Cultivating Extreme Art Cinema

Examines the phenomenon of extreme cinema through an in-depth application of paratextual theory

Using paratextual theory to address the accusations of gimmickry often directed towards extreme art films, Cultivating Extreme Art Cinema: Text, Paratext, and Home Video Culture focuses upon the DVD and Blu-ray object, analysing how sleeve designs, blurbs, and special features shape the identity of the film and prepare the audience for a particular type of cinematic experience. The book discusses the complex interactions that take place on these commercial artefacts, the ways they communicate to both ‘highbrow’ and ‘lowbrow’ audiences, and the manner in which they breach tradition taste distinctions. Including case studies of features like Cannibal Holocaust, Funny Games and Antichrist, the book explores the complicated dichotomies between art and exploitation films to present a fluid history of extreme art cinema.

Key features

• Argues for the critical and cultural significance of paratexts, and the DVD in particular, in shaping our interaction with extreme art cinema
• Provides primary analysis to help examine existing debates surrounding extreme art cinema and its employment of exploitation traditions
• Introduces a novel area of paratextual investigation which moves away from the more traditional exploration of epiphenomena associated with large fan properties
• Highlights the way paratextual materials define the identity of a text through their application of certain signifiers
• Complicates the dichotomies between art and exploitation cinema to present a fluid history of extreme art cinema
• Inserts exploitation cinema more definitively into discourses of extreme art film