drama film

History and evolution

In the cataloging guides consulted, “drama” functions as a general category that overlaps with more specific labels. Genre boundaries can overlap, so a film may carry several classifications.

Conventions and techniques

• Conflict and the characters’ decisions drive the narrative; the problem may be intimate, familial, or social.
• The labels psychological and social specify, respectively, a focus on inner experience or on collective relationships and conditions.
• A legal drama requires the justice system to play a central role in the narrative.
• Melodrama is distinguished by heightened emotional expression and highly dramatic situations.

Boundaries and overlaps

“Coming-of-age” and teen cinema primarily identify a stage of life; biographical cinema, its connection to the life of a real person; and independent cinema, a production category rather than a type of dramatic conflict. The comedy-drama combines serious and comic elements. These labels can coexist with drama; they are not synonyms or always mutually exclusive categories.