Termination or Transformation? The "Terminator" Films and Recent Changes in the U. S. Auto Industry

Since the 1970s, the term transparency has been widely used to signify the concealment of the technological means of the cinematic illusion characteristic of classical and realistic film style.1 Such concealment has been assumed necessary for the cinematic apparatus to achieve its ideological subject effect by providing a coherent yet illusory spectator position. Conversely, any self-reflexive inscription of a film's technical means of production, the hallmark of post1968 radical and avant-garde cinema, was assumed to radically subvert this ideological work.2 While these categorical terms may now seem somewhat dated, the relationship between technology, ideology, and subjectivity in the cinema is still worthy of serious investigation. One of the problems with many previous attempts has been their failure to recognize that cinema has always served a dual function with respect to technology, not only as a technology itself, but also as a means of representing technological change and narrativizing its social effects. These two functions interact in very interesting and sometimes contradictory ways, complicating the question