Cinema and Spectatorship

One of the most significant areas of concern in contemporary film studies is spectatorship, a recently developed but now central and extremely controversial issue. Analysis of spectatorship involves examination of the ways in which filmmakers, by the institutions of the cinema and of the culture in which it exists, and by viewers themselves. In Cinema and Spectatorship Judith Mayne examines and assesses the major theories of spectatorship as they have developed over the last fifteen years, to explore how the analysis of a genuine dialogue between theory and history can lead to an understanding of the complex ways in which the cinema engages its viewers – as a way of putting theory to the test of history’. In the book’s first section Mayne examines three theoretical models of spectatorship, the perceptual, the institutional and the historical. The second section focuses on case studies which crystallize many of the issues already discussed, concentrating on textual analysis, the disrupting genre’, star gazing’ and finally the audience itself. The films she includes in her discussion include Hitchcock’s Rear Window , Maya Deren’s Meshes of the Afternoon, Coma, Alien , and Aliens .
Her book provides a thorough and accessible overview of this complex, often fragmented and controversial area of film theory.