Runaway Hollywood - by Daniel Steinhart (Paperback)

About the Book

"After World War II, as Hollywood faced a changing industrial landscape, movie studios shifted some production activities overseas, where they capitalized on frozen foreign earnings, cheap labor, and striking locations. Hollywood unions called the phenomenon "runaway" production to underscore the dispersal of employment opportunities. Examining the late 1940s to early 1960s, Runaway Hollywood details these changes, showing how film companies exported production around the world and the effect of this move on visual style. It uses an array of historical materials to trace the industry's creation of a more global production operation that intermixed craft practices and aesthetic ideas from Hollywood and abroad"--Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

After World War II, as cultural and industry changes were reshaping Hollywood, movie studios shifted some production activities overseas, capitalizing on frozen foreign earnings, cheap labor, and appealing locations. Hollywood unions called the phenomenon "runaway" production to underscore the outsourcing of employment opportunities. Examining this period of transition from the late 1940s to the early 1960s, Runaway Hollywood shows how film companies exported production around the world and the effect this conversion had on industry practices and visual style. In this fascinating account, Daniel Steinhart uses an array of historical materials to trace the industry's creation of a more international production operation that merged filmmaking practices from Hollywood and abroad to produce movies with a greater global scope.

From the Back Cover

"How exactly does an industry with a production wing based in Los Angeles begin to make movies on other continents? To answer this question, Daniel Steinhart has conducted an extraordinary amount of original research drawing on primary sources from European and US archives. Advancing an innovative transcultural argument, he details how Hollywood's production culture subtly changed as its workers encountered the norms of other industries. The result is a major contribution to our understanding of postwar Hollywood cinema--and it is the definitive study of runaway production."--Patrick Keating, Associate Professor of Communication, Trinity University

"For those who think the idea of runaway film came out of Canada, Steinhart's Runaway Hollywood shows us how film production has always gravitated to the lowest cost location. To that scenario, he adds archival insights on the cross-cultural dimensions of making US movies abroad."--Vicki Mayer, Professor of Communication, Tulane University

"Steinhart offers an ingenious bottom-up perspective on Hollywood's overseas filmmaking ventures during the postwar period, demonstrating the myriad ways that practical and aesthetic concerns intertwined with larger questions of economic and cultural influence. By doing so, he makes an essential and welcome contribution to the critical literature on global Hollywood."--Michael Curtin, Duncan and Suzanne Mellichamp Professor of Film and Media Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara

About the Author

Daniel Steinhart is Assistant Professor of Cinema Studies at the University of Oregon. His work on film and media has appeared in Cinema Journal, NECSUS: European Journal of Media Studies, InMedia: The French Journal of Media Studies, and various edited collections.