Twenty-First-Century Hollywood: Rebooting the System (Short Cuts)

Twenty-First-Century Hollywood looks into the contexts of studio film production in the new century in order to understand what shapes the style and content of present-day cinema. In an era dominated in box-office terms by the franchise and the family film, this book combines close textual readings and industrial analysis, illustrating why these kinds of movies are favored in the contemporary climate by producers and audiences alike. Neil Archer critically explores the narrative and aesthetic strategies at work in Hollywood’s most high-profile films, from Harry Potter, to Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, to The Lego Movie. Along the way, the book answers some often unexpected questions: Why is Hollywood nervous about flying saucers? Why might the cinematic auteur be Hollywood’s savior? And why are the most grown-up movies those made for children? As this study shows, like the films themselves, the answers to these questions are often complex and surprising.

Neil Archer is a lecturer and Program Director in film at Keele University, and is the author of Studying The Bourne Ultimatum (Auteur, 2012) The French Road Movie (Berghahn, 2012), The Road Movie (Wallflower 2016), among others.