"This ambitious, broad-ranging study of one of the world's most interesting genres laudably tries to cover the telenovela industry, its creative process, the contents of novelas, and their reception by the working class. Besides having the descriptive richness one might expect of a book-length case
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study, the work has a sophisticated and relatively thorough theoretical orientation [...] Overall this book is a very good introduction to Brazilian television and the telenovela in particular. It is also of considerable value to those interested in Bourdieu's ideas, questions of social class and audience in general, or ethnographic research about audiences in the Third World." (Book review by Joseph Straubhaar, in: Journal of Communication, Spring 1990, page 162-164)
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"This volume is the first fully comprehensive account of film production in the Third World. Although they are usually ignored or marginalized in histories of world cinema," Third World countries now produce well over half of the world's films. Roy Armes sets out initially to place this huge output
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in a wider context, examining the forces of tradition and colonialism that have shaped the Third World--defined as those countries that have emerged from Western control but have not fully developed their economic potential or rejected the capitalist system in favor of some socialist alternative. He then considers the paradoxes of social structure and cultural life in the post-independence world, where even such basic concepts as "nation," "national culture," and "language" are problematic. The first experience of cinema for such countries has invariably been that of imported Western films, which created the audience and, in most cases, still dominate the market today. Thus, Third World film makers have had to ssert their identity against formidable outside pressures. The later sections of the book look at their output from a number of angles: in terms of the stages of overall growth and corresponding stages of cinematic development; from the point of view of regional evolution in Asia, Africa, and Latin America; and through a detailed examination of the work of some of the Third World's most striking film innovators. In addition to charting the broad outlines of filmic developments too little known in Europe and the United States, the book calls into question many of the assumptions that shape conventional film history. It stresse the role of distribution in defining and limiting production, queries simplistic notions of independent "national cinemas," and points to the need to take social and economic factors into account when considering authorship in cinema. Above all, the book celebrates the achievements of a mass of largely unknown film makers who, in difficult circumstances, have distinctively expanded our definitions of the art of cinema." (Publisher description)
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"Este libro tiene tres niveles, el más importante es el análisis y la interpretación de lo que significa desde el punto de vista de su sentido y de sus contenidos el cine boliviano contemporáneo, el otro tiene que ver con la visión histórica del periodo 1952-1985. En ambos el autor ha buscado
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dar un panorama completo de lo que ha sido esta etapa, sin duda la más rica de la cinematografía nacional. Para lograrlo ha partido de la premisa de que tres realizadores, Ruiz, Sanjinés y Eguino y un guionista, Soria, son los ejes sobre los que se ha movido nuestro cine en esos treinta y tres años. Son ellos además quienes desde Bolivia han hecho los mayores aportes al cine latinoamericano y universal. Pero la obra no se limita a estas figuras, dedica importantes capítulos a quienes hicieron y hacen aportes sustanciales al cine que hoy tenemos y a quienes han trabajado para hacer más sólida nuestra cultura cinematográfica y han permitido algo esencial, la conservación del patrimonio fílmico nacional para las generaciones del futuro. El tercer nivel, indispensable como referencia y de gran utilidad para cualquier investigador, crítico o simplemente cinéfilo, está dedicado a una filmografía exhaustiva del periodo 1952-1985, una bio-filmografía de 33 realizadores bolivianos, el detalle completo de los premios internacionales y nacionales obtenidos por este cine y una cronología año por año desde 1952 de los hechos históricos, el cine y las otras artes desarrolladas en el país en estas tres décadas." (www.bibliotecavirtualcarlosdmesa.com)
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"An international directory of film producers, directors, technicians, and others prominent in the production of films. A good source of information on leaders in the Brazilian film world." (Ann Hartness, Brazil in Reference Books 1965-1989. Scarecrow Press, 1991)