Cartographic Cinema - Tom Conley

• Introduction

  • **Cinema and Cartography**: Examines the relationship between cinema and cartography, exploring how maps and mapping techniques are used in films to shape narratives and audience perception.

  • **Mappings in Film**: Maps as visual tropes that direct the spectator's gaze, engage spatial imagination, and locate characters within fictional spaces.

  • **Methodology**: Interdisciplinary approach examining films, their production contexts, and theoretical frameworks related to cartography, visual culture, and film studies.

• Chapter 1: The Genealogy of Cartographic Cinema

  • **Early Film**: Discusses early silent films where maps were used for storytelling purposes, often as backdrop or prop.

  • **Maps as Symbols**: Maps as symbols of exploration, conquest, power, and identity, reflecting the colonial impulse and national identities.

  • **Evolving Techniques**: Evolution from static maps to animated and interactive maps within films, enhancing storytelling and immersion.

  • Key Points:

    • *Early Use*: Maps as a tool for world-building and narrative guidance in early cinema.

    • *Symbolic Meanings*: Maps carry symbolic significances that can be read alongside the film's thematic concerns.

    • *Technical Advancements*: Technical innovation enables more sophisticated cartographic representations in film.

    • **Spatial Theory**: Incorporates concepts of space and place into film analysis to understand how films represent and construct spaces.

    • **Cartographic Imagination**: The way filmmakers use cartographic techniques to structure space, influence viewer perspectives, and navigate narratives.

    • **Representations of Space**: Analyzes different types of spaces (urban, rural, fantasy) and how maps contribute to their representation in film.

• Chapter 2: The Spatial Turn in Film Studies

  • Key Points:

    • *Theorizing Space*: Recognition of the importance of space in film analysis and its relation to cartographic practices.

    • *Narrative Navigation*: How maps facilitate the spectator's navigation through the film's spatial and narrative elements.

    • *Genre Differences*: Variation in how spaces are mapped across different film genres.

    • **Movement and Mapping**: Explores the relationship between movement within the image, such as camera movements or character actions, and map-like representations.

    • **Kinetic Cartography**: The idea of 'kinetic cartography' where moving images are understood as dynamic maps that track spatial changes over time.

    • **Cinematic Topology**: Analyzes how cinematic images construct topological spaces that challenge or redefine traditional geographical concepts.

• Chapter 3: Mapping the Movement Image

  • Key Points:

    • *Dynamic Representations*: Maps in motion that reflect the dynamism of the cinematic image.

    • *Space-Time Continuum*: Mapped spaces in films that exist within a continuum of time and space.

    • *Topological Shifts*: Topological readings of filmic spaces that question and expand upon cartographic principles.

    • **Reflections**: Considers the implications of cartographic cinema for our understanding of geography, space, history, and subjectivity.

    • **future Trajectories**: Proposes future directions for research in cartographic cinema, including cross-cultural and cross-media approaches.

    • **Audience Engagement**: Discusses the role of audiences in interpreting cartographic elements in films and the potential for these elements to spark critical thought.

• Conclusion

  • Key Points:

    • *Interdisciplinary Impact*: Implications for geographical and cultural studies through an understanding of cartographic cinema.

    • *Audiovisual Interaction*: The significance of sound and imagery in creating cartographically rich film experiences.

    • *Critical Thinking*: The potential for cartographic cinema to encourage viewers to think critically about space and mapping in broader contexts.