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Philosophy goes to the Movies

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Christopher Falzon's Philosophy Goes to the Movies, is, at it is billed, an introduction to philosophy, not philosophy of cinema or film theory.
Falzon's text is an excellent primer on basic philosphical issues in the
Western philosophical tradition. Various, mostly fairly recent films, pre-2005, are utilized for examples of points touched on in the philosophical commentary. I especially like Falzon's chapter on social and political philosophy, developing from a discussion of Marxist theory to a concise and accessible discussion of the ideas of Michel Foucault. Falzon demonstrates the Marxist context for much of Foucault's thought, and how Foucault goes beyond Marx in his analysis of regimes of power. This is a good primer, I would use it in a class in which I wanted to inroduce to undergraduates the relevance of philosophical thought to media and the arts. It may disappoint those looking for cinema studies, with a focus on some aspect of film, as the movie sequences referred to are primarily examples & illustrations.