Providing an indispensable resource for students and general readers, this book serves as an entry point for a conversation on America's favorite pastime, focusing in on generational differences and the evolution of American identity. In an age marked by tension and division, Americans of all ages and backgrounds have turned to film to escape the pressures of everyday life. Yet, beyond escapism, popular cinema is both a mirror and microscope for our collective psyche. Examining the films that have made billions of dollars through a new lens reveals that popular culture is a vital source for understanding what it means to be an American. This book is divided into four sections, each associated with a different generation. Featuring such era-defining hits as Jaws, Back to the Future, Avatar, and The Avengers, each section presents detailed film analyses that showcase the consistency of certain American values throughout generations as well as the constant renegotiation of others. Ideal for any cinephile, The American Blockbuster demonstrates how complex and meaningful even the summer blockbuster can be.

Ben-Hur (1959), Jaws (1975), Avatar (2009), Wonder Woman (2017): the blockbuster movie has held a dominant position in American popular culture for decades. In American Blockbuster Charles R. Acland charts the origins, impact, and dynamics of this most visible, entertaining, and disparaged cultural form. Acland narrates how blockbusters emerged from Hollywood's turn to a hit-driven focus during the industry's business crisis in the 1950s. Movies became bigger, louder, and more spectacular. They also became prototypes for ideas and commodities associated with the future of technology and culture, accelerating the prominence of technological innovation in modern American life. Acland shows that blockbusters continue to be more than just movies; they are industrial strategies and complex cultural machines designed to normalize the ideologies of our technological age.

Ben-Hur (1959), Jaws (1975), Avatar (2009), Wonder Woman (2017): the blockbuster movie has held a dominant position in American popular culture for decades. In American Blockbuster Charles R. Acland charts the origins, impact, and dynamics of this most visible, entertaining, and disparaged cultural form. Acland narrates how blockbusters emerged from Hollywood's turn to a hit-driven focus during the industry's business crisis in the 1950s. Movies became bigger, louder, and more spectacular. They also became prototypes for ideas and commodities associated with the future of technology and culture, accelerating the prominence of technological innovation in modern American life. Acland shows that blockbusters continue to be more than just movies; they are industrial strategies and complex cultural machines designed to normalize the ideologies of our technological age.

Providing an indispensable resource for students and general readers, this book serves as an entry point for a conversation on America's favorite pastime, focusing in on generational differences and the evolution of American identity. In an age marked by tension and division, Americans of all ages and backgrounds have turned to film to escape the pressures of everyday life. Yet, beyond escapism, popular cinema is both a mirror and microscope for our collective psyche. Examining the films that have made billions of dollars through a new lens reveals that popular culture is a vital source for understanding what it means to be an American. This book is divided into four sections, each associated with a different generation. Featuring such era-defining hits as Jaws, Back to the Future, Avatar, and The Avengers, each section presents detailed film analyses that showcase the consistency of certain American values throughout generations as well as the constant renegotiation of others. Ideal for any cinephile, The American Blockbuster demonstrates how complex and meaningful even the summer blockbuster can be.

Can blockbuster films be socially relevant or are they just escapist diversions to entertain the masses and enrich the studios? Not every successful film contains thoughtful commentary, but some that are marketed as pure entertainment do seriously engage social issues. Popular science fiction films of the late 1970s and early 1980s--such as George Lucas' Star Wars trilogy, Ridley Scott's Alien and Aliens, and James Cameron's Terminator films--present a critique of our engagement with technology in a way that resonates with 1960s counterculture. As challengers of the status quo's technological underpinnings, Luke Skywalker, Ellen Ripley and Sarah Connor echo the once-popular social criticism of philosopher Herbert Marcuse and speak directly to the concerns of people living in a technologically complex society. The films of Lucas, Scott and Cameron made money but also made us think about the world we live in.

This book examines how American foreign policy and the commercial film industry's economic interests influenced the portrayal of international terrorism in Hollywood blockbuster films from the time of the Iran hostage crisis to the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Part I provides a historical overview of modern international terrorism and how it relates to the United States, its news media, and its film industry. Part II covers depictions of terrorism during the Cold War under President Reagan, including films like Commando and Iron Eagle. Part III covers the Hollywood terrorist after the Cold War, including European terrorists in the Die Hard franchise, Passenger 57, Patriot Games, Blown Away, The Jackal and Ronin; fundamentalist Islamic terrorists in True Lies and Executive Decision; the return of the communist threat in Air Force One; and 9/11 foreshadowing in The Siege.

Seeking to rebuild the Russian film industry after its post-Soviet collapse, directors and producers sparked a revival of nationalist and patriotic sentiment by applying Hollywood techniques to themes drawn from Russian history. Unsettled by the government's move toward market capitalism, Russians embraced these historical blockbusters, packing the American-style multiplexes that sprouted across the country. Stephen M. Norris examines the connections among cinema, politics, economics, history, and patriotism in the creation of "blockbuster history"—the adaptation of an American cinematic style to Russian historical epics.

"But somewhere along the line, the beast they awakened took on a life of its own, and by the 1990s production budgets had escalated as quickly as profits. Hollywood entered a topsy-turvy world ruled by marketing and merchandising mavens, in which flops like Godzilla made money and hits had to break records just to break even. The blockbuster changed from a major event that took place a few times a year into something that audiences have come to expect weekly, piling into the backs of one another in an annual demolition derby that has left even Hollywood aghast.".

This book examines the Chinese Communist Party’s attempts to improve China’s image around the world, thereby increasing its "soft power." This soft, attractive form of power is crucial if China is to avoid provoking an international backlash against its growing military and economic might. The volume focuses on the period since Xi Jinping came to power in 2012, and is global in scope, examining the impact of Chinese policies from Hong Kong and Taiwan to Africa and South America. The book explains debates over soft power within China and delves into case studies of important policy areas for China’s global image campaign, such as film, news media and the Confucius Institutes. The most comprehensive work of its kind, the volume presents a picture of a Chinese leadership that has access to vast material resources and growing global influence but often struggles to convert these resources into genuine international affection. With a foreword by Joseph Nye, Soft Power With Chinese Characteristics will be invaluable to students and scholars of Chinese politics and Chinese media, as well as international relations and world politics more generally.

The globalisation of communication networks has increased the domains of translation and is challenging ever more the translator’s role. This volume is a collection of contributions from two different conferences (Misano, 1997 and Berlin, 1998). (Multi)Media translation, especially screen translation (TV, cinema, video), has made more explicit the complexities of any communication and has led us to take a fresh look at the translator’s strategies and behaviours.Several papers ponder the concepts of media and multimedia, the necessity of interdisciplinarity, the polysemiotic dimension of audiovisual media. Quite a few discuss the current transformations in audiovisual media policy. A great many deal with practices, mainly in subtitling but also in interpreting for TV and surtitling: what are the quality parameters and the conditions to meet audience’s expectations? Finally some show the cultural and linguistic implications of screen translation. Digitalisation is changing production and broadcasting and speeding up convergence between media, telecommunications and information and communication technology. Is (multi)media translation a new field of study or an umbrella framework for scholars from various disciplines? Is it a trick to overcome the absence of prestige in Translation Studies? Or is it just a buzz word which gives rise to confusion? These questions remain open: the 26 contributions are partial answers.