"Scott Higgins offers an incisive and compelling analysis of the Hollywood sound serial as a distinct film genre
the form, story world, and style of which has much to tell us about enduring elements of popular American cinema."
Charles Wolfe
University of California, Santa Barbara
"Matinee Melodrama demonstrates the value of mining even the most prosaic of cinematic ... Read moreforms, and how it Is laregely obscured tracks still guide and propel mass entertainment."
Film Quarterly
"Matinee Melodrama will transform the study of Hollywood serials. Illustrated by frame stills, and drawing on industrial research, formalist analysis, and game theory, it will soon become a classic."
Steve Neale
Exeter University, England
“Higgins won me over with his clarity of writing, his high principles of research and observation, and his humor. He understands the through-line from serials to Star Wars, Raiders, and other action-adventure films that followed.”
Leonard Maltin "Matinee Melodrama manages a mean feat: making a mostly forgotten, formulaic format seem new and exciting, shining an informative, fascinating light from film history onto today’s television, comics, and videogames."
Jason Mittell
author of Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling
"Matinee Melodrama demonstrates the value of mining even the most prosaic of cinematic forms, and how it Is laregely obscured tracks still guide and propel mass entertainment."
Film Quarterly
“Higgins won me over with his clarity of writing, his high principles of research and observation, and his humor. He understands the through-line from serials to Star Wars, Raiders, and other action-adventure films that followed.”
Leonard Maltin "Matinee Melodrama manages a mean feat: making a mostly forgotten, formulaic format seem new and exciting, shining an informative, fascinating light from film history onto today’s television, comics, and videogames."
Jason Mittell
author of Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling
"Scott Higgins offers an incisive and compelling analysis of the Hollywood sound serial as a distinct film genre
the form, story world, and style of which has much to tell us about enduring elements of popular American cinema."
Charles Wolfe
University of California, Santa Barbara
"Matinee Melodrama will transform the study of Hollywood serials. Illustrated by frame stills, and drawing on industrial research, formalist analysis, and game theory, it will soon become a classic."
Steve Neale
Exeter University, England
"As someone who screens Zorro's Fighting Legion for his students every year, I derived particular enjoyment from Higgins' canny analysis of the ingredients that make up every chapter, and how the storytellers cleverly stretch and compress time. I hope this valuable book inspires other film teachers to explore the wonders of the sound serial."
leonardmaltin.com
Show Less