Pam Cook
Encyclopedia
Pam Cook is Professor Emerita in Film
at the University of Southampton
. Along with Laura Mulvey
and Claire Johnston
, she was a pioneer of 1970s Anglo-American feminist film theory
. Her collaboration with Claire Johnston
on the work of Hollywood film director Dorothy Arzner
provoked debate among feminist film scholars over the following decades.
In the mid-1980s, Cook co-authored and edited the leading film studies
text book The Cinema Book
for the British Film Institute
(BFI). From 1985 to 1994 she was Associate Editor and contributor on the BFI magazines Monthly Film Bulletin
and Sight and Sound, before becoming a lecturer at the University of East Anglia
. In 1998 she was appointed the first Professor of European Film and Media at the University of Southampton
. Since her retirement in 2006, she continues to publish books and articles on film.
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
at the University of Southampton
University of Southampton
The University of Southampton is a British public university located in the city of Southampton, England, a member of the Russell Group. The origins of the university can be dated back to the founding of the Hartley Institution in 1862 by Henry Robertson Hartley. In 1902, the Institution developed...
. Along with Laura Mulvey
Laura Mulvey
Laura Mulvey is a British feminist film theorist. She was educated at St Hilda's College, Oxford. She is currently professor of film and media studies at Birkbeck, University of London...
and Claire Johnston
Claire Johnston
Claire Johnston was a feminist film theoretician. She wrote seminal essays on the construction of ideology in mainstream cinema .-Writings:...
, she was a pioneer of 1970s Anglo-American feminist film theory
Feminist film theory
Feminist film theory is theoretical film criticism derived from feminist politics and feminist theory. Feminists have many approaches to cinema analysis, regarding the film elements analysed and their theoretical underpinnings.-History:...
. Her collaboration with Claire Johnston
Claire Johnston
Claire Johnston was a feminist film theoretician. She wrote seminal essays on the construction of ideology in mainstream cinema .-Writings:...
on the work of Hollywood film director Dorothy Arzner
Dorothy Arzner
Dorothy Arzner was an American film director. Her directorial career in feature films spanned from the late 1920s into the early 1940s, a time period in which there were very few—if any—other women working in the field.- Biography :Born in San Francisco, California, Arzner grew up in Los...
provoked debate among feminist film scholars over the following decades.
In the mid-1980s, Cook co-authored and edited the leading film studies
Film studies
Film studies is an academic discipline that deals with various theoretical, historical, and critical approaches to films. It is sometimes subsumed within media studies and is often compared to television studies...
text book The Cinema Book
The Cinema Book
The Cinema Book is a film studies text book first published by the British Film Institute in 1985 as a resource for teachers. The first edition was based on the BFI Education Department's collection of film clips for use as study guides. However, at the time there were few film text books, and The...
for the British Film Institute
British Film Institute
The British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
(BFI). From 1985 to 1994 she was Associate Editor and contributor on the BFI magazines Monthly Film Bulletin
Monthly Film Bulletin
The Monthly Film Bulletin was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 to April 1991. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those with a narrow arthouse release. The MFB was edited in the mid-1950s by David Robinson, in the late...
and Sight and Sound, before becoming a lecturer at the University of East Anglia
University of East Anglia
The University of East Anglia is a public research university based in Norwich, United Kingdom. It was established in 1963, and is a founder-member of the 1994 Group of research-intensive universities.-History:...
. In 1998 she was appointed the first Professor of European Film and Media at the University of Southampton
University of Southampton
The University of Southampton is a British public university located in the city of Southampton, England, a member of the Russell Group. The origins of the university can be dated back to the founding of the Hartley Institution in 1862 by Henry Robertson Hartley. In 1902, the Institution developed...
. Since her retirement in 2006, she continues to publish books and articles on film.
Books
- Baz Luhrmann, London: BFI Publishing/Palgrave, 2010. Baz LuhrmannBaz LuhrmannMark Anthony "Baz" Luhrmann is an Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for The Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes his films Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!...
- The Cinema Book, Third Edition, London: British Film Institute, 2007.
- Screening the Past: Memory and Nostalgia in Cinema, Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2005.
- I Know Where I'm Going!, BFI Film Classics, London: British Film Institute, 2002. I Know Where I'm Going!I Know Where I'm Going!I Know Where I'm Going! is a 1945 romance film by the British-based film-makers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. It stars Wendy Hiller and Roger Livesey, and features Pamela Brown, Finlay Currie and Petula Clark in her fourth film appearance....
- Gainsborough Pictures, London and Washington: Cassell, 1997. Gainsborough PicturesGainsborough PicturesGainsborough Pictures was a British film studio based on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in the former Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch, London. Gainsborough Studios were active between 1924 and 1951. Built as a power station for the Great Northern & City Railway it...
- Fashioning the Nation: Costume and Identity in British Cinema, London: British Film Institute, 1996.
- Women and Film: A Sight and Sound Reader, London: Scarlet Press/Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993. With Philip Dodd.
Key articles
- 'Another Story: Myth and History in Bonnie and Clyde (1967)', in Tom Brown and James Walters (eds), Film Moments: Criticism, History, Theory, London: BFI/Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. Bonnie and Clyde (film)Bonnie and Clyde (film)The film was originally offered to François Truffaut, the best-known director of the New Wave movement, who made contributions to the script. He passed on the project to make Fahrenheit 451. The producers approached Jean-Luc Godard next...
- 'Sofia Coppola', in Yvonne Tasker (ed.), Fifty Contemporary Film Directors, Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2010. Sofia CoppolaSofia CoppolaSofia Carmina Coppola is an American screenwriter, film director, actress, and producer.In 2003 she received the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Lost in Translation, and became the third woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for Directing...
- ‘Transnational Utopias: Baz Luhrmann and Australian Cinema’, Transnational Cinemas 1 (1), 2010. Baz LuhrmannBaz LuhrmannMark Anthony "Baz" Luhrmann is an Australian film director, screenwriter, and producer best known for The Red Curtain Trilogy, which includes his films Strictly Ballroom, William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge!...
; Australian cinema - ‘On Memorialising Gainsborough Studios’, Journal of British Cinema and Television 6 (2), 2009. Gainsborough PicturesGainsborough PicturesGainsborough Pictures was a British film studio based on the south bank of the Regent's Canal, in Poole Street, Hoxton in the former Metropolitan Borough of Shoreditch, London. Gainsborough Studios were active between 1924 and 1951. Built as a power station for the Great Northern & City Railway it...
- ‘Whatever Happened to BFI Publishing?’, Cinema Journal 47 (4), Summer 2008. The Cinema BookThe Cinema BookThe Cinema Book is a film studies text book first published by the British Film Institute in 1985 as a resource for teachers. The first edition was based on the BFI Education Department's collection of film clips for use as study guides. However, at the time there were few film text books, and The...
- ‘An American in Paris’, in Mandy Merck (ed.), America First: Naming the Nation in US Film, Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2007. An American in Paris (film)An American in Paris (film)An American in Paris is a 1951 MGM musical film inspired by the 1928 orchestral composition by George Gershwin. Starring Gene Kelly, Leslie Caron, Oscar Levant, Georges Guetary, and Nina Foch, the film is set in Paris, and was directed by Vincente Minnelli from a script by Alan Jay Lerner...
- ‘Portrait of a Lady: Sofia Coppola’, Sight and Sound vol. 16, no. 11, November 2006. Sofia CoppolaSofia CoppolaSofia Carmina Coppola is an American screenwriter, film director, actress, and producer.In 2003 she received the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for Lost in Translation, and became the third woman to be nominated for an Academy Award for Directing...
- 'Rethinking Nostalgia: In the Mood for Love and Far from Heaven, in Screening the Past: Memory and Nostalgia in Cinema, Oxford and New York: Routledge, 2005.
- ' "Sean Connery Is James Bond": Re-fashioning British Masculinity in the 1960s', in Rachel Moseley (ed.), Fashioning Film Stars: Dress, Culture, Identity, London: British Film Institute, 2005. With Claire Hines. Sean ConnerySean ConnerySir Thomas Sean Connery , better known as Sean Connery, is a Scottish actor and producer who has won an Academy Award, two BAFTA Awards and three Golden Globes Sir Thomas Sean Connery (born 25 August 1930), better known as Sean Connery, is a Scottish actor and producer who has won an Academy...
- ‘The Trouble with Sex: Diana Dors and the Blonde Bombshell Phenomenon’, in Bruce Babington (ed.), British Stars and Stardom: From Alma Taylor to Sean Connery, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2001. Diana DorsDiana DorsDiana Dors was an English actress, born Diana Mary Fluck in Swindon, Wiltshire. Considered the English equivalent of the blonde bombshells of Hollywood, Dors described herself as: "The only sex symbol Britain has produced since Lady Godiva."-Early life:Diana Mary Fluck was born in Swindon,...
- 'No Fixed Address: The Women's Picture from Outrage to Blue Steel, in Steve Neale and Murray Smith (eds), Contemporary Hollywood Cinema, London and New York: Routledge, 1998.
- 'Neither Here Nor There: National Identity in Gainsborough Costume Drama', in Andrew Higson (ed.), Dissolving Views: Key Articles on British Cinema, London and Washington: Cassell, 1996.
- 'Border Crossings: Women and Film in Context', in Pam Cook and Philip Dodd (eds), Women and Film: A Sight and Sound Reader, London: Scarlet Press/Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993.
- 'Women in the Western', in Edward Buscombe (ed.), The BFI Companion to the Western, London: British Film Institute/André Deutsch, 1988. Reprinted in Jim Kitses and Gregg Rickman (eds), The Western Reader, New York: Limelight, 1998.
- Mandy: Daughter of Transition', in Charles Barr (ed.), All Our Yesterdays: 90 Years of British Cinema, London: British Film Institute, 1986. Mandy (film)Mandy (film)Mandy was a 1952 Ealing Studios film, based on the book The Day Is Ours by Hilda Lewis, with screenplay by Nigel Balchin and Jack Whittingham, and direction by Alexander Mackendrick and Fred Sears. Another title for the film was Crash of Silence...
- 'Melodrama and the Women's Picture', in Sue Aspinall and Robert Murphy (eds), BFI Dossier 18: Gainsborough Melodrama, London: British Film Institute, 1983.
- 'Masculinity in Crisis? Tragedy in Raging Bull, Screen vol. 23, no. 3/4, Sept/Oct 1982. Raging Bull
- 'Duplicity in Mildred Pierce, in E. Ann Kaplan (ed.), Women in Film Noir, London: British Film Institute, 1978. Revised edition 1998. Mildred Pierce (film)Mildred Pierce (film)Mildred Pierce is a 1945 American drama film starring Joan Crawford, Ann Blyth, Jack Carson, Zachary Scott, and Eve Arden in a film noir about a long-suffering mother and her ungrateful daughter. The screenplay by Ranald MacDougall, William Faulkner, and Catherine Turney was based upon the 1941...
- 'Exploitation Films and Feminism', Screen vol.17, no. 2, Summer 1976.
- 'Approaching the Work of Dorothy Arzner', in Claire Johnston (ed.), Dorothy Arzner: Towards a Feminist Cinema, London: British Film Institute, 1975. Dorothy ArznerDorothy ArznerDorothy Arzner was an American film director. Her directorial career in feature films spanned from the late 1920s into the early 1940s, a time period in which there were very few—if any—other women working in the field.- Biography :Born in San Francisco, California, Arzner grew up in Los...
- 'The Place of Woman in the Cinema of Raoul Walsh', in Phil Hardy (ed.), Raoul Walsh, Edinburgh: Edinburgh Film Festival, 1974. With Claire Johnston. Reprinted in Barry Keith Grant (ed.), Auteurs and Authorship: A Reader, Oxford: Blackwell, 2008.