Dear Screen-L: The University of California Press is pleased to announce the publication of: Cinema and Fascism: Italian Film and Society, 1922-1943 Steven Ricci is the Director of the Moving Image Archive Studies program at University of California, Los Angeles, where he also teaches in the Department of Film, Television and Digital Media and the Department of Information Studies. http://go.ucpress.edu/RicciRascism "Italian Fascism was full of paradoxes, one of which concerned the cinema. Why did this self-styled totalitarian regime adopt such an apparently laissez-faire attitude towards this major art form and medium of entertainment? And if Italian cinema in the Fascist period was rarely propagandistic, was it nevertheless permeated by Fascist values in other ways? Steven Ricci approaches these and related questions both knowledgeably and with a refreshingly open mind, eschewing all the usual cliche and coming up with surprising and fascinating answers."-Geoffrey Nowell-Smith, editor of _The Oxford History of World Cinema_ This study considers Italian filmmaking during the Fascist era and offers an original and revealing approach to the interwar years. Steven Ricci directly confronts a long-standing dilemma faced by cultural historians: while made during a period of totalitarian government, these films are neither propagandistic nor openly "Fascist." Instead, the Italian Fascist regime attempted to build ideological consensus by erasing markers of class and regional difference and by circulating terms for an imaginary national identity. _Cinema and Fascism _investigates the complex relationship between the totalitarian regime and Italian cinema. It looks at the films themselves, the industry, and the role of cinema in daily life, and offers new insights into this important but neglected period in cinema history. Full information about the book, including the table of contents, is available online: http://go.ucpress.edu/RicciFascism -- Lolita Guevarra Electronic Marketing Coordinator University of California Press Tel. 510.643.4738 | Fax 510.643.7127 [log in to unmask] ---- To sign off Screen-L, e-mail [log in to unmask] and put SIGNOFF Screen-L in the message. Problems? Contact [log in to unmask]