Already in the 1950s, apart from science-fiction movies following aliens from outer space invasion plots, disaster films or creature horror, another genre was equally prominent in the list of sensational productions: the nuclear threat films. Those were a familiar feature of popular culture, and audiences could watch new movies of the kind until roughly the […]
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Tag: 1980s United States
Film Noir and Los Angeles: Urban History and the Dark Imaginary by Sean W. Maher (2022)
Movies of the film noir genre, shot in the US, usually had two favorite locations when it came to large cities and a setting that would breathe the air of crime, provide sinister plots, gunmen and desperate main characters: the pictures were either set in New York City or Los Angeles. As with Los Angeles, […]
Interpreting Star Wars: Reading a Modern Film Franchise by Miles Booy (2021)
Over the years, more than a handful of books on George Lucas’ Star Wars epic have been written that evaluated, criticized and interpreted the film franchise. When in 1977 Star Wars was first presented, several significant film critics identified a number of central aspects, roles, ideologies or an American perspective on it. The main aspects […]
Vigilantes: Private Justice in Popular Cinema by Kevin Grant (2020)
When in movies a crime is committed against a citizen and neither the police force nor judges seem able or willing to catch and punish the assailant, mostly two options are presented to the victim/protagonist: to accept that the law and its divisions can fail sometimes, or to start a crusade against the aggressor all […]
Crime and Spy Jazz on Screen Since 1971. A History and Discography by Derrick Bang (2020)
In the second volume of his extensive study on crime and spy movie jazz, author Bang devotes his knowledge to the years 1971 to 2019. His strategy of presenting these scores changes a bit in the present volume, as even though in the early 1970s movies were still shown in movie theaters almost exclusively, just […]
The Bronze Age of DC Comics by Paul Levitz (2015)
The third volume of the DC chronicles is out and shows the company’s changing face and politics in the years 1970-1984. As the Golden Age and the Silver Age were focused on the development of DC comics until the year 1970, the current edition is labeled the “Bronze Age“ and demonstrates how the comic artists […]