Cuevas, E. (Efrén)

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    The filmic representation of home in transnational families: The case of "I for India"
    (2016-12) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    In an increasingly globalised world, the phenomenon of transnational families has spanned many countries, raising questions as to the traditional understanding of home, a concept normally associated with the notions of homeland and the family house. This article intends to study these issues through an analysis of I for India (2005), a documentary film portraying the migratory endeavours of an Indian family that moved to the UK in the 1960s. Since filmmaker Sandhya Suri builds this portrayal of her family with the help of a valuable family archive of home movies and audio reels special attention will be given not only to the role of this domestic archive in the making of the film but also the configuration of transnational families in constructing visual/audio memories to share across frontiers.
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    Entre la huella y el índice: relecturas contemporáneas de André Bazin
    (2012) Cuevas, E. (Efrén); Esqueda-Verano, L. (Lourdes)
    Como consecuencia del cambio de lo analógico a lo digital, el debate en torno a la comprensión realista de los medios audiovisuales ha cobrado un nuevo protagonismo. Este debate se ha articulado con frecuencia a partir de la relectura de los teóricos clásicos, entre los que ocupa un lugar prominente André Bazin. Este artículo realiza un análisis de esas lecturas contemporáneas del pensamiento baziniano, con una primera mención al trabajo pionero de Stanley Cavell, para a continuación estudiar las aportaciones de Dudley Andrew, Philip Rosen, Daniel Morgan y Lee Carruthers. En todas ellas se descubre un eco de los temas fundacionales del crítico francés, desde su reflexión sobre la ontología del medio hasta su novedosa comprensión de la dimensión temporal, asociada a conceptos como la ambigüedad o el realismo. El artículo se cierra con una reflexión sobre la vigencia del pensamiento baziniano en el nuevo paradigma digital.--------------------------------------------As a consequence of the turn from analogic to digital media, the debate around the notion of 'realist media' has acquired a newfound importance. This debate has been articulated quite often coming from the classic authors of the realist theory, within which Andre Bazin occupies a prominent position. This article analyzes some of these contemporary new readings of Bazin's thought, namely, those of Stanley Cavell, Dudley Andrew, Philip Rosen, Daniel Morgan and Lee Carruthers. All these renew the principal tenets of the French critic's theory, from the ontology of the medium to his novel understanding of the temporal dimension, linked to concepts such as ambiguity or realism. The article closes with some remarks on the actuality of Bazin's thought in relation to the new digital paradigm.
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    El docudrama contemporáneo: rasgos configuradores
    (Universitat Ramón Llull, 2012) Cuevas, E. (Efrén); Raventós, C. (Carme); Torregrosa, M. (Marta)
    El docudrama se ha convertido en un modelo génerico y narrativo de creciente importancia en la ficción contemporánea y con un impacto cada vez mayor en España, sobre todo en su forma televisiva. Sin embargo, en nuestro país, su investigación académica es todavía relativamente escasa, en comparación con la atención que ha recibido en el mundo angloparlante. Este artículo ofrece una primera aproximación a la definición del docudrama, basado en dos tipos de análisis. En la primera parte, realizamos un análisis contextual, que revisa las características básicas de las principales tradiciones –la británica y la norteamericana– que históricamente han configurado este tipo de obras. En la segunda, se analizan los elementos de carácter textual, basándose en el estudio de sus aspectos ficcionales y documentales. /// The docudrama has become a narrative and genre model of increasing importance in contemporary fiction and with a growing impact in Spain, above all in its televised form. However, in our country, academic research on the docudrama is still relatively limited in comparison with the attention which it has received in the English-speaking world. The paper we present here offers an initial approach to the definition of the docudrama, based on two different types of analysis. In the first part, we consider contextual analysis, which analyzes the basic features of the principal traditions —the British and the North American— which have historically shaped these products. In the second, we analyze elements of a textual nature, based on their dual fictional and documental aspects.
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    Landscapes of the Self: The Cinema of Ross McElwee / Paisajes del yo. El cine de Ross McElwee
    (Ediciones Internacionales Universitarias, 2008-02) García-Martínez, A.N. (Alberto Nahum); Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    A book about the films of American documentary filmmaker Ross McElwee. The book is in ENGLISH and SPANISH. The book opens with an ”Establishing Shot,” a prologue presenting an edited ver¬sion of an article published in 1994 by Stephen Rodrick, which sketches out a lively portrait of McElwee. In the second section, we sought greater depth of field. This is our “Wide angle”, with four transversal studies of McElwee’s filmography. First, Efrén Cuevas addresses the most explicitly autobiographical dimension of his films. Alberto N. García presents a study of Ross McElwee as an essayist. The voice-over forms the central topic of Dominique Bluher’s article. Josep María Catalá reflects on the role of the camera in McElwee’s ouvreu, and from this basis, goes on to work out a wider interpretation of McElwee’s intentions. The third section of the book turns to the “Close Up” in order to focus on each of the four autobiographical feature films made by McElwee. It begins with James H. Watkins’s analysis of Sherman’s March. In the next chapter, on Time Indefinite, Paloma Aten¬cia concentrates on how McElwee uses all the autobiographical elements to con-struct an identity understood in narrative terms. Gonzalo de Pedro examines the interesting reflections which Six O’Clock News offers on the relations between television and film. Finally, Gary Hawkins analyzes Bright Leaves from a very personal perspective, that of his double career as critic and documentary filmmaker. The book ends with a “mirror shot” in which Ross McElwee speaks in his own voice. First, we reproduce the only long text that he has written on his own work, “Finding a Voice,” published in 1995 by the French magazine Trafic. To finish, we include a collage of questions and answers from various interviews that he has given over the years.
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    The Immigrant Experience in Jonas Mekas’s Diary Films: A Chronotopic Analysis of Lost, Lost, Lost
    (University of Hawai'i Press, 2006) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    The article analyzes Jonas Mekas's immigrant experience as portrayed in his film Lost, Lost, Lost (1976). This film constitutes a singular case within immigrant autobiography in cinema because of its diary format and because most of the attempts to portray the immigrant experience autobiographically in film have been done by second and third generation immigrants. In my analysis, I look first at Mekas’s diary films and then I examine the film helped by the chronotopic approach proposed by Mikhail Bakhtin for literary analysis. I intend to show that Bakhtin’s proposals provide a valuable approach to the study of immigrant autobiographies in cinema, since the film medium is so tied to the experience of time and space, both so crucial in the development of immigrant identity in the new country.
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    “Cycles of Life: El cielo gira and Spanish Autobiographical Documentary”
    (Wallflower Press, 2012) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    This chapter intends to examine in the first place why Spanish filmmakers have scarcely adopted an autobiographical approach to documentary, while commenting briefly on those that have appeared during the 2000s. Then, I will analyse closely El cielo gira, which can be considered the best autobiographical film to date from Spain. Its approach may serve as an example of a certain type of Spanish documentary, where it blends an auterist look with a contemplative style, in order to explore in this case the layers of our country with a microhistorical lens.
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    Las razones de un cine personal
    (Ediciones Internacionales Universitarias, 2002) Cuevas, E. (Efrén); Muguiro, C. (Carlos)
    Entrevista realizada por los autores a Alan Berliner
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    Ángel QUINTANA. Fábulas de lo visible. El cine como creador de realidades. Acantilado, Barcelona, 2003, 312 pp.
    (Servicio de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Navarra, 2004) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
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    La crónica histórica a través de la mirada autobiográfica. Las huellas de la II Guerra Mundial en los japoneses-americanos
    (Servicio de Publicaciones del Gobierno de Navarra, 2006) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    Análisis de la crónica cinemetográfica del internamiento sufrido por los "Japanese American" residentes en EEUU durante la II Guerra Mundial, a partir de los documentales que han abordado desde una perspectiva autobiográfica aquellos acontecimientos: Family Gathering (1988), History and Memory (1991), Who's Going to Pay For These Donuts, Anyway? (1992) y Rabbit in the Moon (1999).
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    Vidas contadas, un crisol de identidades
    (Ediciones Internacionales Universitarias, 2007) Cuevas, E. (Efrén)
    Análisis de la película Vidas contadas (Thirteen Conversations about One Thing, 2002). El análisis arranca con un somero examen narratológico de la temporalidad y la focalización; después se realiza un estudio de los principales personajes y los temas que encarnan; y finalmente se concluye con un análisis del tema dominante que subyace a todas las tramas, que gira en torno a la visión providencialista de la vida, en su contraste con una comprensión fatalista. El enfoque planteado responde a un análisis textual del filme, que va de lo narrativo a lo temático, apoyándose en nociones básicas de construcción de personajes, y que aborda los temas filosóficos o antropológicos de modo más bien ensayístico, sin un aparataje bibliográfico sino en función de su valor interpretativo del propio relato.