ABSTRACT
This chapter begins by reviewing author's contributions to the study of crime films. It then describes the background of the field and the main influences on author's own work. Shots in the Mirror, the author's major work on crime films, argues that there is a dynamic interplay between crime movies and the society that produces and consumes them. Crime movies and their social contexts engage in an endless process of mirroring one another, a constant recycling of representations that, when analyzed, can reveal how ourselves, our society, and our movies interpenetrate. Shots in the Mirror was organized both historically and by genre. The chapter focuses on definitional issues and author's methodological approaches; on ways in which crime films and visual criminology have strengthened and extended one another; on a major limitation of the work in the area; and on challenges ahead for the study of crime films and visual criminology.
