Cinema Today

by Buscombe, Edward

• ISBN13: 9780714845166
• ISBN10: 0714845167
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-04-01
• Publisher: Phaidon Press

Summary

A third of the entire history of cinema is represented by films produced from 1970 onwards. Cinema Today explores this history, what may be referred to as the Third Age of world cinema, and the films, people and technologies which have shaped its development. The work of film-makers who have made a significant contribution to the film industry during this period is also highlighted and discussed.Cinema Today begins by examining the moment at which the modern blockbuster was born. In the early 1970s a string of spectacularly successful films such as MASH (1970), The Godfather (1972) and Jaws (1975) transformed the economic climate of Hollywood and the power relationship within it. The first half of the book looks at New Hollywood and explores its recent and continued development through film genres including Crime, Science Fiction, Horror and Comedy. The book identifies how social and economic change influenced the development of films, assesses the impact of emerging new waves of cinema on Hollywood and Hollywood's reaction to these changes. Influential directors such as Martin Scorsese, Woody Allen, George Lucas, Spike Lee and Steven Spielberg are all featured in these chapters along with their films.We then move onto the world stage where Edward Buscombe explores the unique style of film output from Australasia, Africa, India, Western and Eastern Europe, the Middle East and South America. Specific film genres and trends of these regions are highlighted and discussed in relation to the social and economic climate of the time. Many of these film industries, such as French, Indian and Japanese, are significant centres of world production. In these chapters, Buscombe examines the Bollywood cinema of India, art house cinema of France, the British comedy, Japanese crimefilms and Mexican horror films. The films of Bernardo Bertolucci, Pedro Almod+var, Akira Kurosawa, Roman Polanski, Luc Besson, Mike Leigh, Ousmane Semb+ne and Chen Kaige are just an example of the range of work discussed.With a comprehensive directors' filmography, a bibliography, chronology and index at the back of the book, Cinema Today is an invaluable reference tool.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 10
Hollywood and the Rise of the Blockbuster	p. 12
Crime and Action Spectaculars	p. 34
New Science Fiction	p. 62
Horror	p. 86
Comedy and Comedians	p. 112
Classic Genres Revived	p. 130
Auteurs and Independents	p. 154
X-Rated	p. 184
Women and Film	p. 200
Gay and Lesbian Cinema	p. 216
Hollywood and Ethnicity	p. 232
National Identities in Western Europe	p. 250
Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union	p. 334
The Middle East and the Muslim World	p. 364
Bollywood and New Indian Cinema	p. 386
African Voices	p. 408
Cinema in the Far East	p. 424
Cinema in Australia, Canada, New Zealand	p. 454
Latin America	p. 468
Cinema Tomorrow	p. 488
Notes	p. 490
Chronology	p. 491
Select Director's Filmography	p. 493
Bibliography	p. 500
Index	p. 503
Acknowledgements	p. 511
Table of Contents provided by Blackwell. All Rights Reserved.