Film

“This book applies current theory with intellectual rigor and deep commitment to the films of one of our most important contemporary filmmakers. . . . Robert Self’s connection of Altman’s texts to contemporary critical discourse will make this book the most important on its subject.” Robert Kolker, author of Film, Form, and Culture

With his complex and unconventional films, Robert Altman often draws an impassioned response from critics but bafflement and indifference from the general public. Some audiences have dismissed his movies as insignificant, unsatisfying, and unreadable. Ironically, Altman might agree: he makes films in order to challenge filmgoers’ expectations of straightforward narratives and easily understood endings.

In Robert Altman’s Subliminal Reality, Robert T. Self sheds light on Altman’s work and provides the most comprehensive analysis of his films to date. With close readings of classics like MASH, McCabe and Mrs. Miller, and Nashville, as well as more recent films like The Player, Short Cuts, and Cookie’s Fortune, Self asserts the value of Altman’s work not only to film theory and the entertainment industry but to American culture itself.

Robert T. Self is professor of English at Northern Illinois University.

Commerce and Mass Culture Series

University of Minnesota Press
Printed in U.S.A.
Cover design by Ariana Grabec-Dingman
Cover photograph copyright S.I.N./CORBIS.