Politics of Architecture in Contemporary Argentine Cinema

verfasst von: Prof. Amanda Holmes

Verlag: Springer International Publishing

Buchreihe : Hispanic Urban Studies

Enthalten in: Springer Professional "Wirtschaft+Technik" , Springer Professional "Technik" , Springer Professional "Wirtschaft"

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Über dieses Buch

This book considers how architectural landmarks, imagined buildings and urban landscapes take part in the production of meaning in contemporary Argentine cinema. From the iconic Buenos Aires Obelisk to the Hilton International Hotel, the shopping center to the café and the Le Corbusier-designed Curutchet House to the gated community, architecture in these films evokes the political. Tracing architecture’s expression through six films produced since the 1990s—Pizza birra faso, Mundo grúa, Nueve reinas, La niña santa, La antena and El hombre de al lado—Amanda Holmes studies how architecture in cinema elicits political memory, underscores marginalization and class discrepancies, creates nostalgia for neighborhoods and re-evaluates existing communities. Generously illustrated and carefully researched, the book offers an in-depth reading of key contemporary Argentine films and a fresh architectural approach to film analysis.

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Frontmatter

Chapter 1. Introduction

Abstract

This chapter provides a theoretical framework for the study of architecture in Argentine film, especially in the ideas of Giuliana Bruno, Beatriz Sarlo and Anthony Vidler. It traces the recent architectural history of Argentina as well as the recent history of the Argentine film industry. Finally, it discusses the representation of architecture in Argentine cinema from the 1980s to the present.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 2. Pizza birra faso: Buildings of Hierarchy and Exclusion

Abstract

Pizza birra faso draws out the significance of built environments to then question, subvert and even ridicule them. Indeed, rather than underline the power exuded by downtown sites, this chapter argues that the film sarcastically challenges their authority by cinematographically framing authoritative architecture in contact with marginalized protagonists. The young protagonists’ circulation through Buenos Aires highlights the underside of the city that is lived by the unemployed, the homeless and the delinquent.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 3. Machinations of Urban Development and the Construction Industry in Mundo grúa

Abstract

This chapter interprets both the sociopolitical and the symbolic representation of the construction industry in Mundo grúa. Through the construction metaphor, the film represents a disconnect between “machines” and the people who can control, fix and operate them. The victimization of protagonists who seek employment points to the deterioration of economic and political support for the working class. Excluded both from the construction of the buildings as well as from the buildings themselves, this representation of urban development underscores systemic political flaws. This chapter analyzes first the film’s representation of a construction crane as reflecting access to power, to finally interpreting the construction metaphor as reflecting changes in social, economic and political standing.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 4. Properties of Glass in Nueve reinas

Abstract

While the characters work their fraudulent schemes, the Buenos Aires architecture that surrounds them enhances the manipulations of the plot. Nueve reinas takes place in two categories of built environments: “old” Buenos Aires characterized by the downtown street, the typical apartment-style housing, the cafés and the Kavanagh Building; and neoliberal Buenos Aires represented by the Hilton Hotel, the Esso gas station and the Banco Sudamericano. Over the course of the film, the architecture helps demonstrate a cultural transformation of the city from the small-town fraud representative of “old” Buenos Aires to the overwhelming deceit embodied by the contemporary neoliberal city.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 5. The Hotel Termas in La niña santa: Unstable Frames and Open Boundaries

Abstract

Through its architectural mise-en-scène, this chapter claims that La niña santa defies hegemonic aesthetics for framing interior space and reflects questions about order formation in contemporary Argentina. Aspects of the historic Hotel Termas de Rosario de la Frontera seep uncannily into the film’s narrative, creating unstable possibilities for a representational reading of the film. The cinematography enhances further this instability to captures certain architectural features in excess; both sides of the oppositional spatial binaries of surface and depth, framing and obfuscation are accentuated relentlessly through the camera lens, while the social boundaries of public and private assigned to spaces are challenged persistently through the characters’ actions and relationships.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 6. Paper Architecture and Totalitarian Propaganda in La antena

Abstract

Through an intertextual relationship with films of the past, La antena criticizes the oppression of media corporations and calls for resistance against this “totalitarian” power. This chapter first analyzes recycled filmic images to then focus on the film’s particular uses of architecture. Symbolic of the malleability of the population, paper architecture in the form of a city maquette and a fantastical antenna factory underscore the media’s autocratic power. Three Buenos Aires buildings are introduced to emphasize key sociopolitical critiques: the Confitería Ideal associated with the Argentine elite; the Facultad de Derecho with overreaching government power; and the former Biblioteca Nacional with the denigration of the written word. Marking principal concepts, this carefully designed scenography supports the film’s representation of the excessive power of today’s media.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 7. The Architectural Promenade and the Cinematic Window in El hombre de al lado

Abstract

While this filming location might offer the directors an explicit means for underlining the socioeconomic discrepancies between neighbors, it also adds a rich conceptual network through the architectural significance of the property and the connections it provokes between the arts of architecture and film. This chapter first incorporates Le Corbusier’s ideas on architecture and cinema, as well as the architect’s concept of the promenade, in their application to the representation of the Curutchet House in El hombre de al lado. The second part of the chapter focuses on the film’s construction of links between optics and architecture to compare the window with the camera lens and eye to underscore the role of vision—and the possibility of deception—in the understanding of the Other.

Amanda Holmes

Chapter 8. Conclusion

Abstract

This concluding chapter discusses architecture as a means for creating community in Argentina. It focuses on the sites of the café and the gated community as two structures represented in contemporary film that contemplate community development from opposing perspectives. The café fosters a sense of belonging through nostalgia, while the gated community seeks to create community by bringing its members into an exclusive enclave.

Amanda Holmes

Backmatter

Titel: Politics of Architecture in Contemporary Argentine Cinema
verfasst von: Prof. Amanda Holmes
Verlag: Springer International Publishing
Electronic ISBN: 978-3-319-55191-3
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-55190-6
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-55191-3