Table Of ContentAgeing Masculinities
in Contemporary European
and Anglophone Cinema
This volume offers a unique exploration of how ageing masculinities are
constructed and represented in contemporary international cinema.
With chapters spanning a range of national cinemas, the primarily
European focus of the book is juxtaposed with analysis of the social and
cultural constructions of manhood and the “anti-ageing” impulses of
male stardom in contemporary Hollywood. These themes are inflected in
different ways throughout the volume, from considering how old age is
not the monolithic and unified life stage with which it is often framed, to
exploring issues of queerness, sexuality, and asexuality, as well as themes
such as national cinema and dementia.
Offering a diverse and multifaceted portrait of ageing and masculinity in
contemporary cinema, this book will be of interest to scholars and students
of film and screen studies, gender and masculinity studies, and cultural
gerontology.
Tony Tracy is Lecturer in Film and Media Studies and Co-founder of the
Huston School of Film & Digital Media, University of Galway, Ireland. His
research centres on film history and Irish cinema with a particular interest in
masculinities. His monograph White Cottage, White House: Irish American
Masculinities in Classical Hollywood Cinema was published in 2022.
Michaela Schrage-Früh is Lecturer in German and Comparative Literature
at the University of Galway, Ireland. She is the author of Emerging
Identities: Myth, Nation and Gender in the Poetry of Eavan Boland,
Nuala Ní Dhomhnaill and Medbh McGuckian (2004) and Philosophy,
Dreaming and the Literary Imagination (2016). She has published widely
on representations of gender and ageing in literature and culture, and is
co-editor of five essay collections on the theme.
Routledge Advances in Film Studies
Philosophical Theories of Political Cinema
Angelo Emanuele Cioffi
Breaking Down Joker
Violence, Loneliness, Tragedy
Edited by Sean Redmond
Film, Environment, Comedy
Eco-Comedies on the Big Screen
Robin L Murray and Joseph K. Heumann
Space and Time in African Cinema and Cine-scapes
Kenneth W. Harrow
Decline and Reimagination in Cinematic New York
Cortland Rankin
Digital Space and Embodiment in Contemporary Cinema
Screening Composite Spaces
Jennifer Kirby
Emotion Pictures
Movies and Feelings
Lucy Fischer
Gender, Power, and Identity in The Films of Stanley Kubrick
Edited by Karen A. Ritzenhoff, Dijana Metlić and Jeremi Szaniawski
Ageing Masculinities in Contemporary European and Anglophone Cinema
Edited by Tony Tracy and Michaela Schrage-Früh
For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/
Ageing Masculinities in
Contemporary European
and Anglophone Cinema
Edited by Tony Tracy and Michaela
Schrage-Früh
Designed cover image: © Getty Images
First published 2023
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© 2023 selection and editorial matter, Tony Tracy and Michaela
Schrage-Früh; individual chapters, the contributors
The right of Tony Tracy and Michaela Schrage-Früh to be identified
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British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Tracy, Tony, editor. | Schrage-Früh, Michaela, editor.
Title: Ageing masculinities in contemporary European and
Anglophone cinema / edited by Tony Tracy and Michaela
Schrage-Früh.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York : Routledge, 2023. |
Series: Routledge advances in film studies | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2022042343 (print) | LCCN 2022042344 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781032302287 (hardback) | ISBN 9781032306636
(paperback) | ISBN 9781003306146 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Masculinity in motion pictures. | Older people in
motion pictures.
Classification: LCC PN1995.9.A433 A4325 2023 (print) |
LCC PN1995.9.A433 (ebook) | DDC 791.43/65211—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022042343
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022042344
ISBN: 978-1-032-30228-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-30663-6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-30614-6 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003306146
Typeset in Sabon
by Apex CoVantage, LLC
Contents
Acknowledgements vii
List of Figures viii
Notes on Contributors ix
1 Introduction: Ageing Masculinities in Contemporary
European and Anglophone Cinema 1
TONY TRACY AND MICHAELA SCHRAGE-FRÜH
2 The Ageing of Men on Film: Concepts and Perspectives 11
MICHAEL KIMMEL
3 “Using the Difficulty”: Michael Caine as Ageing Rebel 17
ROBERT SHAIL
4 “A Porcelain Feeling”: Performance and Ageing in the Very
Late Films of John Gielgud 29
JONATHAN STUBBS
5 Ageing Disgracefully: Depardieu, Hallyday, Luchini,
and Silver Linings in Recent French Cinema 43
PHIL POWRIE
6 Jean Rochefort as Ageing Star: Masculinity and Masquerade 60
PHILIP DINE
7 From Mustang to 2CV: Ageing in Claude Lelouch’s
Un homme et une femme Trilogy 75
ÉAMON Ó COFAIGH
8 Ageing Male Melodrama and Post-Soviet Generational
Conflict in Contemporary Estonian Cinema 88
TEET TEINEMAA
vi Contents
9 Restitution and Ageing Masculinities in Post-1989
Czech Cinema 101
MATTHEW SWENEY
10 The (Im-)Possibility of Solidarity: Narratives of Ageing,
Masculinity, and Intergenerational Relationships in the
German Comedies We Are the New Ones (2014) and
Granny Nanny (2020) 119
LISA-NIKE BÜHRING
11 Ageing, Masculinity, and the Absurd in Toni Erdmann
(2016) 134
MICHAEL STEWART
12 “What Makes Us Alive”: The Ageing Artist in Paolo
Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty (2013) and Youth (2015) 148
MANUEL BARBERÁ
13 Masculinity, Creativity, and Successful Ageing in Pedro
Almodóvar’s Pain and Glory (2019) 160
HEATHER JERÓNIMO
14 Ageing Myths and Dark Romanticism in Albert Serra’s
Story of My Death (2013) 175
ESTHER ZAPLANA
15 Male Ageing and Retribution in Contemporary Action
Thrillers 189
THOMAS BRITT
16 De-ageing and Denying the “Older Man” in Recent
Hollywood 204
TIMOTHY SHARY
17 Our Fathers: Ageing Masculinities and Dementia
in Contemporary Film 213
TONY TRACY
Index 229
Acknowledgements
This collection developed from research and symposia undertaken as part of
the international research project “Gendering Age: Representations of Mas-
culinities and Ageing in Contemporary European Literatures and Cinemas”
(“MASCAGE”). We gratefully acknowledge the Irish Research Council
and the Gender-Net Plus ERA-Net Cofund for supporting this work. Spe-
cial thanks are due to project leaders Professor Josep M. Armengol (Spain)
and Professor Roberta Maierhofer (Austria), as well as to all participating
researchers, and especially our fellow team members at the University of
Galway, Dr Margaret O’Neill and Dr Áine Ní Léime. Sincere thanks to our
Routledge editors Suzanne Richardson and Tanushree Baijal for their inval-
uable support and guidance throughout the publication process. The project
began just before global COVID-19 restrictions were implemented, and so
we are above all especially grateful to the contributors to this volume for
participation in online events and for their ongoing commitment to develop-
ing their ideas against the backdrop of often uncontested assumptions about
social, cultural, and biological meanings of age and ageing.
Figures
4.1 Gielgud mentors his pupil from a sedentary position in
Shine (1996) 38
4.2 Gielgud raises his head towards the audience in
Catastrophe (2000) 40
5.1 The sculpture of Serge constructed from soft toys 46
5.2 The cover of Innocent 47
5.3 The strip search in Welcome to New York (2014) 48
5.4 Franck tries to recognize his hired killers from photos 50
5.5 The man-free utopia of an extended family 50
5.6 The extended family of Salaud, on t’aime (2014) 51
5.7 Germain fantasizes that he is in the room described in
Claude’s story 53
5.8 Martin spies on Gemma 54
Notes on Contributors
Manuel Barberá earned his PhD in Literature (cum laude and with an inter-
national mention) at Universitat de València, Spain, in 2020. He works as
a post-doctoral researcher at Universidad de Castilla–La Mancha, Spain,
where he analyses representations of ageing masculinities in European lit-
eratures and cinemas. He is author of Making the Best of a Bad Job: Rep-
resentations of Disability, Gender and Old Age in the Novels of Samuel
Beckett (Peter Lang, 2021).
Thomas Britt is Professor of Film and Video Studies at George Mason Uni-
versity, USA, where he teaches ethics and is the head of the screenwriting
concentration. He is a recipient of the university’s Teaching Excellence
Award. He writes about film, television, and music for various publica-
tions. His short film screenplays have been selected or awarded by more
than 100 film festivals and competitions internationally.
Lisa-Nike Bühring is a research assistant at the University of Applied Sci-
ences Fresenius, Germany, where she lectures in qualitative research and
media and cultural studies. Her research focuses on the analysis of the
socio-cultural frames of ageing and gender in the West and on gaining a
better understanding of how these narratives affect older people and par-
ticularly older men. She has contributed to the Encyclopaedia of Gender,
Media and Communication and is a member of the Centre for Women,
Ageing and Media (WAM); the European Network in Ageing Studies
(ENAS); Ageing + Communication + Technologies (ACT); the North
American Network of Ageing Studies (NANAS); and the Gender-Net
Plus ERA-Net project “MASCAGE – Gendering Age: Representations
of Masculinities and Ageing in Contemporary European Literatures and
Cinemas” (2019–2022).
Philip Dine is Personal Professor Emeritus at University of Galway, Ireland.
He has been a pioneering figure internationally in the cultural history
of French sport and the literary and cinematographic representations
of colonial conflict. He has published widely on representations of the
French empire and its cultural legacies in fields ranging from children’s
