Hollywood Cinema: An Introduction

Considering the Hollywood cinema as both commercial and aesthetic practice, Hollywood Cinema offers comprehensive coverage of the world's most powerful film industry, and some of its most popular and profitable movies. Examining films as diverse as Rudolph Valentino's The Son of the Sheik and Arnold Schwarzenegger's Total Recall this original study combines a wealth of information on the operation of Hollywood, with a polemical account of those criticisms and theories through which movie scholars have sought to understand its labyrithine operations. This is the broadest ranging account of Hollywood Cinema available, covering its subject from historical, social, cultural, economic and theoretical angles alike, synthesizing theory and research. Accessible, explanatory and fully illustrated with film stills and line drawings.