R&L Logo R&L Logo
  • GENERAL
    • Browse by Subjects
    • New Releases
    • Coming Soon
    • Chases's Calendar
  • ACADEMIC
    • Textbooks
    • Browse by Course
    • Instructor's Copies
    • Monographs & Research
    • Reference
  • PROFESSIONAL
    • Education
    • Intelligence & Security
    • Library Services
    • Business & Leadership
    • Museum Studies
    • Music
    • Pastoral Resources
    • Psychotherapy
  • FREUD SET
Cover Image
Hardback
eBook
share of facebook share on twitter
Add to GoodReads

The Apocalypse in Film

Dystopias, Disasters, and Other Visions about the End of the World

Edited by Karen A. Ritzenhoff and Angela Krewani

We live in a world at risk. Dire predictions about our future or the demise of planet earth persist. Even fictional representations depict narratives of decay and the end of a commonly shared social reality. Along with recurring Hollywood blockbusters that imagine the end of the world, there has been a new wave of zombie features as well as independent films that offer various visions of the future.

The Apocalypse in Film: Dystopias, Disasters, and Other Visions about the End of the World offers an overview of Armageddon in film from the silent era to the present. This collection of essays discusses how such films reflect social anxieties—ones that are linked to economic, ecological, and cultural factors. Featuring a broad spectrum of international scholars specializing in different historical genres and methodologies, these essays look at a number of films, including the silent classic The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the black comedy Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, the Mayan calendar disaster epic, 2012, and in particular, Lars Von Trier’s Melancholia, the focus of several essays.

As some filmmakers translate the anxiety about a changing global climate and geo-political relations into visions of the apocalypse, others articulate worries about the planet’s future by depicting chemical warfare, environmental disasters, or human made destruction. This book analyzes the emergence of apocalyptic and dystopic narratives and explores the political and social situations on which these films are based. Contributing to the dialogue on dystopic culture in war and peace, The Apocalypse in Film will be of interest to scholars in film and media studies, border studies, gender studies, sociology, and political science.
  • Details
  • Details
  • Author
  • Author
  • TOC
  • TOC
  • Reviews
  • Reviews
Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Pages: 254 • Trim: 6¼ x 9½
978-1-4422-6027-6 • Hardback • December 2015 • $117.00 • (£90.00)
978-1-4422-6029-0 • eBook • December 2015 • $111.00 • (£85.00)
Subjects: Performing Arts / Film / History & Criticism, Performing Arts / Film & Video / Genres, Performing Arts / Science Fiction, Performing Arts / Horror
Karen A. Ritzenhoff is professor in the Department of Communication at Central Connecticut State University and is also affiliated with the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program. She is the co-editor of Screening the Dark Side of Love: From Euro-Horror to American Cinema (2012) and Selling Sex on Screen: From Weimar Cinema to Zombie Porn (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015).

Angela Krewani is professor for Media Studies at Philipps University in Marburg, Germany. She is the co-editor of Hollywood – Recent Developments (2005) and McLuhan’s Global Village Today (2014).
Acknowledgements
IntroductionKaren A. Ritzenhoff and Angela Krewani
PART ITHE EARLY DEPICTIONS OF DISASTER
Chapter 1World War One and Hollywood’s First Modern Armageddon: Understanding Wartime and Post-Conflict Representations of a Global Cataclysm in Civilization (1916) and The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
Clémentine Tholas-Disset
Chapter 2The End of the World: Loss and Redemption in Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
Karen Randell
PART IIGLOBAL DEMISE AND COLD WAR
Chapter 3‘Radiation’s rising, but one mustn’t grumble too much’: Nuclear Apocalypse Played as Farce in Richard Lester’s The Bed-Sitting Room (1969)
Thomas Prasch
Chapter 4The Legacy of Dr. Strangelove: Stanley Kubrick, Science Fiction Blockbusters and the Future of Humanity
Peter Krämer
Chapter 5‘Gentleman, You Can’t Fight in Here’: Gender Symbolism and the End of the World in Dr. Strangelove and Melancholia
Catriona McAvoy
PART IIIMELANCHOLIA AND OTHER REPRESENTATIONS OF THE APOCALYPSE
Chapter 6 Is There an End to It? Fictional Shelters and Shelter-Fiction
Solvejg Nitzke
Chapter 7Melancholia and the Apocalypse Within
Pierre Floquet
Chapter 8Eco Apocalypse: Environmentalism, Political Alienation and Therapeutic Agency
Philip Hammond and Hugh Ortega Breton
PART IVPOLITICS OF SHOWING THE UNTHINKABLE
Chapter 9Disaster Films: The End of the World and the Risk Society Hero
Frederick Wasser
Chapter 10 The (Gender) Politics of Disaster in 2012 (2009)
Charles Antoine Courcoux
Chapter 11Tarkovsky’s The Sacrifice: A Religious Humanist Apocalypse
Tatjana Ljujić
Chapter 12Dead Narratives: Defining Humanity Through Stories
A. Fiona Pearson and Scott Ellis
PART VMOVING BEYOND THE END OF THE WORLD
Chapter 13Opposing Thatcherism: Filmic Apocalypse as a Political Strategy in 1980s Britain
Angela Krewani
Chapter 14Painting in Time: On the Use of Digital Visual Effects in Melancholia (2011)
Andreas Kirchner
Chapter 15The Corporate and Corporeal: Min(d)ing the Body—Conscience and Consumption in Early 21st Century Hollywood Dystopia
Wendy Sterba
Index
About the Editors and Contributors
Ritzenhoff and Krewani introduce and present essays on the ‘filmic and narrative representations of contemporary catastrophes,’ including television programs, digital media, and even action figures associated with those media. Since ‘apocalypse’ can mean different things—destruction, devastation, disaster, revelation—the contributors of the 15 essays go in a variety of directions in exploring their subjects. Several essays treat Lars von Trier’s Melancholia (2011), an international art film that renewed critical interest in apocalyptic cinema. Other films covered include The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Rex Ingram, 1921), Dr. Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick, 1964), and The Sacrifice (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1986). Also considered are zombies in Night of the Living Dead (George Romero, 1968) and The Walking Dead (Frank Darabont, 2010). An intriguing essay by Frederick Wasser shows how producer Irwin Allen’s disaster films (e.g., The Towering Inferno, 1974) were rendered obsolete by Steven Spielberg’s Jaws (1975). This collection joins Kristen Moana Thompson’s Apocalyptic Dread: American Film at the Turn of the Millennium (CH, Nov'07, 45-1383), another readable, exciting work on films about last things. Film stills are well chosen.

Summing Up: Recommended. All readers.

— Choice Reviews


One whose interest in cinema transcends mere entertainment may find this collection of theories and analyses quite fascinating.
— Free Kittens Movie Guide


From the cruel winds of austerity to the savage songs of war and terror, the end of times proclamations surround us. Our cinema is filled with the rubble of catastrophe and our stories with the characters of nihilism and annihilation. In this incredibly timely and wonderfully structured collection on the apocalypse, chaos and catastrophe are examined across the history of film and through a remarkably interesting set of themes. From the war film to the science fiction spectacle, from the melancholia of dark dystopias to the hungriness of the zombie film, we see the world ending, and with it a present already dead and a future not yet born. Each chapter is filled with insightful textual and contextual analysis as the dead skin of past and present decompose and recompose before us. A must read and must have collection for those interested in the chaos within cinema.
— Sean Redmond, Deakin University


Using the depiction of human-made catastrophe in more than a century of apocalyptic film-making the authors of this first-rate, edited volume analyze political, social, racial, gender, religious, and ecological problems threatening the real world—often in different ways than presented in movies. This book is an excellent example of contemporary scholars looking at popular culture, here motion pictures, as at times reflecting and more often disregarding reality.
— Brigitte Nacos, Columbia Univeristy


This collection of essays, edited by Karen A. Ritzenhoff and Angela Krewani, accounts for the omnipresence of the apocalypse in English-language cinema, a motif which represents a particularly potent allegory in our globalized world. I was very much impressed by the sheer novelty and range of the in-depth explorations the book offers.
— David Roche, Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès


The Apocalypse in Film

Dystopias, Disasters, and Other Visions about the End of the World

Cover Image
Hardback
eBook
Summary
Summary
  • We live in a world at risk. Dire predictions about our future or the demise of planet earth persist. Even fictional representations depict narratives of decay and the end of a commonly shared social reality. Along with recurring Hollywood blockbusters that imagine the end of the world, there has been a new wave of zombie features as well as independent films that offer various visions of the future.

    The Apocalypse in Film: Dystopias, Disasters, and Other Visions about the End of the World offers an overview of Armageddon in film from the silent era to the present. This collection of essays discusses how such films reflect social anxieties—ones that are linked to economic, ecological, and cultural factors. Featuring a broad spectrum of international scholars specializing in different historical genres and methodologies, these essays look at a number of films, including the silent classic The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the black comedy Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, the Mayan calendar disaster epic, 2012, and in particular, Lars Von Trier’s Melancholia, the focus of several essays.

    As some filmmakers translate the anxiety about a changing global climate and geo-political relations into visions of the apocalypse, others articulate worries about the planet’s future by depicting chemical warfare, environmental disasters, or human made destruction. This book analyzes the emergence of apocalyptic and dystopic narratives and explores the political and social situations on which these films are based. Contributing to the dialogue on dystopic culture in war and peace, The Apocalypse in Film will be of interest to scholars in film and media studies, border studies, gender studies, sociology, and political science.
Details
Details
  • Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
    Pages: 254 • Trim: 6¼ x 9½
    978-1-4422-6027-6 • Hardback • December 2015 • $117.00 • (£90.00)
    978-1-4422-6029-0 • eBook • December 2015 • $111.00 • (£85.00)
    Subjects: Performing Arts / Film / History & Criticism, Performing Arts / Film & Video / Genres, Performing Arts / Science Fiction, Performing Arts / Horror
Author
Author
  • Karen A. Ritzenhoff is professor in the Department of Communication at Central Connecticut State University and is also affiliated with the Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies Program. She is the co-editor of Screening the Dark Side of Love: From Euro-Horror to American Cinema (2012) and Selling Sex on Screen: From Weimar Cinema to Zombie Porn (Rowman & Littlefield, 2015).

    Angela Krewani is professor for Media Studies at Philipps University in Marburg, Germany. She is the co-editor of Hollywood – Recent Developments (2005) and McLuhan’s Global Village Today (2014).
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
  • Acknowledgements
    IntroductionKaren A. Ritzenhoff and Angela Krewani
    PART ITHE EARLY DEPICTIONS OF DISASTER
    Chapter 1World War One and Hollywood’s First Modern Armageddon: Understanding Wartime and Post-Conflict Representations of a Global Cataclysm in Civilization (1916) and The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
    Clémentine Tholas-Disset
    Chapter 2The End of the World: Loss and Redemption in Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (1921)
    Karen Randell
    PART IIGLOBAL DEMISE AND COLD WAR
    Chapter 3‘Radiation’s rising, but one mustn’t grumble too much’: Nuclear Apocalypse Played as Farce in Richard Lester’s The Bed-Sitting Room (1969)
    Thomas Prasch
    Chapter 4The Legacy of Dr. Strangelove: Stanley Kubrick, Science Fiction Blockbusters and the Future of Humanity
    Peter Krämer
    Chapter 5‘Gentleman, You Can’t Fight in Here’: Gender Symbolism and the End of the World in Dr. Strangelove and Melancholia
    Catriona McAvoy
    PART IIIMELANCHOLIA AND OTHER REPRESENTATIONS OF THE APOCALYPSE
    Chapter 6 Is There an End to It? Fictional Shelters and Shelter-Fiction
    Solvejg Nitzke
    Chapter 7Melancholia and the Apocalypse Within
    Pierre Floquet
    Chapter 8Eco Apocalypse: Environmentalism, Political Alienation and Therapeutic Agency
    Philip Hammond and Hugh Ortega Breton
    PART IVPOLITICS OF SHOWING THE UNTHINKABLE
    Chapter 9Disaster Films: The End of the World and the Risk Society Hero
    Frederick Wasser
    Chapter 10 The (Gender) Politics of Disaster in 2012 (2009)
    Charles Antoine Courcoux
    Chapter 11Tarkovsky’s The Sacrifice: A Religious Humanist Apocalypse
    Tatjana Ljujić
    Chapter 12Dead Narratives: Defining Humanity Through Stories
    A. Fiona Pearson and Scott Ellis
    PART VMOVING BEYOND THE END OF THE WORLD
    Chapter 13Opposing Thatcherism: Filmic Apocalypse as a Political Strategy in 1980s Britain
    Angela Krewani
    Chapter 14Painting in Time: On the Use of Digital Visual Effects in Melancholia (2011)
    Andreas Kirchner
    Chapter 15The Corporate and Corporeal: Min(d)ing the Body—Conscience and Consumption in Early 21st Century Hollywood Dystopia
    Wendy Sterba
    Index
    About the Editors and Contributors
Reviews
Reviews
  • Ritzenhoff and Krewani introduce and present essays on the ‘filmic and narrative representations of contemporary catastrophes,’ including television programs, digital media, and even action figures associated with those media. Since ‘apocalypse’ can mean different things—destruction, devastation, disaster, revelation—the contributors of the 15 essays go in a variety of directions in exploring their subjects. Several essays treat Lars von Trier’s Melancholia (2011), an international art film that renewed critical interest in apocalyptic cinema. Other films covered include The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse (Rex Ingram, 1921), Dr. Strangelove (Stanley Kubrick, 1964), and The Sacrifice (Andrei Tarkovsky, 1986). Also considered are zombies in Night of the Living Dead (George Romero, 1968) and The Walking Dead (Frank Darabont, 2010). An intriguing essay by Frederick Wasser shows how producer Irwin Allen’s disaster films (e.g., The Towering Inferno, 1974) were rendered obsolete by Steven Spielberg’s Jaws (1975). This collection joins Kristen Moana Thompson’s Apocalyptic Dread: American Film at the Turn of the Millennium (CH, Nov'07, 45-1383), another readable, exciting work on films about last things. Film stills are well chosen.

    Summing Up: Recommended. All readers.

    — Choice Reviews


    One whose interest in cinema transcends mere entertainment may find this collection of theories and analyses quite fascinating.
    — Free Kittens Movie Guide


    From the cruel winds of austerity to the savage songs of war and terror, the end of times proclamations surround us. Our cinema is filled with the rubble of catastrophe and our stories with the characters of nihilism and annihilation. In this incredibly timely and wonderfully structured collection on the apocalypse, chaos and catastrophe are examined across the history of film and through a remarkably interesting set of themes. From the war film to the science fiction spectacle, from the melancholia of dark dystopias to the hungriness of the zombie film, we see the world ending, and with it a present already dead and a future not yet born. Each chapter is filled with insightful textual and contextual analysis as the dead skin of past and present decompose and recompose before us. A must read and must have collection for those interested in the chaos within cinema.
    — Sean Redmond, Deakin University


    Using the depiction of human-made catastrophe in more than a century of apocalyptic film-making the authors of this first-rate, edited volume analyze political, social, racial, gender, religious, and ecological problems threatening the real world—often in different ways than presented in movies. This book is an excellent example of contemporary scholars looking at popular culture, here motion pictures, as at times reflecting and more often disregarding reality.
    — Brigitte Nacos, Columbia Univeristy


    This collection of essays, edited by Karen A. Ritzenhoff and Angela Krewani, accounts for the omnipresence of the apocalypse in English-language cinema, a motif which represents a particularly potent allegory in our globalized world. I was very much impressed by the sheer novelty and range of the in-depth explorations the book offers.
    — David Roche, Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès


ALSO AVAILABLE

  • Cover image for the book Zeppo: The Reluctant Marx Brother
  • Cover image for the book American Noir Film: From The Maltese Falcon to Gone Girl
  • Cover image for the book The 12-Hour Film Expert: Everything You Need to Know about Movies
  • Cover image for the book The Crow: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Classic Film, Revised and Updated
  • Cover image for the book Hello, Norma Jeane: The Marilyn Monroe You Didn't Know
  • Cover image for the book Sideways Uncorked: The Perfect Pairing of Film and Wine
  • Cover image for the book A City Full of Hawks: On the Waterfront Seventy Years Later—Still the Great American Contender
  • Cover image for the book Blazing Saddles Meets Young Frankenstein: The 50th Anniversary of the Year of Mel Brooks
  • Cover image for the book I Want You Around: The Ramones and the Making of Rock ‘n’ Roll High School
  • Cover image for the book James Bond and the Sixties Spy Craze
  • Cover image for the book Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel
  • Cover image for the book Double Solitaire: The Films of Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder
  • Cover image for the book The Taking of New York City: Crime on the Screen and in the Streets of the Big Apple in the 1970s
  • Cover image for the book I AM MCLOVIN: How Superbad Became the Biggest Comedy Hit of Its Generation
  • Cover image for the book Breaking the Code: Otto Preminger versus Hollywood’s Censors
  • Cover image for the book Hard to Watch: How to Fall in Love with Difficult Movies
  • Cover image for the book Godzilla FAQ: All That's Left to Know About the King of the Monsters
  • Cover image for the book One with the Force: 18 Universal Truths in Star Wars
  • Cover image for the book Top Five: How ‘High Fidelity’ Found Its Rhythm and Became a Cult Movie Classic
  • Cover image for the book The Worst We Can Find: MST3K, RiffTrax, and the History of Heckling at the Movies
  • Cover image for the book The Morph-Image: The Subjunctive Synthesis of Time
  • Cover image for the book Historical Dictionary of Chinese Cinema, Second Edition
  • Cover image for the book I See Dead People: The Making of ‘The Sixth Sense’
  • Cover image for the book Zeppo: The Reluctant Marx Brother
  • Cover image for the book American Noir Film: From The Maltese Falcon to Gone Girl
  • Cover image for the book The 12-Hour Film Expert: Everything You Need to Know about Movies
  • Cover image for the book The Crow: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Classic Film, Revised and Updated
  • Cover image for the book Hello, Norma Jeane: The Marilyn Monroe You Didn't Know
  • Cover image for the book Sideways Uncorked: The Perfect Pairing of Film and Wine
  • Cover image for the book A City Full of Hawks: On the Waterfront Seventy Years Later—Still the Great American Contender
  • Cover image for the book Blazing Saddles Meets Young Frankenstein: The 50th Anniversary of the Year of Mel Brooks
  • Cover image for the book I Want You Around: The Ramones and the Making of Rock ‘n’ Roll High School
  • Cover image for the book James Bond and the Sixties Spy Craze
  • Cover image for the book Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel
  • Cover image for the book Double Solitaire: The Films of Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder
  • Cover image for the book The Taking of New York City: Crime on the Screen and in the Streets of the Big Apple in the 1970s
  • Cover image for the book I AM MCLOVIN: How Superbad Became the Biggest Comedy Hit of Its Generation
  • Cover image for the book Breaking the Code: Otto Preminger versus Hollywood’s Censors
  • Cover image for the book Hard to Watch: How to Fall in Love with Difficult Movies
  • Cover image for the book Godzilla FAQ: All That's Left to Know About the King of the Monsters
  • Cover image for the book One with the Force: 18 Universal Truths in Star Wars
  • Cover image for the book Top Five: How ‘High Fidelity’ Found Its Rhythm and Became a Cult Movie Classic
  • Cover image for the book The Worst We Can Find: MST3K, RiffTrax, and the History of Heckling at the Movies
  • Cover image for the book The Morph-Image: The Subjunctive Synthesis of Time
  • Cover image for the book Historical Dictionary of Chinese Cinema, Second Edition
  • Cover image for the book I See Dead People: The Making of ‘The Sixth Sense’
facebook icon twitter icon instagram icon linked in icon NEWSLETTERS
ABOUT US
  • Mission Statement
  • Employment
  • Privacy
  • Accessibility Statement
CONTACT
  • Company Directory
  • Publicity and Media Queries
  • Rights and Permissions
  • Textbook Resource Center
AUTHOR RESOURCES
  • Royalty Contact
  • Production Guidelines
  • Manuscript Submissions
ORDERING INFORMATION
  • Rowman & Littlefield
  • National Book Network
  • Ingram Publisher Services UK
  • Special Sales
  • International Sales
  • eBook Partners
  • Digital Catalogs
IMPRINTS
  • Rowman & Littlefield
  • Lexington Books
  • Hamilton Books
  • Applause Books
  • Amadeus Press
  • Backbeat Books
  • Bernan
  • Hal Leonard Books
  • Limelight Editions
  • Co-Publishing Partners
  • Globe Pequot
  • Down East Books
  • Falcon Guides
  • Gooseberry Patch
  • Lyons Press
  • Muddy Boots
  • Pineapple Press
  • TwoDot Books
  • Stackpole Books
PARTNERS
  • American Alliance of Museums
  • American Association for State and Local History
  • Brookings Institution Press
  • Center for Strategic & International Studies
  • Council on Foreign Relations
  • Fairleigh Dickinson University Press
  • Fortress Press
  • The Foundation for Critical Thinking
  • Lehigh University Press
  • United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
  • Other Partners...