'Comprehensive and thorough,  takes a new direction in its surprise application to documentary that has the potential to shake up the field.'- , Columbia University, USA'Spiegel has introduced a new sub-genre to utopian studies, the documentary film. The book covers an impressive range of films, making the book one of the few truly international and comparative works in utopian studies.'-, University of Missouri-St. Louis, USA This book examines a wide range of films – both historically and geographically – to explore the field of nonfiction cinematic utopias. As a literary genre, the utopian novel has a long and distinguished tradition: beginning with Thomas Moreʼs foundational text in 1516, there has been a steady stream of outlines for a better state. In film, however, the positive utopia—the eutopia—seems to be non-existent. There is wide agreement among scholars that a classic positive utopia, although it usually features a narrative frame, lacks some of the basic elements we normally expect from a fiction film – namely, a conflict-driven plot and individual characters who try to achieve clearly defined goals. The fundamental mistake most researchers have made is to concentrate on fiction films in the first place. This is a dead end, because utopias are not fiction proper. This book takes a new approach; starting from the insight that literary utopias are first and foremost meant as a reaction to the ills of the present and not as entertaining stories. Looking at documentary and propaganda films, this book combines insights from documentary research and utopian studies, to analyse a vast and diverse corpus of films.weiterlesen