Film genre

[2] Drawing heavily from the theories of literary-genre criticism, film genres are usually delineated by "conventions, iconography, settings, narratives, characters and actors".

Broader examples include the docufiction and docudrama, which merge the basic categories of fiction and non-fiction (documentary).

Regarding actors, some may acquire a reputation linked to a single genre, such as John Wayne (the Western) or Fred Astaire (the musical).

[4] Genres can also be classified by more inherent characteristics (usually implied in their names), such as settings, theme/topic, mood, target audience, or budget/type of production.

[14] From the earliest days of cinema in the 19th century the term "genre" (already in use in English with reference to works of art or literary production from at least 1770[26]) was used[by whom?]

[31] The conventions in genre films enable filmmakers to generate them in an industrial, assembly-line fashion, an approach which can be seen in the James Bond spy-films, which all use a formula of "lots of action, fancy gadgets, beautiful woman and colourful villains", even though the actors, directors and screenwriters change.

[31] Films are rarely purely from one genre, which is in keeping with the cinema's diverse and derivative origins, it being a blend of "vaudeville, music-hall, theatre, photography" and novels.

The "social conventions" method of identifying the genre of a film is based on the accepted cultural consensus within society.

[32] Jim Colins claims that since the 1980s, Hollywood films have been influenced by the trend towards "ironic hybridization", in which directors combine elements from different genres, as with the Western/science fiction mix in Back to the Future Part III.

While some genres are based on story content (the war film), other are borrowed from literature (comedy, melodrama) or from other media (the musical).

Hollywood story consultant John Truby states that "...you have to know how to transcend the forms [genres] so you can give the audience a sense of originality and surprise".

Huge widescreens helped Western films to create an expansive setting of the open plains and desert.

[40] Linda Williams argues that horror, melodrama, and pornography all fall into the category of "body genres" since they are each designed to elicit physical reactions on the part of viewers.

Eric R. Williams (no relation to Linda Williams) argues that all narrative feature-length films can be categorized as one of eleven "super genres" (action, crime, fantasy, horror, romance, science fiction, slice of life, sports, thriller, war and Western).

[36] Similarly, Williams explains that labels such as animation and musical are more specific to storytelling technique and therefore fall into his category of "voice".

For example, the 1970s Blaxploitation films have been called an attempt to "undermine the rise of Afro-American's Black consciousness movement" of that era.

Films such as the musical were created as a form of entertainment during the Great Depression allowing its viewers an escape during tough times.

In the earliest, classic Westerns, there was a clear hero who protected society from lawless villains who lived in the wilderness and came into civilization to commit crimes.

[4] However, in revisionist Westerns of the 1970s, the protagonist becomes an antihero who lives in the wilderness to get away from a civilization that is depicted as corrupt, with the villains now integrated into society.

This enables viewers to understand the evolution of film genres as time and history morphs or views and ideals of the entertainment industry.