Relaying Cinema in Midcentury Iran: Material Cultures in Transit

by Kaveh Askari

Overview

Relaying Cinema in Midcentury Iran investigates how the cultural translation of cinema has been shaped by the physical translation of its ephemera. Kaveh Askari examines film circulation and its effect on Iranian film culture in the period before foreign studios established official distribution channels and Iran became a notable site of world cinema. This transcultural history draws on cross-archival comparison of films, distributor memos, licensing contracts, advertising schemes, and audio recordings. Askari meticulously tracks the fragile and sometimes forgotten material of film as it circulated through the Middle East into Iran and shows how this material was rerouted, reengineered, and reimagined in the process.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520329768
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	01/25/2022
Series:	Cinema Cultures in Contact , #2
Edition description:	First Edition
Pages:	260
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Kaveh Askari is Associate Professor and Director of the Film Studies Program at Michigan State University. He is author of Making Movies into Art.   

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations vii

Acknowledgments xi

Note on Transliteration and Titles xvii

Introduction 1

1 An Afterlife for Junk Prints 26

Film Traffic and Regional Influence 29

Serials Out of Sync 33

Ironies of Appropriation 41

2 Circulation Worries 45

Sustenance: Engineering and Maintenance 47

Copyright: The Public Good and Creativity 53

License: Junk Prints and Affidavits of Destruction 60

Obsolescence: Dubbing Technologies and Leverage 68

3 Collage Sound as Industrial Practice 81

Founding and the Found 83

Archiving, Assembly, and Recognition 88

Temp Love, Out of Sync 94

Relaying the Popular Song 103

4 The Anxious Exuberance of Tehran Noir 114

The Crime Thriller as Currency in the Press 121

Currency Disputes 129

Aesthetic Standards and Scarce Resources 137

Modularity and Fluency 141

Mixed Signals of Kin and Home 146

5 Eastern Boys and Failed Heroes 160

Year of The Heroes 163

Failures of The Heroes 167

Kimiai's First Film Cycle 173

Sponsorship, Nostalgia, and Collecting 178

Under the Sign of Rio Bravo 180

Coda 189

Notes 199

Index 233