‘The well‐organized splendor of a growing culture’: Sites of fantasy and The Thief of Bagdad
2010; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 8; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/17460650903515962
ISSN1746-0662
Autores Tópico(s)Shakespeare, Adaptation, and Literary Criticism
ResumoAbstract This article examines how the spectacular fantasy of The Thief of Bagdad (dir. Raoul Walsh, 1924) resonated with cultural sites outside of cinema at the time of its release. The film's reception and marketing often characterized the film in non‐cinematic terms, as something other than cinema. This article focuses on how aspects of consumer culture and fairy tales provided material for intermedial connections, entwining the film discursively and formally with other sites of fantasy. This helped situate the film within a conception of spectacle as something potentially productive and socially beneficial that had developed around notions of consumerism in the 1920s. Keywords: The Thief of Bagdad fairy talesconsumer culturefilm receptionillustrated books Arabian Nights Notes 1. See Studlar Citation1994, 107–24 and Studlar Citation1996. The film's use of Orientalism is approached in much different ways in Shohat Citation1997 and Irwin Citation2004. 2. For a discussion of these strategies of commercial enticement, see especially Leach Citation1994. 3. A Scenario Writer, 'The Evolution of a Picture', New York Times 16 March 1924. 4. For a detailed discussion of such books, see Felmingham Citation1988. 5. For an account of the speech, see 'Coolidge Praises Advertising as Aid to Our Prosperity', New York Times, 28 October 1926. Lears notes that the speech was actually written by the advertising executive Bruce Barton (Lears Citation1994, 224). 6. The advertisement was printed in, for example, Oakland Tribune, 17 September 1921, and Republicans and Times, Cedar Rapids, Iowa, 15 December 1921. 7. The advertisement was printed in, for example, Newark Advocate, 25 April 1922, and Modesto Evening News, 24 April 1922. 8. 'Two Feature Stories and Paragraphs During Run of Picture', The Thief of Bagdad pressbook, British Film Institute National Library, London. This was a 'feature story, to be signed by a fictitious person, who will represent the Filmland correspondent of the paper accepting it'. 9. 'General Advance Stories About the Picture', The Thief of Bagdad pressbook, British Film Institute National Library, London.
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