Overview

Renowned for making films that are at once sly domestic satires and heartbreaking 'social realist' dramas, British writer-director Mike Leigh confronts his viewers with an un-romanticized dramatization of modern-day society in the hopes of inspiring them to strive for greater self-awareness and compassion for others. This collection features new, interdisciplinary essays that cover all phases of the BAFTA-award-winner’s film career, from his early made-for-television film work to his theatrical releases, including Life is Sweet (1990), Naked (1993), Secrets & Lies (1996), Career Girls (1997), Topsy-Turvy (1999), All or Nothing (2002), Vera Drake (2004), Happy-Go-Lucky (2008) and Another Year (2010). With contributions from international scholars from a variety of fields, the essays in this collection cover individual films and the recurring themes and motifs in several films, such as representations of class and gender, and overt social commentary and political subtexts. Also covered are Leigh's visual stylizations and storytelling techniques ranging from explorations of the costume design to set design to the music and camerawork and editing; the collaborative process of ‘devising and directing’ a Mike Leigh film that involves character-building, world-construction, plotting, improvisations and script-writing; the process of funding and marketing for these seemingly 'uncommercial' projects, and a survey of Leigh’s critical reception and the existing writing on his work.

Full Product Details

Author:   Bryan Cardinale-Powell ,  Prof Marc DiPaolo (Moraine Valley Community College, USA)
Publisher:   Continuum Publishing Corporation
Imprint:   Continuum Publishing Corporation
Dimensions:   Width: 15.20cm , Height: 3.00cm , Length: 22.90cm
Weight:   0.670kg
ISBN:  

9781623565992

ISBN 10:   1623565995
Pages:   368
Publication Date:   04 July 2013
Audience:   College/higher education ,  Professional and scholarly ,  Tertiary & Higher Education ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Hardback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.

Table of Contents

Introduction: The Politics and Poetics of Comic-Realist Cinema, Marc DiPaolo I. Devising Leigh Christopher Meir - The Industry and/of the Auteur Robert Marchand - Devising and Directing Andrew Crowther - Every Performance is a Contrivance: Art & Truth in Topsy-Turvy Brenda Wentworth, Christopher Jordan, and Sharon Cogdill - Costuming Choices: Stylization and Leigh's Selective Realism Bryan Cardinale-Powell - Cultural Stillbirth: An examination of reactions to Vera Drake II. It’s an Ordinary Life Leonard Quart - The Uniqueness of Ordinary Lives: Home Sweet Home and Grown-Ups Sarah Godfrey - Masculinities and Male Identities from Bleak Moments to Happy-Go-Lucky William Verrone - Transgression and Transcendence III. Beyond Verisimilitude Stella Hockenhull - Melodrama and Tradition in Vera Drake and Another Year Frances Pheasant-Kelly - Class, Loss and Space: Reframing Secrets & Lies Bryan Cardinale-Powell - All or Nothing: Mike Leigh and the Fickle Finger IV. Leigh versus the Tories Steven Morrison - ‘Those Days Are Over’: Naked & Something Rotten in the 1990s Derek Gladwin - Gendered Troubles on Screen: Reproducing Nationalism in Four Days in July Ana Miller - Fluctuating Identifications, Learning Disability, and Class in Meantime Kevin M. Flanagan - The Grotesque State of the Nation: Mike Leigh’s High Hopes and the Thatcherite Comedy of Errors David Sweeney - 'I Spy': Mike Leigh in the Age of Britpop About the Contributors Index

Reviews

Including complete documentation of each essay and citation, sketches of the editors and authors, and a seven-page index, this is the best book on Leigh since Sean O'Sullivan's Mike Leigh (CH, Apr'12, 49-4358). Summing Up Highly recommended. All readers. R. Blackwood, emeritus, City Colleges of Chicago, CHOICE The significance of Cardinale-Powell and DiPaolo s editorial achievement and approach in Devised and Directed by Mike Leigh resides in the extent to which their agenda frequently mirrors the terms of Leigh s cinematic equivalents. Like several great movies by that writer/director, this book manages to be both sympathetic and judicious in its collection and subsequent choreography of a potentially unworkable array of competing individual perspectives on a central subject. It extends existing critical debates around Leigh s film and television career and opens up new avenues of inquiry. In so doing, it both justifies its own existence and also prepares the ground for further Mike Leigh scholarship yet to come. Jonathan Murray, Cineaste

Including complete documentation of each essay and citation, sketches of the editors and authors, and a seven-page index, this is the best book on Leigh since Sean O'Sullivan's Mike Leigh (CH, Apr'12, 49-4358). Summing Up Highly recommended. All readers. --R. Blackwood, emeritus, City Colleges of Chicago, CHOICE The significance of Cardinale-Powell and DiPaolo's editorial achievement and approach in Devised and Directed by Mike Leigh resides in the extent to which their agenda frequently mirrors the terms of Leigh's cinematic equivalents. Like several great movies by that writer/director, this book manages to be both sympathetic and judicious in its collection and subsequent choreography of a potentially unworkable array of competing individual perspectives on a central subject. It extends existing critical debates around Leigh's film and television career and opens up new avenues of inquiry. In so doing, it both justifies its own existence and also prepares the ground for further Mike Leigh scholarship yet to come. -Jonathan Murray, Cineaste Including complete documentation of each essay and citation, sketches of the editors and authors, and a seven-page index, this is the best book on Leigh since Sean O'Sullivan's Mike Leigh (CH, Apr'12, 49-4358). Summing Up Highly recommended. All readers. R. Blackwood, emeritus, City Colleges of Chicago, CHOICE The significance of Cardinale-Powell and DiPaolo s editorial achievement and approach in Devised and Directed by Mike Leigh resides in the extent to which their agenda frequently mirrors the terms of Leigh s cinematic equivalents. Like several great movies by that writer/director, this book manages to be both sympathetic and judicious in its collection and subsequent choreography of a potentially unworkable array of competing individual perspectives on a central subject. It extends existing critical debates around Leigh s film and television career and opens up new avenues of inquiry. In so doing, it both justifies its own existence and also prepares the ground for further Mike Leigh scholarship yet to come. Jonathan Murray, Cineaste

Including complete documentation of each essay and citation, sketches of the editors and authors, and a seven-page index, this is the best book on Leigh since Sean O'Sullivan's Mike Leigh (CH, Apr'12, 49-4358). Summing Up: Highly recommended. All readers. -- R. Blackwood, emeritus, City Colleges of Chicago * CHOICE * The significance of Cardinale-Powell and DiPaolo’s editorial achievement and approach in Devised and Directed by Mike Leigh resides in the extent to which their agenda frequently mirrors the terms of Leigh’s cinematic equivalents. Like several great movies by that writer/director, this book manages to be both sympathetic and judicious in its collection and subsequent choreography of a potentially unworkable array of competing individual perspectives on a central subject. It extends existing critical debates around Leigh’s film and television career and opens up new avenues of inquiry. In so doing, it both justifies its own existence and also prepares the ground for further Mike Leigh scholarship yet to come. -- Jonathan Murray * Cineaste * The Devised and Directed by Mark Leigh is a must read for people seeking to understand the technicalities related in filmmaking. It will be very helpful to researchers, academicians, practitioners and lay readers to understand the art of story telling, film direction and studies. -- Swati Bute, AMITY University, India * Cinema Journal * As this welcome collection of critical essays makes clear, the work of Mike Leigh continues to be as much deserving of attention from film scholars, as from journalists and reviewers. Devised and Directed by Mike Leigh offers ambitiously wide-ranging theoretical perspectives and approaches, and its contributors have produced new insights and interesting discussion of the work. As a result, it should serve both its primary academic audience, and ‘any informed reader who is a fan of Leigh’s work,’ very well indeed. -- Anne Hogan, Lecturer in Film, University of Southampton, UK

Author Information

Bryan Cardinale-Powell is Visiting Professor of Moving Image Arts at Oklahoma City University, US. Marc DiPaolo is Assistant Professor of English and Film at Oklahoma City University, US.

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