The monthly roundup of film and television publications compiled by Simon Baker, Institute of Historical Research, and published here at the BUFVC by Linda Kaye.

This month’s Roundup opens with an unusual cinematic special issue from an unusual source – Small Wars & Insurgencies. The issue, entitled Cinema and Insurgencies, covers ancient history on film to the modern narcotic wars of Mexico by way of the Greek Civil War and counter-insurgency in Vietnam.

Downton Abbey makes it into Roundup with Baena and Byker’s Dialects of Nostalgia: Downton Abbey and English Identity which explores both Englishness and nostalgia in the period drama through a close narrative analysis while looking at what the collective nostalgia may reveal about underlying cultural values and social class. Costume dramas also feature in two articles from the Journal Brontë Studies. Catherine Han interviews the costume designer for the BBC 2006 production of Jane Eyre and Pérez Ríu looks at the adaptation of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1996).

Last month’s Roundup featured two roundtables on Spielberg’s Lincoln (2012) and this issue features a roundtable on 12 years a Slave in the journal Civil War History.

And finally two articles look at animation. Chris Pallant in New York: The Animated City looks at the portrayal of the city in Disney’s Fantasia 2000 (1999), Patrick Jean’s computer-generated short Pixels (2009), and Rockstar Games’ Grand Theft Auto IV (2008). While Caroline Jack looks at the cartoon series Fun and Facts about American Business (1946-1952) that was designed to build public support for the principles and practices of free enterprise, as an example of the Cold War public relations.

Media Screen Roundup (Aug 2015) IHR-BUFVC (PDF)