Moving Pictures

Following on from the author’s previous books treating aspects of the cinematic experience, this text reflects on what he has learned about that major innovation in the cultural life of humankind, and suggests to readers and scholars what ideas and concepts they might find useful in their own future studies.

As this book argues, the most illuminating perspective for studying the movies is ‘play’, the notion that moving pictures were a major ludenic innovation in the world’s cultural life and became a definite source of human knowledge and discourse. In that way, movies became an important medium of not only popular entertainment, but also popular enlightenment.

The perspective and conceptual framework developed in this work will be suggestive to future inquirers interested in understanding the power and persistence of popular movies, helping them towards further insight into this major cultural phenomenon. By using moving pictures to amend the ancient art and craft of storytelling, the future of the medium may persist in the future, if in altered and new modes of popular presentation.