Identifying Hollywood's Audiences: Cultural Identity and the Movies - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0851707386 ISBN 13: 9780851707389

Publisher: British Film Institute, 1999

Synopsis

Compiled from significant new research into audience studies, this book examines the methods the American motion picture industry has used to identify and understand its audiences, and the ways in which that understanding has shaped the movies it produced, from the 1920s to the 1990s.
The contributors reassess what is known about the social composition of classical Hollywood audiences, the role of opinion leaders in forming viewer choices, and the development of statistical audience research methods, challenging the conventional wisdom that the classical motion picture industry knew little about its audiences.
Looking at explanations for the decline in movie attendance in the postwar years and Hollywood's adaptation to the demographics of the baby boom and the postmodern family, these essays detail how Hollywood has repeatedly reinvented and reconstructed the identities of its audiences. The book also examines how such groups as adolescent males and female horror movie fans use film-viewing to display and establish their cultural competence and subcultural identities.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Examines what Hoolywood knew about its audiences between the 1920s and 1990s. This book looks at the methods the American motion picture industry has used to identify and understand its customers, and the ways in which that understanding has shaped the movies it produced. The authors reassess what is known about the social composition of classical Hollywood audiences, the role of opinion leaders in forming viewer choices and the development of statistical audience research methods. It challengs the conventional wisdom that the classical motion picture industry knew little about its audiences. Looking at Hollywoods adaptation to demographics, the book details how Hollywood has repeatedly reinvented and reconstructed the identities of its audiences. It also examines how such groups as adolescent males and female horror movie fans use film-viewing to display and establish their cultural competence and subcultural identities. The book demonstrates the range of demands that audiences make in the movies they watch, and the complex ways in which viewers negotiate their own self-images and the meanings of the texts they consume.

About the Author

Melvyn Stokes teaches American history and film history at University College, London.

About this edition

• Publisher: British Film Institute
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0851707386
• ISBN 13: 9780851707389
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 209
• Editor: Stokes Melvyn, Maltby Richard