Dr Mark McKenna's fourth book, Big Wednesday: Lamenting Lost Youth in the New Hollywood
We're delighted to share that Dr Mark McKenna has published his fourth book, ’Big Wednesday: Lamenting Lost Youth in the New Hollywood’ with Routledge. The monograph uses the divisive 1970s surf film Big Wednesday as a vehicle to interrogate some the founding principles of film, media and cultural studies, considering issues of discourse, authorship, genre, stardom and commerce and how they each impacted on the film’s reception and rehabilitation.
Described in peer review as an “impressively wide-ranging, carefully researched and engagingly written study of an oft neglected movie classic. In addition to an illuminating analysis of Big Wednesday and of the film’s making, marketing and reception, the book offers a compelling account of the importance and evolution of surf culture, and a wealth of new insights into the careers of its maverick writer-director, John Milius, and its three leading men. All this is presented with detailed references to key debates in Film Studies and to significant trends in Hollywood cinema since the 1960s.”
Dr McKenna has said that he was “keen to develop a book that engaged with the core aspects of the discipline, but that presented these ideas in an interesting and accessible way to student’s interested in understanding how debates in the discipline have developed and evolved over time”.
Following a successful book launch at Dr McKenna’s alma mater, the University of Sunderland, in November, he will be presenting his work at a range of conferences in the coming months and integrating these new findings into his undergraduate teaching at University of Staffordshire.
McKenna, Mark (2024) Big Wednesday: Lamenting Lost Youth in the New Hollywood, London: Routledge.