"Irony is a Cheap Shot": Robert Altman, Luis Buñuel, and the Maneuvers of Comic Deconstruction

In 2006, the year of his death, Robert Altman received an Honorary Academy Award for his lifetime achievement. Despite this belated recognition by the Hollywood establishment, his films since the late 1960s have been regarded as highly critical and aesthetically complex forms of interrogating Americ...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Amerikastudien 2007-01, Vol.52 (1), p.63-79
Main Author: Decker, Christof
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bourgeois
Deconstructionism
Film criticism
Humor
Irony
Motion picture industry
Movies
Narratives
Performative utterances
Weddings
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Summary:In 2006, the year of his death, Robert Altman received an Honorary Academy Award for his lifetime achievement. Despite this belated recognition by the Hollywood establishment, his films since the late 1960s have been regarded as highly critical and aesthetically complex forms of interrogating American culture and society. Indeed, Altman was one of the last active auteurs from the era of the New Hollywood Cinema who had begun their careers by deconstructing Hollywood formulas and American myths. Focusing on his early work and, in particular, on aspects of the comic, this essay examines how Altman's films shaped, and complicated, what has been called his democratic aesthetic. By juxtaposing Altman with the late work of Luis Buñuel, I will argue that a crucial, if ambiguous, achievement of the American art cinema lies in its interrelation of comic deconstruction and performative self-creation.
ISSN:0340-2827