Drama (film and television)

In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super-genre, macro-genre, or micro-genre, such as soap opera, police crime drama, political drama, legal drama, historical drama, domestic drama, teen drama, and comedy drama (dramedy). These terms tend to indicate a particular setting or subject matter, or they combine a drama's otherwise serious tone with elements that encourage a broader range of moods. To these ends, a primary element in a drama is the occurrence of conflict—emotional, social, or otherwise—and its resolution in the course of the storyline.

All forms of cinema or television that involve fictional stories are forms of drama in the broader sense if their storytelling is achieved by means of actors who represent (mimesis) characters. In this broader sense, drama is a mode distinct from novels, short stories, and narrative poetry or songs. In the modern era, before the birth of cinema or television, "drama" within theatre was a type of play that was neither a comedy nor a tragedy. It is this narrower sense that the film and television industries, along with film studies, adopted. "Radio drama" has been used in both senses—originally transmitted in a live performance, it has also been used to describe the more high-brow and serious end of the dramatic output of radio.

The Screenwriters Taxonomy contends that film genres are fundamentally based upon a film's atmosphere, character and story, and therefore the labels "drama" and "comedy" are too broad to be considered a genre. Instead, the taxonomy contends that film dramas are a "Type" of film; listing at least ten different sub-types of film and television drama.

Docudramas are dramatized adaptations of real-life events. While not always completely accurate, the general facts are more-or-less true. The difference between a docudrama and a documentary is that in a documentary it uses real people to describe history or current events; in a docudrama it uses professionally trained actors to play the roles in the current event, that is "dramatized" a bit. Examples: Black Mass (2015) and Zodiac (2007).

Unlike docudramas, docu-fictional films combine documentary and fiction, where actual footage or real events are intermingled with recreated scenes. Examples: Interior. Leather Bar (2013) and Your Name Here (2015).

Many otherwise serious productions have humorous scenes and characters intended to provide comic relief. A comedy drama has humor as a more central component of the story, along with serious content. Examples include Three Colours: White (1994), The Truman Show (1998), The Man Without a Past (2002), The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2011), and Silver Linings Playbook (2012).

Coined by film professor Ken Dancyger, these stories exaggerate characters and situations to the point of becoming fable, legend or fairy tale. Examples: Fantastic Mr. Fox (2009) and Maleficent (2014).

Light dramas are light-hearted stories that are, nevertheless, serious in nature. Examples: The Help (2011) and The Terminal (2004).