Beyond Realism

Beyond Realism: Naturalist Film in Theory and Practice is the first major critical study of international naturalist cinema. From its earliest representation in silent films, such as Walsh's Regeneration (1915) and Eisenstein's Stachka/Strike (1925), to recent productions, such as Chukwu's Clemency (2019) and Aronofsky's The Whale (2022), the naturalist film narrative encompasses the whole of film history, traversing language, movement and genre. Often mistaken for realist film, international naturalist cinema has a unique cultural and critical history. It is a way of reading film narratives based on interdisciplinary reconfigurations, indicating what Fredric Jameson refers to as 'a relational type of thinking.' Robert Singer, Professor of Liberal Studies, CUNY Graduate Center [ret.]. His areas of expertise include literary and film interrelations, interdisciplinary research in film history and aesthetics, and comparative studies. He has written and directed several independent short films and co-produced the animated film, Ulalume (2022).