Author / Editor information

CARL PLANTINGA is the Arthur H. DeKruyter Chair of Communication at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Among his many books are Rhetoric and Representation in Non-Fiction Film, Moving Viewers: American Film and the Spectator’s Experience, and Screen Stories: Emotion and the Ethics of Engagement.

Reviews

“In both content and approach, Alternative Realities is revelatory in its exploration of the cinematic imagination and the ambiguities of realism and verisimilitude. It articulates cinema’s role in calling truths about our society to attention through the creation of realistic and fantastical worlds in screen stories that span documentary to science fiction.”

— Jane Stadler, the University of Queensland

"Plantinga gives us a unique, bold and incisive account of how movies blend reality and fantasy, conjoining soaring realms of the imagination with the empirical frames of everyday reality."

— Stephen Prince, author of Digital Visual Effects and Digital Cinema

“In both content and approach, Alternative Realities is revelatory in its exploration of the cinematic imagination and the ambiguities of realism and verisimilitude. It articulates cinema’s role in calling truths about our society to attention through the creation of realistic and fantastical worlds in screen stories that span documentary to science fiction.”

— Jane Stadler, the University of Queensland

"Plantinga gives us a unique, bold and incisive account of how movies blend reality and fantasy, conjoining soaring realms of the imagination with the empirical frames of everyday reality."

— Stephen Prince, author of Digital Visual Effects and Digital Cinema

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
CONTENTS Publicly Available Download PDF	v
INTRODUCTION Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
1 REALISM AND THE IMAGINATION Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	9
2 FANTASY AND REALITY Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	37
3 SUBJECTIVE REALITIES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	65
4 RUPTURED REALITIES Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	89
5 DOCUMENTARY: ART OF THE REAL? Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	112
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
FURTHER READING Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	137
WORKS CITED Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	141
INDEX Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	147

Language: English
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Audience: General/trade;
Pages
- Main content: 167
Keywords: Popular Culture; Cinema; Visuals; Audio; CGI; Animation; Science Fiction; Fantasy; Reality; Superhero; Movies; Realism; Imagination; Narratives; A Trip to the Moon; The Kingdom of Fairies; Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2; Filmmaking; Directing; Hollywood; Visual Effects; Paradox

eBook

Published: December 18, 2020
ISBN: 9780813599854