โ Scribed by Charles R. Acland
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
Ben-Hur (1959), Jaws (1975), Avatar (2009), Wonder Woman (2017): the blockbuster movie has held a dominant position in American popular culture for decades. In American Blockbuster Charles R. Acland charts the origins, impact, and dynamics of this most visible, entertaining, and disparaged cultural form. Acland narrates how blockbusters emerged from Hollywood's turn to a hit-driven focus during the industry's business crisis in the 1950s. Movies became bigger, louder, and more spectacular. They also became prototypes for ideas and commodities associated with the future of technology and culture, accelerating the prominence of technological innovation in modern American life. Acland shows that blockbusters continue to be more than just movies; they are industrial strategies and complex cultural machines designed to normalize the ideologies of our technological age.
Cover
Contents
Acknowledgments
Part I: The Spectacle Industry
One. Blockbuster Ballyhoo
Two. Industrial Regimes of Entertainment
Part II: The Rise of the Blockbuster
Three. Delivering Blockbusters
Four. The Business of Big
Five. Hollywood's Return
Six. Cosmopolitan Artlessness
Part III: The Technological Sublime of Entertainment Everywhere
Seven. The End of James Cameron's Quiet Years
Eight. The Technological Heart of Movie Culture
Epilogue. Exhausted Entertainment
Notes
Filmography
Bibliography
Index
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
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M
N
O
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Q
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