ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Several agencies and film distributors were enormously helpful in facilitating my access to films discussed in the book. I am therefore grateful to World Artists, distributors of Je tu il elle; First Run Features (The Man Who Envied Women); and especially Women Make Movies (Illusions, Reassemblage, and Ten Cents a Dance [Parallax]). The Australian Film Commission obtained a copy of A Song of Ceylon (now distributed by Women Make Movies) for my use. Thanks to Tom Gunning and Charles Musser for help in finding some of the early films discussed in chapter five; and to Andy Spencer for translation of a German text.

For help in locating stills for illustrations, thanks to Terry Geesken of the Museum of Modern Art Film Stills Archive, to Women Make Movies, to Yvonne Rainer, and to Sam McElfresh of the American Federation of Arts. The illustrations in the book are reproduced courtesy of the Museum of Modern Art, Women Make Movies, Yvonne Rainer, the American Federation of Arts Film/Video Program (from the “Before Hollywood” exhibition; Patrick G. Loughney, photographer), World Artists, The British Film Institute, Corinth Films, and New Yorker Films. Thanks to Lucretia Knapp for technical assistance.

Early versions of portions of some chapters have appeared elsewhere. Portions of the introduction and chapter three appeared in New German Critique, no. 23 (1981); an early version of part of chapter one in Wide Angle 6, no. 3 (1984). A previous version of the discussion of Redupers (chapter two) appeared in New German Critique, no. 24-25 (1981-82). Earlier versions of parts of chapter five appeared in frauen und film, no. 41 (1986), and in Before Hollywood: Turn-of-the-Century Film from American Archives (New York: American Federation of Arts, 1986); © American Federation of Arts, reprinted with permission.

I am grateful to the students who have taken my course on “Women and Film” at Ohio State University over the years; many of the ideas developed in this book began, one way or another, in the classroom. For conversation and encouragement at crucial moments, thanks to Lucy Fischer, Anne Friedberg, Mitchell Greenberg, Dana Polan, Leslie Mitchener, B. Ruby Rich, and Marie-Claire Vallois. I have received grant support from the Ohio Arts Council, as well as the College of Humanities and the Center for Women’s Studies at Ohio State, and released time from the Department of French and Italian—all of which made the completion of the book possible. For friendship and more, special thanks to Teresa de Lauretis. Most of all, thanks to Terry Moore for being such a good sport.