1.
Film genre
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A film genre is a motion picture category based on similarities in either the narrative elements or the emotional response to the film. Most theories of film genre are borrowed from literary genre criticism, the basic genres include fiction and documentary, from which subgenres have emerged, such as docufiction and docudrama. Other subgenres include the courtroom and trial-focused drama known as the legal drama, types of fiction which may seem unrelated can also be combined to form hybrid subgenres, such as the melding of horror and comedy in the Evil Dead films. Other popular combinations are the comedy and the action comedy film. Films can also be classified by the setting, theme, topic, mood, format, the setting is the environment where the story and action takes place. The theme or topic refers to the issues or concepts that the film revolves around, the mood is the emotional tone of the film. Format refers to the way the film was shot or the manner of presentation, additional ways of categorizing film genres is by the target audience or by type of production. American film historian Janet Staiger states that the genre of a film can be defined in four ways, the idealist method judges films by predetermined standards. The empirical method identifies the genre of a film by comparing it to a list of films already deemed to fall within a certain genre, the apriori method uses common generic elements which are identified in advance. The social conventions method of identifying the genre of a film is based on the cultural consensus within society. Martin Loop contends that Hollywood films are not pure genres, because most Hollywood movies blend the love-oriented plot of the genre with other genres. Many films cross into multiple genres, recently, film theorist Robert Stam challenged whether genres really exist, or whether they are merely made up by critics. Stam has questioned whether genres really out there in the world or are they really the construction of analysts, as well, he has asked whether there is a. finite taxonomy of genres or are they in principle infinite. And whether genres are. timeless essences ephemeral, time-bound entities, Stam has also asked whether genre analysis should aim at being descriptive or prescriptive. While some genres are based on content, other are borrowed from literature or from other media. Some are performer-based or budget-based, while others are based on status, racial identity, location. Many genres have built-in audiences and corresponding publications that support them, for example, horror films have a well-established fanbase that reads horror magazines such as Fangoria. Films that are difficult to categorize into a genre are often less successful, as such, film genres are also useful in the areas of marketing, film criticism and the analysis of consumption
2.
Film
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A film, also called a movie, motion picture, theatrical film or photoplay, is a series of still images which, when shown on a screen, creates the illusion of moving images due to the phi phenomenon. This optical illusion causes the audience to perceive continuous motion between separate objects viewed rapidly in succession, the process of filmmaking is both an art and an industry. The word cinema, short for cinematography, is used to refer to the industry of films. Films were originally recorded onto plastic film through a photochemical process, the adoption of CGI-based special effects led to the use of digital intermediates. Most contemporary films are now fully digital through the process of production, distribution. Films recorded in a form traditionally included an analogous optical soundtrack. It runs along a portion of the film exclusively reserved for it and is not projected, Films are cultural artifacts created by specific cultures. They reflect those cultures, and, in turn, affect them, Film is considered to be an important art form, a source of popular entertainment, and a powerful medium for educating—or indoctrinating—citizens. The visual basis of film gives it a power of communication. Some films have become popular worldwide attractions by using dubbing or subtitles to translate the dialog into the language of the viewer, some have criticized the film industrys glorification of violence and its potentially negative treatment of women. The individual images that make up a film are called frames, the perception of motion is due to a psychological effect called phi phenomenon. The name film originates from the fact that film has historically been the medium for recording and displaying motion pictures. Many other terms exist for a motion picture, including picture, picture show, moving picture, photoplay. The most common term in the United States is movie, while in Europe film is preferred. Terms for the field, in general, include the big screen, the screen, the movies, and cinema. In early years, the sheet was sometimes used instead of screen. Preceding film in origin by thousands of years, early plays and dances had elements common to film, scripts, sets, costumes, production, direction, actors, audiences, storyboards, much terminology later used in film theory and criticism apply, such as mise en scène. Owing to the lack of any technology for doing so, the moving images, the magic lantern, probably created by Christiaan Huygens in the 1650s, could be used to project animation, which was achieved by various types of mechanical slides
3.
Humour
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Humour or humor is the tendency of particular cognitive experiences to provoke laughter and provide amusement. The term derives from the medicine of the ancient Greeks. People of all ages and cultures respond to humour, most people are able to experience humour—be amused, smile or laugh at something funny—and thus are considered to have a sense of humour. The hypothetical person lacking a sense of humour would likely find the behaviour inducing it to be inexplicable, strange, for example, young children may favour slapstick such as Punch and Judy puppet shows or the Tom and Jerry cartoons, whose physical nature makes it accessible to them. By contrast, more sophisticated forms of such as satire require an understanding of its social meaning and context. Many theories exist about what humour is and what social function it serves, the benign-violation theory, endorsed by Peter McGraw, attempts to explain humours existence. The theory says humour only occurs when something seems wrong, unsettling, or threatening, Humour can be used as a method to easily engage in social interaction by taking away that awkward, uncomfortable, or uneasy feeling of social interactions. Others believe that the use of humour can facilitate social interactions. Some claim that humour cannot or should not be explained, white once said, Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the pure scientific mind. Counter to this argument, protests against offensive cartoons invite the dissection of humour or its lack by aggrieved individuals and this process of dissecting humour does not necessarily banish a sense of humour but begs attention towards its politics and assumed universality. Arthur Schopenhauer lamented the misuse of humour to mean any type of comedy, however, both humour and comic are often used when theorising about the subject. The connotations of humour as opposed to comic are said to be that of response versus stimulus, additionally, humour was thought to include a combination of ridiculousness and wit in an individual, the paradigmatic case being Shakespeares Sir John Falstaff. The French were slow to adopt the term humour, in French, non-satirical humour can be specifically termed droll humour or recreational drollery. As with any art form, the acceptance of a style or incidence of humour depends on sociological factors. Throughout history, comedy has been used as a form of entertainment all over the world, both a social etiquette and a certain intelligence can be displayed through forms of wit and sarcasm. Eighteenth-century German author Georg Lichtenberg said that the more you know humour, later, in Greek philosophy, Aristotle, in the Poetics, suggested that an ugliness that does not disgust is fundamental to humour. Each rasa was associated with a specific bhavas portrayed on stage, due to cultural differences, they disassociated comedy from Greek dramatic representation, and instead identified it with Arabic poetic themes and forms, such as hija. They viewed comedy as simply the art of reprehension and made no reference to light and cheerful events or troublesome beginnings, after the Latin translations of the 12th century, the term comedy thus gained a new semantic meaning in Medieval literature
4.
Black comedy
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Black comedy or dark comedy is a comic style that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo. Literary critics have associated black comedy and black humor with authors as early as the ancient Greeks with Aristophanes, Black comedy corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor. The term black humor was coined by the Surrealist theorist André Breton in 1935 while interpreting the writings of Jonathan Swift. Bretons preference was to some of Swifts writings as a subgenre of comedy and satire in which laughter arises from cynicism and skepticism. Scholars have associated black humor with authors as early as the ancient Greeks with Aristophanes, Breton coined the term for his book Anthology of Black Humor, in which he credited Jonathan Swift as the originator of black humor and gallows humor, and included excerpts from 45 other writers. This victims suffering is trivialized, which leads to sympathizing with the victimizer, as found in the social commentary. Black humor is also related to that of the grotesque genre. Breton identified Swift as the originator of black humor and gallows humor, particularly in his pieces Directions to Servants, A Modest Proposal, A Meditation Upon a Broom-Stick, the terms black comedy or dark comedy have been later derived as alternatives to Bretons term. Bruce Jay Friedman, in his anthology entitled Black Humor, imported the concept of comedy to the United States. He labeled many different authors and works with the idea, arguing that they shared the literary genre. The Friedman label came to prominence in the 1950s and 1960s, early American writers who employed black humor were Nathanael West and Vladimir Nabokov. In 1965 a mass-market paperback titled Black Humor, was released and this was one of the first American anthologies devoted to the conception of black humor as a literary genre, the publication also sparked nationwide interest in black humor. Among the writers labeled as black humorists by journalists and literary critics are Roald Dahl, Thomas Pynchon, Kurt Vonnegut, Warren Zevon, John Barth, Joseph Heller, popular themes of the genre include violence, discrimination, disease, sexuality, religion and barbarism. Comedians, like Lenny Bruce, that since the late 1950s have been labeled for using sick comedy by mainstream journalists, have also labeled with black comedy. By contrast, blue comedy focuses more on crude topics such as nudity, sex, in obscene humor, much of the humorous element comes from shock and revulsion, while black comedy might include an element of irony, or even fatalism. For example, the black comedy self-mutilation appears in the English novel Tristram Shandy. Tristram, five years old at the time, starts to urinate out of a window for lack of a chamber pot. The sash falls and circumcises him, his family reacts with both chaotic action and philosophic digression, cringe comedy Comedy horror Macabre Off-color humor
5.
Stand-up comedy
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Stand-up comedy is a comic style in which a comedian performs in front of a live audience, usually speaking directly to them. The performer is known as a comic, stand-up comic, stand-up comedian. In stand-up comedy, the comedian usually recites a grouping of humorous stories, jokes and one-liners typically called a monologue, routine, some stand-up comedians use props, music, or magic tricks to enhance their acts. Stand-up comedy is often performed in clubs, bars and pubs, nightclubs. Outside of live performance, stand-up is often distributed commercially via television, DVD, CD, in stand-up comedy, the feedback of the audience is instant and crucial for the comedians act. Audiences expect a stand-up comic to provide a stream of laughs. Will Ferrell has called stand-up comedy hard, lonely and vicious, a stand-up comedy show may involve only one comedian, or feature a headline or a showcase format. This is followed by one or two middle or featured acts, who perform 15- to 20-minute sets, followed by a headliner who performs for longer, a showcase format may still feature an MC. Bringer shows are another opportunity for amateur performers, the performer must bring a specified number of paying guests in order to get stage time. The guests usually have to pay a charge and there is often a minimum number of drinks that must be ordered. These shows usually have a showcase format and this type of show gives comedians better exposure than open mics because there is usually better audience turnout and industry professionals sometimes go to watch. Different comedy clubs have different requirements for their bringer shows, gotham Comedy Club in New York City, for example, usually has ten-person bringers, while Broadway Comedy Club in New York City usually has six-person bringers. As the name implies, stand-up comedians usually perform their material while standing, stand-up comedy has its origin in classic Parrhesia in 400 BC used for cynics and epicureans in order to tell the reality without censorship. Stand-up comedy in the United Kingdom began in the halls of the 18th and 19th centuries. The heavy censorship regime of the Lord Chamberlains Office required all comedians to submit their acts for censorship, the act would be returned with unacceptable sections underlined in blue pencil. The comedian was then obliged not to deviate from the act in its edited form, the rise of the post-war comedians coincided with the rise of television and radio, and the traditional music hall circuit suffered greatly as a result. By the 1970s, music hall entertainment was virtually dead, alternative circuits had evolved, such as working mens clubs. The alternative comedy scene began to evolve
6.
The King of Comedy (film)
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The King of Comedy is a 1983 American satirical black comedy film directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Robert De Niro, Jerry Lewis and Sandra Bernhard. Written by Paul D. Zimmerman, the focuses on themes including celebrity worship. 20th Century Fox released the film on February 18,1983, in the United States, the film began shooting in New York on June 1,1981, to avoid clashing with a forthcoming writers strike, and opened the Cannes Film Festival in 1983. Rupert Pupkin, an autograph hound, is an aspiring. After meeting Jerry Langford, a comedian and talk show host. He attempts to book a spot on the show but is rebuffed by Langfords staff. Along the way, Rupert indulges in elaborate and obsessive fantasies in which he and Langford are colleagues, hoping to impress, Rupert invites a date, Rita, to accompany him when he decides to show up uninvited at Langfords country home. When Langford returns to his house from a round, he finds Rupert. Angered, he launches into a tirade against Rupert, telling him that his act is mediocre. While Jerry yells at him, Rupert continues trying to stay on his good graces, when the straight approach does not work, Rupert hatches a kidnapping plot with the help of Masha, a fellow stalker similarly obsessed with Langford. As ransom, Rupert demands that he be given the spot on that evenings Jerry Langford Show. The network brass, lawyers, and the FBI agree to his demands, between the taping of the show and the broadcast, Masha has her dream date with Langford, who is duct-taped to a chair in her parents Manhattan townhouse. Jerry convinces her to him and he manages to escape. Ruperts stand-up routine is well received by the audience, in his act, he describes his troubled life while simultaneously laughing at his circumstances. Rupert closes by confessing to the audience that he kidnapped Jerry Langford in order to break into show business. The audience laughs, believing it to be part of his act, Rupert responds by saying, Tomorrow youll know I wasnt kidding and youll all think Im crazy. But I figure it this way, better to be king for a night, the movie closes with a news report of Ruperts release from prison, set to a montage of storefronts stocking his long awaited autobiography, King For a Night. He later appears as The Jerry Langford Show director, assuring Tony Randall that his cue cards are funny, Scorseses mother Catherine Scorsese plays Pupkins mother
7.
Wag the Dog
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Wag the Dog is a 1997 black comedy film produced and directed by Barry Levinson. The screenplay by Hilary Henkin and David Mamet was loosely adapted from Larry Beinharts novel American Hero, the film stars Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro, with Anne Heche, Denis Leary, and William H. Macy in supporting roles. The President of the United States is caught making advances on an underage Firefly Girl less than two weeks before Election Day, conrad Brean, a top-notch spin doctor, is brought in to take the publics attention away from the scandal. He decides to construct a diversionary war with Albania, hoping the media will concentrate on this instead, Brean contacts Hollywood producer Stanley Motss to create the war, complete with a theme song and fake film footage of a photogenic orphan in Albania. When the CIA learns of the plot, they send Agent Young to confront Brean who convinces him that revealing the deception is against his best interests. The CIA announces that the war has ended, but otherwise maintains the deception, at each stage of the plan, Motss continually dismisses setbacks as nothing and compares them to past movie-making catastrophes he averted. When the team goes to retrieve Schumann, they discover he is in fact a criminally insane Army prison convict before their plane crashes en route to Andrews Air Force Base. The team survives and is rescued by a farmer, but Schumann attempts to rape the farmers daughter, Motss then stages an elaborate military funeral, claiming that Schumann died from wounds sustained during his rescue. While watching a talk show Motss gets frustrated that the media are crediting the presidents win to a tired campaign slogan of Dont change horses in mid-stream rather than Motsss hard work. Despite previously claiming he was inspired by the challenge, Motss announces that he wants credit and will reveal his involvement, Motss refuses to back down, so Brean reluctantly has him killed and makes it look as if he had a heart attack. Because a dog is smarter than its tail, if the tail were smarter, it would wag the dog. Hoffmans character, Stanley Motss, is said to have been based directly upon famed producer Robert Evans, the award of writing credits on the film became controversial at the time, due to objections by Barry Levinson. After Levinson became attached as director, David Mamet was hired to rewrite Hilary Henkins screenplay, given the close relationship between Levinson and Mamet, New Line Cinema asked that Mamet be given sole credit for the screenplay. The film featured songs created for the fictitious campaign waged by the protagonists, these songs include Good Old Shoe, The American Dream. However, none of these made it onto the soundtrack CD. The CD featured only the track and seven of Knopflers instrumentals. On Rotten Tomatoes, Wag the Dog has an rating of 85% based on 72 reviews. The sites critical consensus reads, Smart, well-acted, and uncomfortably prescient political satire from director Barry Levinson, strangelove, it makes you laugh, and then it makes you wonder
8.
Brideless Groom
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Brideless Groom is the 101st short film released by Columbia Pictures in 1947 starring American slapstick comedy team The Three Stooges. The comedians released 190 short films for the studio between 1934 and 1959, Shemp plays a voice instructor and the object of affection to tone-deaf vocal student Miss Dinkelmeyer, with Larry his musical accompanist. After an excruciating session, Moe enters his classroom to tell Shemp that his uncle had died, however, Shemp cannot collect the money unless he is married within 48 hours after the reading of the will, leaving him only a few hours. Shemp uses his filled-up black address book to propose to any and all women he has ever known, upon recovering from his bruising, Shemp unintentionally proposes to his unattractive and tone-deaf student Miss Dinkelmeyer. She happily accepts and the two of them, with Moe and Larry in tow, head over to the Justice of Peace to get married, Shemp pulls out the wedding ring but accidentally loses it in the piano. Moe forces him to look, and in doing so Shemp wrecks the piano completely, eventually he finds the ring, and he is hustled to get married right away. They all arrive at the Justice of Peaces office looking to marry Shemp to get his money, the women start fighting, taking out their aggressions not only on themselves but upon the Stooges as well. Both Moe and Larry are repeatedly kicked in the shins while standing among the crowd of battling women, nonetheless, Shemp, in a dazed state, ends up marrying his student, just in time to collect the money. Shemp comes to, is told what happened, and is frightened beyond reproach, Brideless Groom was filmed from March 12-13,1947. The plot theme of Brideless Groom is not unique, having been used in Buster Keatons 1925 comedy Seven Chances, writer Clyde Bruckman was also partially responsible for Seven Chances. The film features longtime Stooges supporting player Emil Sitkas best-remembered line Hold hands, the shot where Sitka has a birdcage smashed on his head was worked into the 1994 movie Pulp Fiction when Eric Stoltz is watching television. Brideless Groom would be recycled in the half of 1956s Husbands Beware. Brideless Groom is one of four Stooge shorts that fell into the domain after the copyright lapsed in the 1960s. As such, these four shorts frequently appear on cheaply produced VHS or DVD compilations, in 2005 Brideless Groom was colorized and included as one of the featured shorts on a Legend Films DVD compilation called The Three Stooges In Color, featuring wraparounds from The Film Crew. Sony/Columbia Pictures also colorized a restored version of film that was released in 2007 as part of the DVD collection Hapless Half-Wits. The version of Voices of Spring during Shemp and Miss Dinkelmeyers singing lesson was sung by frequent Stooge co-star Christine McIntyre and this version of Voices of Spring, along with McIntyre herself, were previously used in the Three Stooges short Micro-Phonies. Brideless Groom features a sequence with Christine McIntyre who portrays Miss Hopkins, unfortunately, she mistakes him for her cousin Basil. After learning her mistake, she takes it out on poor Shemp by slapping him silly, during the filming of the scene, when Christine threw her punch, she leaned too far into it, and hit Shemp for real and broke his nose
9.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
10.
American comedy films
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American comedy films are comedy films produced in the United States. The genre is one of the oldest in American cinema, some of the very first silent movies were comedies, as slapstick comedy often relies on visual depictions, without requiring sound. With the advent of sound in the late 1920s and 1930s, by the 1950s, the television industry had become serious competition for the movie industry. The 1960s saw a number of broad, star-packed comedies. In the 1970s, black comedies were popular, leading figures in the 1970s were Woody Allen and Mel Brooks. One of the developments of the 1990s was the re-emergence of the romantic comedy film. Another development was the use of gross-out humour. Comic films began to appear in significant numbers during the era of silent films, the visual humour of many of these silent films relied on slapstick and burlesque. In American film, the most prominent comic actors of the silent era were Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, a popular trend during the 1920s and afterward was comedy in the form of animated cartoons. Several popular characters of the received the cartoon treatment. Among these were Felix the Cat, Mickey Mouse, Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, toward the end of the 1920s, the introduction of sound into movies made possible dramatic new film styles and the use of verbal humour. During the 1930s, the silent film comedy was replaced by dialogue from film comedians such as the W. C. The comedian Charlie Chaplin was one of the last silent film hold-outs, screwball comedies, such as produced by Frank Capra, exhibited a pleasing, idealized climate that portrayed reassuring social values and a certain optimism about everyday life. Movies still included slapstick humour and other comedy, but these were now frequently supplemental to the verbal interaction. Another common comic production from the 1930s was the short subject, hal Roach Studio specialized in this form. While Columbia was prolific, producing 190 Three Stooges releases, alone and these non-feature productions only went into decline in the 1950s when they were migrated to the television. With the entry of the United States into World War II, comedies portrayed military themes such as service, civil defense, boot-camp and shore-leave. The war-time restrictions on travel made this a time for Hollywood
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