The Cinema Of Steven Spielberg Empire Of Light (directors' Cuts) [Hardcover]

Nigel Morris is Principal Lecturer in Media Theory and Teacher Fellow in the Department of Media Production, University of Lincoln. His publications include articles and chapters on aspects of American, British, German and Welsh cinema, literary adaptation, and cinematic and literary modernism.Cinema's most successful director is a commercial and cultural force demanding serious consideration. Not just triumphant marketing, this international popularity is partly a function of the movies themselves. Polarised critical attitudes largely overlook this, and evidence either unquestioning adulation or vilification?often vitriolic?for epitomising contemporary Hollywood. Detailed textual analyses reveal that alongside conventional commercial appeal, Spielberg's movies function consistently as a self-reflexive commentary on cinema. Rather than straightforwardly consumed realism or fantasy, they invite divergent readings and self-conscious spectatorship which contradict assumptions about their ideological tendencies. Exercising powerful emotional appeal, their ambiguities are profitably advantageous in maximising audiences and generating media attention.A fascinating take on the man's legendary work.Highly recommended.Acknowledgements
Introduction: the Critical Context
1. Close Encounters of the Third Kind: tripping the light fantastic
2. Duel: the descent of Mann
3. The Sugarland Express: a light comedy?
4. Jaws: searching the depths
5. 1941: war on Hollywood
6. Raiders of the Lost Ark: lights, camera, action
7. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial: turn on your love light
8. Twilight Zone: The Movie: magic lantern man overshadowed
9. Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: anything goes
10. The CololÃx