Going to the Movies

Shop girls and factory hands paying a nickel to watch silent Westerns in a variety bill at the Music Hall; the "sophisticated" clientele of New York's modernist art-house cinemas; the sold-out opening weekends at shopping-mall megaplexes; FilmAid screenings of Charlie Chaplin in refugee camps in Afghanistan... the ways in which American and global audiences have viewed movies are as rich and varied a part of cinematic history as anything shown on the silver screen.

Richard Maltby is professor of screen studies at Flinders University, South Australia and series editor for Exeter Studies in Film History. Melvyn Stokes teaches at University College, London. Robert C. Allen is professor of American studies, history, and communications at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.