DPHU1005 Chap.8 Genre and the Genre Film
Genre and the Genre Film
A genre is a group of films that share conventions of setting, iconography, character, plot and theme, and that create expectations which each new film satisfies, delays or overturns.
The Week 8 lecture introduces genre, and the Week 9 tutorial applies it with two readings: Thomas Schatz's essay on film genre and the genre film, which treats genres as a system a culture uses to rehearse its conflicts and distinguishes genres of order from genres of integration, and Leighton Grist's essay on Unforgiven from a collection on the western.
The Week 8 screening is Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven (1992), a western that keeps the genre's iconography, the frontier town, the bounty, the final gunfight, while stripping away its glamour and questioning its myths.
That makes it a revisionist western: a genre film about the stories the genre tells. This chapter shows how to describe conventions and their functions, how to analyse a film that revises them, and how to avoid the common traps of listing conventions or treating revision as simple rejection. The third short answer falls in the Week 9 tutorial.
What this chapter covers
- 01
Genre as a set of conventions and audience expectations
- 02
Iconography: the objects and images that signal a genre
- 03
Schatz: genres of order and genres of integration
- 04
Conventions of the classic western
- 05
Unforgiven as a revisionist western
- 06
Violence, legend and the writer who embellishes events
- 07
Traps: listing conventions, treating revision as rejection
- 08
Preparing Short Answer 3 in the Week 9 tutorial
Worked example · free
Analysing a genre convention and its revision
- +1Name the convention: the skilled gunfighter hero with a code of honour.
- +1State the expectation it creates: violence that is swift, clean and justified.
- +1Show the revision: an ageing former killer who struggles even to mount his horse.
- +1Show its consequence: killing is slow and painful and damages those who do it.
- +1Conclude: the film uses the genre's form to question the myth it once celebrated.
Key terms
- Convention
- A familiar element that recurs across films of the same type, such as a stock character or plot situation.
- Iconography
- The recurring objects, settings and images that identify a genre at a glance, such as the revolver and saloon in a western.
- Genre of order
- Schatz's term for genres in which an individual hero confronts violence in a contested space, such as the western.
- Genre of integration
- Schatz's term for genres that bring a couple or community together in a settled space, such as the musical.
- Revisionist western
- A western that questions or reverses the genre's traditional myths while keeping its familiar form.
Genre and the Genre Film FAQ
What makes a film part of a genre?
Shared conventions: recognisable settings, iconography, character types, plot patterns and themes that audiences learn to expect. Genres work like an agreement between filmmakers and viewers, and each new film plays with that agreement by fulfilling, delaying or overturning expectations.
What are genres of order and genres of integration?
In Thomas Schatz's reading, genres of order such as the western and the gangster film follow an individual hero dealing with violence in a contested space. Genres of integration such as the musical bring a couple or community together in a settled space.
Why is Unforgiven called a revisionist western?
It keeps the western's form, including the bounty, the frontier town and the final gunfight, but shows violence as clumsy and morally damaging and exposes how legends are embellished. It questions the myths of the genre while still depending on them for its effect.
How should I answer a genre short answer?
Define genre and the relevant concept briefly, then work through one or two scenes. For each convention, state what the audience expects, show what the film does with it and explain why that matters. Use Schatz for theory and Grist for the reading of Unforgiven.
Do genres change over time?
Yes. Critics describe genres developing from early, experimental forms through a classic phase to more self-conscious and revisionist versions that comment on their own conventions. Unforgiven belongs to that late stage, which is why it can both deliver a western and question the myths the western has told.
Assessment move
Make a three-column table for the western: convention, classic version, Unforgiven's version. Fill it after the screening and use it to plan Short Answer 3. Practise Schatz's two categories on films you already know, and write one paragraph that moves from expectation to revision to meaning in under ten minutes.
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