The article focuses on the problem of the text as a universal category and the primary reality of any studied cultural phenomenon. It also touches upon a range of issues connected with different approaches to literary text analysis.

The article overviews the American cinema of the 1930 in terms of the “cyclic conception” stating that the life of American society is subject to a distinctive algorhithm of public mood: “social restlessness” alternating with “private interest”. The author surveys gangster film, one of the dominating genres of the Depression cinema as exemplified by “The Pubic Enemy (1931, dir. William A. Wellman). The article also traces the links of the “social restlessness” films of the 1930s with the previous and subsequent phases stressing the problem of dividing each phase into stages: formation, prime and decline.

The article traces the tendencies of representing the past in the Soviet cinema of the Thaw as exemplified by Grigoriy Chukhray’s «Ballad of a Soldier».

The article is devoted to the problem of re-creating the period in non-fiction cinema. A line is drawn between the two structural types based on the methods of representing and recreating the time: the pattern containing some elements of a “total” screen spectacle and the edited method formed by re-structuring temporal links. Accordingly, the conceptual techniques and instruments pertaining to each pattern are described. The author concludes that both time structuring methods in non-fiction cinema correspond to different types of phenomena.

The article analyses the aftereffect, one of the aspects of screen image perception. Unlike the ordinary perception of the object’s kinetic positions the aftereffect is not based on the analogy but on the contrast. It could be accounted for by the existence of two opposing visual perception systems in the human brain. This effect appears in the perception of both reality and screen image.

The article describes the process of transforming the concept of “artistic space” into a category of modern aesthetics due to the work of various 20th century philosophers (O. Spengler, M. Heidegger, P. Florensky, etc.) The author argues that unlike the chronotope, which is a local notion relevant only for temporal arts, the notion of “artistic space” is universal and valid for all art-forms.

The article investigates the role of information space in the forming of young generation culture and analyses its structure and problem field.

The article is devoted to the peculiarities of the origin of Algerian cinema which has long been neglected by Russian researchers. Using Arab-language sources the author shows that the national film industry emerged in the context of the revolutionary situation of 1954-1962 and tells about the European filmmakers who contributed to its formation and development.

A profile of Shadi Abdel Salam, an out standing Egyptian filmmaker, screenwriter, artist and teacher.

A short essay on the career of the Indianborn American-based filmmaker-screenwriter-producer-actor

The author substantiates the innovative trend in the revival and development of Russian film production based on of the sociological analysis of the problem as far as the marketability and ways of its recovery within the frames of the state film policy are concerned. The concluding part of the article prepared at the State Institute of Culture Studies in collaboration with the Film Art Institute (for the beginning see Issues 14, 15) covers the conceptual guidelines of the governmental policy concerning national cinema and the practical measures of its rational correction.

The article examines the presence of shows on TV, reveals the culturological foundations of screen representation as a mass culture phenomenon and points out the techniques of modeling this kind of TV programs.

The article explores the artistic merit of the underestimated Belgian director’s major films which combine magic irrational elements with visible real life attributes. Employing imaginary space and cinematic time in the films which could be classified as “magic realism”, helps reveal a specific truth: the shift of the angle enables one to see the hidden depth and the mystery, to create a complex picture of the world.

He author shares her impressions on the recent Russian films and analyses the visual tendencies in modern films.