Genre Theory

Doughty & Etherington-Wright

Genre: “A. Kind; sort; style. B. A particular style or category of works of art; especially a type of literary work characterized by a particular form, style, or purpose” (45)

Robert Stam: “While some genres are based on story content (the war film), others are borrowed from literature (comedy, melodrama) or from other media (the musical). Some are performer-based (Astaire-Rogers films) or budget-based (blockbusters), while others are based on artistic status (the art film), racial identity (Black cinema), location (the Western), or sexual orientation (Queer cinema)”

Setting the Scene

• Genre, first used in literary studies, derives from the French word genus, meaning type
• As early as the 50s, Andre Bazin (film theorist and critic) was talking about genre
• By the 60s and 70s, genre criticism was seen as a systematic move away from Auteur Theory
• More inclusive discipline, taking collaboration and commercial filmmaking into account
• Seems straightforward, but definitions and groupings are often complicated

Andrew Tudor: “Genre” (1974)

• What comes first - the body of films that constitute the genre, or the principle characteristics that define it?
• Formal elements and common features of a specific genre need to be identified
• Clearly seen in film parodies
• In order for the comedy to work, an understanding of generic traits is needed
• What is the relationship between Auteur and Genre?
• How does a director use generic rules to his own ends?
• Audiences define genres, not critics
• Differs across cultures
• Too many “free-floating” variables…

Formal Elements

• Iconography (open to anyone from an early age): symbolic image we attach to images
• Costume
• Setting
• Staging
• Stars
• Tone (deeper level of analysis)
• Lighting
• Music
• Cinematography

Across the Universe (Taymor, 2007)

Narrative

• Genres typically adhere to a formulaic way of telling a story
• Multifarious ways of reading narrative
• Blueprints that are frequently repeated across a number of films
• Musicals often feature a girl falling in love with the boy next door
• In horror, only the virginal heroine survives
• Kitses approaches the Western genre by focusing on oppositions of wilderness/civilization, individual/community, savagery/community, and many more
• Synonymous with Altman’s “syntax” below…

Rick Altman - “A Semantic/Syntactic Approach to Film Genre” (1984)

• Three contradictions in genre analysis:
• 1. Both inclusive and exclusive
• Inclusive in that it’s easy to construct a long list of films that fall into a specific genre
• Exclusive in that there are certain texts that are canonized and are discussed as exemplary classics
• 2. Too preoccupied with semiotics (signs, iconography, and meaning) rather than considering the historical emergence of genre movies
• No account for how genres develop, mutate, rise and fall in popularity, and the audience is forgotten
• 3. “Genre is a lie that masquerades as truth. The audience is unknowingly manipulated by generic conventions; it feeds on desires for entertainment (ritual) yet at the same time transmits messages of mass conformity (ideology)” (48)

Altman’s Two Approaches: Semantic and Syntactic

• Semantic: in literature, it refers to words and meaning
• When applied to cinema, it’s the building blocks of genre: costume, acting, cinematography, set, iconography, etc. (materials)
• Syntactic (Syntax): in literature, it refers to grammar and how sentences are constructed
• When applied to cinema, it’s the overlying structure, deeper meaning (arrangement)
• Both aspects should be taken into account for greater understanding
• Some films may put more attention into one over the other or vice versa
• The relationship between the two changes over time
• Shifting relationship between Hollywood and its audience (ritual) and ideas of mass conformity change depending on political, economic, and social climate (ideology)

Altman Cont…

• Westerns and Musicals genres are the most durable, establishing the most “coherent syntax”
• Those that quickly disappear are reliant on “recurring semantic elements, never developing a stable syntax (Catastrophes and Newsroom Dramas, etc.)
• He later adds “pragmatics” (the context between the information on the screen and how it is interpreted)
• Meaning is never fixed; it is dependent on how the viewer reads the information
• Geography and chronology (nationality, race, age, era, etc.)

Edward Buscombe - “The Idea of Genre in the American Cinema” (1970)

• Similar to Altman, only instead of Semantic and Syntactic, he uses the terms Inner and Outer meanings
• “Do genres in the cinema really exist?
• What functions do they fulfill?
• How do specific genres originate or what gives rise to them?
• Outer Form: specific metre or structure
• Places more emphasis here
• Setting, clothes, tools of the trade, and miscellaneous physical objects
• Inner Form: attitude, tone, purpose - more crudely, subject and audience

Audiences

• Niche groups
• Based on gender, sexuality, race, nationality, class, etc.
• Certain genres associated with these groups
• Art-house films as elitist and linked to educated intellectuals rather than the masses
• Audience expectation
• Marketing relies on a level of audience cultural competency
• Subconsciously over a period of time
• Adhering to generic conventions is a tried and tested way to “safely” make money

The Canon

• Taken from English Literary Studies
• Determined by intellectuals and critics that deem certain texts worthy of academic study
• Artistically worthy vs popular with the masses
• Western: Stagecoach (Ford, 1939) and The Searchers (Ford, 1956)
• Musicals: Singin’ in the Rain (Kelly & Donen, 1952) and The Wizard of Oz (Fleming, 1939)
• SciFi: Metropolis (Lang, 1927) and Invasion of the Body Snatchers (Siegel, 1956)
• Constantly changing and evolving

Steve Neale - “Questions of Genre” (1990)

• Two things are central to the understanding of genre:
• Verisimilitude
• Probable or likely, not truth
• Acceptable in musicals for someone to suddenly sing and dance, not in other genres…
• “Question of social and cultural functions that genres perform”
• Theorists and critics discuss genre differently than industry and audience
• “Film noir” was not technically a genre…
• Genres borrow from other forms like stage, vaudeville, circus, burlesque, etc.

Neale - Genre Studies Must Consider the Following

• Prehistory (the development from other forms of media)
• All films regardless of quality (not just canonical texts)
• Factors other than content (advertising, studio policy, stars, etc.)

Genre Revisionism

• Began in late 50s, but took hold in 60s and 70s
• Upheaval at home and abroad
• Racial equality, Viet Nam, Cold War, etc.
• Allegory opposed to direct messages
• “Genre revisionism occurs when the dominant ideology (formal elements and narrative) in traditional genres is no longer considered applicable to the time period” (53) (Western table on pgs. 53-55)
• Genres want to stay relevant, so they adapt, evolve, mutate, omit, etc.
• The Searchers (Ford, 1956), MASH (Altman, 1970), Shrek, Adamson Jenson, 2001), Scream (Craven, 1996), etc.

Hybridity

• Generic “purity” is problematic
• Most films are not just one genre…
• Genres and subgenres
• Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street (Burton, 2007)
• Robert Stam uses the term “submerged”
• A genre may appear to fit on category, but has underlying theme associated with a different genre
• Easy Rider (Hopper, 1969) as both Road Movie and Western

Case Study: The Musical (pgs. 60-65)

The Musical

• Escapism
• Setting
• Altman
• Show
• Fairytale
• Folktale
• Narrative Structure
• Altman’s dual-focus narrative…
• Stars
• Iconography and Hybridity
• Cultural Competency