Cirrus@Austlit

'Dear Readers: welcome to Issue 111 of Senses of Cinema, a journal in which the serious and eclectic discussion of moving images past, present, and future never dies, no matter the historical ruptures all around us.

'We open with a special 13-text dossier that is sure to become a touchstone for researchers, students, cinephiles, and enthusiasts of all sorts in the future. Guest edited by Adrian Danks and Olympia Szilagyi with editorial assistance from Digby Houghton, “‘A very open-ended canon’: The Many Histories of the Melbourne Cinémathèque” pays tribute to (and diligently historicizes) the eponymous film society, a pivotal institution in Melbourne and Australian cinemagoing culture. As Danks notes in his succinct introduction, the dossier offers “only a partial and proudly parochial account of this history,” leaving vast amounts of the Cinémathèque’s 75-year life untouched. Yet the reader – Melbourne-based or not – is left with the distinct and deep impression of the inexhaustible vibrancy of an organisation dependent not just on films, but especially on people: the members without which cinema is just a dark room full of dusty seats.' (Production summary)