Metacinema

Metacinema is a term in film studies that designates cinema that foregrounds its own status as cinema. It refers to works in which the making, structure, and consumption of films become explicit subjects within the narrative. Characteristics include self-reflexivity, where characters or narrators acknowledge audience or cinematic conventions; depiction of film production or industry; meta-commentary on genre and storytelling; and the blurring of fiction and reality through devices such as direct address, film-within-a-film structures, or scenes about editing, projection, or censorship.

Historically, the concept matured with art cinema and postmodern filmmaking. Fellini's 8½ (1963) is frequently cited as a foundational metacinema film, combining a director's creative crisis with dream sequences and critiques of cinema itself. Since then, films such as The Truman Show (1998), The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), Adaptation. (2002), Synecdoche, New York (2008), and Birdman (2014) have been described as metacinematic or self-reflexive, though scholars sometimes reserve metacinema for works that explicitly examine the filmmaking process rather than merely using self-conscious narration.

Some scholars distinguish metacinema from broader reflexive or metafictional cinema, while others view it as a subset of reflexivity. The term is used variably across languages and theoretical traditions, but generally conveys an interest in cinema's status as representation and its relationship to reality and spectatorship.