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

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 #:
000219
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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206 twice the length of the others. Furthermore, if one notes the general content of the shots and marks each visual motif as one would mark a musical motif (noting variants of each motif with a '' or '! marking), the pattern of the sequence becomes even clearer. Set 3 is a i itaemancicat of set 2, in a quicker tempo. Then each successive threeShot set begins with some variant of the Same basic motifs A and C (i.e., the guitar and the waves) but ends with the motif that dominated the previous lengthy single shot. Thus set 5 ends with the motif that dominated set 4 (shot 12); set 7 ends with the motif that dominated set 6 (shot 16); set 9 ends with the motif present in set 8 (shot 20); and set 11 ends with the motif present: in set: 10 (shot 24). The final shot 28, containing a completely new motif and lasting fully twice as long as any other shot in the sequence, brings the whole sequence to a calm close. The consequence of such highly organized editing is a quasi-"musical" Sequence, with a pattern of introduction, repeat, and "variations" built upon the rhythmic form provided by varying the lengths of the shots. Such complex rhythmic organization of shots is nowhere apparent in any non-Impressionist narrative films examined, although abstract films like Ballet Mécanique and Themes et Variations make frequent use of similar rhythmic editing.