Quick recap : Movies are part of cinema and Genres are the Theme of cinema.

Genre :  Genre is a Theme, style and aesthetic of cinema.

I'll make it easy for you ; Action ,Drama, Horror, Comedy , Romance; These are Genres , To be Precise ,These are Primary Genres.

Primary Genres are permanent genres as they are sustained and survived since the beginning of cinema.

So that left us with a question, which Genre is (Almost)Dead now ?  

The Good and Old “Melo Drama”.

Melo drama is meant to convey the basic human emotions like sadness (Alas!) ,happiness(Hurrah!) by using the dialogues and excessive reactions which are often looks Stereotypic. 

EX: Imagine someone performing the Dev das movie as street drama.

Types Of Genres :  There 3 types of genres in general; 

Primary ,Sub and Mixed Genres.

Primary Genres: Like I said Earlier, these are the evergreen genres that are flourishing today.

Horror, Thriller ,Sci-fi , Neo Noir , Super hero , western, romance, Comedy, Musical, Animation, Manga etc.

Sub Genres:  A Genre which has a specific style included in it.

For example, the movie “Pink"(India) is a “Court room drama” or "Legal Drama". Here Drama is a primary genre and "Legal" is a style that a director chose to show that drama.

You can also Take Mockumentary (Mock documentary)as an example, where a Movie is shown in documentary style ;  Reminds me of excellent horror comedy of Taika Waititi called “What We Do In The Shadows”(2014).

More ex :  Sci-Fi Thriller, slapstick comedy, slasher Thriller, Psychological Horror, Historical drama, Asian Horror.

Comedy genre has many sub genres and often called as most Fluid Genre as it can be a both sub genre and Mixed genre.

Mixed Genre :  It is a Combination of two or more genres.

Ex: Rom-com(Romantic Comedy), Horror Comedy , Action Comedy, Thriller comedy , Horror Thriller..(Every category will be explained in coming blogs), Musical comedy, Action Drama , Drama Western etc.

Knowing these genres, allow us to choose the movies wisely and helps us to create much refined list of movies.

Genres are often used to attract the target audience and fans and that fills the banks of cinema.

But The Real Artistry in Film making industry lies not in honoring the genre tropes. 

The audience are getting too much cooler to thrill, too much prepared for a scare and too much clever to hold the suspense. Hence Just following the rules of genre and Falling into its tropes, gave audience a feel like watching mediocre film and that is the end of that film.

Genre is Both a Boon and Bane .

Several cinema greats like Hitchcock ,Kurosawa ,Sergio Leone, Spielberg , martin Scorsese; already made movies to define and strengthen the Genres like Thrillers, horrors, epic dramas ,westerns, Action, Sci -Fi, Neo noir and gangster movies.

Now What's left for the New Age of cinema is to create new genres by blending and bending them .

Therefore Thousands of new age dramas and horrors are following either the genre blending or genre bending techniques to retain their glory and audience.

“ I Love Genre, But I hate it at the same time. I Have The Urge to make Audiences Thrill with the excitement of a Genre. But I also try to betray and destroy the expectations placed on that genre.”  - Bong Joon ho (Academy Award winner for the movie Parasite(2019) )

I will provide a list of cinema legends and great directors from new age and their movies from each genre, in next blog.. Thanks and peace..

To be continued…..