Genre Study

What is it?

• Category
• To study a film as a genre involves grouping together a large body of films according to characteristics that they all share
• There are two different approaches to identify these characteristics, de descriptive approach (describing the attributes of the film, mood, setting, and theme and then you put all together into a genre), and the functional approach (what a film is design to do: define the function and purpose of the film).

Genre study vs. Auteursim:

• Contrast between two approaches
• Genre study is all about thinking the characteristics which make a particular film fit into a group as many other.
• Auteursim is all about thinking what makes a particular film different from any other according to who directed it.

Why study films according to genre

• Makes sense to films (breaks down different types of movies)
• Compare particular characteristics of films
• Helps us to trace and understand social development and how it has changed over years
• Satisfaction of expectations as you already know what the theme of the movie will be depending on the particular genre it has.

Problems with the descriptive approach to genre study

• Boundaries between film genres are fuzzy – some films are hard to categorize.
• Overtime genres develop(change)
• The function of the same film can often be read in different ways
• Different interpretations
• Who define the genres? Film critics, the film industry, or movie goers.

Criticism of genre study

• Artificial and contrived

Examples of main genres:

• Action
• Adventure
• Comedy
• Crime and gangster
• Drama
• Epical
• Fantasy
• Horror
• Musicals
• Science fiction
• Thrillers
• War
• Westerns

*There are also sub-genres which are inside a genre itself.