ABSTRACT
From Inception to The Lake House, moviegoers are increasingly flocking to narratologically complex puzzle films. These puzzle movies borrow techniques—like fragmented spatio-temporal reality, time loops, unstable characters with split identities or unreliable narrators—more commonly attributed to art cinema and independent films. The essays in Hollywood Puzzle Films examine the appropriation of puzzle film techniques by contemporary Hollywood dramas and blockbusters through questions of narrative, time, and altered realities. Analyzing movies like Source Code, The Butterfly Effect, Donnie Darko, Déjà Vu, and adaptations of Philip K. Dick, contributors explore the implications of Hollywood's new movie mind games.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
chapter |14 pages
Introduction
section one|39 pages
Narratology and systems theory
section two|85 pages
Inception, the archetypal hollywood puzzle film
chapter four|17 pages
‘Show, don't tell'
section three|73 pages
The science fiction hollywood puzzle film
chapter nine|20 pages
Fourth dimensions, seventh senses
chapter eleven|16 pages
The image of time in post-classical hollywood
section four|82 pages
The drama hollywood puzzle film