Paracinema is an

academic An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...

term to refer to a wide variety of film genres out of the mainstream, bearing the same relationship to 'legitimate' film as

paraliterature Paraliterature comprises written works dismissed as not literary. It includes commercial fiction, popular fiction, pulp fiction, comic books and, most notably, genre fiction with works of science fiction, fantasy, mystery and others.:361 The term ...

comic book A comic book, also called comicbook, comic magazine or (in the United Kingdom and Ireland) simply comic, is a publication that consists of comics art in the form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are of ...

s and

pulp fiction ''Pulp Fiction'' is a 1994 American crime film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, who conceived it with Roger Avary.See, e.g., King (2002), pp. 185–7; ; Starring John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Bruce Willis, Tim Roth, Vin ...

bears to literature.

Definition

In terms of taste and attitude in cinema practice, paracinema is similar to

camp Camp may refer to: Outdoor accommodation and recreation * Campsite or campground, a recreational outdoor sleeping and eating site * a temporary settlement for nomads * Camp, a term used in New England, Northern Ontario and New Brunswick to descri ...

, and both are conceptually linked to

trash Trash may refer to: Garbage * Garbage, unwanted or undesired waste material ** Litter, material discarded in inappropriate places ** Municipal solid waste, unwanted or undesired waste material generated in a municipal environment Arts, enter ...

and

kitsch Kitsch ( ; loanword from German) is a term applied to art and design that is perceived as naïve imitation, overly-eccentric, gratuitous, or of banal taste. The avant-garde opposed kitsch as melodramatic and superficial affiliation with ...

in the world of cult cinema. The term was first defined by cultural historian

Jeffrey Sconce Jeffrey Sconce is a professor and cultural historian of media and film. He is a professor in the Screen Cultures program at Northwestern University. Early life and education Sconce has a B.A., B.S., and M.A. from the University of Texas, Austin, a ...

, who described paracinema as 'an extremely elastic textual category'.

In addition to
art film An art film (or arthouse film) is typically an independent film, aimed at a niche market rather than a mass market audience. It is "intended to be a serious, artistic work, often experimental and not designed for mass appeal", "made primarily f ...
, horror, and
science fiction films Science fiction (or sci-fi) is a film genre that uses speculative, fictional science-based depictions of phenomena that are not fully accepted by mainstream science, such as extraterrestrial lifeforms, spacecraft, robots, cyborgs, interstellar ...
, "paracinema" catalogues "include entries from such seemingly disparate genres" as badfilm,
splatterpunk Splatterpunk is a movement within horror fiction originating in the 1980s, distinguished by its graphic, often gory, depiction of violence, countercultural alignment and "hyperintensive horror with no limits.""Schow, David J." by Gary Westfahl in ...
,
mondo film Mondo films are a subgenre of exploitation films and documentary films. Many mondo films are made in a way to resemble a pseudo-documentary and usually depicting sensational topics, scenes, or situations. Common traits of mondo films include p ...
s, sword-and-sandal epics, Elvis flicks, government hygiene films, Japanese
monster movie A monster movie, monster film, creature feature or giant monster film is a film that focuses on one or more characters struggling to survive attacks by one or more antagonistic monsters, often abnormally large ones. The film may also fall under ...
s, beach party musicals, and "just about every other historical manifestation of
exploitation cinema An exploitation film is a film that tries to succeed financially by exploiting current trends, niche genres, or Exploitation fiction, lurid content. Exploitation films are generally low-quality "B movies", though some set trends, attract critical ...
from
juvenile delinquency Juvenile delinquency, also known as juvenile offending, is the act of participating in unlawful behavior as a minor or individual younger than the statutory age of majority. In the United States of America, a juvenile delinquent is a person ...
documentaries to ...
pornography Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults,
.

Paracinema denotes an opposition to mainstream that, unlike other cult genres, specifically attacks the "reigning notions of 'quality'." Sconce also referred to paracinema as a particular film reading strategy aimed at performing a cultural leveling between the praised high culture and discarded low culture.

Structure

The term "paracinema" is also used in the context of

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

experimental film Experimental film or avant-garde cinema is a mode of filmmaking that rigorously re-evaluates cinematic conventions and explores non-narrative forms or alternatives to traditional narratives or methods of working. Many experimental films, parti ...

studies to denote works identified by their makers as films but that lack one or more material/mechanical elements of the film medium. Such works began to appear in the 1960s in the wake of

Conceptual art Conceptual art, also referred to as conceptualism, is art in which the concept(s) or idea(s) involved in the work take precedence over traditional aesthetic, technical, and material concerns. Some works of conceptual art, sometimes called insta ...

's rejection of standard artistic media like painting and embrace of much more ephemeral, transient materials and forms (including concepts themselves, independent of realization in any concrete material form). In exploring the fundamental nature and purpose of their medium, experimental filmmakers in the 1960s and 1970s began to question the necessity of film technology for the creation of cinema, and began making works without film that were nonetheless still considered part of the avant-garde film tradition. Such works include

Ken Jacobs Ken Jacobs (born May 25, 1933 in Brooklyn, New York) is an American experimental filmmaker. His style often involves the use of found footage which he edits and manipulates. He has also directed films using his own footage. Ken Jacobs directed ...

's "Nervous System" works and live shadowplays, the latter made with no film, camera, or projectors, only shadows cast by flickering lights onto a screen. Anthony McCall's "solid light" films, such as ''Line Describing a Cone'' (1973) and ''Long Film for Ambient Light'' (1975), are other examples; ''Long Film for Ambient Light'', despite its title, employed no film at all. It consisted simply of an empty artists' space lit over a 24-hour period by sunlight during the day and electric light at night.

Tony Conrad Anthony Schmalz Conrad (March 7, 1940 – April 9, 2016) was an American video artist, experimental filmmaker, musician, composer, sound artist, teacher, and writer. Active in a variety of media since the early 1960s, he was a pioneer of both ...

's ''Yellow Movies'' (1972–1975), rectangular pieces of paper coated with house paint and allowed to turn yellow from exposure over many years, are yet another example of film makers' investigation of the fundamental properties and effects of cinema outside the physical boundaries of the film medium. In many cases, "paracinematic" works came out of a sense among radical filmmakers that the film medium posed overly restrictive and unnecessary constraints (e.g. material and economic limitations) on their search for new kinds of cinematic experience. "Cinema", in this context, is understood as a much more varied art form than among most other kinds of filmmakers, who assume that "film" cannot be disconnected from the film medium. Esperanza Collado,
Paracinema: la desmaterialización del cine en las prácticas artísticas
'. Trama editorial, Madrid, 2012.

Definition

Structure

See also