Film Studies Essay: Exploring Crime Film Criticism and its Evolution

This essay provides a comprehensive analysis of crime film criticism, tracing its evolution and key methodologies. It begins by defining film theories and sub-genres, focusing on crime films and their division into detective and gangster movies. The essay explores different critical approaches, including auteur criticism, thematic analysis, and feminist perspectives, highlighting the influence of various critics and theorists. It examines the historical context of crime film criticism, from early British commentary to the impact of French and feminist influences. The essay also discusses the challenges in understanding the subject, such as the use of jargon and the intermixing of theories. Finally, it poses a question about the post-modern take on crime film criticism. This paper covers the history of film criticism based on the genre of crime movies, providing examples of critics from the initial British criticism days, to the French and feminist influences on the matter of criticism.

Running head: FILM STUDIES
FILM STUDIES
Name of the Student
Name of thee university
Author notes

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Summary
Film theories and sub-genres are the systematic and critical analysis of different aspeacts of a
film production. There are number of theories built on the basis of types of academic criticism
intended. Among the criticism of the sub-genres of the films, the crime films are the most
difficult because of their tendency of splitting in sub-genres. The main two genres of crime
movies are the detective movies and the gangster movies. The first one is based on the
intentionalist history on the other hand; the gangster movies are based on the anti-intentioanlist
history. There are reasons that the crime movies are judged by their critical methodologies and
sub-genres and not on their discontinuous chronology.
in the systematic film criticism, critics like Paul Rotha usually dismissed the criticism of the
established genres of Hollywood and would favour to discuss the more individual and original
films. The types of films selected for the criticism are exactly the opposite of the horros film
genres. Many critics were in the same page as Paul Rotha and only after 1901, G.K. Chesterton
wrote “A Defense of Detective Stories” that advocates the crime stories as the “only form of
popular literature” and therefore worthy of criticism.
In the “The Hollywood mythmaking” part, the author discussed about the taste of the audiences.
The popular film cultures were still not at the spot light when in 1940s Parker Tyler and Robert
Warshow started talking against this context of film making. The irony is that, both of them were
inspired by the works of Rothe, but to establish their points, they were taking examples from
popular genres of filmmaking. Gradually, the criticism shifted to the genre vs. auteur tradition
because of the active role of American Journalism. Critics like James Agee, Manny Farber, Otis

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Ferguson and Pauline Kael started a new trend in the film criticism that advocates the auteur
criticism of Andrew Sarris. The work of Andrew Sarris was a controversial and influential one as
it ranked the directors in the category of “Pantheon” to the “Strained Seriousness” and “Less
than Meets the Eye”. The French influence in the film criticism could be seen in the theories of
Iconographic and Thematic analysis. The genre of crime and its interesting aspects began to give
audience the experience of insecurity and anguish at the same time.
By the 1970s, the critics started to place the gangster movies at the heart of the crime film
criticism. The wave of feminist criticism has also influenced the context of crime film criticism.
There could be seen a contrast between the presentation of the other theorists and the feminist
critics by the end of 1970s. The angle of criticism for the female characters of the movie shifted
from the impression of the female characters to the presentation of the same. The changing
presentation of the male and female characters in the gangster and detective movies was the
result of the feministic waves in the film criticism.
Part 2- Three most compelling aspects
The first thing that is most important part of the study is that presentation of the changing context
of the crime movies in Hollywood. The paper presents a compelling and detailed history of the
criticism and its changes happen in the genre of crime movies.
The second important thing is the discussion of theories and their context along with the time.
The paper has multiple theorists name and their idea of the crime film criticism.
The third most important part of this study is the flow of criticism and examples provided. The
article is about the history of the film criticism based on the genre of crime movies. Therefore,

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the author started to give example of the critics, right from the initial British criticism days, to
the French and feminist influences on the matter of criticism. This makes the work compact and
critical at the same time.
Part 3- Two Aspects of the reading tough to understand
The first thing in the reading that is difficult to understand is the use of jargons and too many
allusions to the movies. This paper has the examples of many movies and critical studies that
make the reading really complex to me. Another thing is that, the theories that are presented in
this reading are inter-mixed in most of the part. There are examples of multiple theories. But the
author starts talking about one after another without any coherence in some place. This is
difficult to decode.
Part 4- One question that seeks to go beyond the reading content
What is the post-modern take on crime film criticism and how is that represented in the works of
the critics in contemporary times?