ABSTRACT
The development of film and law continues apace. As the individual chapters within the text illustrate, the field is a broad one and encompasses many elements and approaches. The Bibliography itself testifies to the exponential growth in the area, and also the diversity of approaches and material. This eclecticism was noted by Machura and Robson (2001, p 1) in their introduction to the Journal of Law and Society Special Issue on Law and Film:
We would argue that this diversity is one of its strengths. Indeed, to approach a discipline in such a way allows it to develop in an organic form and reflect the interests of academics working in a nascent discipline. Given this eclecticism and broadness of approach, the question might well be posited, ‘where next?’ The concluding chapter of this book seeks to chart some of these potential trajectories, and in so doing identify sites for possible excavation. One of the most fascinating aspects of popular culture is its temporality, and the velocity at which it develops. Within law and film, the foci of our attention changes almost constantly as new subjects present themselves for analysis and comment. This echoes the rapid shifts that we see within popular culture, generally:
Within film and law the texts are the new films which add to the canon of what we know as legal film (whatever that might be, see Chapter 1). These appear at increasingly regular intervals, and this is exacerbated by the re-release, and consequent re-evaluation, of ‘old’ films that are produced in new formats, especially DVD, at present. It is to be hoped that DVD will provide a new lease of life for some of the harder to get films which is a particular problem in the UK. Below we attempt to map the ways in which law and film might develop in the future. A starting point is where we came into this discussion, understanding and reading legal film. We then consider how further investigation in this area may effect of the portrayals of law, and notably lawyers, on the public perception of both the institution of law and the profession itself. Finally, we then consider
how the academic study of film and the law may develop its theoretical components to provide a more critical edge.
