ABSTRACT
Given that so much concern about the pernicious influence of media targets violence in film, it is important to develop a grasp of some of the conceptual and methodological tools underpinning sociological film analysis. Film studies, of course, is a well-established discipline in its own right, and there is insufficient space in this Reader to discuss even a selection of its domain assumptions and key methodological approaches. To reiterate an earlier point. Genres do not consist solely of films. They consist also of specific systems of expectation and hypothesis which spectators bring with them to the cinema and which interact with films themselves during the course of the viewing process. These systems provide spectators with means of recognition and understanding. Genre is, of course, an important ingredient in any film’s narrative image. In addition to images, Hollywood’s inter-textual relay also circulates a number of generic labels, terms and names.
