This book focuses specifically on the contribution made by American female filmmakers to popular genre film. It asks: what do women who are engaged creatively with film industries do with genre and what does genre do with them? Through analysis of the films themselves, their reception and the industrial and cultural contexts in which these films were released, the book challenges traditional concepts of film authorship and male/female genre divisions, as well as re-evaluating certain genres as a space worthy of feminist criticism, such as horror cinema, the Western, war film and romantic comedy. It argues that women work within the genericity of audiovisual storytelling not only to "undo" or "subvert" popular formats, but also to draw creatively on their generative force.