What Have I Learnt About Genre?

Throughout my learning I have learnt that genre is a way of categorising films, books, music etc. Audiences recognise genre in films through different conventions such as:
- Visual Imagery
- The Plot
- Character
- Setting
- Music and stars
- Modes of narrative development
-Iconography

Audiences also play a huge part in deciding what genres film makers should create a film about because they are partly open systems which should stay the same to give the audience a sense of familiarity. However must include some form of variation to keep the audience interested. This is where the genre cycle fits in, and it works by adapting films to attract and keep audiences entertained overtime. People like to know what type of film they are going to see as they find a sense of comfort in it and find familiar genres appealing. On the other hand it could be argued that genres are simply just rigid and unchanging stereotypes. I, however have learnt that genre is never static and is continually evolving and overlapping. Hyrbrid genre is an example of how genre has evolved because it allows film producers to mix more than one genre together such as romance and comedy, better known as rom-coms. This allows film producers to adapt genre to create a never-ending list of new genres to keep audiences entertained, due to the fact most genres individually have a limited shelf-life. I also believe that hybrid-genre allows film produces to reach a wider audience attracting people they wouldn't normally, such as by mixing romance and horror to create a romantic horror. You are then reaching out to two different audiences that might both now be interested in seeing your film.

Although films vary individually when you look at them as a whole you will find they tend to all have a similar narrative and structure. Therefore some people argue genre isn't that important and could infact be non-existent completely. From my learning I disagree with this statement, although it is a very strong argument, I believe genre is still surviving due to film producers continually reproducing new experiences for audiences and breaking down genre into sub-genre. For example Science-Fiction can be broken down into:
- Time Travel
- Aliens
- Space
These are all sub-genres because 'science-fiction' is so broad. 

Overall I have learnt that genre is important to the film industry because film making is so expensive, therefore it allows them to provide audiences with novelty as well as new experiences therefore limiting the risk aspect in making a film.