What is Genre?

I am doing some research on genre and how it has changed so i have a better understanding of the part genre plays in a film opening and so i understand it more thoroughly. I am also doing some research on the thriller genre so i have a better understanding of that and this will help me when analysing my 5 thrillers.

Genre
A genre is a set of codes and conventions that make it fit a certain label - this is then labelled as a certain genre. an example of this is if a film has a boy meets girl situation, a plot involving love, complications of love and romantic situations it will be labelled a romance. Other things can be part of these conventions such as sound, editing, mis-en-scene, that make a film fit a perticular genre. in recent years, regenrification has happened, and films tend be a mix of more than one genre ( this is called hybridisation), such as a romantic comedy or a sci fi horror. this often appeals to a wider range of people and means that films can still be new and interesting rather than sticking to a simple genre convention.

Some examples of genre:

-Comedy: White chicks, Meet the forckers, The house Bunny,
-Horror: Nightmare on elm street,
-Thriller: Batman the dark knight,
-Romantic Comedy: 50 First dates,
-Action: 2012, Twilight,
-Science Fiction: Starwars, Enter the matrix,
-Crime and Gangster: Diehard,
-Musical: Grease, Hairspray, High School Musical,
-War: Saving priavte ryan, Forrest Gump,
-Reality: Slumdog Millioanaire, Angus,thongs and Perfect snogging, Remeber me, Dear john,

When researching genre's it gave me a wide understanding of the type's of genre and sub genre's and what they mean, for example, Comedy :Comedies are light-hearted plots consistently and deliberately designed to amuse and provoke laughter (with one-liners, jokes, etc.) by exaggerating the situation, the language, action, relationships and characters. This section describes various forms of comedy through cinematic history, including slapstick, screwball, spoofs and parodies, romantic comedies, black comedy (dark satirical comedy), and more. There is alot more to genre than i thought and the sub genre headings made me realise this.