Page 18 - Alternative Europe Eurotrash and Exploitation Cinema Since 1945

of films wants to become popular, but is often prevented of becoming part of the cinema establishment
because the films are continuously dismissed as cheap or irrelevant rubbish.
The dynamics between these corners, the battlefield of alternative cinema, has not gone unnoticed
by scholars. Jeffrey Sconce, Joan Hawkins and Mark Betz, to name but a few, have been trying
to pin down the mechanisms that operate between these supposedly separate spheres of cinema. 9
Sconce's concept of paracinema, Hawkins' notion of the artistic horrific and Betz's analysis of unusual
reception practices all point to the same thing: they try to explain why some films are considered to
be more (or less) alternative than others. Sometimes it is their textual organisation, their status, their
controversial potential or even their reception, mostly it is a combination of all these factors. Almost
always reputations are involved. As analyses of Tenebrae (Dario Argento, 1982), by Xavier Mendik,
and Daughters of Darkness (Harry Kümel, 1971), by Ernest Mathijs, point out, alternative films do
not allow for a clear-cut distinction between text and context; they are messy dispersible texts, existing
beyond and below the usual confinements of film culture.'10
So, all qualifications taken into account, 'alternative European cinema' encompasses everything
between the odd-but-accepted and the unknown, from the almost obvious to the almost non-existing.
Rather than offer an exhaustive account of all of the traditions that have hitherto remained concealed
from theoretical investigation, Alternative Europe offers a series of key case studies gathered from
major European cycles, traditions and figures. In its claim that European 'trash' and 'exploitation'
cinema represents a legitimate area of intellectual study, this volume draws upon, reconsiders and
extends, existing cinematic studies into the underbelly of international film.

GUILT, CONFESSION, TESTIMONY - RESISTANCE, REBELLION, LIBERATION

Given its focus, this book's intention is to give room to a diversity of approaches and topics concerning
exploitation and underground cinema. With so much work to be done on the topic, charting the
territory becomes a dominant issue. We have tried to make sure that as many interesting perspectives
were present, while also ensuring that the chapters enclosed all address alternative European cinema.
However, while fully acknowledging the diversities of alternative European cinema, there seem to be
a couple of recurring issues, above and beyond the ones that inform this book. First of all, much of
alternative European cinema seems to address issues of guilt, confession and testimony. This seems
to point, consciously or involuntarily, to their ability to function as sites of reconfiguration of the
self, as attempts to explore possibilities of reconstructing cultural frameworks. Of course, with the
massive traumas of World War Two, the rise and collapse of communism, and decolonisation only
a few decades behind them, both the audiences and makers of alternative European cinema could
hardly ignore it. Nor can they be blind for the scandals and upheavals in their own local contexts,
be they coup attempts, serial murders or terrorism. But it seems telling that these traumas are both
acknowledged through interiorisation, and expressed through excesses, offering both soft- and shock-
therapy.
A second, and connected, recurrent thread appears to be that of resistance, rebellion and liberation.
Alternative European cinema sets itself not just against a mainstream culture, but also against a range
of ways of thinking, politically and ideologically. Arguably, alternative European cinema as discussed
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