SHORT CUTS
INTRODUCTIONS TO FILM STUDIES
OTHER TITLES IN THE SHORT CUTS SERIES
THE HORROR GENRE: FROM BEELZEBUB TO BLAIR WITCH Paul Wells
THE STAR SYSTEM: HOLLYWOODS PRODUCTION OF POPULAR IDENTITIES Paul McDonald
SCIENCE FICTION CINEMA: FROM OUTERSPACE TO CYBERSPACE Geoff King and Tanya Krzywinska
EARLY SOVIET CINEMA: INNOVATION, IDEOLOGY AND PROPAGANDA David Gillespie
READING HOLLYWOOD: SPACES AND MEANINGS IN AMERICAN FILM Deborah Thomas
DISASTER MOVIES: THE CINEMA OF CATASTROPHE Stephen Keane
THE WESTERN GENRE: FROM LORDSBURG TO BIG WHISKEY John Saunders
PSYCHOANALYSIS AND CINEMA: THE PLAY OF SHADOWS Vicky Lebeau
COSTUME AND CINEMA: DRESS CODES IN POPULAR FILM Sarah Street
MISE-EN-SCNE: FILM STYLE AND INTERPRETATION John Gibbs
NEW CHINESE CINEMA: CHALLENGING REPRESENTATIONS Sheila Cornelius with Ian Haydn Smith
SCENARIO: THE CRAFT OF SCREENWRITING Tudor Gates
ANIMATION: GENRE AND AUTHORSHIP Paul Wells
WOMENS CINEMA: THE CONTESTED SCREEN Alison Butler
BRITISH SOCIAL REALISM: FROM DOCUMENTARY TO BRIT GRIT Samantha Lay
FILM EDITING: THE ART OF THE EXPRESSIVE Valerie Orpen
AVANT-GARDE FILM: FORMS, THEMES AND PASSIONS Michael OPray
PRODUCTION DESIGN: ARCHITECTS OF THE SCREEN Jane Barnwell
NEW GERMAN CINEMA: IMAGES OF A GENERATION Julia Knight
EARLY CINEMA: FROM FACTORY GATE TO DREAM FACTORY Simon Popple and Joe Kember
MUSIC IN FILM: SOUNDTRACKS AND SYNERGY Pauline Reay
MELODRAMA: GENRE, STYLE, SENSIBILITY John Mercer and Martin Shingler
FEMINIST FILM STUDIES: WRITING THE WOMAN INTO CINEMA Janet McCabe
FILM PERFORMANCE: FROM ACHIEVEMENT TO APPRECIATION Andrew Klevan
NEW DIGITAL CINEMA: REINVENTING THE MOVING IMAGE Holly Willis
THE MUSICAL: RACE, GENDER AND PERFORMANCE Susan Smith
TEEN MOVIES: AMERICAN YOUTH ON SCREEN Timothy Shary
FILM NOIR: FROM BERLIN TO SIN CITY Mark Bould
DOCUMENTARY: THE MARGINS OF REALITY Paul Ward
THE NEW HOLLYWOOD: FROM BONNIE AND CLYDE TO STAR WARS Peter Krmer
ITALIAN NEO-REALISM: REBUILDING THE CINEMATIC CITY Mark Shiel
WAR CINEMA: HOLLYWOOD ON THE FRONT LINE Guy Westwell
FILM GENRE: FROM ICONOGRAPHY TO IDEOLOGY Barry Keith Grant
ROMANTIC COMEDY: BOY MEETS GIRL MEETS GENRE Tamar Jeffers McDonald
SPECTATORSHIP: THE POWER OF LOOKING ON Michele Aaron
SHAKESPEARE ON FILM: SUCH THINGS THAT DREAMS ARE MADE OF Carolyn Jess-Cooke
CRIME FILMS: INVESTIGATING THE SCENE Kirsten Moana Thompson
THE FRENCH NEW WAVE: A NEW LOOK Naomi Greene
CINEMA AND HISTORY: THE TELLING OF STORIES Mike Chopra-Gant
GERMAN EXPRESSIONIST CINEMA: THE WORLD OF LIGHT AND SHADOW Ian Roberts
FILM AND PHILOSOPHY: TAKING MOVIES SERIOUSLY Daniel Shaw
CONTEMPORARY BRITISH CINEMA: FROM HERITAGE TO HORROR James Leggott
RELIGION AND FILM: CINEMA AND THE RE-CREATION OF THE WORLD S. Brent Plate
FANTASY CINEMA: IMPOSSIBLE WORLDS ON SCREEN David Butler
FILM VIOLENCE: HISTORY, IDEOLOGY, GENRE James Kendrick
NEW KOREAN CINEMA: BREAKING THE WAVES Darcy Paquet
FILM AUTHORSHIP: AUTEURS AND OTHER MYTHS C. Paul Sellors
THE VAMPIRE FILM: UNDEAD CINEMA Jeffrey Weinstock
HERITAGE FILM
NATION, GENRE AND REPRESENTATION
BELN VIDAL
A Wallflower Book
Published by
Columbia University Press
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
cup.columbia.edu
Copyright Beln Vidal 2012
All rights reserved.
E-ISBN 978-0-231-85004-9
A complete CIP record is available from the Library of Congress
ISBN 978-0-231-16203-6 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN 978-0-231-85004-9 (e-book)
A Columbia University Press E-book.
CUP would be pleased to hear about your reading experience with this e-book at .
CONTENTS
I would like to thank the Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland for its financial support towards the publication of this book. Huge thanks too to Yoram Allon at Wallflower Press for the opportunity and his patience at the various times when life and chance interfered with the progress of the work.
I am indebted to my colleagues in the department of Film Studies at Kings College London for offering the nurturing intellectual environment and day-to-day support that have made possible for me to complete this book.
This volume also owes a debt to friends and colleagues in various institutions. Our conversations over the years provided inspiration and greatly enriched my understanding of the issues at stake; especially John Caughie (who made me realise how crucial television was to the heritage film), Julianne Pidduck, David Martin-Jones, Mette Hjort, William Brown and Yun Mi Hwang. In addition, I would like to thank my MLitt/MA students at both the University of St Andrews and Kings College London for stimulating discussions around the heritage film.
Very special thanks are due to Ginette Vincendeau and Gary Needham for reading and commenting on sections of the manuscript, but also for their continuous encouragement and friendly support. Jen Rutherford greatly helped improve the final draft with her sharp proofreading, giving generous assistance when it was most needed. Any errors and infelicities that may remain in the book are entirely my own.
Finally, I would like to express my deep gratitude to Manuel Prez Carballo, for being there every step of the (long) way with love and humour, for watching and talking for hours on end.
Fans of the costume drama, audiences interested in films about historical characters and events, and even film students learning about history and film may not recognise the term heritage film immediately. Unlike the western, the romantic comedy or the horror film, the heritage film is not a genre in the industrial sense of the term. Rather, the concept has its roots in British film studies, where it has become associated with a powerful undercurrent of nostalgia for the past conveyed by historical dramas, romantic costume films and literary adaptations. These films often flaunt their connections with classical works of the literary canon, lavish production values and star performances. They regularly stand up for prizes in festivals and award ceremonies. They screen at both art cinemas and multiplexes, often as quality pictures, or at the mainstream end of the international art-film circuit. The heritage film is, in short, a distinctive strand in contemporary cinema, albeit one dogged by a certain bad press. The heritage film is often associated with craftsmanship, with competent yet unexciting filmmaking. However, its complex links with issues of history and representation, its continuous popularity and its relevance for the study of the national cinemas warrant its critical interest; as we shall see, its relation with the past as well as with its own generic past is anything but static.
