Table Of ContentFILM AND THE NATURAL ENVIRONMENT
ELEMENTS AND ATMOSPHERES
ADAM O’BRIEN
SHORT CUTS
SHORT CUTS
INTRODUCTIONS TO FILM STUDIES
OTHER SELECT TITLES IN THE SHORT CUTS SERIES
THE HORROR GENRE: FROM BEELZEBUB TO BLAIR WITCH Paul Wells
THE STAR SYSTEM: HOLLYWOOD’S 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-SCÈNE: FILM STYLE AND INTERPRETATION John Gibbs
NEW CHINESE CINEMA: CHALLENGING REPRESENTATIONS Sheila Cornelius
ANIMATION: GENRE AND AUTHORSHIP Paul Wells
WOMEN’S 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 O’Pray
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 Krämer
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 Belén Vidal
QUEER CINEMA: SCHOOLGIRLS, VAMPIRES AND GAY COWBOYS Barbara Mennel
ACTION MOVIES: THE CINEMA OF STRIKING BACK Harvey O’Brien
BOLLYWOOD: GODS, GLAMOUR AND GOSSIP Kush Varia
THE SPORTS FILM: GAMES PEOPLE PLAY Bruce Babington
THE HEIST FILM: STEALING WITH STYLE Daryl Lee
INTERNATIONAL POLITICS AND FILM: SPACE, VISION, POWER Sean Carter and Klaus Dodds
FILM THEORY: CREATING A CINEMATIC GRAMMAR Felicity Colman
BIO-PICS: A LIFE IN PICTURES Ellen Cheshire
THE GANGSTER FILM: FATAL SUCCESS IN AMERICAN CINEMA Ron Wilson
FILM PROGRAMMING: CURATING FOR CINEMAS, FESTIVALS, ARCHIVES Peter Bosma
POSTMODERNISM AND FILM: RETHINKING HOLLYWOOD’S AESTHETICS Catherine Constable
THE ROAD MOVIE: IN SEARCH OF MEANING Neil Archer
PRISON MOVIES: CINEMA BEHIND BARS Kevin Kehrwald
THE CHILDREN’S FILM: GENRE, NATION, AND NARRATIVE Noel Brown
SILENT CINEMA: BEFORE THE PICTURES GOT SMALL Lawrence Napper
TRASH CINEMA: THE LURE OF THE LOW Guy Barefoot
F I L M A N D T H E N AT U R A L
E N V I R O N M E N T
ELEMENTS AND ATMOSPHERES
ADAM O’BRIEN
WALLFLOWER
LONDON and NEW YORK
A Wallflower Press book
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Columbia University Press
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Cover image: Still the Water (2014) © Soda Pictures
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vii
Introduction 1
1 Film Studies and the Natural Environment 7
2 Film Narrative and the Natural Environment 31
3 Film Genre and the Natural Environment 52
4 National Cinemas and the Natural Environment 73
Conclusion 96
Filmography 104
Bibliography 108
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v
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I wrote this book since joining the Department of Film, Theatre & Television
at the University of Reading, and can only hope that it reflects some of
the qualities which have made this such an ideal place for sharing and
exploring ideas about cinema. At Reading, Lisa Purse, John Gibbs, Tamara
Courage and Stefan Solomon deserve particular thanks. Michael Malay
(Bristol) offered some typically astute suggestions, Alastair Phillips
(Warwick) recommended an excellent book at an opportune moment, and
Yoram Allon (Commissioning Editor at Wallflower Press) was patient and
encouraging from start to finish.
I am doubly fortunate to have a loving family surrounded by more loving
family, and am grateful for how much they all support my work. Roddy,
Joseph and Ruth are the distractions one could hope for, and Rebecca con-
tinues to know and help me in countless ways.
vii
INTRODUCTION
Is Titanic (1997) a film about nature? We might instinctively say that it is,
on the grounds that the film’s drama is based on a catastrophe suffered at
sea, instigated by a force beyond human, social influence. Until we recall
that Titanic places a heavy emphasis on the culpability of certain people,
and wonder whether that makes it a work less about nature. But would the
film’s meanings, effects and pleasures be the same had the disaster been
distinctively man-made (a declaration of war, for example)? And if Titanic
seems to be positing nature as an antagonist, distinct from social phe-
nomena such as capitalism, class and technology, does that mean that the
iceberg represents nature? What about the wind which blows against Jack
(Leonardo DiCaprio) and Rose (Kate Winslet) as they stand at the bow of
the ship, and which enables Rose’s fantasy of flying? How can one natural
feature take meaningful priority over another? Where does nature begin
and end?
Raymond Williams suggests that since nature is a word ‘which carries,
over a very long period, many of the major variations of human thought […]
it is necessary to be especially aware of its difficulty’ (2014: 189). ‘Nature’,
‘natural’ and related terms have received much interrogation, and rightly
so; understanding the divide between ‘natural’ and ‘unnatural’ is an
activity of huge political, ethical, scientific and philosophical complexity.
Likewise ‘human’ and ‘non-human’, ‘environment’ and ‘landscape’, ‘local’
and ‘global’, ‘object’ and ‘organism’, among others. The language and
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