American Cinema of the 2000s: Themes and Variations

The decade from 2000 to 2009 is framed, at one end, by the traumatic catastrophe of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and, at the other, by the election of the first African American president of the United States. In between, the United States and the world witnessed the rapid expansion of new media and the Internet, such natural disasters as Hurricane Katrina, political uprisings around the world, and a massive meltdown of world economies.

Amid these crises and revolutions, American films responded in multiple ways, sometimes directly reflecting these turbulent times, and sometimes indirectly couching history in traditional genres and stories. In American Cinema of the 2000s, essays from ten top film scholars examine such popular series as the groundbreaking Matrix films and the gripping adventures of former CIA covert operative Jason Bourne; new, offbeat films like Juno; and the resurgence of documentaries like Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11.  Each essay demonstrates the complex ways in which American culture and American cinema are bound together in subtle and challenging ways.

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American Cinema of the 2000s: Themes and Variations

The decade from 2000 to 2009 is framed, at one end, by the traumatic catastrophe of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and, at the other, by the election of the first African American president of the United States. In between, the United States and the world witnessed the rapid expansion of new media and the Internet, such natural disasters as Hurricane Katrina, political uprisings around the world, and a massive meltdown of world economies.

Amid these crises and revolutions, American films responded in multiple ways, sometimes directly reflecting these turbulent times, and sometimes indirectly couching history in traditional genres and stories. In American Cinema of the 2000s, essays from ten top film scholars examine such popular series as the groundbreaking Matrix films and the gripping adventures of former CIA covert operative Jason Bourne; new, offbeat films like Juno; and the resurgence of documentaries like Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11.  Each essay demonstrates the complex ways in which American culture and American cinema are bound together in subtle and challenging ways.

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Overview

The decade from 2000 to 2009 is framed, at one end, by the traumatic catastrophe of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and, at the other, by the election of the first African American president of the United States. In between, the United States and the world witnessed the rapid expansion of new media and the Internet, such natural disasters as Hurricane Katrina, political uprisings around the world, and a massive meltdown of world economies.

Amid these crises and revolutions, American films responded in multiple ways, sometimes directly reflecting these turbulent times, and sometimes indirectly couching history in traditional genres and stories. In American Cinema of the 2000s, essays from ten top film scholars examine such popular series as the groundbreaking Matrix films and the gripping adventures of former CIA covert operative Jason Bourne; new, offbeat films like Juno; and the resurgence of documentaries like Michael Moore’s Fahrenheit 9/11.  Each essay demonstrates the complex ways in which American culture and American cinema are bound together in subtle and challenging ways.


Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780813553238
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Publication date: 04/15/2012
Series: Screen Decades: American Culture/American Cinema Series
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 288
Sales rank: 848,041
File size: 7 MB

About the Author

TIMOTHY CORRIGAN is a professor of English and cinema studies at the University of Pennsylvania. His many books include NewGerman Film: The Displaced Image; A Cinema without Walls: Movies and Culture after Vietnam; and The Essay Film: From Montaigne, After Marker. He is the editor of the journal Adaptation and an editorial board member of Cinema Journal.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Timeline
Introduction

2000 Movies, Anti-Climaxes, and Disenchantments

2001 Movies, Smart Films, and Dumb Stories

2002 Movies and Melancholy

2003 Movies, “Shock and Awe,” and the Troubled Blockbuster

2004 Movies and Spectacle in a Political Year

2005 Movies, Terror, and the American Family

2006 Movies and Crisis

2007 Movies and the Art of Living Dangerously

2008 Movies and a Hollywood Too Big to Fail

2009 Movies, a Nation, and New Identities

Select Academy Awards, 2000–2009
Works Cited and Consulted
Contributors
Index
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