Big-budget, spectacular films designed to appeal to mass audience: is this what- or all- blockbusters are? Movie Blockbusters brings together leading film scholars to consider this most high-profile and culturally significant genre. Drawing on a range of critical perspectives, the book traces how and why the "event movie" has played such a large role in the popular imagination, tracing a path from the spectacles of the silent era to the effects-laden mega-hits of the digital age.

The contributors explain what the rise of the blockbuster says about the Hollywood film industry, address the work of notable blockbuster auteurs such as Steven Spielberg and James Cameron, discuss key movies such as Jaws, The Jazz Singer, The Ten Commandments, Terminator 2 and Titanic, and consider the various contexts in which blockbusters are produced, distributed, marketed and consumed. In addition, the book considers the movie scene outside Hollywood, discussing blockbusters made in Bollywood, China, South Korea, New Zealand and Argentina.