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We discuss the function of wide-scale destruction and ruins in apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic films such as “Planet of the Apes”, “Independence Day”, “2012”, “The Day After Tomorrow”, “The Road”, “12 Monkeys”, “I am Legend”, and “Don’t Look Up”.
Sources
- Leary, John Patrick. “Detroitism: What Does ‘Ruin Porn’ Tell Us about the Motor City?” Guernica, January 15, 2011. https://www.guernicamag.com/leary_1_15_11/
- Page, Max. The City’s End: Two Centuries of Fantasies, Fears, and Premonitions of New York’s Destruction. New Haven [Conn.]; London: Yale University Press, 2010.
- Prince, Stephen. Apocalypse Cinema. Quick Takes: Movies and Popular Culture. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2021.
- Simmel, Georg. Essays on Sociology, Philosophy, and Aesthetics. Edited by Kurt H. Wolff. New York: Harper and Row, 1965.
- Sontag, Susan. “Imagination of Disaster.” In Against Interpretation and Other Essays. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1966.
- Trimble, S. Undead Ends: Stories of Apocalypse. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 2019.
- Weinstein, Beth. “The City’s End.” Places Journal, no. 2010 (January 14, 2010). https://doi.org/10.22269/100114.
- Wilson, Scott. “Cities of Wrecked Desire: Post-Apocalyptic Cinema and Ruin Pornography.” In ACTAS ICONO14 – V Congresso Internacional Cidades Criativas, edited by Ernesto Taborda-Hernández, 1:514–23, 2017
- Woodward, Christopher. In Ruins: A Journey Through History, Art, and Literature. New York: Vintage Books, 2010.
- Woodward, Richard B. “Disaster Photography: When Is Documentary Exploitation?” ARTnews, February 6, 2013. https://www.artnews.com/art-news/news/the-debate-over-ruin-porn-2170/
