Film and Literary Genres

I was literally petrified

FILMS Watched the Titans movie. It's a classical mash-up. A bit 'tell Perseus that Helen's cyclops is riding a Minotaur in a trireme.' (Dan Snow)

The "for people who hate forrin muck films" breed of lazy remake. (@woodo79)

amazing dreck from beyond the galaxy (Dan Auty in the late 70s when rep cinemas screened old scifi and you could even see it on telly sometimes. He is now Den of Geek, and his brother Chris is a well-known film producer.)

The decade was finally starting to show the growth of the post-war economy and shine, so were the movies, even the noirs, and it was the beginning of the end for the genre. The look was not the only thing that started to "lighten up", the characters were becoming less cynical, more perky, and frankly more boring. This can be exemplified by the room-mates here that are so spunky and aloof that they seem to glide and float through this mystery/thriller. Low-brow blues and jazz was replaced with the nonthreatening pop softness of Nat King Cole. (Anonymous imdb commenter on Blue Gardenia nails it again.)

pig opera: dramas starring cute pigs (Babe, Private Function, Betty Blue Eyes)
doll horror
desert road trip (popular in 70s)
French-window froth (imdb)

mama drama
wire-fu
berserk pensioner (Marigold Hotel and spin-offs)

four-quadrant tent-pole movie (Dan Auty – whatever that means!)

inspiration porn (Amy Dentata – films about cute maths genii)
found footage (Bit like a “found diary” book.)
low-tech Steampunk Victoriana (Greg Jenner on Dr Who)

Upmarket romance – girl gets the guy, but, boy, does it take time. (@JonnyGeller)


LITERARY
creative writing class prose: present continuous, banal detail and no authorial spin. Do they teach you to write badly? Do you have to appeal to the senses? (Per writer Elif Batuman – they stick religiously to Strunk and White and tell you to be concrete and kill your darlings.)

ghostwriter’s prose: It was a lovely hotel… suddenly a man in a Stetson hat appeared… On top of page after page of this mind-numbingly boring and irrelevant filler, the paint-by-numbers ghostwriter's prose is also dull and grating – "correct" in construction but utterly devoid of any creativity, style or interest. (Amazon review of The Best of Friends. Ghost writers also tend to say “he was my rock” and “his smile lit up the room”.)

More here, and links to the rest.