Without Empathy: Irony and the Satirical Impulse in Eight Major Filmmakers

Irony and the satirical impulse in cinema have gradually lost favor, mockery increasingly more selective in its choice of targets. As Linda Hutcheon notes, irony is becoming a problematic mode of expression in the twenty-first century.

The book examines the work of eight film auteurs: Luis Bunuel, R.W. Fassbinder, Stanley Kubrick, Robert Altman, Paul Verhoeven, Aki Kaurismaki, Aleksei Balabanov and David Lynch, much of whose work is not always regarded thus and the films examined are often ...