Film Genre Reader IV

by Grant, Barry Keith

• ISBN13: 9780292742062
• ISBN10: 0292742061
• Edition: 4th
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-12-15
• Publisher: Univ of Texas Pr

Summary

From reviews of the third edition:"Film Genre Reader III lives up to the high expectations set by its predecessors, providing an accessible and relatively comprehensive look at genre studies. The anthology's consideration of the advantages and challenges of genre studies, as well as its inclusion of various film genres and methodological approaches, presents a pedagogically useful overview."--ScopeSince 1986, Film Genre Reader has been the standard reference and classroom text for the study of genre in film, with more than 25,000 copies sold. Barry Keith Grant has again revised and updated the book to reflect the most recent developments in genre study. This fourth edition adds new essays on genre definition and cycles, action movies, science fiction, and heritage films, along with a comprehensive and updated bibliography. The volume includes more than thirty essays by some of film's most distinguished critics and scholars of popular cinema, including Charles Ramírez Berg, John G. Cawelti, Celestino Deleyto, David Desser, Thomas Elsaesser, Steve Neale, Thomas Schatz, Paul Schrader, Vivian Sobchack, Janet Staiger, Linda Williams, and Robin Wood.

Author Biography

Barry Keith Grant is Professor in the Department of Communications, Popular Culture, and Film at Brock University in Ontario, Canada. A Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, he is the author or editor of many books, including Film Genre: From Iconography to Ideology and The Dread of Difference: Gender and the Horror Film.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Fourth Edition	p. xv
Introduction	p. xvii
Theory
Genre	p. 3
The Idea of Genre in the American Cinema	p. 12
A Semantic/Syntactic Approach to Film Genre	p. 27
Cycles and Clusters: The Shape of Film Genre History	p. 42
Genre Films and the Status Quo	p. 60
Social Implications in the Hollywood Genres	p. 69
Ideology, Genre, Auteur	p. 78
"Cinema/Ideology/Criticism" Revisited: The Progressive Genre	p. 93
The Structural Influence: New Directions in Film Genre Study	p. 110
Genre Film: A Classical Experience	p. 121
Experience and Meaning in Genre Films	p. 133
Genre and Performance: An Overview	p. 148
Film Bodies: Gender, Genre, and Excess	p. 159
Questions of Genre	p. 178
Hybrid or Inbred: The Purity Hypothesis and Hollywood Genre History	p. 203
Film Genres at the Crossroads: What Genres and Films Do to Each Other	p. 218
Selected Genre Criticism
The Western (Genre and Movies)	p. 239
Apes and Essences: Some Sources of Significance in the American Gangster Film	p. 255
Notes on Film Noir	p. 265
Chinatown and Generic Transformation in Recent American Films	p. 279
Shoot-Out at the Genre Corral: Problems in the "Evolution" of the Western	p. 298
The Bug in the Rug: Notes on the Disaster Genre	p. 313
"Surge and Splendor": A Phenomenology of the Hollywood Historical Epic	p. 332
Children of the Light	p. 360
Monsters from the Id	p. 382
Immigrants, Aliens, and Extraterrestrials: Science Fiction's Alien "Other" as (Among Other Things) New Latino Imagery	p. 402
Tales of Sound and Fury: Observations on the Family Melodrama	p. 433
Screwball Comedies: Constructing Romance, Mystifying Marriage	p. 463
Redressing the "Natural": The Temporary Transvestite Film	p. 484
Friendly Civilians: Images of Women and the Feminization of the Audience in Vietnam War Films	p. 510
The Family in Action	p. 524
The Self-Reflexive Musical and the Myth of Entertainment	p. 543
The Black Gangster Film	p. 558
Teen Films: The Cinematic Image of Youth	p. 576
Re-presenting the National Past: Nostalgia and Pastiche in the Heritage Film	p. 602
Global Noir: Genre Film in the Age of Transnationalism	p. 628
Bibliography	p. 649
Notes on Contributors	p. 735
Index	p. 743
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