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French Impressionist Cinema: Film Culture, Film Theory, and Film Style (December 1974)

Page scan 000106 from French Impressionist Cinema: Film Culture, Film Theory, and Film Style

Record Details:

Title:
French Impressionist Cinema: Film Culture, Film Theory, and Film Style
Date:
December 1974
Publisher:
University of Iowa
Volume:
French Impressionist Cinema: Film Culture, Film Theory, and Film Style (Dissertation, 1974)
Leaf #:
000106
Language:
English
Collection:
Global Cinema
Format:
dissertations
Contributor:
Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
Doctoral dissertation entitled, "French Impressionist Cinema: Film Culture, Film Theory, and Film Style," by film scholar David Bordwell. Submitted to the University of Iowa in 1974. Document is scanned from the David Bordwell and Kristin Thompson papers, archived at the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research.
Date Added:
May 23, 2024
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93 Nevertheless, a set of broad theoretical assumptions pervade the movement's journal essays and public lectures. This chapter will systematize and analyze Impressionist theoretical assumptions in an effort to reveal the underlying position. Rather than treat each major writer in an atomistic fashion, I shall outline the fundamental tenets of the theory by drawing on various writers; this will permit a clearer view of the shared position of the members of the movement. Finally, it should be noted that Impressionist film theory frequently oscillates between descriptive and normative assumptions; as we would expect in an avant-garde movement, the theory holds not only that film's nature is of a certain kind but also that given films should be a certain way. Like some other aesthetic theories, Impressionism slides from assuming that it is describing conditions which obtain for all art to assuming that it is setting standards which apply to good art. I shall note such shifts’ from a descriptive to an evaluative attitude where the shifts are important for understanding the theory's scope. There are four principal propositions upon which Impressionist theory rests, dealing with the definition Sates, (opis relation of film to traditional arts, the nature of the film image, and the nature of filmic construction. I shall discuss these in