Twenty-First-Century Hollywood: Rebooting the System, by Neil Archer

Abstract

Hollywood has always been a loaded term, one with multiple meanings including a studio system, a standardised form, a global industry, and arguably a national cinema. It connotes film stars and directors, genres, and questions of equity and representation. It is an easy and popular scapegoat for many of the issues facing contemporary culture. Though demonstrably the most prevalent (and therefore widely accessible) cinema in most parts of the globe, critically approaching Hollywood cinema is an increasingly difficult endeavour for myriad reasons, chief of which is its vastness. Programming at American multiplexes continues to be dominated by mid-to-high-budget Hollywood films, meaning that audiences seeking international or independent works must often turn elsewhere.