The Great Pretenders

The Great Pretenders: Genre, Form, and Style in the Film Musicals of John Carney In this deeply fascinating account of the film musicals of John Carney, we explore the riches of story, form and aesthetics to hear and see how song occupies the spaces of nostalgia in a late modern national and transnational context where social relations have been rendered ephemeral. The Great Pretenders engages in some truly beautiful moments of textual analysis, offering us a new appreciation of the modern film musical - one that is rooted to the past, but which affectively moves us into and beyond digital dematerialisation and for what counts as authenticity. Ireland's own national imaginary is read against the grain of Hollywood, while Carney's authorship itself sits in a liminal state: his voice wet with Irish lyricism, and its notes saturated in the new conditions of modern filmmaking and social life. A brilliant book. Menendez-Otero's fascinating study of Carney's musicals delivers a wealth of research into the films' production, marketing and reception, alongside incisive commentary and critical analysis. The book ably makes the case for the significance of Carney's work in the contemporary renewal of the musical and of Irish cinema. Dr Karen McNally London Metropolitan University