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2036-461X
19174
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Cinéma & Cie. Film and Media Studies Journal
Multiple and Multiple-Language Versions
Text.Serial.Journal
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie
2
Projects & Abstracts
2003-03-01
2022-11-29
2003-03-01
2024-02-14
Cinéma & Cie
MAGIS - Gradisca Film Studies Spring School
2003/03/01
International Film Studies Conference
2036-461X
2
en
Multiple and Multiple-Language Versions
https://riviste.unimi.it/index.php/cinemaetcie/article/download/19174/16978
2
MULTIPLE AND MULTIPLE-LANGUAGE VERSIONS
MAGIS - Gradisca Film Studies Spring School
March 21-28, 2003




   This School, organized through a partnership among various European Universities,
is born in close relation to the Udine International Film Studies Conference, both as an
opportunity to expand on the themes explored at the Conference and as an occasion to
develop a didactic activity directed to PhD candidates, advanced graduate students, and
young researchers in general.
   The first School program is connected to the themes of the 2002 Conference (Film and
Its Multiples) and those of the 2003 Conference (The Film’s Thresholds), while explor-
ing a precise historiographical circumstance (and the related theoretical issues): multi-
ple versions realized at the beginning of the sound era.

  Usually the realisation of multiple versions of movies based on the same plot, shot in
different languages, sometimes with the same director and actors, some other with dif-
ferent nationality personnel, is circumscribed in a precise historical phase: the shift
from silent to sound era. The historical and archival research on the multiple versions
productive phase has never been conducted in a truly systematic way, apart from pio-
neer work by Herbert Holba, the contributions by Mario Quargnolo, the researches and
proposals of CineGraph (Hamburg) and the Cinema Ritrovato (Bologna). The multiple
versions question demands deep investigation and realisation of a detailed catalogue,
since it is a moment of generalised and international reassessment of the entire film
industry. Reconstructing such a phase appears to be so necessary, because its particular
nature can enlighten many features of the modes of production and representation that
will be defined during the Thirties.

  The main objectives of this work project are follows: first, to elaborate a “cartogra-
phy” of films which have multiple versions; second, to investigate what we may call
“multiple” and “variant” in relation with linguistic, stylistic, narrative frameworks and
genre patterns and also in relation with the cultural identity of national cinematogra-
phies (cultural industry among national and “transnational” strategies of communica-
tions). The research will aim at recognizing the variants and the recurrence of commu-
nicative processes in the “multiple versions”. The outputs of our work programme will
be the experimental compared analysis of the multiple versions films and also the for-
mulation of philologically correct methods to classify them. Particularly, studying mul-
tiple versions seems to be crucial for the below-mentioned topics:

  Film restoration
  Sound technology

CINEMA & Cie, no. 2, Spring 2003                                                     ­165
MULTIPLE AND MULTIPLE-LANGUAGE VERSIONS

  Productive structures and infrastructures
  International productive policies
  International distribution models
  National and international consumers’ practices and experiences
  Stardom and author models
  National and international narrative styles

  In its first phase, the research on multiple versions intends to link a wide number of
FIAF film archives, in order to promote a catalogue of the copies of those films that have
several versions in different languages. In such a way, it would be possible to identify in
the film archives of different countries the various versions of a single production; thus,
the whole context of a specific productive case could be traced. After this phase, the
identification and cataloguing of non-film materials related to multiple versions and
present in different archives should follow. Single researchers should take care of a
restricted number of examples, and give account of their genealogy. In a third phase,
the reconstruction of different versions, the comparison of film and non-film materials
and the inclusion of the productive case in its context will be communicated during
institutional meetings (FIAF conferences, Udine International Film Studies
Conference, Internationaler Filmhistorischer Kongress-Hamburg, Pordenone Silent
Film Festival, Il Cinema Ritrovato in Bologna, etc.). In the fourth phase, the research
project results will allow a philological restoration, if needed, or a new visibility of the
studied films.


  The partners of the Spring School Project are:
  Universiteit Amsterdam, Universität Bremen, Università della Svizzera Italiana-
Lugano, Università Cattolica di Milano, Université de Paris III, Università degli Studi di
Pisa, Charles University-Prague, Università di Udine, Universidad de Valencia.



  The research project is promoted by:

  International Film Studies Conference, Udine
  University of Udine/DAMS, Gorizia
  MAGIS - Gradisca Film Studies Spring School
  CineGraph, Hamburg
  La Cineteca del Friuli, Gemona
  Cineteca del Comune di Bologna




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