Film Studies- An Introduction

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by Warren Buckland


  Rohmer, Eric and Chabrol, Claude, Hitchcock: The First Forty-Four Films (New York: Ungar, 1979).

  The first book-length study of Alfred Hitchcock’s films, first published in French in 1957 by these two prominent writers for Cahiers du Cinéma.

  Rothman, William, Documentary Film Classics (Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 1997).

  This book contains a series of close, detailed readings of a select number of important and well-known documentaries: Nanook of the North (Robert Flaherty, 1922); Land Without Bread (Luis Buñuel, 1933); Night and Fog (Alain Resnais, 1955); Chronicle of a Summer (Rouch and Morin, 1961); A Happy Mother’s Day (Richard Leacock and Joyce Chopra, 1963); and Don’t Look Back (D A Pennebaker, 1967).

  Salt, Barry, Film Style and Technology: History and Analysis, Second Edition (London: Starword, 1992).

  The research carried out for this book is phenomenal and simply overwhelming. Salt has analysed literally thousands of films shot by shot from each decade of the cinema, noting the stylistic parameters of each shot and scene, and representing this information statistically (including bar charts of shot scales of individual films). The book is also packed with information on the history of film technology.

  Sarris, Andrew, The American Cinema: Directors and

  Directions: 1929–1968 (New York: Da Capo Press, 1996).

  Bibliography 213

  First published in 1968 and fortunately republished by Da Capo Press, this is the bible of auteur studies. The 11 categories in which Sarris places various directors (‘Less than meets the eye’, ‘Make way for the clowns!’) may be a little quirky, but the dictionary-length and mini essays on predominately American directors are invaluable.

  Sharff, Stefan, The Elements of Cinema: Toward a Theory of Cinesthetic Impact (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982).

  A concise and informative study of cinematic structure through the close analysis of several significant film scenes.

  Shivas, Mark, ‘Minnelli’s Method’, Movie, 1 (1962), pp. 17–18.

  Shivas examines how Vincente Minnelli’s films transcend their scripts via mise-en-scène.

  Taylor, Greg, Artists in the Audience: Cults, Camp, and American Film Criticism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999).

  This book nicely complements Haberski’s book (described

  above). Taylor offers a selective history of a number of post-Second World War North American film critics, especially Manny Farber and Parker Tyler, who creatively sanctioned popular movies as a contemporary art form. In Taylor’s

  words, ‘Beginning in the 1940s, key vanguard critics pioneered new models of film appreciation, providing a vision of critic as creative artist, as opposed to distanced judge: now even seemingly unexceptional movies could be matched to highbrow aesthetic norms’ (p. 7). These vanguard critics, Taylor argues, were not interested in presenting their reviews as a consumers’

  guide to the movies (reviews as advertising) but as a creative response to movies (film reviewing as writing).

  Thompson, Kristin, Storytelling in the New Hollywood: Understanding Classical Narrative Technique (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 1999).

  A detailed investigation into the narrative techniques used in contemporary Hollywood films. Thompson argues

  214

  that contemporary Hollywood films use similar narrative techniques found in the classical period of Hollywood (1920s to the 1950s) – techniques that continue to create clear, unified narratives. She then presents detailed analyses of ten contemporary Hollywood films, ranging between Alien, Back to the Future and The Hunt for Red October.

  Thompson, Kristin and Bordwell, David, Film History: An Introduction, Second Edition (Boston: McGraw-Hill, 2003).

  Thompson and Bordwell’s comprehensive history of world

  cinema.

  Truffaut, François, ‘A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema’

  in Bill Nichols (ed.), Movies and Methods (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976), pp. 224–37.

  Truffaut’s celebrated and controversial attack on the French

  ‘tradition of quality’ and his promotion of the film director as auteur.

  Truffaut, François, Hitchcock (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1967).

  The most famous book on Alfred Hitchcock, based on more

  than 50 hours of interviews between Truffaut and Hitchcock.

  Vincendeau, Ginette (ed.), Encyclopedia of European Cinema (London: Cassell, 1995).

  A comprehensive and informative reference book with a slight bias towards French cinema. The longer entries are particularly valuable.

  Walker, Michael, Hitchcock’s Motifs (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2005).

  The author painstakingly enumerates the major themes and motifs that recur in Alfred Hitchcock’s films.

  Wollen, Peter, Signs and Meaning in the Cinema, Second Edition (London: Secker and Warburg, 1972).

  This is a key book in the history of film studies. Wollen was the first author to present a sophisticated theoretical exposition in

  Bibliography 215

  English of Sergei Eisenstein, film semiology, plus a structuralist version of auteur criticism.

  Wood, Robin, Hitchcock’s Films (London: Zwemmer, 1965).

  Wood’s celebrated auteurist study of Hitchcock, revised and updated several times since its first publication in 1965.

  216

  Index

  A.I.: Artificial Intelligence 39

  Coalface 156, 158–61

  Aitken, ian 158, 160

  colour, use of 13

  Alice in the Cities 101, 105–6

  colour film developing 13

  Altman, Charles 2

  compositional motivation 188,

  American Cold War ideology 146–8

  195

  American culture, and Wenders

  condensed plot synopsis 183–4

  99–101

  confession and guilt, in Hitchcock

  analysis x-xi

  films 97

  approaches to cinema study 2–3

  confined space shooting 96–7

  Arnheim, Rudolf 22

  contextual criticism xiv

  artistic motivation 190

  continuity editing 14–16, 24

  associations 24

  Corner, John 161

  auteurism xiv, 22, 78–93, 111–12,

  Crash 191

  116, 120–1, 193

  critics’ role 180

  axis of action line 15

  Curtiz, michael 85

  The Battle of Algiers 192

  dahl, John 139–44

  Battleship Potemkin 24–5

  Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid 21

  Bazin, André 22–3

  deeley, michael 4

  Before Sunrise 13

  deep focus photography 8–14, 22

  The Big Sleep 43, 44–5

  description x

  Bigelow, Kathryn 107–11

  The Desire to Desire 134

  The Birds 16

  diegetic sound 20

  Blade Runner 4

  directional continuity 15–16

  Blonde Venus 126–30, 134

  director’s role 83

  Blue Velvet 38

  documentary types 154–76

  Bordwell, david 15, 162

  Double Indemnity 41

  A Bout de Souffle/Breathless 87–93

  douchet, Jean 94

  Bowling for Columbine 168

  editing

  Cahiers du Cinéma journal 80–5, 93

  continuity editing 14–16, 24

  camera angles 22

  Hitchcock 95

  Casablanca 85

  in Jurassic Park 19

  Caughie, John 91–2

  versus long take 17–18

  cause-effect logic 34–6, 37, 41,

  eisenstein, Sergei 7, 22, 23,

  109, 126

  24–5

  Cavell, Stanley 22, 12
5, 130

  The English Patient 184–8, 189

  censorship 126, 129, 130–1

  ethics in documentaries 165

  Citizen Kane 8–10, 12

  european Art Cinema 99, 104

  Index 217

  Event Horizon 193

  genre

  exposition 62, 72

  approaches 120–1

  expository documentary 156–61

  fallen woman films 126–30

  eyeline match 15–16

  films as myth 122–4

  hybrid genres 122

  fallen woman films 126–30

  melodrama 124–36

  fast motion 22

  paranoid woman’s films 134–6

  female directors 107–8

  German expressionism 95

  feminist films 110–11

  Gilda 64–5

  femme fatales 137, 138, 140, 145

  Godard, Jean-luc 87–93

  film advertising 181–2

  Gone With the Wind 6

  film aesthetics, theoretical analysis

  Grant, Barry Keith 123

  of 21–7

  Film Comment journal 167

  Handke, Peter 100

  film criticism 181–2

  High School 162–3

  film journalism 181–2

  Hitchcock, Alfred 17–18, 20–1, 26,

  film noir 41, 137–44, 189

  33–4, 40, 42, 43, 93–9

  see also neo-films noirs

  hybrid genres 122

  film review 180–97

  abbreviated arguments about

  image, and narrative 104

  film 183, 187

  interactive documentary 163–9

  background information 183, 186

  Interstellar 180, 181, 193–7

  components of 183–8

  intertextual motivation 189

  condensed plot synopsis 183–4

  Invasion of the Body Snatchers 146–8

  The English Patient 184–8, 189

  entertainment value 191–2

  Jacobson, Harlan 167–8

  evaluation 188–93

  Jane Eyre 135

  functions of 181–2

  Jaws 11

  Interstellar 193–7

  journalism of opinion 181

  motivation types 188–91

  journalism of taste 181

  redemption 192–3

  Joy Ride 144

  social value 192

  Jurassic Park 19

  film rhetoric 181–2

  film sound 20–1

  Kermode, mark 195–6

  Film-eye principle 171

  Khondji, darius 13

  Film-truth principle 171

  Kill Me Again 139–43

  flashbacks 41

  Kiss Me Deadly 144

  formalists 22, 26

  French New Wave 82, 84, 90–2

  Lady in the Lake 50

  French, Philip 168–9, 184–8, 189

  The Last Seduction 142–3

  leigh, mike 12

  gangster films 5–6

  Letter From an Unknown Woman 133

  Gaslight 135–6

  linklater, Richard 13

  218

  Little Caesar 5

  narrative, and image 104

  long takes 7–14, 22, 96–7

  narrative chronology 55–9

  Lost Highway 69, 122

  narrative stages 37–8

  The Lost World: Jurassic Park 12, 189

  narrative structure 32–41, 112

  The Loveless 108–10

  narrative techniques, Hitchcock

  lynch, david 38, 59, 69, 122

  97–9

  narrative turning points 37–8

  mcCarthy, todd 194–5

  neo-films noirs 139–44

  macGuffins 40

  New German Cinema 99, 100

  The Magnificent Ambersons 8–10

  Nichols, Bill 154–6

  Magnificent Obsession 52–5

  Nolan, Christopher 55

  mainwaring, daniel 147

  non-diegetic sound 21

  male bonding 102–4

  non-linear structure 55–8

  male melodramas 125

  North by Northwest 36–8, 47, 50–2,

  male-female relationships 102–4

  53

  The Maltese Falcon 17, 176

  Northern ireland in film 192

  Man with a Movie Camera 170–1

  Notorious 17–18

  match on action cut 15–16

  meaning through pattern 84

  observational documentary 161–3

  Meet Me in St Louis 6

  omniscient narration 41–74

  melodrama 124–36

  Only Yesterday 130–4

  Memento 55

  metteur-en-scène 79, 85

  paranoid woman’s film 134–6

  Mildred Pierce 41

  Paris, Texas 102–3

  minnelli, Vincente 82, 85–6

  perfect murder, in Hitchcock films

  mise-en-scène 4, 10, 78–9, 82–3, 96,

  97

  104, 137

  performative documentary 171–6

  mise-en-shot 4, 7–19, 78–9, 82–3,

  Perkins, Victor 83

  84, 96, 104, 137

  point-of-view cutting 15–16

  montage 22, 23–7, 95

  point-of-view shots 48, 50, 61, 95–6

  moore, michael 165–8

  Psycho 20–1, 26, 33–4, 39–40, 42, 94

  Movie magazine 84–6, 95

  The Public Enemy 5

  Mulholland Dr. 32, 40, 41, 59–74

  Pulp Fiction 32, 41, 55–9

  narration

  Quote Whores 181

  The Big Sleep 44–5

  Magnificent Obsession 52–5

  Ray, Nicholas 85

  Mulholland Dr. 59–74

  Realism 189

  North by Northwest 50–2

  realistic motivation 189

  omniscient 41–74

  realists 26

  Pulp Fiction 55–9

  Rear Window 94

  restricted 41–74

  Rebecca 135–6

  Taxi Driver 45–50

  Red Rock West 141–2

  Index 219

  reflexive documentary 169–71

  Them! 145

  repetition of events 60

  The Thin Blue Line 172–6

  restricted narration 41–74

  thompson, Kristin 162

  road movies, Wenders 101–2

  The Times of Harvey Milk 155

  Roger and Me 165–8

  todorov, tzvetan 37–8

  Rope 96

  truffaut, François 43, 80–4, 193

  Rounders 143

  The Two Mrs Carrolls 135, 136

  Salt, Barry 7–9, 18

  unknown woman melodrama

  Sarris, Andrew 86–7, 95

  130–4

  Schindler’s List 19

  Until the End of the World 101–2,

  science fiction (1950s) 144–8

  104

  Scott, Ridley 4

  script quality 81

  Vertov, dziga 92–3, 170–1

  Secrets and Lies 12

  Vincendeau, Ginette 80, 87

  set design 4–6

  mGm 6

  Welles, Orson 8–10

  Warner Bros. (1930s) 5–6

  Wenders, Wim 99–106

  Siegel, don 147

  When Worlds Collide 145

  significant form x, xiii

  Where No Vultures Fly 23

  slow motion 22

  Wings of Desire 103, 105

  Spielberg, Steven 11–12, 19, 39

  Wiseman, Frederick 162–3

  storyboards 19

  The Wizard of Oz 6

  suspense, in Hitchcock films 97

  Wood, Robin 95

  Written on the Wind 125

  Tarnishe
d Angels 125

  wrong man, in Hitchcock films 97

  Taxi Driver 45–50

  technical constraints 96

  Zacharek, Stephanie 196–7

  220

  Notes

  Notes 221

  Document Outline

  Cover

  Book title

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  Introduction

  1 Film aesthetics: formalism and realism Mise-en-scène

  Set design

  Mise-en-shot

  Film sound

  Theoretical analysis of film aesthetics

  2 Film structure: narrative and narration Narrative structure

  Restricted and omniscient narration

  3 Film authorship: the director as auteur The origin of the auteur policy

  Style and themes in Alfred Hitchcock’s films

  The cinema of Wim Wenders

  The cinema of Kathryn Bigelow

  The contemporary auteur

  4 Film genres: defining the typical film Problems in the study of genres

  Genre film as myth

  New studies of melodrama

  Film noir

  1950s science fiction

  5 The non-fiction film: five types of documentary Expository documentary

  Observational documentary

  Interactive documentary

  Reflexive documentary

  Performative documentary

  6 The reception of film: the art and profession of film reviewing The four functions of film reviewing

  The four components of film reviewing

  Evaluation

  Three reviews of Interstellar

  Taking it further Film studies on the internet

  Bibliography

  Index A

  B

  C

  D

  E

  F

  G

  H

  I

  J

  K

  L

  M

  N

  O

  P

  Q

  R

  S

  T

  U

  V

  W

  Z

 

 

 


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