Abstract

LOZANO RENDON, José Carlos  and  FRANKENBERG, Lorena. Critical and oppositional readings of Hollywood films made by Mexican youngsters: the ''Angeles y demonios'' (Angels and devils) case. anagramas rumbos sentidos comun. [online]. 2011, vol.9, n.18, pp.165-184. ISSN 1692-2522.

As well as in many other countries worldwide, Hollywood super-productions are extremely successful in the Mexican market. Each year, million people go to movie theaters to watch several movies coming from the United States of America. Despite the strong popularity of cultural studios in Mexico and the historical concern in this country for the ideological impact of American audiovisual imports on the cultural identity of audiences, very few empirical studies about specific readings of foreign films have been conducted. This article tackles findings from 10 focused interviews and 5 focus groups with youngsters from Monterrey, Mexico about readings of the Hollywood film ''Angeles and Demonios,'' (Angles and Devils) based on the successful novel written by Dan Brown. Informants were students from a private university. In order to avoid their strong familiarization with theories of communication or the methodology used, participants were selected from academic programs not related to humanities or social sciences. This article explores the level to which these youngsters were able to establish a critical distance before the film, classifying their comments on the film in a category called ''not oppositional'' and four categories for oppositional comments: critical, resistance, challenge, and deconstruction. Findings show that most comments from the interviewees were not critical toward the film content and the few oppositional comments expressed were superficial and poorly elaborated. On the other hand, the catholic religious background of most youngsters seemed to construct a clear and strong mediation in their readings. The article concludes with a discussion on the implications of the findings in relation to contributions of cultural studies to the analysis of negotiated readings, social mediations, and appropriation processes.

Keywords : film decoding; audience studies; cultural studies; negotiated readings of media contents; reception.

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