Gary D. Rhodes

The Perils of Moviegoing in America (eBook, PDF)

1896-1950

• Format: PDF

Produktbeschreibung

During the first fifty years of the American cinema, the act of going to the movies was a risky process, fraught with a number of possible physical and moral dangers. Film fires were rampant, claiming many lives, as were movie theatre robberies, which became particularly common during the Great Depression. Labor disputes provoked a large number of movie theatre bombings, while low-level criminals like murderers, molesters, and prostitutes plied their trades in the darkened auditoriums. That was all in addition to the spread of disease, both real (as in the case of influenza) and imagined ("movie eyestrain").

Audiences also confronted an array of perceived moral dangers. Blue Laws prohibited Sunday film screenings, though theatres ignored them in many areas, sometimes resulting in the arrests of entire audiences. Movie theatre lotteries became another problem, condemned by politicians and clergymen throughout America for being immoral gambling.

The Perils of Moviegoing in America: 1896-1950 provides the first history of the many threats that faced film audiences, threats which claimed hundreds, if not thousands, of lives.

Produktdetails

• Verlag: Bloomsbury Publishing Inc
• Seitenzahl: 384
• Erscheinungstermin: 24. November 2011
• Englisch
• ISBN-13: 9781441188656
• Artikelnr.: 48422450

Autorenporträt

Gary D. Rhodes is Full Professor of Film and Media at Oklahoma Baptist University, USA. He is the author of numerous books, including The Perils of Moviegoing in America (Bloomsbury, 2012) and The Birth of the American Horror Film (2018). Rhodes is a founding editor of Horror Studies: An Interdisciplinary Journal. He is also the writer- director of such documentary films as Lugosi: Hollywood's Dracula (1997) and Banned in Oklahoma (2004). His most recent book is Consuming Images: Film Art and the American Television Commercial (2020), coauthored with Robert Singer. His forthcoming book is entitled Vampires in Silent Cinema (2023).