The fall issue of Cinephile looks to examine these issues and beyond, with an eye towards the past in order to understand where the horror genre may be headed in the near future. The issue aims to focus on two key aspects of contemporary horror’s relation to its immediate past. First, does the appropriation of international horror cinema by Hollywood and its many remakes suggest a perverse turn in the globalization of the genre? How do remakes embrace, reject or negotiate the cultural elements of the original for Western and global audiences? Secondly, what is the state of horror’s power to shock? How has the virtual domination of computer-generated effects affected the horror industry, on both aesthetic and technical perspectives? Do digital effects add to the genre’s visceral impact, or instead detract from the sense of plasticity that made the genre infamous in the 1970s and 80s?

See full details at http://cinephile.ca/call-for-papers/.

…in this, our 5th anniversay issue, we set out to navigate the murky and uncharted depths of ‘alternative cinema’. But carving out an epistemology of this amorphous cinema is no small endeavour-and what do we mean by ‘alternative cinema’ anyway? On the one hand, it is always evolving, always repositioning itself outside mainstream modes of representation: once the mainstream appropriates elements of alternative style, new configurations naturally spring up in response. At the same time, it has no singular mandate, no fixed ideological underpinnings, and is beholden to no specific national cinema or film movement.

Continue reading the Editor’s Note

Steffen Hantke on Hitler as Actor, Jerry White on From Ingushetia to the Finland Station, William Beard’s interview with Guy Maddin, and more, including Holocaust Exploitation, Post-Soviet Freakonomics, and Cinematic Prosthesis

The Scene (Vol. 5, No. 2: Fall 2009)

There are certain scenes which have the power to enthral, provoke, and delight—our cover captures one such titillating tableau. But what gives such a scene the ability to stand apart, to take on a life of its own? What is it about Robert De Niro’s “Are you talking to me?” scene that has such lasting cultural resonance? How does Gene Kelly dancing in the rain embody an entire ethos of escapism?

Continue reading the Editor’s Note

Elena del Río on What a Scene Can Do, Brenda Austin-Smith on Alice in the Cities, Murray Pomerance on Hitchcock’s Torn Curtain, and more, including the Snuff Coda, Eastern Promises, and Joy Division and the Televised Performance Scene.  Also: The New Scene Canon!

The Call For Papers is now available; submissions are due January 22, 2010.