The Kind Millionaire, Lemonade Joe and Superman. On Czech Film Parodies

• Authors: Petr Mareš
• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

PL

The article deals with Czech film parodies that were produced primarily during the period of the state-directed cinema (1945–1989). Their development was connected to a campaign against trash literature, which attempted in the 1930s and 1940s to suppress different popular genres that were considered worthless and harmful. Parodies caricatured conventions of disapproved genres (romance, western, detective story), but at the same time, maintained an awareness of them and eventually also functioned as a substitute for them. The construction of parodies was often based on the accumulation of motifs of a given genre and their escalation to absurdity. The technique of confrontation of disparate elements was also repeatedly used: the conventionality and artificiality of the world of the parodied genre was unveiled as an encounter with the world, which was presented as real and ordinary.

Keywords

PL

parody; pre-text; popular genres; romance; western; comics

• Publisher: Uniwersytet im. Adama Mickiewicza w Poznaniu
• Journal: Images. The International Journal of European Film, Performing Arts and Audiovisual Communication
• Year: 2014
• Volume: 14
• Issue: 23
• Pages: 15-24

Dates

published

2014-01-13

Contributors

author

Petr Mareš

• Uniwersytet Karola w Pradze

References

• D. Mocná, “Parodie” [Parody], in D. Mocná, J. Peterka et al., Encyklopedie literárních žánrů [Encyclopedia of Literary Genres], Paseka, Prague–Litomyšl 2004, pp. 441–447.
• T. Verweyen – G. Witting, Einfache Formen der Intertextualität. Theoretische Überlegungen und historische Untersuchungen, Mentis, Paderborn 2010, p. 268.
• G. Genette, Palimpseste. Die Literatur auf zweiter Stufe, Suhrkamp Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1993, pp. 13–14.
• Mrtvacima ulaz zabranjen (1960); A translation, Mrtvým vstup zakázán, published in 1965.
• P. Janáček, Literární brak. Operace vyloučení, operace nahrazení, 1938–1951 [Trash Literature.
• Operation of Exclusion, Operation of Replacement, 1938–1951], Host, Brno 2004.
• D. Mocná, “Pytlákova schovanka aneb Fričovo velké loučení” [The Poacher’s Foster-Daughter or Frič’s Big Farewell], Iluminace 8, 1996, no. 2, pp. 77–105.
• J. Čulík, Jací jsme. Česká společnost v hraném filmu devadesátých a nultých let [How We Are. Czech Society in Feature Films of the 1990s and 2000s], Host, Brno 2007, pp. 530–531, 538–541, 544–545.
• T. Bartošek, “Krvavý román. Studie kulturně a filmově historická” [Horror Story. A Study in Cultural and Film History], Film a doba 39, 1993, no. 2, pp. 72–77.

Identifiers

DOI

10.14746/i.2014.23.2