Title Sequences as Paratexts: Narrative Anticipation and Recapitulation (Routledge Studies in Media Theory and Practice)

"In his third book on the semiotics of title sequences, Title Sequences as Paratexts, theorist Michael Betancourt offers an analysis of the relationship between the title sequence and its primary text'"the narrative whose production the titles credit. Using a wealth of examples drawn from across film history'"ranging from White Zombie (1931), Citizen Kane (1940) and Bullitt (1968) to Prince of Darkness (1987), Mission: Impossible (1996), Sucker Punch (2011) and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 (2017)'"Betancourt develops an undiferstanding of how the audience interprets title sequences as instances of paranarrative, simultaneously engaging them as both narrative exposition and as credits for the production. This theory of cinematic paratexts, while focused on the title sequence, has application to trailers, commercials, and other media as well."--Provided by publisher In his third book on the semiotics of title sequences, Title Sequences as Paratexts, theorist Michael Betancourt offers an analysis of the relationship between the title sequence and its primary text--the narrative whose production the titles credit. Using a wealth of examples drawn from across film history--ranging from White Zombie (1931), Citizen Kane (1940), and Bullitt (1968) to Prince of Darkness (1987), Mission: Impossible (1996), Sucker Punch (2011), and Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 (2017)--Betancourt develops an understanding of how the audience interprets title sequences as instances of paranarrative, simultaneously engaging with them as both narrative exposition and as credits for the production. This theory of cinematic paratexts, while focused on the title sequence, has application to trailers, commercials, and other media as well Cover 1 Title 4 Copyright 5 Dedication 6 Contents 8 List of Figures 10 Acknowledgements 14 1 Introduction 16 Limina 18 Anticipation and Recapitulation 28 Problems of Cinematic Paratext 33 2 Narrative Exposition 44 Pseudo-independence 51 Intratextuality 55 3 Expositional Modes 62 The Allegory Mode 70 Lexical Expertise 82 4 The Comment Mode 90 Narrative Futurity 94 Intertextuality and Quotation 104 5 The Summary Mode 116 Complex Summary 123 Narrative Restatement 128 6 The Prologue Mode 135 Realist Integration 143 Expository Texts 154 7 Conclusions 162 The Paradoxes of Cinematic Paratext 162 Typography and Pseudo-independence 165 The Ideology of Naturalism::Stylization 168 Index 174