Dr Leon Hunt
Senior Lecturer - Arts and Humanities
Gaskell Building 160
- Email: leon.hunt@brunel.ac.uk
- Tel: +44 (0)1895 266586
- Film & Television
- Theatre, Music and Film/TV
- Arts and Humanities
- College of Business, Arts and Social Sciences
Summary
Leon is a Senior Lecturer in Film and TV Studies. His teaching and research interests include Hong Kong cinema, popular East Asian cinema, Cult Film and TV, Horror, TV Comedy and British Film and Television. He has published widely in these areas. British Low Culture: From Safari Suits to Sexploitation (Routledge 1998) explores some of the ‘forgotten’ areas of British popular culture (sexploitation films, youth cult novels, ‘low’ comedy), offers an alternative cultural history of the 1970s and engages with issues of taste and popularity.Kung Fu Cult Masters: From Bruce Lee to Crouching Tiger (Wallflower Press 2003) was the first English-language book-length academic study of Chinese martial arts cinema and its impact on global media, including the transnational stardom of Bruce Lee and Jet Li, the migration of Hong Kong film-making talent and aesthetics to Hollywood and the remediation of martial arts cinema through videogames and modern special effects technologies. The book was translated into Chinese and reprinted by Peking University Press in 2011. East Asian Cinemas: Exploring Transnational Connections on Film (co-edited with Leung Wing Fai, I.B. Tauris 2008) looks at the global impact of popular East Asian cinemas, and my own essay in the collection examines the way western filmmakers like Quentin Tarantino and Luc Besson have absorbed influences from Asian action genres.
The League of Gentlemen (BFI/Palgrave 2008) is a monograph in the BFI’s ‘TV Classics’ series. My current book Cult British TV Comedy (Manchester University Press, forthcoming 2013) expands my research into the cult/post-alternative TV comedy of the last twenty years and includes case studies of Vic Reeves and sitcom writer Graham Linehan as well as exploring ‘dark’ and ‘cringe’ comedy and looking at issues of taste and offence. Leon is also currently co-editing (with Sharon Lockyer and Milly Williamson) Screening the Undead: Vampires and Zombies in Film and Television (I.B. Tauris forthcoming 2013.)
Newest selected publications
Hunt, L. (2022) 'Mario Bava The Artisan as Italian Horror Auteur'. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISSN 10: 1501356526 ISSN 13: 9781501356520
Hunt, LR. (2018) 'Danger: Diabolik'. New York: Columbia University Press. ISSN 10: 0231182813 ISSN 13: 9780231182812
Hunt, LR. (2017) 'Una diva non come le altre: Le streghe (The Witches) and the paradoxical stardom of Silvana Mangano', in Yu, S. and Austin, G. (eds.) Revisiting Star Studies: Cultures, Themes and Methods. Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press. pp. 240 - 258. ISBN 10: 1474404316. ISBN 13: 9781474404327.
Hunt, LR. (2016) 'Kings of Terror, Geniuses of Crime: giallo cinema and fumetti neri', in Baschiera, S. and Hunter, R. (eds.) Italian Horror Cinema. Edinburgh : Edinburgh University Press. pp. 145 - 159. ISBN 10: 1474419682. ISBN 13: 978-0748693528.
Hunt, LR. (2014) 'Enter the 2-disc Platinum Edition: Bruce Lee and Post-DVD Textuality'. JOMEC Journal, 0 (5). pp. 1 - 12. ISSN: 2049-2340 Open Access Link