Road Movie Book

The Road Movie Bookis the first comprehensive study of an enduring but ever-changing Hollywood genre, its place in American culture, and its legacy to world cinema. The road and the cinema both flourished in the twentieth century, as technological advances brought motion pictures to a mass audience and the mass produced automobile opened up the road to the ordinary American. When Jean Baudrillard equated modern American culture with 'space, speed, cinema, technology' he could just as easily have added that the road movie is its supreme emblemThe contributors explore how the road movie has confronted and represented issues of nationhood, sexuality, gender, class and race. They map the generic terrain of the road movie, trace its evolution on American television as well as on the big screen from the 1930s through the 1980s, and, finally, consider road movies that go off the road, departing from the US landscape or travelling on the margins of contemporary American cultureMovies discussed include* Road classics such as It Happened One Night, The Grapes of Wrath, The Wizard of Ozand the Bob Hope-Bing Crosby Road to film* 1960's reworkings of the road movie in Easy Riderand Bonnie and Clyd* Russ Meyer's road movies: from Motorpsycho!to Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill* Contemporary hits such as Paris Texas, Rain Man, Natural Born Killersand Thelma and Louis* The road movie, Australian style, from Mad Maxto the Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.