It seems to me that TV within films replaced radio in the role of providing exposition.  Somebody turns on radio/TV to hear about an escaped killer, car wreck, whatever.  In Night of the Living Dead this had gone far enough that the TV exposition is presented (or at least usually interpreted) as unreliable.  Though by now we have real-life reporters appearing in fictional movies (at least a couple in Iron Man 2) and even entire movies built of TV broadcasts (Special Bulletin, [REC], Feed).  

Other than simple plot points if a movie is playing on TV within another movie it seems to usually have some relation to the main film even if it's just a genre homage (romance films having a classic romance clip, horror horror, etc).  Sounds like this isn't exactly what you want but it's probably a blurry line between a monster movie that has Frankenstein on the TV for little purpose and say Joe Dante stuffing The Howling with numerous references to other movies as a form of criticism.

One example of what you might be looking for is The Disorderly Orderly where one of the characters imitates every commercial that comes on TV.


-----Original Message-----
>From: "W. McCarthy" <[log in to unmask]>
>Sent: Jun 4, 2010 10:12 AM
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: [SCREEN-L] incorporation of TV/cinema screen into cinema narrative
>
>I wonder if someone would be kind enough to direct me toward any studies --
>or even mere lists of examples -- which have been made of the incorporation
>of images of a TV (and/or cinema) screen into a film's narrative -- screen
>within a screen, that is. What I have chiefly in mind are complex examples
>such as Arturo Ripstein's Así es la vida, Stone's Any Given Sunday,
>Cronenberg's Videodrome, Dassin's Dream of Passion, etc., in which the
>screen's images are somehow integral to (or make ironic comment upon) the
>on-going narrative. In Any Given Sunday, e.g., Wyler's 1959 Ben-Hur plays on
>a screen in order to produce an ironic atmosphere in a key scene. However,
>any instance, even incidental, in which a TV or film screen is incorporated
>would interest me.
>
>Gratefully,
>Bill McCarthy
>
>----
>Screen-L is sponsored by the Telecommunication & Film Dept., the
>University of Alabama: http://www.tcf.ua.edu


“Music—any art—is there to give us more freedom, not take it away.” - Greil Marcus

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