Table of Contents

Part 1: History and Style 1. Inventing Early Cinema 2. The 'Culture War' of Sensational Melodrama, 1910-1914 3. 'Child of Commerce! Bastard of Art': Early Film Melodrama 4. Action-Adventure as Hollywood Genre Part 2: Theorising Action Aesthetics 5. 'Get Ready for Rush Hour': The Chronotope in Action 6. Dwight MacDonald and the Historical Epic 7. The Collapse of Reality and Illusion in The Matrix 8. Guns and Gas: Investigating the Post-Classical Car Chase Film 9. Saving Private Ryan's 'Special Affect' Part 3: Gender, Stars, Bodies 10. Ready for Action: G.I. Jane. Demi Moore's Body and the Female Combat Movie 11. Más Macha: The New Latina Action Hero 12. Beauty in Motion: Gender, Spectacle and Action Babe Cinema 13. Breakdown: White Masculinity, Class and US Action-Adventure Films 14. Maximus Melodramaticus: Masculinity, Masochism and White Male Paranoia in Contemporary Hollywood Cinema 15. The Family in Action Part 4: Nation, Ethnicity and Stardom 16. The Hong Kong/Hollywood Connection: Stardom and Spectacle in Transnational Action Cinema 17. Europeans in Action 18. Greek War Film as Melodrama: Women, Female Stars and the Nation as Victim 19. Spaghetti Western, Genre Criticism and National Cinema: Re-Defining the Frame of Reference Part 5: Action, Authorship and Industry 20. Genre and Violence in the Work of Kurosawa and Peckinpah 21. The Dirty Dozen: The Contradictory Nature of Screen Violence 22. 'It's aimed at kids - the kid in everybody': George Lucas, Star Wars and Childrens Entertainment 23. Man's Favourite Sport? The Action Films of Kathryn Bigelow 24. 'They call me action woman': The Marketing of Mimi Leder as a New Concept in the High Concept 'Action' Film