A strong argument can be made for the action film as the most vital and visually adventurous genre of our day. Even such unapologetically popular entertainment as the Die Hard and Lethal Weapon series and the Schwartzenegger and Stallone catalogues open up the screen with moments of great cinematic energy, verve and abandon.
Action films are, at heart, fantasies of motion, with a kind of unjaded purity.
In the past, when movies were less self-conscious, they were often art in spite of themselves. This course will examine the historical precedents of the modern action film, then seek to understand its strengths and its weaknesses as cinema, and its meaning in the larger, cultural context. And, since this course will likely be an introduction to film studies for most students, we will also consider the basic mechanics of filmmaking and -viewing. An Insider's Guide to the Hollywood of the East by Fredric Dannen and Barry Long. Two 5-page papers and a final essay exam.