1st Edition
A Multimodal Stylistic Approach to Screen Adaptations of the Work of Alice Munro
This volume brings together perspectives from multimodal stylistics and adaptation studies for a unified theoretical analysis of adaptations of the work of Alice Munro, demonstrating the affordances of the approach in furthering interdisciplinary research at the intersection of these fields
The book considers films and television programmes as complex multimodal stylistic systems in and of themselves in order to pave the way for a clearer understanding of screen adaptations as expressions of modal, medial, and aesthetic change. In focusing on Munro, Francesconi draws attention to a writer whose body of work has been adapted widely across television and film for an international market over several decades, offering a diachronic overview and insights into the confluence of socio-cultural contexts, audiences, and dynamics of production and distribution across adaptations. The volume complements this perspective with a microanalysis of the adaptations themselves, exploring the varied creative use of audio-visual dimensions, including sound, light, and movement. The book seeks to overcome simplified fidelity-based understandings of screen adaptations more broadly, showcasing creative multi-layered approaches to a creator’s oeuvre to effect true transformation across media and modes.
The volume will be of interest to scholars in multimodality, adaptation studies, film studies, and comparative literature.
Contents
0. Introduction
- Adapting Clothes, Peaches and Stories
- A Panoramic Shot over Adaptations
- Dissemination of Preliminary Results
- Volume Outline
Chapter 1. Adaptation(s)
- Towards a Definition
- The Limits and Risks of Fidelity
- Intertextual Connections
- Engaging Readers and Spectators
- Adaptation as Process and as Product
Chapter 2. Multimodal Stylistic Analysis
- Multimodal Stylistics
- A Socio-semiotic Metafunctional Framework
- Forms and Functions of Speech
- Film Dialogues and the Voice-in
- Screen/Story Boundaries and The Voice-over
- Lyrics, Volume, Melodies
- Words on the Screen
- Size of Frame and Angles
- Movements
- Colour and Light Choices and Changes
- Beyond the Shot
Chapter 3. Short Canadian Films
- Boys and Girls
- Gender and/as Space Representation
- Thanks for the Ride
- Film Music Framing Theme, Time and Tone
- All about Connection
- The Voice-over across Time
Chapter 4. Extended Canadian Works
- Lives of Girls and Women
- Del’s Relationship with her Mother
- There is a Change Coming
- Writing Things down
- Struggle for Cohesion
- Edge of Madness
- "A Wilderness Station" as Historiographic Metafiction
- Patterns of Adaptation
- Closing in on Madness
- Changes in the Film Adaptation
- Away from Her: Closeness and Distance
- Fiona’s Approach to her Illness
- Grant as Husband, Caregiver, and Focaliser
- The Canadian Culture
Chapter 5. International Screen Adaptations
- Bending Fate in Hateship Loveship
- Ankle Socks and Robust Shoes: Johanna
- Writing Letters as Writing Life
- Juliet Travelling to Spain
- Almodóvar’s Story of Adaptation(s)
- Julieta’s Letter-writing Scenes
- Making Logical Connections Clear
- From Canada to Canaan: An Iranian Journey
- Criss-crossing Characters
- A Disturbance, a Definite Picture, a Dream
- From Unpainted Houses to the Promised Land
Concluding Remarks
Index
Biography
Sabrina Francesconi is Associate Professor of English Linguistics at the University of Trento. Her research interests are tourism and heritage discourses, adaptation studies, Canadian studies, humour studies, multimodal analysis, multimodal genre analysis, multimodal stylistics, and systemic-functional stylistics.
