Foreword

This collection of new essays on watching films engages in a conversation with a new research direction in cinema studies, one that focuses less on the form and content of films and instead explores their circulation and consumption, and that considers the cinema as a site of social and cultural exchange. Borrowing concerns about both distribution and reception from work in other areas of media studies, this trend is underpinned by a strengthening recognition that if we intend to address the social and cultural significance of cinema, we must find ways to write about its audiences, not as imaginary spectators...