Genre - or 'type' - is a core concept in both film production and the history of film. Genres play a key role in how moviegoers perceive and rate films, and is likely to determine a film's production values and costs.
Written in a clear, engaging, jargon-free style, this volume offers a cutting-edge theoretical overview of the topic of genre as practiced in British, American and French film criticism. Organized by a series of simple but fundamental questions, the book uses numerous examples from classic Hollywood cinema (the western, drama, musical comedy, and film noir) as well as some more contemporary examples from European or Asian cinema that are so often neglected by other studies in the field. How do we characterize genre and what are its various functions? In what ways does genre give a film its identity? How do genres emerge? What is the cultural significance of genre and how does it circulate within and across national boundaries? Informative and user-friendly, Moine's book is accessible to general readers and adapts easily to a wide range of teaching approaches.
Rezensionen / Stimmen
"This is a sharp and incisive book on film genre ... .Moine brings a great deal of fresh insight to her discussion of the mechanics of genre movies in this tight, ably translated little volume, which includes a deft introduction from Janet Staiger. Moine has something absolutely new to say, and her book stands out in a crowded field. It is accessible yet elegantly theoretical, and superbly written and researched. Highly recommended." (Choice Reviews, December 2008)
Auflage
Sprache
Verlagsort
Verlagsgruppe
Zielgruppe
Für Beruf und Forschung
Film buffs, students, and scholars interested in film theory and European film.
Produkt-Hinweis
Broschur/Paperback
Klebebindung
Maße
Höhe: 223 mm
Breite: 139 mm
Dicke: 15 mm
Gewicht
ISBN-13
978-1-4051-5651-6 (9781405156516)
Schweitzer Klassifikation
Raphaelle Moine is Professor of Cinema Studies at Université Paris X-Nanterre.
Hilary Radner holds the foundation chair of Film and Media Studies in the Department of Media, Film & Communication Studies at the University of Otago
Alistair Fox is Professor of English at the University of Otago.
Autor*in
Université Paris X, Nanterre
Übersetzung
University of Otago, New Zealand
Introduction.
Chapter 1: In the Genre Jungle.
Cinematic genre: an empirical category.
Every use has its own typology.
Viewers' guides.
Reference volumes: dictionaries and encyclopaedias.
Lack of agreement over cinematic categories.
An impossible typology?
Different levels of characterisation.
Different frames of reference.
The mixing of genres.
The hierarchy of genres.
The question of history.
Chapter 2: Looking for the Rules of Genre.
Looking for genre's formal rules.
Russian formalists and cinematic genres.
The notion of a theoretical genre.
Genre: an intertextual phenomenon.
Genre as architext.
Genre: a continuous and infinite text.
In search of the structures of genre.
Grand narrative structures.
Elementary structures of narrative.
Semantic-syntactic definitions of genre.
The Semantic-syntactic definition of genre.
An open approach to context.
Chapter 3: What Is the Purpose of Genres?
A production tool.
The standardisation/differentiation dialectic.
The avoidance of generic ascription by Hollywood studios.
The social functions of genre.
Genres and the production of stereotypes in contemporary culture.
An instrument of ideological repression.
A collective cultural expression.
The limits of ideological and ritual functions.
The communicative function of genre.
Generic 'rails'.
Generic mediation.
Chapter 4: The Generic Identities of a Film.
The relations between film and genre.
Generically modelled films, and generically marked films.
The genre film.
Genre and auteur.
The uses of generic identity.
Generic redefinitions.
Two examples: film noir and the woman's film.
Genre, series, auteur: categories of interpretation.
The mixing of genres: pluri-generic attributes.
The myth of the pure genre.
Post-modern augmentation of genre-mixing.
Parody and pastiche.
Chapter 5: How Should One Think About the History of a Genre?
To put an end to the theory of generic evolution.
Organicism and evolutionism: the genre's destiny.
The limits of historical determinism.
Towards a complex history of genres.
The birth of a cinematic genre.
A post-dated birth certificate.
Cultural interactions and cinematic recreation.
The notion of genrification.
Genrification outside of Hollywood.
Hybridization and mutation of genres.
Alliances and ruptures.
Reversals and successes.
Eclipses and resurgences.
Chapter 6: Genres in Context.
Cultural identity and the circulation of genres.
Trans-national genres and local genres: a misleading dichotomy.
The genre of melodrama, or melodramatic genres?
The circulation of genres.
Generic regimes.
The rationale of generic regimes.
The Hollywood genre system.
Generic regimes outside of Hollywood.
The series and generic labels of early cinema.
Conclusion.
Select Bibliography.
Index of Films
