MSc Thesis Cinema as a Tool for Development Investigating the Power of Mobile Cinema in the Latin American Context By Philippine Sellam 1 In partial requirement of: Master of Sustainable Development/ International Development track Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University Student: Philippine Sellam (3227774)
[email protected] Under the supervision of: Gery Nijenhuis Utrecht, August 2014 Cover Picture and full page pictures between chapters: The public of mobile cinema/Fieldwork 2014 Title font: ‘Homeless font’ purchased from the Arells Foundation (www.homelessfonts.org) 2 Everything you can imagine is real - Picasso 3 Abstract During the last fifteen years, mobile cinema has sparked new interest in the cinema and development sectors. Taking cinema out of conventional theatres and bringing it to the people by transporting screening equipment on trucks, bicycles or trains and setting up ephemeral cinemas in the public space. Widening the diffusion of local films can provide strong incentives to a region or a country’s cinematographic industry and stimulate the production of independent films on socially conscious themes. But the main ambition of most mobile cinema projects is to channel the power of cultural community encounters to trigger critical social reflections and pave the way for social transformation. Just as other cultural activities, gathering to watch a film can bring new inspirations and motivations, which are subjective drivers for actor-based and self-sustained community change. Research is needed to substantiate the hypothesis that mobile cinema contributes to social change in the aforementioned sense. Therefore, the present work proposes to take an investigative look into mobile cinema in order to find out the ways and the extent to which it contributes to actor-based community development.