Screening #MeToo offers an important and timely discussion of the pervasive nature of rape culture in Hollywood. Essays in the collection examine films released from the 1960s onward, a broad period that coincides with the end of the Motion Picture Production Code in Hollywood, which resulted in more frequent and increasingly graphic images of sex and violence being included in mainstream movies. Focusing on narratives in which surveillance and sexual violence feature prominently, contributors from North America and Europe examine a variety of film genres, including spy films, teen comedies, kitchen sink dramas, coming-of-age stories, rape/revenge films, and horror films. Reflecting the increasing social and academic awareness of sexual violence in Hollywood film and its transmission and cultivation of rape culture in the United States and abroad, they are concerned not only with the content of the films under scrutiny but also with the clear relationship between the stories, how they are being told, and the culture that produced them. Screening #MeToo challenges readers to look at mainstream Hollywood films differently, in light of attitudes about art and power, sexuality and consent, and the pleasures and frustrations of criticizing "entertainment" films from these perspectives.

It started with an article and grew into a movement. #MeToo was born in the wake of a Pulitzer-prize winning New York Times investigative report on producer Harvey Weinstein's habitual sexual harassment of young women. The hashtag empowered women around the world to share their stories of sexual assault and abuse. Corporations responded by firing dozens of accused CEOs, media moguls, and movie stars, and politicians responded by sponsoring legislation against sexual harassment. This collection of articles tracks the movement from its start. It looks at the international response and inevitable criticism, as well as the future of the movement.

In the wake of the MeToo movement, revelations of sexual assault and harassment continue to disrupt sexual politics across the globe. Reports of widespread misconduct—in workplaces from doctors’ offices to factory floors—precipitate firings, legal actions, street protests, and policy punditry. Meenakshi Gigi Durham situates media culture as a place in which these broader social struggles are produced and reproduced. The media figures whose depravity sparked the #MeToo movement are symbols of the complexities of sexual desire and consent. Pop culture fuels controversies about rape culture; social media users have launched feminist resistance that turned to real-world activism; and investigative journalists have broken stories of assault, offering a platform for survivors to speak truth to patriarchal power. Arguing that the media are a linchpin in these events, Durham provides a feminist account of the interrelated contexts of media production, representation, and reception. She situates the media as the key site where the establishment of sexuality and social relations takes place, and traces the media's powerful role in both reifying and challenging rape culture. This timely and stimulating book will be of interest to students and scholars of media, communication, gender studies, and sociology, as well as to anyone concerned by the current state of sexual politics.​

Beginning with Casino Royale (2006) and ending with No Time to Die (2021), the Daniel Craig era of James Bond films coincides with the rise of various justice movements challenging deeply entrenched systems of inequality and oppression, ranging from sexism, racism, and immigration to 2SLGBTQIA+ rights, reproductive justice and climate change. While focus is often placed on individual actions and institutional policies and practices, it is important to recognize the role that culture plays within these systems. Mainstream film is not simply 'mindless' entertainment but a key part of a global cultural industry that naturalizes and normalizes power structures. Engaging with these issues, Resisting James Bond is a multidisciplinary collection that explores inequality and oppression in the world of 007 through a range of critical and theoretical approaches. The chapters explore the embodiment and disembodiment of power and privilege across the formal, narrative, cultural and geopolitical elements that define the revisionist-reversionist world of Daniel Craig's Bond.

Identifies a new genre—misdirection films—and explains its appeal to contemporary producers and audiences. Are You Watching Closely? is the first book to explore the recent spate of “misdirection films,” a previously unidentified Hollywood genre characterized by narratives that inspire viewers to reinterpret them retrospectively. Since 1990, Hollywood has backed more of these films than ever before, many of which, including The Sixth Sense (1999), A Beautiful Mind (2001), and Inception (2010), were both commercial and critical successes. Seth Friedman examines this genre in its sociocultural, industrial, and technological contexts to explain why it has become more attractive to producers and audiences. The recent popularity of misdirection films, Friedman argues, is linked to new technologies that enable repeat viewings and online discussion, which makes it enticing to an industry that depends increasingly on the aftermarket, as well as to historically specific cultural developments. That is, in addition to being well suited for shifting industrial and technological conditions, these films are appealing because they suggest that it remains possible to know what “actually” occurred and who was “really” responsible for events at a time when it is also becoming increasingly recognized that “truth” is relative. Are You Watching Closely? shows how Hollywood’s effective strategies for these changing circumstances put it at the forefront of a storytelling trend that has increasingly become important across media. Through close analyses of how misdirection films have been designed, marketed, and received in relation to their contexts, Friedman demonstrates the ways in which they epitomize a kind of narrative experimentation that has become a crucial facet of twenty-first-century audiovisual storytelling.

Catholic Horror on Television: Haunting Faith explores the significant intersection of horror media and the Catholic Church. Religious themes enjoy a long history in film and television, with narratives featuring the supernatural, science fiction, and horror making use of Roman Catholicism in particular. The horror genre frequently tells fantastic stories about the mysteries that we seek to understand, helping to come to terms with the destructive and the monstrous. This book analyzes the genre of Catholic horror in the current television and streaming media environment, exploring its treatment of physical mortality, the metaphysics of meaning, and morality. Catholic Horror on Television: Haunting Faith offers a fresh take on how television and streaming horror series critique, expand, and interrogate Catholicism and its place in the modern world. In doing so, this book contributes to conversations in several disciplines including media, cultural, television, and religious studies.

Screening Protest brings together a range of scholarly perspectives on the study of protest mediations on television and in film. Arguing that the screen is a fruitful, if overlooked, analytical focus, the book explores how visual narratives of protest wander across borders – territorial, temporal and generic. Chapters compare coverage of major protests in recent history by global news channels like Al Jazeera English, BBC World, CNN International and RT. They consider how geopolitical agendas, newsroom culture and the ubiquity of eyewitness footage shape the narration of events such as the ‘Umbrella Revolution’ in Hong Kong, anti-austerity protests in Greece, pro-EU mobilizations in the Ukraine and clashes in Ferguson. A focus on narrative allows authors to compare such news stories with popular cultural depictions of the protester, in films and television series such as The Hunger Games, Robin Hood and Suffragette. Although focussed on the screen, the scope of the book is broad, given its exploration of images distributed worldwide. Written with both scholars and students in mind, Screening Protest will interest researchers in political science, sociology, media and film studies, as well as the general reader interested in current affairs.