This book sheds new light on the cinema and modernity debate by confronting established theories on the role of the modern cinematic experience with new empirical work on the history of the social experience of cinema-going, film audiences and film exhibition.

The book provides a wide range of research methodologies and perspectives on these matters, including:

• the use of oral history methods
• questionnaires
• diaries
• audience letters
• as well as industrial, sociological and other accounts on historical film audiences.
...

• Includes contributions from Robert Allen, Annette Kuhn, John Sedwick, Mark Jancovich, Peter Sanfield, and Kathryn Fuller-Seeley among others
• Develops the original argument that the social history of cinema-going and of the experience of cinema...

This volume is part of the recent interest in the study of religion and popular media culture (cinema in particular), but it strongly differs from most of this work in this maturing discipline. Contrary to most other edited volumes and monographs on film and religion, Moralizing Cinema will not focus upon films (cf. the representation of biblical figures, religious themes in films, the fidelity question in movies), but rather look beyond the film text, content or aesthetics, by concentrating on the cinema-related actions, strategies and policies developed by the Catholic Church and...

The Routledge Companion to New Cinema History is conceived as a showcase of, as well as a reflection upon, recently emerging trends in investigating the history of cinema as a significant social and cultural institution. In its assessment of the wider historical conditions of the cinematic experience, the Companion argues that, alongside the study of film production, distribution and exhibition, a more serious understanding and specific research on film exhibition and reception are required. It brings together newly written essays by leading scholars from around...