film genre theory (O)

SPY MOVIES

Stale-beer stories take place in the shadows, where dull-looking operatives plot and probe, it’s never clear who’s a friend and who’s an enemy. Moreover, Stale-beer stories often tend to be informed by the actual practices of spying, and sometimes written by those with some experience in the world of espionage, e.g. the quintessential stale-beer writer John le Carré.It is "more realistic" in that it does not romanticize the profession. Consequently, the stakes tend to be a lot lower: rather than dealing with plots to Take Over the World or completely destroy the rival, Stale Beer plots typically involve seemingly minor plans for the possibility of incremental gain.For e.g ''The Irish Pub'' and ''Brewmaster''.

SPY

Involve the use of fictional works depicting spies and secret agents seeking to uncover or maintain secrets from each other and for one country or for the benefit of another. Living a masquerade, spies are usually cynical, amoral, deceitful, alienated, and ready to betray another person or cause, although these are often seen as merely the means to achieve a patriotic goal.'MARTINI' and 'STALE BEER' are 2 categories often used to define spy stories.Martini stories operate in a glamorous world where bad guys live in lairs,and our hero drives fast cars and seldom takes off a tuxedo. For e.g ''Vengeance:A Love Story''(2017), which involves a group of strangers who come to the aid of a single mother, seeking to bring her rapists to justice.Moreover, the film called ''End Game''(2006)is also an e.g of a martini film where A secret Service agent and a news reporter investigate the conspiracy behind the assassination of the President.

Epic movies

EPIC

Epics include costume dramas, historical dramas, war films, medieval romps, or 'period pictures' that often cover a large expanse of time set against a vast, panoramic backdrop. Epics often share elements of the elaborate adventure films genre. Epics take an historical or imagined event, mythic, legendary, or heroic figure, and add an extravagant setting or period, lavish costumes, and accompany everything with grandeur and spectacle, dramatic scope, high production values, and a sweeping musical score.In other words, epic movies are those movies which a protagonist going to great lengths over a long period of time in order to achieve a vital objective.For e.g Gladiator(2000),where a former Roman General sets out to exact vengeance against the corrupt emperor who murdered his family and sent him into slavery.Other examples include, a, The Tree of Life, Gangs of New York etc.

Disaster Movies

DISASTER

Involve a cross-over with sci-fi thriller, center their story around a disaster,usually natural but it can be atrificial as well. Along with showing the spectacular disaster, these films concentrate on the chaotic events surrounding the disaster, including efforts for survival, the effects upon individuals and families, and 'what-if' scenarios. The best disaster films comment upon the negative effects of advancing technology, demonstrate the 'hubris' of scientists and other individuals, deliver uplifting moral lessons of sacrifice, and provide a 'how-to' in terms of survival skills.Most disaster films have large-scale special effects, huge casts of stars faced with the crisis, a persevering hero or heroine called upon to lead the struggle against the threat, and many plot-lines affecting multiple characters. For e.g 2012, The Day after Tomorrow,The Core, San Andreas and many others.

Thriller Movies

THRILLER

Thrillers are often hybrids with other genres - there are action-thrillers, crime-caper thrillers, western-thrillers, film-noir thrillers, even romantic comedy-thrillers. Another closely-related genre is the horror film genre. Thriller and suspense films are virtually synonymous and interchangeable categorizations. They are types of films known to promote intense excitement, suspense, a high level of anticipation, ultra-heightened expectation, uncertainty, anxiety, and nerve-wracking tension.For e.g, Serenity,Get Out,Shutter Island,Passengers,Inception,Taken and many others.

Martial Arts Movies

Martial arts films are a sub-genre of action films, which feature numerous martial arts fights between characters. These fights are usually the films' primary appeal and entertainment value, and often are a method of storytelling and character expression and development. The primary focus of martial art movies is on the physical fight scenes pepped throughout the film(movie action scenes).For e.g Kung Fu Hustle,The Matrix,Police Story,Rush Hour and many more.

MARTIAL ARTS

Superhero Movies

SUPERHERO

Fictional super-heroes with extraordinary powers, derived from comic books, newspaper comic-strips, pulp magazines and other sources, have since become the subjects of numerous fantasy and sci-fi films (both live-action and animated, serialized and feature-length, on TV and on the big screen) with action-oriented heroes and heroines, almost too many to mention fully. They have inspired generations of readers, TV audiences, and movie-goers, and have dealt with a variety of deep personal, political and social issues. For e.g, Wonder Woman, Iron Man, Ant Man, Black Panther, Shazam etc.

Video Game Movies

This is a list of film adaptations of video games. They also include short films, cutscene films (made up of cut-scenes and cinematics from the actual games), documentaries with video games as their subjects and films in which video games play a large part. For e.g, Halo, Pixels, Wreck-it Ralph, Tomb Raider, Rampage, Detective Pikachu etc.

VIDEO GAMES

Romantic Drama

Typically revolves around 2 lovers who face obstacles and the hazards of hardship, finances, physical illness, racial or social class status, occupation, psychological restraints, or family that threaten to break their union and attainment of love. For example, The Fault In Our Stars, Love, Simon, The Last Song, Me Before You and many more.

Romantic Drama

Romantic Comedy

(Rom-Coms)

Rom-Coms

Romantic comedies are movies with light-hearted, humorous dramatic stories centered around romantic ideals such as a "true love" able to surmount most obstacles or the "perfect couple." The basic plot of a romantic comedy is that two people, usually a man and a woman, meet and then part ways due to an argument or other contrived obstacles. Initially, these two people do not become romantically involved, because they believe that they do not like each other, because one of them already has a partner, or social pressures. However, the screenwriters leave obvious clues that suggest that the characters are in fact attracted to each other, or that they would be a good love match.For e.g, 'Crazy Rich Asians', 'The Big Sick', 'Crazy,Stupid, Love', 'The Proposal' etc.

Romantic Thrillers

Romantic Thrillers

A romantic thriller is a narrative that involves romance

and thriller.A good thriller provides entertainment by making viewers uncomfortable with moments of suspense, the heightened feeling of anxiety and fright. It makes people sit on the edge of their seats. A thriller is more a familiar concept and description than a pure genre.Romantic thriller in discussion of genres, is more a metagenre that merges two or more genres together. It is different from established and historically specific cinema movements like Gothic horror or Golden Age detective. A genre works on two levels. First a specific theme exists. Then general relationships, patterns and structural elements are interwoven to the specific theme. This is why there can be a large variety of visual styles and story structures in romantic thriller. For e.g, Adrift, Passengers, The Island, The Lobster and many more.

Chick-Flicks

'Chick flicks' have often been put down as trite, sappy, emotional, soap-opera-ish, cliched, melodramatic, weepy, and trivial. Often considered an all-encompassing sub-genre, they mostly include dialogue-laden, formulated romantic comedies (with mismatched lovers or female relationships), tearjerkers and gal-pal films, movies about family crises and emotional catharsis, some traditional 'weepies' and fantasy-action adventures, sometimes with foul-mouthed and empowered females, and female bonding situations involving families, mothers, daughters and children.Basic themes of 'chick flicks' include self-discovery, efforts to find the right man (although often misguided or attracting the wrong one), mistaken identity complications, various love triangles, 'Cinderella' or 'ugly-duckling' tales, and lots of female bonding.For e.g, Bride Wars, The Devil Wears Prada, Legally Blonde, and Bridesmaids etc.

Chick-Flicks

Slapstick

Slapstick

Slapstick was predominant in the earliest silent films, since they didn't need sound to be effective, and they were popular with non-English speaking audiences in metropolitan areas. The term slapstick was taken from the wooden sticks that clowns slapped together to promote audience applause.

This is primitive and universal comedy with broad, aggressive, physical, and visual action, including harmless or painless cruelty and violence, horseplay, and often vulgar sight gags. For e.g Dumb and Dumber, Night at the Museum, Airplane! and Flubber etc.

Deadpan

Deadpan

This form of comedy was best exemplified by the expression-less face of stoic comic hero Buster Keaton.For e.g The Match Factory Girl, Drifting Clouds, Shadows in Paradise etc.

Screwball

Screwball

Screwball comedies, a sub-genre of romantic comedy films.The word 'screwball' denotes lunacy, craziness, eccentricity, ridiculousness, and erratic behavior.These films combine farce, slapstick, and the witty dialogue of more sophisticated films. In general, they are light-hearted, frothy, often sophisticated, romantic stories, commonly focusing on a battle of the sexes in which both co-protagonists try to outwit or outmaneuver each other.For e.g She's Funny That Way, My Favorite Wife, Mistress America, Holiday, and Easy Living etc.

Verbal Comedy

This was classically typified by the cruel verbal wit of W. C. Fields, or the verbal absurdity of dialogues in the Marx Brothers films, or later by the self-effacing, thoughtful humor of Woody Allen's literate comedies.

Verbal Comedy

Black/Dark Comedy

Black/Dark Comedy

These are dark, sarcastic, humorous, or sardonic stories that help us examine otherwise ignored darker serious, pessimistic subjects such as war, death, or illness. Two of the greatest black comedies ever made include the following: Stanley Kubrick's Cold War classic satire from a script by co-writer Terry Southern, Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964)

Parody or Spoof/Satire

Parody or Spoof/Sattire

These specific types of comedy (also called put-ons, send-ups, charades, lampoons, take-offs, jests, mockumentaries, etc.) are usually a humorous or anarchic take-off that ridicules, impersonates, punctures, scoffs at, and/or imitates (mimics) the style, conventions, formulas, characters (by caricature), or motifs of a serious work, film, performer, or genre.For e.g Shrek, The Other Guys, The Blues Brothers and many others.

Slasher Movies

Slasher movies

Slasher movies depict a series of violent murders or assaults by an attacker armed with a knife or a razor.Such movies typically a psychopathic killer(sometimes masked)who stalks and graphically murders a series of adolescent victims in a typically random,unprovoked fashion,killing many within a single day e.g Halloween, Happy Death Day,The Cabin in the Woods, Sorority Row, Scream and many others.

Splatter Movies

A splatter film is a subgenre of horror film that deliberately focuses on graphic portrayals of gore and graphic violence. These films, usually through the use of special effects, display a fascination with the vulnerability of the human body and the theatricality of its mutilation. For e.g, Evil Dead, Hostel, Dead Snow and many others.

Splatter Movies

Psychological Horror Movies

Psychological

In psychological horror, suspicion, distrust, self-doubt and paranoia about oneself, others or the world are present. This is referred to in Jungian psychology as characteristics of the archetypal shadow. These are the emotional and mental fears that keep people up at night and evoke a sense of dread in everyday life.

This sub-genre reveals the complexity of human nature through the use of metaphor. Struggles with monsters, aliens, supernatural creatures are metaphors for emotional and psychological struggles. Characters are battling their own inner demons. Resolutions are complex, complicated, and unexpected. The villain may get away. The protagonist may have to learn how to live with a monster or disappear completely into madness. These films are often light on gore and “I couldn’t sleep alone for a week!” scares. They rely more on atmosphere, subtle creepy details, suggestion, and ambiguity. For e.g, Mother!, Unsane,The Number 23 etc.

Survival Horror

Survival Horror

Survival horror is a subgenre of video games inspired by horror fiction that focuses on survival of the character as the game tries to frighten players with either horror graphics or scary ambience. Although combat can be part of the gameplay, the player is made to feel less in control than in typical action games through limited ammunition, health, speed and vision, or through various obstructions of the player's interaction with the game mechanics. The player is also challenged to find items that unlock the path to new areas and solve puzzles to proceed in the game. Games make use of strong horror themes, like dark maze-like environments and unexpected attacks from enemies.For e.g The Witch, Zombieland, The Crazies, Rogue and many others.

Found Footage Movies

These movies are primarily wholly portrayed with footage literally taken or later found by one of the characters in the film.For e.g Creep,Willow Creak, As Above,So Below,Grave Encounters etc.

Found Footage Movies

Paranormal/Occult

These are those movies whose main protagonist is a supernatural force or an entity.Can also cross-over into the fantastical,non-horror sub-genre.For e.g The Devil's Rock, Paranormal Activity 3, Hereditary, MidSommar, Night of the Demon and many more.

Paranormal/Occult

Monster Movies

Monster Movies

A monster movie – sometimes called a Creature Feature – must contain the unexpected appearance, normally in a serene setting, of a creature (or many creatures) hostile to humanity. The nature of the creature is usually revealed gradually, and its attacks normally increase in severity. It may be a mutated animal or human, an Alien, a kind of animal normally not hostile or any unnatural (but not supernatural) creature. For e.g, Rampage, Godzilla, Kong:Skull Island, Pacific Rim and Cloverfield etc.

Traditional Movies

Traditional animation usually refers to animation hand-drawn on paper. It was the process used for most of the productions throughout the 20th century.The genre allows for the illusion of animated movement due to the frame-by-frame manipulation of drawings and illustrations. Although computer technology has assisted animators in their efforts over the years, the basic means by which an animated film comes to life has essentially remained the same—by drawing frames one by one.Traditionally animated films include, Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, Aladdin(1992), Pinnochio (1940), Bambi(1942), Tarzan (1999), Beauty and the Beast (1991) , and The Lion King (1994).

Traditional Animation

ROTOSCOPING

This particular technique is used by animators when they want to trace live action sequence movements and turn them into drawings. They'll often use the action sequence as a basis and as an inspiration for character animation.

Rotoscoping

Puppet Animation

Puppet Animation

Puppet animation is a development from object animation where instead of using objects, puppets are used. Puppet animation is a development of stop-motion animation, rather than using objects in different frames puppets were introduced due to their human-like qualities so directors can move the puppet freely and more easily to show different movements. It works by taking pictures and moving the puppet in different frames. Films involving puppet animation are: The Pirates!, Coraline, Nightmare Before Christmas, Fantastic Mr. Fox and many others.

Claymation Movies

Claymation Movies

Claymation®, is a term that was created by Will Vinton. Vinton owned an animation studio that helped clay artists develop clay animation movies. Clay animation is a form of stop-motion animation that uses 3D models sculpted from oil-based modeling clay (e.g., Plasticine) and often built over a wire armature for support. Clay animation got its start way back in 1897 when modeling clay was invented. Artists began to sculpt characters out of clay. They would then take multiple still pictures of the character, moving the character slightly in between each picture.When those pictures were displayed quickly in succession, they created the illusion of movement. e.g of claymation movies include, Early Man, Chicken Run, Mary and Max, Flushed Away, Hell and Back , etc.

Live-Action Animated Movies

A live-action animated film is one that combines live action film making with animation.Films that are both live action and computer animated tend to have fictional characters or figures represented and characterized by cast members through motion capture, and then animated and modeled by animators, while films that are live action and traditionally animated use hand-drawn or stop-motion animation. For e.g Mary Poppins (1964), Space Jam (1996), Scooby Doo (2002), Garfield the Movie (2004), Alvin and the Chipmunks (2007), Enchanted, Alice in Wonderland (2010), Tom & Jerry (2021).

Live-Action Animated Movies

Cut-Out Animation

Cut out Animation

Cut-out animation involves producing animations using 2-D characters, props and scenes cut from materials, such as paper, card or fabric. Animators divide characters into smaller segments, piece together the individual cut-out shapes and move them in small steps, taking a picture -- with a film camera capable of taking single pictures -- at each step, to create the illusion of movement. For e.g, The Breadwinner, Strange Frame, Twice Upon a Time, Left-Hander etc.

important to understand why we like to get scared in the first place

ANTERIOR: rationality

when we are in a place of safety (movie theater, couch at home, haunted house, roller coaster) the front part helps to relax that fight or flight mentality from amygdala we have when we are scared

POSTERIOR: primal instincts

We still get to enjoy the flood of endorphins and chemicals that are released from being scared.

Number of horror films

• Horror now consistently comprises over 10% of all feature films made.
• Despite the increase in volume of horror movies, the horror genre has the highest overall rate of profitability when compared to other film genres.