THE TRANSATLANTIC GAZE: ITALIAN CINEMA, AMERICAN FILM by Mary Ann McDonald Carolan is now available in paperback in the Italian/American Culture series from SUNY Press. San Francisco Book Review calls this collection of essays "an astutely focused text on a universally acknowledged subject, but one that is rarely covered these days, even in academia."

The Transatlantic Gaze documents the sustained and profound artistic impact of Italian directors, actors, and screenwriters on American film. Working across a variety of genres, including neorealism, comedy, the Western, and the art film, Carolan explores how and why American directors from Woody Allen to Quentin Tarantino have adapted certain Italian trademark techniques and motifs.

Allen's To Rome with Love (2012), for example, is an homage to the genius of Italian filmmakers, and to Federico Fellini in particular, whose Lo sceicco bianco/The White Sheik (1952) also resonates with Allen's The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985) as well as with Neil LaBute's Nurse Betty (2000). Tarantino's Kill Bill saga (2003, 2004) plays off elements of Sergio Leone's spaghetti Western C'era una volta il West/Once Upon a Time in the West (1968), a transatlantic conversation about the Western that continues in Tarantino's Oscar-winning Django Unchained (2012). Lee Daniels's Precious (2009) and Spike Lee's Miracle at St. Anna (2008), meanwhile, demonstrate that the neorealism of Roberto Rossellini and Vittorio De Sica, which arose from the political and economic exigencies of postwar Italy, is an effective vehicle for critiquing social issues such as poverty and racism in a contemporary American context. The book concludes with an examination of American remakes of popular Italian films, a comparison that offers insight into the similarities and differences between the two cultures and the transformations in genre, both subtle and obvious, that underlie this form of cross-cultural exchange. Through the lens of American directors, this intercultural analysis reframes Italian cinema in a transnational context.

The Transatlantic Gaze is recommended for courses on Italian Americana and Italian cinema. Its pairings of Italian and American film introduce various genres—neorealism, western, comedy, art film—while allowing us to see the differences, both subtle and obvious, in the two distinct film cultures. To request an exam copy, please visit http://www.sunypress.edu/1-50-exam-copies.aspx.

Mary Ann McDonald Carolan, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Modern Languages & Literatures
Director, Italian Studies Program
Fairfield University
Fairfield, CT 06824
USA

http://www.sunypress.edu/p-5834-the-transatlantic-gaze.aspx