An Introduction to World Cinema, 2d ed.

Worked perfect for my class

This book was pretty good. There we're various different types and ages of film to study in this book. Although, It doesn't have basic things like a good index and no glossary. This was difficult for test since definitions were pretty vauge in the book. The printing was also a bit off. There were parts of the book that were completely faded. Also, color pictures would be nice.

The book was exactly what I needed for class and meets all the requirements of my professor and myself. Thanks

Useful

i got the book quickly but thats the only good thing i have to say about my experience ( i only got it quickly because i paid 12 bucks to get it shipped in 2 days) the book is in terrible condition. while i knew that there would be writing on the pages, the condition of the book, specifically the spine of the book is terrible. it has tape on the spine, barely be holding it together but when i open the book and try to keep it open, the pages are coming loose and soon they'll probably be falling out. paid almost 17 bucks for a book in crappy condition (plus the 12 bucks of shipping, came out to almost 30 dollars) i would not recommend anyone use this seller. i ordered another book from your_online_bookstore and paid $0.58 for the book itself and only $6.99 for the shipping and it only took two days to arrive. the book itself is in great condition. even a third book that i tried ordering from goodwillbooks ended in a better experience for me which is impressive since they didn't even send me the book. the day after i placed the order, i received an email from them informing me that they had canceled my order because upon review of the book (as every seller should do) they had the integrity to be honest and decided the book was not in a good enough condition to sell. the reason was that the spine of the book was damaged. they apologized for the inconvenience and were very professional and truthful. i will not be purchasing anything else from this seller

as described and in timely manner.

Aristides Gazetas has managed to cram an insightful and relatively comprehensive history and analysis of world cinema between the covers of a single volume--no small feat. There are lacunae. The films surveyed tend to be European and American (inclusive of both the north and the south), and Asian and Indian cinema are short-changed. But such gaps are perhaps inevitable in a book that seeks to cover a great deal of ground.What Gazetas does, he does well. He begins with a survey of silent films, with an especially good chapter on D.W. Griffith, and moves on to consider movements such as French avant-garde cinema, the Hollywood phenomenon in all its stages, Italian neorealism, symbolist traditions (particularly Bergman and Bunuel), French New Wave, and postwar German and Italian cinema. He has a rather sketchy chapter on post-colonial narratives, and for this second edition he's added a couple of chapters: one on terrorism and cinema (which is in large part a recycling of the first edition's discussion of von Trotta's "Marianne and Juliane") and one on recent Canadian films.Throughout, Gazetas stresses that cinema is what the philosopher Wittgenstein would've called a "life form": a living phenomenon which arises from a particular historical and cultural context and which in turn influences the context that births it.* In a significant way, says Gazetas, contemporary life has been "cinematized." Cinematic images, metaphors, and frameworks have become a part of daily life and serve in part as filters through which we read and construct reality. So reflecting on world cinema isn't only an aesthetic or sociological enterprise. It's also a postmodern metaphysical one.Gazetas' book is a good place to begin for any serious student of film. It's well-written, cogently organized, loaded with stills, and features six intriguing guest essays (all of the are good; but for my money, the most intriguing is Andre Bazin's "The Evolution of the Language of Cinema"). When you read the book, be sure to have a pencil and paper handy to jot down the titles of all the films Gazetas' text will make you want to watch._________* Gazetas doesn't actually refer to Wittgenstein, but it seems to me that his understanding of cinema is compatible with the notion of "life form."

Very unorganized and boring. Had it for cinema class and it wasn't interesting at all. A lot of the information in it is repeated many times.