ABSTRACT

In this edited collection, an international ensemble of scholars examine what contemporary cinema tells us about neoliberal capitalism and cinema, exploring whether filmmakers are able to imagine progressive alternatives under capitalist conditions. Individual contributions discuss filmmaking practices, film distribution, textual characteristics and the reception of films made in different parts of the world. They engage with topics such as class struggle, debt, multiculturalism and the effect of neoliberalism on love and sexual behaviour. Written in accessible, jargon-free language, Contemporary Cinema and Neoliberal Ideology is an essential text for those interested in political filmmaking and the political meanings of films.

chapter |22 pages

Introduction

part 1|66 pages

Political economy of neoliberalism and its discontents

chapter 1|17 pages

Team Loach and Sixteen Films

Authorship, collaboration, leadership (and football) 1

chapter 2|15 pages

US independent cinema and the capitalist mode of production

Complicating discourses of independence and oppositionality

chapter 3|16 pages

The lure of becoming cinema

The role of the internet in amateur and independent filmmaking

part 3|80 pages

Love and sexual identities under neoliberalism

chapter 10|14 pages

Hedges of Manhattan

The disquieting charm of the haute bourgeoisie in Jonathan Demme’s Rachel Getting Married

chapter 11|17 pages

Corporations of feelings

Romantic comedy in the age of neoliberalism

chapter 12|15 pages

Why is everyone not falling in love?

Love, sex and neoliberalism in film adaptations of Bret Easton Ellis’ works

chapter 14|16 pages

Polymorphous consumption

Eytan Fox’s The Bubble as gated community