Lost in the dataspace : digital spaces and virtual worlds in contemporary post-cinema

This thesis explores the visual construction of digital and virtual spaces across a range of contemporary films spanning from 2011-2018. Using the field of Post-Cinema Studies as a theoretical backdrop, it engages in deep textual analysis of the films Ready Player One (2018), Holy Motors (2012), Hugo (2011), Resident Evil: Retribution (2012), Detention (2011), Cloud Atlas (2012), and Blackhat (2015) in order to consider the ways in which contemporary cinema reflects and mediates the increasingly digital conditions under which it is produced. It broadly considers the ontological, aesthetic, and poetic status of digital cinema in the 2010s as it increasingly hybridizes with modern digital media such as video games, cell phones, and virtual reality.