45661Ndalianis 3/17/04 11:39 AM Page 1 “Entertainment media continue to undergo dramatic transformations. Yet Angela NEO-BAROQUE AESTHETICS AND ENTERTAINMENT CONTEMPORARY NEO-BAROQUE AESTHETICS Ndalianis refreshingly reminds us how much films like Jurassic Park or Alien, and AND CONTEMPORARY ENTERTAINMENT computer games such as Phantasmagoria and Tomb Raider, owe to the labyrinthine compositions and machinic illusions of seventeenth-century ceiling painting. She ANGELA NDALIANIS convincingly shows that the late twentieth-century culture of special effects is neo- baroque through and through: given to open-ended spectacles, fictions blended with reality, and bold displays of technical virtuosity.” The artists of the seventeenth-century baroque period — BARBARA MARIA STAFFORD, WILLIAM B. OGDEN DISTINGUISHED SERVICE used spectacle to delight and astonish; contemporary PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO entertainment media, according to Angela Ndalianis, are imbued with a neo-baroque aesthetic that is similarly spectacular. In Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and “The majority of recent theorizing about emerging media technologies has been Contemporary Entertainment she situates today’s techno-fascinated, economically reductive, or just plain superficial on questions film, computer games, comic books, and theme park of textuality and narrative. Ndalianis situates contemporary visual media within a rich attractions within an aesthetic-historical context and historical tradition as she boldly goes where few, if any, scholars have gone before — uses the baroque as a framework to enrich our into the realm of computer games and theme park attractions. Her compelling analy- understanding of contemporary entertainment media. sis of how new technologies of entertainment have fundamentally transformed our relationships with visual texts will make this book a landmark work in media theory.” The neo-baroque aesthetics that Ndalianis analyzes — JIM COLLINS, DEPARTMENT OF FILM, TELEVISION, AND THEATRE, are not, she argues, a case of art history repeating or UNIVERSITY OF NOTRE DAME imitating itself; these forms have emerged as a result of recent technological and economic transforma- tions. The neo-baroque forms combine sight, sound, “Ndalianis's book achieves that rare thing: a scholarly argument based on carefully and text in ways that parallel such seventeenth- articulated historical evidence that is accessible to the nonspecialist and a joy century baroque forms as magic lanterns, automata, to read. It is an erudite call to rethink the contribution that the baroque has made painting, sculpture, and theater but use new technol- to western thought and art practice—in particular to reflect on the way that contem- ogy to express the concerns of the late twentieth and porary technologies of entertainment seem to be drawn to an aesthetic that lies early twenty-first century. Moving smoothly from outside the academic obsession with representation.” century to century, comparing ceiling paintings to the ANGELA NDALIANIS IS HEAD OF THE CINEMA — MICHAEL PUNT, EDITOR–IN–CHIEF, LEONARDO REVIEWS STUDIES PROGRAM AT THE UNIVERSITY OF computer game Doom, a Spiderman theme park MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA adventure to the baroque version of multimedia NDALIANIS known as the Bel Composto, and a Medici wedding to Terminator 2: 3D, the book demonstrates the logic Cover illustration: Detail from Pietro da Cortona's Divine of media histories. Ndalianis focuses on the complex Providence/The Glorification of Urban VIII, Palazzo Barberini, interrelationships among entertainment media Rome (1633–1639). Copyright Photo Vasari, Rome. The MIT Press and presents a rigorous cross-genre, cross-historical Jacket design: Tímea Adrián Massachusetts Institute of Technology • Cambridge, Massachusetts 02142 • http://mitpress.mit.edu analysis of media aesthetics. 0-262-14084-5 ,!7IA2G2-beaied!:t;K;k;K;k Media in Transition series Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment Media in Transition David Thorburn, series editor Edward Barrett, Henry Jenkins, associate editors New Media, 1740–1915, edited by Lisa Gitelman and Geoffrey B. Pingree, 2003 Democracy and New Media, edited by Henry Jenkins and David Thorburn, 2003 Rethinking Media Change: The Aesthetics of Transition, edited by David Thorburn and Henry Jenkins, 2003 Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment, Angela Ndalianis, 2004 Neo-Baroque Aesthetics and Contemporary Entertainment Angela Ndalianis The MIT Press Cambridge, Massachusetts London, England ( 2004 Massachusetts Institute of Technology All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher. This book was set in Perpetua on 3B2 by Asco Typesetters, Hong Kong, and was printed and bound in the United States of America. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Ndalianis, Angela, 1960– Neo-Baroque aesthetics and contemporary entertainment / Angela Ndalianis p. cm. — (Media in transition) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-262-14084-5 (hc. : alk. paper) 1. Motion pictures. 2. Mass media. 3. Mass media—Technological innovations. 4. Cinematography—Special effects. 5. Civilization, Baroque. 6. Video games. I. Title. II. Series. PN1995.N374 2004 791.43—dc22 2003059383 10 987654321 Contents List of Illustrations vii Series Foreword xi Acknowledgments xiii Introduction: The Baroque and the Neo-Baroque 1 Postclassical, Modern Classicism, or Neo-Baroque? Will the Real Contemporary Cinema Please Stand Up? 1 ...OfThings Baroque 7 The ‘‘Baroque Baroque’’ and the Hollywood Style: the 1920s and 1930s 10 The Latin American and Spanish Neo-Baroque 12 The Spatial Aspect of the Cultural System 15 The Neo-Baroque and Contemporary Entertainment Media 23 1 Polycentrism and Seriality: (Neo-)Baroque Narrative Formations 31 Seriality and the (Neo-)Baroque 31 Globalization, Seriality and Entertainment Media 34 Capitalism, Seriality, and the Baroque 41 Seigneurial Seriality: Serial Form and Baroque Allegory 49 An Aesthetic of Repetition and the Drive for Perfection 55 The Fragment and the Whole: Aliens/Predator: The Deadliest of the Species 60 2 Intertextuality, Labyrinths, and the (Neo-)Baroque 71 ‘‘Intertextual Arenas’’ and (Neo-)Baroque Folds 71 vi Contents Multiple Temporalities and Monadic Logic: The Evil Dead and Evil Dead II, the ‘‘Original’’ and the Sequel 73 The Labyrinth, Virtuosity, and the Barberini Ceiling 81 Doom, Doom II, and Neo-Baroque Forces of Expansion 96 The Labyrinth, Virtuosity, and Doom II 103 3 Hypertexts, Mappings, and Colonized Spaces 109 Phantasmagoria and Intertextual Journeys through Horror 109 Stalker Film Meets the Stalker CD-ROM ‘‘Interactive Movie’’ 115 The Hypertextual Array: A New Medium for the Neo-Baroque 120 Colonizing Space: The Baroque Mapping of New Worlds 129 Colonizing Cyberspace: Neo-Baroque Mapping and Virtual Spaces 140 4 Virtuosity, Special-Effects Spectacles, and Architectures of the Senses 151 (Neo-)Baroque Visuality 151 The Quadratura Spectacle of S. Ignazio and the Digital Spectacle of Jurassic Park 160 Optics, Virtuosity, and Seventeenth-Century Illusionistic Ceiling Paintings 171 Optics, Virtuosity, and Digital Effects in Science Fiction Cinema 179 Star Wars and the Architecture of Vision 189 Remediation, Spectacle, and the Assault on the Sensorium 193 Terminator 2: 3D Battle across Time, the Unity of the Arts, and Architectures of the Senses 199 5 Special-Effects Magic and the Spiritual Presence of the Technological 209 Sensual Seduction and (Neo-)Baroque Transcendence 209 Aliens and the Second Coming: The Spiritual Presence of the Technological 221 The Magic of Spectacle 226 The Aesthetics of Rare Experiences 233 The Game of Creation: Automata, Cyborgs, and Animated Statues 243 The Amazing Adventures of Spiderman and the Bel Composto 251 Notes 257 References 297 Index 313 Illustrations I.1 The Jurassic Park Ride, Universal Studios, Orlando, Florida 2 I.2 William Randolph Hearst’s California residence, San Simeon 13 I.3 Andrea Pozzo, The Glory of S. Ignazio (detail), Rome, 1691–1694 16 I.4 Promotional poster for the phenomenally successful Lucas franchise Star Wars (1977) 24 1.1 A poster for the B-film serial Superman’s Dilemma (1948) 35 1.2 Jacob van Swanenburgh, The Seven Deadly Sins,c.1600–1610 47 1.3 Jacob van Swanenburgh, Hell Scene,c.1600–1610 47 1.4 Comics performing in the Piazza San Marco, Venice 50 1.5 Apollo’s Chariot, Versailles (1667–1672) 52 1.6 Aliens/Predator: The Deadliest of the Species, no. 8 (1993–1994) 65 1.7 Aliens/Predator: The Deadliest of the Species, no. 6 (1993–1994) 67 1.8 Aliens/Predator: The Deadliest of the Species, no. 12 (1993–1994) 68 2.1 Ash (Bruce Campbell) from Evil Dead II 76 2.2 A unicursal or monodirectional labyrinth 82 2.3 A multicursal or multidirectional labyrinth 83 2.4 Pietro da Cortona’s Divine Providence/The Glorification of Urban VIII (1633–1639) 85 2.5 Minerva and the Fall of the Giants (1633–1639) 86 2.6 Annibale Carracci’s trompe l’oeil frescoes on the vault of the Galleria Farnese (1597–1608) 89 viii Illustrations 3.1 The ‘‘final girl’’ heroine, Adrienne, from Sierra’s Phantasmagoria (1995) 110 3.2 An interior space from Phantasmagoria (Sierra 1995) 113 3.3 An exterior space from Phantasmagoria (Sierra 1995) 113 3.4 Adrienne explores the kitchen area, from Phantasmagoria (Sierra 1995) 115 3.5 Fifteenth century mappa mundi (map of the world) that relies on Claudius Ptolemy’s