Auteurism

Question 1

auteurist mode of analysis

Answer 1

understanding a film by way of its relationship (stylistically, narratively, and thematically) to other films by the same director

Question 2

concept of auteurism

Answer 2

tied to and enabled by european art cinema
•Bears the visible traces of its own creator
•Art refuse to be subordinated to narrative
•Self reflexive
•Announces its status as art that has been created

Question 3

influence of auteurism

Answer 3

informs the way we think about film history and film culture
•Reviews often make reference to directors
•How they can be understood compared + contrasted to previous work

Question 4

influence of auteurism

Answer 4

• Academic studies
• Director collected of box set of movies: criterion collection
• Tiff feature series organized around a director
• Common place to refer to director

Question 5

Assumptions

Answer 5

•director chief creative talent behind any film + thus understood as author

Question 6

Auteur theory

Answer 6

certain directors are able to present view of world so consistently that they qualify for special status, that of the auteur

Question 7

Oeuvre

Answer 7

body of work
•needs to be substantial enough + high enough quality to be distinguished
•Oeuvre needs to be consistent + distinguishable enough that others recognize it

Question 8

Historical Development of Auteurism

Answer 8

François Truffaut - A Certain Tendency of French Cinema - Cahiers du Cinéma
Attacked Tradition of Quality for being more literary than cinematic + introduced notion of a cinema of auteurs wherein the director was more important creatively than the screenwriter

Question 9

Cahiers du Cinéma

Answer 9

became known for auteurist approach to film criticism, which led it to value certain directors (Robert Bresson and Federico Fellini, Howard Hawks and Alfred Hitchcock) over others

Question 10

Auteurism spread

Answer 10

spread to North America in the mid-1960s through the writings of Andrew Sarris
•Andrew sarris’ hierarchial taxonomy from most important directors

Question 11

Historical Development of Auteurism

Answer 11

• French saw isolated cases of genius that slipped through
• Realized more hollywood directors with distinct vision
• Author in some way impose their own personalities + concerns despite the interference of hollywood system

Question 12

Historical Development of Auteurism

Answer 12

• “Auteur analysis of the 1950s + 60s consisted of applying art cinema reading strategies to classical hollywood cinema” David Bordwell
• cahier critics believed hollywood films should be more celebrated

Question 13

André Bazin - Cahiers du Cinéma - Critiques auteurism

Answer 13

-rejecting films not directed by auteurs: Film not directed by auteur considered unimportant
-attitude of “artistic infallibility” : Once considered auteur, impossible that they make a bad movie, automatically good
•Rigid hierarchy in terms of film culture

Question 14

André Bazin - Cahiers du Cinéma - Critiques auteurism

Answer 14

• establishing a priori assumptions concerning evolution of talent: Assumed that good auteur can only get better with age
• devaluing a film’s subject : Devalues a film’s subject
• valorizing a director for having a worldview that gains expression consistently: Doesn’t interrogate the worldview

Question 15

André Bazin - Cahiers du Cinéma - Critiques auteurism

Answer 15

-failing to consider history, society + technology: Buys into the idea that the auteur exists independently of the context that they are necessarily enmeshed
•Expressing that particular genius, can’t be tainted by anything larger than itself

Question 16

The Auteur Theory - Peter Wollen

Answer 16

reformulated auteurism by emphasizing the textual author over the flesh and blood one, and unconscious effects over conscious intentions

Question 17

The Auteur Theory - Peter Wollen

Answer 17

• Shifts emphasis to textual author + unconscious effects
• Auteur should be understood that something the critic creates through analysis: acts of decipherment + decryption
• Should analyze Hawks by the essence of his person
• Trace the deep structure within the body of work

Question 18

flesh + blood vs. textual

Answer 18

• Howard hawks (flesh + blood) - creates a bunch of movies – produces “Howard Hawks” (textual author + cultural conduit)
• Howard hawks deep structure created by the analysis of his work
• Set of stylistic, thematic, narrative predilections that make up his works

Question 19

flesh + blood vs. textual

Answer 19

• Fears, preoccupations, desires, values that gain expression through his films perhaps unconsciously
• A figure defined by much of what he brings to his work consciously + unconsciously

Question 20

Cultural conduit

Answer 20

individual whom his cultural context and historical moment flows through
-not necessarily intention

Question 21

The Auteur Theory - Peter Wollen

Answer 21

informs much contemporary work on the subject
•Giving expression to much wider social phenomenon
•work speaks to a larger social context + historical moment

Question 22

Textual auteur

Answer 22

•Not someone who can transcend, rather shaped by those things they are enmeshed
•Textual auteur is emphasized in cinema studies
•How they are associated with recurring style, narrative + themes
•Shift from intentions to unconscious effects
-possibility of multiple meanings