Political Thriller in Contemporary American Cinema

<p><i>The Political Thriller in Contemporary American Cinema </i>examines how political thriller films (de)construct and reflect the sociopolitical realities of the second half of the twentieth century as well as the first two decades of the twenty-first century.</p><p>The book highlights the convergence between the cinematic narrative its underlying political discourse and the audience’s perception of it. Through a critical lens it analyzes how contemporary films utilize characterization narrative and suspense to examine topics of governance malfeasance and power dynamics. By referring to films such as <i>The Manchurian Candidate</i> <i>Zero Dark Thirty</i> and <i>Snowden</i> this book traces the evolution of the political thriller questioning how its narratives mirror issues such as covert operations the erosion of democracy and governmental surveillance. In turn the conspiratorial and underlying paranoid nature of these films serves as a reflection of societal anxieties and a metaphorization of the levers of power in America’s modern-day democracy.</p><p>Consequently this book serves as a contribution to the growing body of research on political cinema and the way it simultaneously reflects and shapes political life through its role as a sociocultural phenomenon. In doing so it invites readers to further delve into the exploration of these films which represent complex commentaries on the structures of corporations media and the military that are predominant in contemporary American society and cinema.</p>