Current Research: Silent Architects: Women Producers, Invisible Labour, and Feminist Histories in Horror Cinema

My current PhD project Silent Architects: Women Producers, Invisible Labour, and Feminist Histories in Horror Cinema examines the contributions of women producers in horror and exploitation cinema. Check back later for more information!

MA Thesis: “We must be burning film like mad”: Exploring Canadian production cultures at Cinepix, 1976-1986.

Abstract: This thesis examines the Canadian production, distribution, and exhibition company Cinépix between the years 1976-1986. Best well-known for their films Valérie (1969), Shivers (1975), Meatballs (1979), and My Bloody Valentine (1981), Cinépix has been neglected in the field of Canadian film studies. This thesis uses the framework of Media Industry Studies, and especially John Caldwell’s research on production culture, examining Cinépix’s previously unused archival material, including original memos, letters, storyboards, scripts, production notes, location documents, and producer’s notes on rushes. Films researched include the previously underexamined Meatballs III (1986), State Park (1988), Ilsa: Harem Keeper of the Oil Sheiks (1976), The Vindicator (1986), and Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone (1983), among others. This research argues that Cinépix’s production cultures were defined through commercial adaptability, independence, masculinity, and most importantly, the concept of the producer, exemplified by the company’s figureheads John Dunning and Andre Link. Through its use of Media Industry Studies approaches, this thesis also presents a new way of conceptualizing Canadian cinema and provokes new research within the discipline.​

Read online: https://prism.ucalgary.ca/items/d09c7e66-053c-4d55-b509-e56442177fdc

BA Honours Thesis: “Room on the Rad Team”: Exploring the Albertan Reception of Rad through the lens of the ‘Local Film’

Abstract: This thesis will examine the relationship between the local Albertan reception of Rad, and the tradition of the ‘local film’. Filmed in Alberta in the fall of 1985, Rad was a commercial and critical failure upon release, yet has gained a cult following in recent decades, culminating in the film’s 25th anniversary reunion in Cochrane and Calgary in 2011. Despite being an American film with a fictionalized American setting, Rad contains numerous instances where local culture, history, talent, and geography bursts onto the screen. I suggest that because of their specific geographic location, local viewers have an alternative decoding to Rad that echoes many of the reception practices that were cemented within the tradition of the local film decades earlier. To explore this claim, this thesis presents a formal analysis of Rad in relation to the historical ‘local film’; it additionally offers a series of interviews with seven self-identified Albertan fans of Rad in order to discern what draws them to the film. Central to this thesis is the argument that more academic attention needs to be placed on the relationship between the geographic spaces of film and media production and local reception of these texts.

Please contact me if you are interested in reading!