Performing Femininity: Woman as Performer in Early Russian Cinema

Description

More than three decades have passed since the establishment of the Islamic Republic of Iran in 1979. In that time, theories of modern revolution would suggest a retreat from ideological goals, heralding a phase of institutional development. However, Hamad Albloshi argues that Iran is unique: the current rhetoric of conservative Iranian leaders implies the regime has not left its revolutionary stage. Through an examination of the hardline conservative ideology in Iran-personified by the former president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad-this book explores how the usual development seen in revolutions from radical discourse to pragmatic rhetoric has not been the case in Iran. Albloshi explores the evolution of the hardline conservatives and their main ideas about the nature of the Iranian regime, their position toward other groups within the system, and their approach to the international community. By doing so, he sheds new light on the group's position in the country and the ideological roots of major shifts that occurred in Iran's internal and external policies in the period between 2005 and 2013. Cover Half-title Endorsement Series information Title page Copyright information Table of contents List of Illustrations General Editors’ Preface Acknowledgements Note on Transliteration Introduction 1 The Oriental Dancer The first Russian feature film: the first steps towards the creation of a new art form The Persian princess: the first female performer of Russian film The objectified performer: ‘blocking’, visual pleasure and male fantasy The death of the dancer and the murderer’s motives: homosociality and self-preservation From fantasy figure to femme fatale: the Persian princess and ‘Salomania’ The spectator’s response: triumph, or tragedy? 2 The Peasant Girl and the Boyar’s Ward Olga: dancing and desire Lusha: dancing, incest and suicide Blocking Privileging the female narrative perspective: natural settings and the mobile camera Lusha: from victim to author of her own fate The ‘full scene’ and the snokhach: from victimiser to victim 3 The Opera Singer The first professional female performer: Evgenii Bauer’s Vera Dubrovskaia ‘Becoming’ a woman, 1: objectification, idealisation and enculturation ‘Becoming’ a woman, 2: agency ‘Becoming’ a woman, 3: encountering opposition Vera and the workman Vera and the prince ‘Becoming’ a woman, 4: on stage – imitation, masquerade and performing gender ‘Becoming’ a woman, 5: off stage – new womanhood and feminism 4 From the Oriental Dancer to the Tango-Woman Grigorii Libkin’s Stenka Razin Evgenii Bauer’s Child of the Big City Mary and the Salome dancer Mary through Mary’s eyes? Mary through ‘male’ eyes: from ancient mythologies to new archetypes of fatal femininity Mary through Viktor’s eyes Mary through Bauer’s eyes: the tango-woman as an emblem of the new age Evgenii Bauer’s Silent Witnesses [Nemye svideteli] The fate of the tango dancer in later pre-Revolutionary films 5 The Gypsy Dancer Sources of the myth Re-enacting nineteenth-century myths: the first films on the Gypsy theme Modernising and undermining the nineteenth-century myths of the tsyganka The tsyganka as dikovinka: Evgenii Bauer’s Children of the Age The tsyganka as New Woman: Petr Chardynin’s The Love of a Councillor of State 6 From the Ballerina to the Early Modern Dancer Early Russian film representations of the ballerina Aleksandr Shiriaev’s The Artist Pierrots [P´ero-khudozhniki] From the feminist perspective: later filmic representations of the ballerina Wladyslaw Starewicz’s dragonfly-ballerina Boris Chaikovskii’s A Ballerina’s Romance [Roman baleriny, 1916]: the ballerina as ‘real’ woman Mad love. From idolatry through necrolatry to murder: two films by Evgenii Bauer Daydreams The ideal: the dead wife The reality: the living mistress The Dying Swan Beyond the ballerina: the early modern dancer Petr Chardynin’s Vera Nevolina From literature to film: Anastasiia Verbitskaia’s Mania Eltsova Evgenii Bauer’s Duncan-esque dancer 7 The Actress Film, literature and life: barbarous liberties and arbitrary alterations? The actress as cultural stereotype From Turgenev’s Klara Milich to Bauer’s Zoia Kadmina: the actress as real woman Alterations, excisions and additions Anatomy of a cinematic sequence The close-up The track-in Moving closer to the camera From Zoia’s point of view Andrei’s Zoia: photographs, dreams and visions From staged suicide to social protest Reviving Kadmina and updating her legend: the creation of a cinematic heroine Privileging the cinematic Conclusion Performing femininity in an age of social change: the female performer as New Woman Performing femininity: the female performer as the embodiment of a theoretical idea Performing femininity in an age of artistic change: the female performer as cinematic heroine A new symbolic value: the female performer as an emblem of the pre-Revolutionary film industry Coda Beyond 1918: reversing pre-Revolutionary gender roles Notes Introduction 1. The Oriental Dancer 2. The Peasant Girl and the Boyar’s Ward 3. The Opera Singer 4. From the Oriental Dancer to the Tango-Woman 5. The Gypsy Dancer 6. From the Ballerina to the Early Modern Dancer 7. The Actress Conclusion Coda Bibliography Filmography Films Whose Director Is Unknown Index