Genre on the Road: The Road Movie as Automobilities Research

Archer

Abstract

This article argues for the use of film studies in the study of mobilities, with a specific focus on the analysis of genre, and the particularly fictional character of genre film. The article focuses on genre’s emerging and shifting forms across temporal, geographical and gendered circumstances of production, identifying that the road movie establishes an imaginary relationship with actual contexts; one that is, in itself, highly suggestive as a means of representation. As I go on to discuss, with reference to specific film examples, this imaginary dimension to the fictional road film, and the nature of genre film as a mode of performance, enable it to envision or project subjective or repressed contexts of automotive mobility; contexts that are in this instance less accessible to more objective modes of observation and recording.

Citation

Archer. (2017). Genre on the Road: The Road Movie as Automobilities Research. Mobilities, 509-519. https://doi.org/10.1080/17450101.2017.1330988

• Acceptance Date: Apr 24, 2017
• Publication Date: Jun 5, 2017
• Journal: Mobilities
• Print ISSN: 1745-0101
• Publisher: Routledge
• Pages: 509-519
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17450101.2017.1330988
• Keywords: automobility, genre, road movie, technology, sociology, performance
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17450101.2017.1330988