Topoi of technology in Italian 'experimental' industrial film (1959-1973)

After discussing some problematic premises of topic theory in relation to the study of cinema, the paper proposes to investigate audiovisual topoi by combining Rick Altman’s “semantic/syntactic/pragmatic” approach to film genre with the structural perspective on audiovisual “textuality” developed by Gianmario Borio starting from the reflections of Michel Chion and Nicholas Cook. This methodological framework is applied to the case of Italian industrial cinema. An outline of the history of this non-fiction genre presents technology as a semantic field emerging in relation to the rapid industrialization process during the period of the so-called Italian “economic miracle” (1958-1963). Pragmatic aspects play a significant role. In those years the major industrial corporations and centres for scientific research (Enea, Eni, Fiat, Innocenti, Italsider, Olivetti) invested in cinematographic communication as a means to promote their image and popularize scientific-technological information, taking advantage of state subsidies. On this basis industrial cinema became a field of conscious audiovisual experimentation. Among the musical collaborators we find prominent avantgarde composers engaged in the field of both electroacoustic and instrumental music, such as Luciano Berio and Egisto Macchi. Their contribution produced a radical change in the soundscape of the genre, directly affecting the audiovisual representation of technology. Particularly electronic and concrete music were the fundamental component in the recurrence of audiovisual structures forming new topoi. Among these emerge both topical configurations aiming at producing simple communicational effects and elaborate constructions involving the use of rhetoric figures.