Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Cinema and Antiquity: 2000-2011

A reminder that registration for the following conference is open until the end of this month. We are also still accepting applications for postgraduate travel bursaries.

Cinema and Antiquity: 2000-2011
The 1st J.P. Postgate Colloquium, University of Liverpool
12-14 July 2011

The resurgence of cinema’s interest in antiquity that was triggered by the release of Gladiator in 2000 shows no signs of abating. In 2010-11, many more ancient world films have been appearing on our screens (Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief; Clash of the Titans; Agora; Centurion; The Eagle; not to mention the TV series Spartacus: Blood and Sand). The public appetite for films that deal with ancient history and mythology apparently remains strong, and ‘classics and film’ courses have established themselves in universities worldwide, leading the way in the increasing prominence of reception studies within classics and ancient history. The time is ripe for reflection on these developments. This major international conference seeks to explore the directions that have been taken in a decade of moviemaking and scholarship, and to advance the field by concentrating on issues too often overlooked.

All registration and payment details are available online at http://sace.liv.ac.uk/cinemaantiquity/. The deadline for registration is 30 June 2011.

Please contact the conference organizers, Joanna Paul (Joanna.Paul@liv.ac.uk) or Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones (L.Llewellyn-Jones@ed.ac.uk) for further information.


Conference Programme

TUESDAY 12 JULY Registration from 11

1.00 Welcome

1.15-2.45 Panel A: Screening Ancient Violence
1. Hunter Gardner (University of South Carolina), ‘“Are You Not Entertained?”: Screening Ancient Violence in the New Millennium’
2. Juliette Harrisson (University of Birmingham/Open University), ‘Using ultra-violence to mark the ancient world as Self or Other’
3. Amanda Potter (Open University), ‘Blood and Boobies: Viewer reactions to Spartacus: Blood and Sand’

2.45-3.05 Break

3.10-4.40 Panel B: Documenting Antiquity
1. Fiona Hobden (University of Liverpool), ‘Making history: authority and authenticity in ancient world documentary’
2. Lisa Maurice (Bar Ilan University), ‘Sine ira et studio in the 21st century: ancient history and the modern documentary’
3. Salvador Bartera (University of Tennessee) and Claire Stocks (University of Cambridge), ‘HBO’s Rome and its Audience Reception in America, England and Italy’
4.45-5.45 Keynote: Pantelis Michelakis (University of Bristol) and Maria Wyke (University College London), ‘Antiquity in Silent Cinema’


WEDNESDAY 13 JULY

9.30-11.00 Panel C: The Aesthetics of Antiquity
1. Robert Burgoyne (University of St Andrews), ‘Alexander and the Phantasmagoria of History’
2. Michael Williams (University of Southampton), ‘‘Remember Me’: Nostalgia and Digital Patination in the Contemporary Classical Epic’
3. Joanna Paul (University of Liverpool), ‘The Vanished Library? The End of the Classical World in Alejandro Amenabar’s Agora’

11.00-11.20 Break

11.20-12.50 Panel D: Audience Receptions
1. Corinne Pache (Trinity University), ‘Don’t Mess with Myth - Percy Jackson’s “Epic Fail”’
2. Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones (University of Edinburgh), ‘Trouble in the Tehran Multiplex: 300 and its Iranian Critics’
3. Clare Foster (University of Cambridge), ‘Constructed Pasts: Ancient History Films in Theory and in Practice’

12.50-2.00 Lunch

2.00-3.30 Panel E: Changing Contexts: Animation, Games, Museums
1. Sarah Miles (University of Durham), ‘‘Jack and the Spartans’: Samurai Jack meets Frank Miller and Lynn Varley's 300’’
2. Mark Kirby-Hirst (University of South Africa) and Beschara Karam (University of South Africa), ‘“Where to from here?”: The Transformation of Classics from Film to Video Game’
3. Debbie Challis (Petrie Museum) and John Johnston (University College London), ‘The Case of the Petrie Museum: Resurrecting Hammer’s Mummies in the Twenty-first Century’

3.30-3.50 Break

3.50-4.50 Keynote: Professor Martin Winkler (George Mason University), ‘Fascinating Ur-Fascism: The Case of 300’

5.30-7.00 Wine reception (venue tbc)


THURSDAY 14 JULY

9.00-11.00 Panel F: National contexts
1. Erato Basea (University of Oxford), ‘“I am (not) the Acropolis”: Filmmaking, national culture and the anxiety of heritage’
2. Katie Billotte (Royal Holloway, University of London), ‘Asi es la vida: Medea as a “Wise Latina”’
3. Ewa Skwara (Adam Mickiewicz University), ‘“Where are you going, antiquity?” – the Polish version of Quo Vadis’
4. Martin Lindner (University of Göttingen), ‘Germania Nova – Moving Pictures and the Reinvention of Ancient Germany’

11.00-11.20 Break

11.20-12.50 Panel G: Icons of Antiquity
1. Daniel O’Brien (University of Southampton), ‘White Supremacy? Difference as Degeneracy in 300’
2. Penelope Goodman (University of Leeds), ‘“I am master of nothing”: Augustus in television drama in the early 21st century’
3. Trevor Fear (Open University), ‘Cleopatra in the New Millennium: the changing dynamics of a historical icon’

12.50-1.40 Lunch

1.40-3.40 Panel H: Screening Late Antiquity
1. Ingo Stelte (Mainz University), ‘From the Front Line to the Home Front - Mira's Development from a Warrior to a Mother in Doug Lefler's The Last Legion’
2. Tony Keen (Open University), ‘On second thought, let’s not go to Camelot: situating the ‘historical Arthur’ through casting in King Arthur and The Last Legion’
3. Mary McHugh (Gustavus Adolphus College), ‘Pre-Cinema in Antiquity: Forgetting and Remembering a Hero(ine) of Alexandria’
4. Nicholas Kalospyros (University of Athens), ‘Vulgar Entertainment vs Austere Scholarship: The Case of Amenábar’s Agora as a Future Tension for Cinematic Text Adaptation of Cultural Readings’

3.40-4.00 Break

4.00-5.00 Keynote: Monica Cyrino (University of New Mexico), ‘I Was Colin Farrell’s Latin Teacher’

END





Dr Joanna Paul
School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology
University of Liverpool
12 Abercromby Square
Liverpool
L69 7WZ

Tel. 0151 794 2469
Email: Joanna.Paul@liv.ac.uk

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