Representation of physical space in cinema is a subject that has been investigated by scholars from different disciplines, including filmmakers. Space in cinema is formed through the overlapping of the three components' of physical space, projected space - the image of the physical space..:.. and mental space, an image or an abstract idea formed in the viewer's mind. Representation of space in cinema is therefore a spatial system structured by three interrelated components of physical; optical and psyc!tological relationships. This study investigates the nature ofinfluential factors contributing to the representation of space in Iranian cinema. To do this, the study constructs a model ofcinematic space system structured by the three components of physical space, screen space and mental space. At the centre of the model there is a shared, overlapping area, whose landscape is a complex spatial form influenced by cultural images. The study argues that this landscape is the site for the development of the viewer's mental image in the context ofIranian films. The study reviews the socio-cultural factors that have influenced the development of cinema in Iran since 1900. It then focuses on analysing the representation of space in Iranian films, identifying dominant influential factors in the landscape of the shared area which have influenced the representation ofspace. The findings of this research confirm that shared cultural images, especially traditional painting and performing arts, Taziyeh, have influenced the cinematic space of Iranian films, although the extent and direction of, influence varies and depends upon the socio-political environment in each period.

An Invitation to Travel- The Image of Japanese Film in the West 1950-1975 is a reception study which presents the events and efforts that characterize the reception of Japanese film in France, Great Britain and the United States, after World War Two. Chapter One presents the research questions informing this study and discusses the historically located Western cultural concepts involved such as the aesthetics of art 1 cinema, Japonisme, and the notion of'Japaneseness'. The argumentation as such is based on the presumption of a still prevailing Orientalist discourse at the time. The thesis discusses the Japanese film industry's need to devise a new strategy of doing export business with the West in relation to the changed postwar context in Chapter Two. The preparations on the part of the Japanese to distribute their films in the West through different modes of transnational publicity are in focus here, from introductory 'film weeks', to marketing vehicles such as UnUapan Film Quarterly, and the first Western books on Japanese film history. The thesis then proceeds to deal with the groundbreaking introduction of this first non-occidental national cinema from four different angles; exhibition (Chapter Three), critical reception (Chapter Four), publicity (Chapter Five) and canon formation (Chapter Six). Chapter Three looks into the history ofWestern exhibition ofJapanese film in the countries involved in this study and identifies divergent attitudes between institutional and commercial screenings. It also locates possible changes in exhibition policy over time. Chapter Four establishes the main players in the critical reception ofJapanese cinema in the West and examines national divergences in attitude towards this 'new' national cinema. In order to do so, it necessarily discusses the development of Western auteurism in the late 1950s, and its effect on the film periodicals in the countries involved. Chapter Five presents an alternative venue of research through the image of Japanese cinema induced by Western poster design. It explores Western responses based on concepts involving Japonisme and national stereotypes in both commercial (capitalistic) and non-commercial (communist) aesthetic contexts. Chapter Six explores the history of canon formation and the evaluation of Japanese film in the West. The thesis argues that the extant Western canon on Japanese film is inconclusive and that it could be exchanged, in part, for at least three other versions of the same national cinema, enough to make the current image of Western postwar Japanese film history seem utterly unsatisfactory. . The conclusion in Chapter Seven presents the outcome of the effects of exhibition, critical reception and publicity, as well as the trajectory of canon formation in the previous chapters. By looking back again at its components, this study indicates several areas that warrant further research in order to extend the existing Western conceptualization ofJapanese film history.

This thesis provides a complex and in-depth analysis of the reception, by actual audiences, of recent films about the Holocaust. Drawing on approaches from cultural studies, and using an original methodology developed for this project, the analysis of film text and context was combined with an empirical, qualitative reception study. Using Britain as a case study, it is demonstrated that the reception process of feature films and docu-dramas about the Holocaust is multi-faceted and cannot be fully understood through textual analysis alone. The thesis challenges the widespread generalisations about films’ alleged impact on ‘the public’ in the literature about Holocaust representations. By analysing the data, the ways in which a select number of films are made sense of immediately after the film viewing are explored, and how the Holocaust is understood through these films. It is demonstrated that the reading of films is simultaneously multiple and emanating from the text, which triggers and facilitates a range of interpretations. The process of making sense of Holocaust representations is an active process, which is influenced, guided and at times constrained by preconceptions, emotions, and the extent to which films are considered as authentic. As such, the thesis makes a long overdue contribution to the study of the representation of the Holocaust.

This thesis adopts a comparative approach to the study of Irish film, establishing shared cultural characteristics which have existed within twentieth century Ireland and Spain, and tracing the effects of these nationally specific characteristics into the representational strategies of recent Irish and Spanish cinema. In such a way it accounts for the specificities of Ireland's social and cultural experiences whilst situating Ireland's historical development in a European context. It traces the demise of an insular Catholic-nationalism as the dominant ideology within Ireland and Spain, examining the effects of this on representations of contemporary life within their national cinemas. One of its central arguments is that this demise has left a problematic relationship to power within both cultures as previous power structures are rejected within the process of modernisation. The effects of this are traced into the representations . of state and pareo/al authority within recent Irish and Spanish cinema. Other effects of the shift in values within both cultures include the focus on a mobile sexuality as a symbol of the modernised nation and a move from the rural to the urban as the paradigmatic space of national life.

Films are shaped by the social and historical constellations within which, and for which, they are made. This thesis analyses the narrative and visual style of films of contemporary Japanese cinema (made from the late 1980s omvard) in relation to their social and historical context of production and reception. In particular, the thesis is concerned with the representation of minority groups in contemporary Japanese cinema and the relationship ofthis to more general trends in contemporary Japanese nationalism and multiculturalism. Although there have been studies ofthe relationship between Japanese films and Japanese nationalism in the 1930s. and 1940s, this issue has been relatively neglected in writing on contemporary Japanese cinema. However, given the changes in both Japanese society and Japanese cinema over the last twenty-five years, this is an issue that undoubtedly merits sustained critical attention.Just as the trend towards multiculturalism within Japan more generally may be seen to be multi-faceted, so the turn towards the representation of minorities within Japanese cinema cannot be regarded as straightforwardly 'progressive' but must be subject to critical examination. The purpose ofthis thesis, therefore, is to consider the ways in which 'millticultural' sentiments have emerged in contemporary Japanese cinema. In this respect, Japanese films may be seen not simply to have 'reflected' more general trends within Japanese society but to have played an active role in constructing and communicating different versions ofmulticulturalism. Accordingly, the thesis is particularly concerned with how representations of 'otherness' in contemporary Japanese cinema may be identified as reinforcing or subverting dominant discourses of 'Japaneseness'.

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This thesis examines cultural representations of German soldiers during the Second World War in East and West German film and literature from the 1950s. My focus is the role of gender in shaping perceptions and memories of the military and war in the early GDR and FRG, against the context of shifts in gender roles and relations in the aftermath of war, and establishment of two ideologically opposed yet closely intertwined post-war orders. I demonstrate that the texts’ renegotiations of German masculinities both reflect and challenge wider official and hegemonic discourses concerned with the reintegration of male citizens into the post-war states, while foregrounding memories of male experiences of war. The use of gender as a structural category reveals a range of other wartime experiences within these texts that remain unconsidered within existing scholarship. Reading against the grain of existing research this thesis uncovers a multitude of female protagonists alongside soldier figures, predominantly overlooked within both contemporary reception and subsequent scholarship. These female figures play a constitutive role in shaping perspectives on war, performing crucial functions ranging from acting as the signifier for male strength or aggression, to introducing other wartime experiences into the narrative. The thesis does not separate the two German states, but instead reads twenty texts from the FRG and GDR alongside each other in a thematic analysis. I examine representations of five key military experiences; those of child soldiers, instances of military opposition, the Eastern Front, German retreat and post-war experiences. My texts point to the multifaceted and distinct ongoing confrontations with the war in the FRG and GDR, which provided an important cornerstone in the formation of East and West German identities. These texts stand as important reassessments of the Nazi past and underline the centrality of gender for contemporary understandings of wartime experiences.