A Companion to the Action Film

An authoritative guide to the action-packed film genre

With 24 incisive, cutting-edge contributions from esteemed scholars and critics, A Companion to the Action Filmprovides an authoritative and in-depth guide to this internationally popular and wide-ranging genre. As the first major anthology on the action film in more than a decade, the volume offers insights into the genre’s historical development, explores its production techniques and visual poetics, and provides reflections on the numerous social, cultural, and political issues it has and continues to embody.

A Companion to the Action Film offers original research and critical analysis that examines the iconic characteristics of the genre, its visual aesthetics, and its narrative traits; considers the impact of major directors and stars on the genre’s evolution; puts the action film in dialogue with various technologies and other forms of media such as graphic novels and television; and maps out new avenues of critical study for the future. This important resource:

• Offers a definitive guide to the action film
• Contains insightful contributions from a wide range of international film experts and scholars
• Reviews the evolution of the genre from the silent era to today’s age of digital blockbusters
• Offers nuanced commentary and analysis of socio-cultural issues such as race, nationality, and gender in action films

Written for scholars, teachers and students in film studies, film theory, film history, genre studies, and popular culture, A Companion to the Action Film is an essential guide to one of international cinema’s most important, popular, and influential genres.

Keywords: Guide to action films; text on action films; resource to action films; understanding action films; history of the action film; Blaxploitation and the action film; superheroes in action films; early action films; queens in action films; director John Ford; direction Kurosawa; director John Frankenheimer; director Sam Peckinpah; director Don Siegel; Sylvester Stallone and action films; Arnold Schwarzenegger and action films; Bruce Lee and action films; Jackie Chan and action films; Jean-Claude Van-Damme and action films; the blockbuster action films; postmodern action films; stunt work in action films; the narrative of action films; graphic novels and action films; animation in action films; violence in action films; the question of race in action films, Film Theory, Film Theory