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[iptbdeeediaie’ 7 Film Theory and Criticism FILM THEORY AND CRITICISM Introductory Readings FOURTH EDITION GERALD MAST MARSHALL COHEN LEO BRAUDY New York Oxford OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS 1992 Oxford University Press DDuthi Bombay. Catan Mads” Karasts Kuali Lumpur Singapore Hong Keng Tatyo and wot compen Copyright © 1974, 1979, 1985, 1992 by Oxford University Press, Inc Pub by Oxford Universi Pri. ne Ati rserad No par of hs pubicaon may be epeducs ‘etome, mechanical photocopying etn oer ‘inoue por perma of Oxo Uninet Pr rary f Congres Catalogs Piation Dita Fim thoes entation eadings (Gerad Nt Marat! Cohen, to Brady ne 1 em. Inclder ttogapical eens ISBN oi. Soct-8 Thefllonngsreprde san exesion the cop page (CHARLES AFFRON Cinemand Simon Copyright © 1982 by Univer Chicago Pres. Reprod by pei DUDLEY ANDREW Conepsin Film Thwy Copigh © 984 by OxordUniveraty Pe. Resin by perm [RUDOLF ARNHEIM, Fin 45 Ant. Copyight © 1957 by The Regents ofthe Universty of Cala Reprint by [ELA BALASZ. Theorof te Fm, 1982 Reprinted by peminion of Dover ablation in ROLAND BARTHES. Mythologie nated fom ne French Mhlor, Coptgh © 1957 by Edom Seu, ars ramiaion © 1972 by Jonathan Cape Rept by perminon ate eae Rota Bc Hl ad Wan JEAN-LOUIS BAUDRY “icles ofthe Basic Cinematographic Appa lim Quarry, Volume 28 Numer (Winer 1974-75) tnmlaaty Ann Wins Repay prison. The Appar Meaty ‘Approaches tthe Impreon of Retin Cine" Commas Number 33 (197) Pane by fan Aeon nd eras Ap fer Camera Ohare, Rube (al 970) Repo by pression ANDRE BAZIN Whats Cinema vl and 2, eased by Hugh Gry Copyright © 1967 by The Regen of the JOHN BELTON Ekzaedk Wei, Jn Belin, ft Thay and Aether of Fl Sound Copynht © 1985 WALTER BENJAMIN (lumina Copyrght © 1955 by Surham Vera. Fanart 4M: Engi aa eprgh\© 188 by Harcourt Bree Jvanohh ne Renal ypermuson of Harcourt Brace Jovanovic, nes ed JEAN-LOUP ROURGET Jounal of Maden Lier Volume 3 Number? Up 1973), Rep by permasion ‘ot Temple Univers STANBRAKHAGE Reprint ftom Pum Cala no. 30 (Fl 1963. by permis. LEO BRAUDY The ivi ina Frame. Copynah © 196 by Leo Bray. Rene by permisin of Doubly & NICK BROWNE lm Quaner; Volume 4, Number 2 (Winter 1975-76 Reprinted by pemision, [NOEL CARROLL “The Specie Ths,” Phsophical room of Clas Ful Ths 198, by pemison of not Universiy Pre. "Jent-Lui Ray ad The Apart” Astin Mees, 988, ened perma of Columba Unierty Pre STANLEY CAVELL The Word Few. Copyright© 1971 by Sunes Cael Resin by peminon fhe ur. JOHN G.CAWELTI “Chinatown and the Detective Fi.” Copa 179 hy ohm Caml Use by permision of SEYMOUR CHATMAN Chica guy Volane 8 (1980) Reprinted by geminioe JEAN-LUC COMOLLI AND JEAN NARBONI_ Pele to “Yount Man Lins" Sven, Volume 3, Number 3 (G91 Repnne by pemision of Stet for Educa nF and Teer, rsh Fa nat and Rode Kean Pal Lh RICHARDCORLISS_ fim Common, Volumes, Number Winer 1970) Coy 1970 by Film Commen ling Corporation. Reprint by permission ofthe Film Soy of Lncln Center Patt ae asap Cons’ Taine Pictures Sremoriers in the America Cinema Copp & 14 hy Reardon Reena DANIEL DAYAN Fulm Quan, Volume 2, Number | (Fall 174), Reprinted by ermision, MAYADEREN Reprinted by prmision of Darla Joma fhe Amica Academy of At an Senses oat MARY ANN DOANE. Seren, Numer 25 Setember-Osater 1982), Reprint by permision of Sixty fr Eu RICHARD DYER Stay Coprgh 6 1979 y the Bs Fim nate, Repay permion SSERGEL EISENSTEIN im Form qansted by ly Leja. Copyeigh ©1989 by Haroun Hace Jovan. I renewed 1977 y Jay Lend, Repro pemiiono Harourt Bre onanovieh foc and Dean Dace Pubs SSM EISENSTEIN, VL FUDOVKIN,G.V.ALEXANDROV_ Pil Frm waaay Jy Ley, Copy 1969 by Harcourt Brae Jovanowch In senewed 1977 Jy Ley, Repent perm of Harcourt Bre och, JONN ELLIS Vise Factions. Coprigh © 1982 Rouge & Kegan Pau. Ld Repent by pemison, THOMAS ELSAESSER_ Sonopuim. Number 4 Copyeht 1972 bythe Bots Fil este, Repay permis JANE FEUER Quary Rete o Film Studies Volume 2, Number (Aug 177, Rept permit the Redgrave Publishing Company CHRISTINEGLEDMILL Quarry Rew of Fim Stay, al 178, Rented pein othe Rene Pa MOLLY HASKELL From Reverncto Rap: The Treen Women th Mei 174 Rep permis SIEGFRIED KRACAUER. “Basic Concept “The saben Phys Eee” mn Thon of Fl The Rederpion of Pisce Realy cope © 1980 by Oxloré Unie Pree Retina perm. The Cab ‘net af Dr Calan” rom Frm Calgar te Haler Copy 1987 by Prccon Uiversty Pre Rept) pe GERALD MAST. Fiim/Ciema, Movie Theory of Epon Copy © 197 by Geral Mas Reprod by (COLIN MACCAME Screen Volume 17, Number (Aut 1978) Reprise by pemision of Soot for Edeabon JORNMELLEN tot an Homer and hi Sealine Nw Fm Cop 193 oe Maen y (CHRISTIAN METZ. fil Lance: A Semiotrofthe Cinema tat hy Micha Tayo Traaion copy {©1974 by Ontos Univer Pes ne. Reprated by ermisin. "Intention, Miro” ad "The Pasion fr Per ‘ving om The Imaginary Signer Rept em Sven Valume 1, Nur 3 by pean of Set or Fcaonn Fim and Tkevsion andthe shor. “Aural Obata by Corp Gut a “Lepr Bommel French Stes, Volume 01980) Reprised laabets Wess ha Belin: Sud Phe ‘nd Pracice Copp 1985 Colin Univesity Prom Used by permaon ‘TANIA MODLESKI, Cinema Jura, Volane 23, Numb 3 Speing 1988) Reprinted by peminion LAURA MULVEY. “Visual Meare and Naratve Cinema” Reprine om Sen, Volume 1, NUBEE ye tion of Sock for Edvations im and Tlvion, ERWIN PANOFSKY ulin fhe Dapurimon of and Achaory Preto Univer 1934, Reprint by V.E-PERKINS. Fim Fl Copyr@M 1972 ty V.F Perkins. Resin by perman of engin Boks Lt WILLIAM ROTHMAN Pum Quarry, Volume 29, Number | (Fal 1975) Rep by permiin. ANDREW SARKIS Fb Cul, Wine 1962-63 Rept ty permis ofthe tno. THOMASSEHALZ neuen ytem Copy Hy Toma Sha Rep permit a KAIASILVERMAN, The SubetofSemios Coppngh © 19830 Ovord Unive Fres Repay permission SUSAN SONTAG Syies of Ral Wil Copyright © 1966, 967.1968, 1969, by Stn Son. Rep per JEAN-MARIESTRAUS AND DANIELE HUILLET Tralatodby Bu Kavaleria Bisateth Weis. Joe Bloat: ‘Hm Sound: Thay and Price Cpyribn'©198S Colman Uniserty Pron Una ty permit GAYLYNSTUDLAR, “Masoeham an he Ferene Pesuef Cinema. Copyng& 1985 Gayl Studie. From [BM owes an eros, VoL Copyngnt 198 by Une of Cabo Pres Rept by pera soe of Univer Cana Pre PARKER TYLER Magic and ithofth Mons Copyright © 1970 Sion &Schuse.In Repntes by permis son ol'Simon & Sebastes of Gull & Weer Conse end Marin Secer A Warr id [ROBERT WARSHOW The Immeiae Experience, 142. Regi ty permis of Paul Wann, Reprnedby perminan of Uninet Publaon Ames, I andthe Amis Pi aioe PETER WOLLEN Sg and Meo iA Crema Cog 072 Ina Une Pe Rp BIN WOOD _ FC: Vue 1 Number Uany-Fetray 197 Capt 197 by i Com PREFACE In the years since the first edition of this collection appeared in 1974, the academic study of film in America has changed enormously and the journalistic and popular criticism of film has been deeply affected as well. Many of the same issues that pre- ‘occupied and stimulated writers from the very beginning of film theory and criti- cism are still puzzling later generations: Is the filmed world realistic or artificial? Does it use a special language? Is its vision best expressed in silence? in sound? in black and white? in color? in live action? in animation? in two dimensions? in three? on a wide sereeen? on a narrow screen? through stories that may be derived from other arts? through stories that can only be told on film? ‘Many of these questions about film were first formulated in critical language that ‘owed an important debt to the methods and terminology of such humanistic dis ciplines as literary criticism, art history, and aesthetics. Meanwhile, beginning in the 1970s and continuing to the present, at the same time that film study was, thieving an academic status separate from the departments of language and art ‘where it had often first flourished, interpretive approaches derived from the social sciences began to have a tremendous influence. In this fertile and energetic period—pethaps the richest in new explorations of the nature of film since the invention of the medium itself{—the most salient ave~ ‘hues of interpretation first followed semiotic and structuralist imperatives, derived from linguistics and anthropology and often augmented with Marxist historical and Freudian psychoanalytic analysis. Somewhat later came Lacan’s revisionary view of Freud (itself responsive to linguistic issues), the feminist interrogation of the power structures of vision (in which Marx and Freud were often married). and the deconstructive views of Jacques Derrida (where efforts to pierce the surface of the text and discover its “contradictions” often employed Marxist and psychoan- alytic tools). x PREFACE None of these new approaches has appeared without controversy or has main- tained its relevance without polemic, Each in its own way has contributed to such. classical issues of film theory as the relation of film to reality and how film may (or ‘may not) be considered a language. In addition, they have introduced such new considerations as the way that films reveal the underlying social attitudes and ide- ologies of the cultures that produce them, the ways films manipulate audience beliefs, and the ways they raise, exploit, and seek to satisfy the audience's desires. In the light both of continuing issues and new approaches, we might roughly divide the history of film theory into three somewhat overlapping phases. The first, which generally corresponds to the silent period, was formalist. From about 1916 (the yearin which the earliest essay in this volume was published) to the mid-1930s, theorists such as Hugo Munsterberg, Rudolf Amheim, and Sergei Eisenstein attempted to demonstrate that film was indeed an art, not just a direct recording of nature. The coming of synchronized sound and a nostalgia for the achievements of silent film then brought on a realist reaction to the formalist argument. Erwin Panofsky, Siegfried Kracauer, and André Bazin among others argued that film was not an art in opposition to nature but somehow, ina rich paradox, an art of nature. In the 1960s and 1970s, this classical phase of film theory was challenged by writ- ers responding both to historical conditions (the Vietnam War, the student riots in France and America) and to new developments in the academic concept of “knowl edge,” as defined by literature and the social sciences. These writers questioned the confidence with which classical film theory had used such terms as art, nature, soci- ety, reality, illusion, self, performance, work, author, and artist. The study of lin- guistics—drawing on the work of C. S. Peirce, Ferdinand de Saussure, Roman Jakobson, Louis Hjelmslev, and Noam Chomsky—explored the systems of mean- ing that allow communication itself to exist. Along with Lacan's psychoanalytic approach and Derrida’s philosophic inquisition of textual meaning, the structural anthropology of Claude Lévi-Strauss and the demystified cultural history of Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault exerted a powerful influence on film study. Now, as we begin the 1990s, there is a continuing concern with discovering the ‘general terms and assumptions required for understanding film. However, since the mid- 1980s, a complementary trend has begun to gather strength. One significant aspect of this trend seeks to merge insights owed to history, psychology, and lin- Buistics into a synthesis suitable for understanding individual films as well as film in general. This potential synthesis is sometimes proposed under the general spon- sorship of feminism, neoformalism, cognitive psychology, empiricism, or phenom- enology. It often emphasizes the audience's active contribution to the creation of film meaning (as opposed to the passivity usually postulated in earlier cultural approaches). It may also emphasize the resistance of the performer, especially the star, to the meaning imposed by the film narrative; the ability of the independent filmmaker to construct a personal statement despite the supposedly totalitarian necessities of the medium: or the web of financial, political, and artistic decisions that constitute film production. With this new phase as yet only beginning to demonstrate its potential, we have ‘maintained the historical perspective of this collection as a broad survey of thinking, about film over the past eight decades. Surveys of how the earlier editions of this PREFACE xi collection were being used in the classroom showed us how often courses were structured around an interplay between classical and contemporary answers to the basic questions of film theory, along with an acute awareness of the new avenues that have been opened by the willingness to venture beyond disciplinary barriers. In rethinking the selections, we have therefore retained a good number of “classi- ccal” works that have set the agenda of even much of the most advanced recent the- ‘ory and criticism. At the same time we have tried to illustrate the crucial new direc- tions theory has taken over the last twenty-five years, In the process of opening space for new essays, we have regretted the need to drop old favorites, ifonly to keep the collection to a manageable size (and price). Perhaps because so many of these questions about film have tured out to be perennially interwoven, our division of the complexity of theory into seven prime topics now also seems more a question of emphasis than of exclusivity, Especially when they consider the more recent essays, readers will discover connections that 20 beyond the confines of a particular section. As before, the final section, “Film: Psychology, Society, and Ideology," most obviously carries the banners of the new approaches: how film shapes or reflects cultural attitudes, reinforces or rejects the dominant modes of cultural thinking, stimulates or frustrates the needs and drives of the psyche. But the impact of new thinking is visible in each section. The ttle of the second section has been changed from “Film Image and Film Language” to “Film Language” to correspond to its concern with that question. Section II has accordingly been retitled “The Film Medium: Image and Sound” to register the inclusion of essays that deal with both the visual and the aural components of the medium. In addition to other changes, essays on the question of adaptation have ‘been added to the section on “Film, Theater, and Literatur Im Genres” section has been extensively redone, as has the section on “The Film Artist” —an area brushed aside by contemporary theory that is now beginning to receive acute new attention, ‘Our deep thanks to those whose suggestions and criticism helped us formulate this new edition, especially Ernest Callenbach, Allan Casebier, Marsha Kinder, and ‘the many (anonymous) teachers of film who took the time to respond to Oxtord's queries about their use of the third edition. ‘Weare also grateful to Angel Shekerdjian and Valentina Stoicescu for their great help in the complicated task of re-editing and reorganization, Finally, we dedicate this edition to the memory of Gerald Mast, scholar, critic, and friend, whose contributions to film studies were at once so comprehensive and so insightful Los Angeles LB. June 1991 M.C. CONTENTS 1Q Film and Reality 3 SIEGFRIED KRACAUER From Theory of Film Basic Concepts, 9 SIEGFRIED KRACAUER From From Caligari to Hitler The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, 21 ANDRE BAZIN From What Is Cinema? ‘The Myth of Total Cinema, 34 ANDREBAZIN From What Is Cinema? De Sica: Metteur-en-scéne, 38 RUDOLF ARNHEIM From Film as Art The Complete Film, 48 V.F.PERKINS From Film as Film Form and Discipline, 52 MAYA DEREN Cinematography: The Creative Use of Reality, 59 STAN BRAKHAGE From Metaphors on Vision, 71 xiv CONTENTS: COLIN MACCABE ‘Theory and and Pleasure, 79 : Principles of Realism CHRISTINE GLEDHILL Recent Developments in Feminist Criticism, 93, 11.Q Film Language 115 VSEVOLOD PUDOVKIN From Film Technique [On Editing], 121 SERGEIEISENSTEIN From Film Form ‘The Cinematographic Principle and the Ideogram, 127 A Dialectic Approach to Film Form, 138 ANDRE BAZIN From What Is Cinema? ‘The Evolution of the Language of Cinema, 155 CHRISTIAN METZ From Film Language Some Points in the Semiotics of the Cinema, 168 DANIEL DAYAN The Tutor-Code of Classical Cinema, 179 WILLIAM ROTHMAN Against “The System of the Suture,” 192 KAJASILVERMAN From The Subject of Semiotics [On Suture}, 199 NICK BROWNE The Spectator-in-the-Text: The Rhetoric of Stagecoach, 210 II Q The Film Medium: Image and Sound 227 ERWIN PANOFSKY Style and Medium in the Motion Pictures, 233 SIEGFRIED KRACAUER From Theory of Film ‘The Establishment of Physical Existence, 249 BELA BALAZS From Theory of the Film ‘The Close-up, 260 ‘The Face of Man, 262 CONTENTS: w RUDOLF ARNHEIM From Film as Art Film and Reality, 268 The Making ofa Film, 272 NOEL CARROLL From Philosophical Problems of Classical Film Theory ‘The Specificity Thesis, 278 GERALD MAST From Film/Cinema/Movie Projection, 286 STANLEY CAVELL From The World Viewed Photograph and Screen, 291 Audience, Actor, and Star, 292 Types; Cycles as Genres, 294 Ideas of Origin, 299 JEAN-LOUIS BAUDRY Ideological Effects of the Basic Cinematographic Apparatus, 302 CHRISTIAN METZ Aural Objects, 313 S. M. EISENSTEIN, V. I. PUDOVKIN, AND G. V. ALEXANDROV ‘A Statement [On Sound), 317 JEAN-MARIE STRAUB and DANIELE HUILLET Direct Sound: ‘An Interview, 320 JOHN BELTON Technology and Aesthetics of Film Sound, 323 CHARLES AFFRON From Cinema and Sentiment Voice and Space, 332 JOHNELLIS From Visible Fictions Broadcast TV as Sound and Image, 341 IV Q Film, Theater, and Literature 351 HUGO MUNSTERBERG From The Film: A Psychological Study ‘The Means of the Photoplay, 355 SUSAN SONTAG Film and Theatre, 362 wi CONTENTS: ANDRE BAZIN From What Is Cinema? Theater and Cinema, 375 LEO BRAUDY From The World in a Frame Acting: Stage vs, Screen, 387 SERGEIEISENSTEIN From Film Form Dickens, Griffith, and the Film Today, 395 SEYMOUR CHATMAN Whi (and Vice Versa), 403 jovels Can Do That Films Can't DUDLEY ANDREW From Concepts in Film Theory Adaptation, 420 V Q Film Genres 429 LEOBRAUDY From The World in a Frame Genre: The Conventions of Connection, 435 ROBERT WARSHOW Movie Chronicle: The Westerner, 453 JEAN-LOUP BOURGET Social Implications in the Hollywood Genres, 467 ROBIN WOOD Ideology, Genre, Auteur, 475 JANE FEUER The Self-Reflexive Musical and the Myth of Entertainment, 486 JOHNG.CAWELTI Chinatown and Generic Transformation in Recent American Films, 498 THOMAS ELSAESSER Tales of Sound and Fury: Observations ‘on the Family Melodrama, 512 TANIA MODLESKI ‘Time and Desire in the Woman's Film, 536 BRUCE KAWIN The Mummy's Pool, 549 LINDA WILLIAMS | When the Woman Looks, 561 CONTENTS wil VIO The Film Artist $79 ANDREW SARRIS Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962, 585 PETER WOLLEN From Signs and Meaning in the Cinema The Auteur Theory, 589 RICHARD CORLISS The Hollywood Screenwriter, 606 JOHNELLIS From Visible Fictions Stars as a Cinematic Phenomenon, 614 RICHARDDYER From Stars, 622 ROLAND BARTHES. The Face of Garbo, 628 MOLLY HASKELL From From Reverence to Rape Female Stars of the 1940s, 632 JOAN MELLEN From Women and Theis ‘The Mae West Nobody Knows, 646 Sexuality in the New Film THOMAS. “The Whole Equation of Pictures,” HATZ From The Genius of the System 4 VILQ Film: Psychology, Society, and Ideology 659 WALTER BENJAMIN The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction, 665 JEAN-LUC COMOLLI and JEAN NARBON! Cinema/ Ideology/Criticism, 682 JEAN-LOUIS BAUDRY The Apparatus: Metapsychological Approaches to the Impression of Reality in Cinema, 690 NOEL CARROLL From Mystifying Movies Jean-Louis Baudry and “The Apparatus,” 708 wii CONTENTS PARKER TYLER From Magic and Myth of the Movies Preface, 725 CHRISTIAN METZ From The Imaginary Signifier Identification, Mirror, 730 ‘The Passion for Perceiving, 741 LAURA MULVEY Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema, 746 MARY ANN DOANE Film and the Masquerade: Theori the Female Spectator, 758 ing GAYLYNSTUDLAR Masochism and the Perverse Pleasures of the Cinema, 773 Bibliography, 791 Film Theory and Criticism I Film and Reality ‘The main tradition of Western aesthetics, deriving fom Aristotle's Poetics, adopts the view that art “imitates” nature or, in Hamlet's phrase, holds “the mirror up to nature.” Painting, from the early Renaissance to the late nineteenth century, from ‘Giotto to Manet and the Impressionists, pursued this ideal with ever-increasing suc- ‘cess. Later the novels of Balzac and Tolstoy provided a more detailed representa- tion of nature and society than anything literature had previously known, and the plays of fbsen and Chekhov seemed to carry Hamlet's deal of the theater to its limit Al these achievements were eclipsed, however, by the invention of photography. For the camera, and especially the motion picture camera, was unique in its ability to represent nature, I the ideal of artis to create an illusion of reality, the motion picture made it possible to achieve this ideal in an unprecedented way. But is the aim of art 10 imitate nature at all? And ifit is, what role remains for the other arts when film achievesit so simply and perfectly? An anti-realist tradition therefore denies that the goal of artis the imitation of nature. Some anti-realists hhave argued that to create a work of art is not simply to copy the world but to add another, and very special, object to the world, This object may be valuable because it offers an interpretation or idealization of the world, or even because it creates another, wholly autonomous, world. Others in this anti-realist tradition argue that the value of such an object may be that it expresses the feelings and emotions of its creator, or that the artist manages to impose a beautiful or a significant form on the ‘materials with which he works. The artist's feelings may be expressed abstractly, and the resulting form may be purely imaginative. The work of art may not allude to nature at all. For example, theonsts of modern painting have argued that painting should not even attempt to provide a three-dimensional representation of reality but acknowl- edge, instead, that it is essentially the application of pigments to a two-dimensional 4 FILM AND REALITY surface. This modernist view assumes that painting cannot and should not compete with film in attempting to mirror reality, Painting must renounce that task alto- gether. Other critics have countered, however, that film cannot reproduce reality either. And, even if t could, it ought not to try. According to this anti-realist view, film, like any other art form, must offer an interpretation of the world or, by the ‘manipulation of the camera, create an alternative world. Just as painting must acknowledge that it is not really a mirror but pigments on canvas, cinema must acknowledge that it is simply projected images on a screen. To claim that these mages ought to be images of physical reality—as opposed to any other kinds of images—is pure dogma. Why should these images not liberate the imagination from the tedium of reality, introducing us to the world of abstractions or of dreams instead? Siegfried Kracauer is a leading exponent of the realist view of cinema. In his book, Theory of Film, Kracauer argues that because film literally photographs real- ity italone is capable of holding the mirror up to nature. Film actually reproduces the raw material of the physical world within the work of art. This makes it impos- sible for a film to be a “pure” expression of the artist's formative intentions or an abstract, imaginative expression of his emotions. Kracauer insists that itis the clear obligation and the special privilege of film (a descendant of still photography) to record and reveal, and thereby redeem, physical reality. Kracauer’s attitude isa response to the common complaint that the abstractions and categorizations of modern science and technology make it impossible for us to appreciate the concrete world in which we live—what John Crowe Ransom called “the world’s body.” The distinct function of art (especially of poeticimagery) might therefore well be to help us possess the concrete world once more. Kracauer believes that film art actually does this; it “literally redeems this world from its dormant state, its state of virtual nonexistence, by endeavoring to experience it through the camera.” For Kracauer film delivers us from technology by technology. Inhis earlier work, From Caligari to Hitler, a study of the German cinema from 1919 to 1933, Kracauer traces the decline of German political culture as reflected in the history of its cinema. By representing its story as.a tale told by a madman, (Caligari reflects the general retreat from the facts of German life as well asthe abuse of power and authority characteristic of German political institutions. The total ‘organization of Caligari’s landscapes within studio walls, its scenery of the soul, reveal the German cinema turning away from a reality which is haphazard, incal- culable, and uncontrollable. In doing so, says Kracauer, German cinema helped Prepare the way for Hitler's rise by subtly diverting the audience from a serious appraisal of social realities. This era of German film, usually considered one of the sgrcat periods in the history of cinema, is for Kracauer an example of al that cinema ‘must avoid. By ignoring the claims of camera reality the German cinema achieved the damnation, not the redemption, of German life. André Bazin, who also insists on the unique realism of cinema, does so, however, from a markedly different viewpoint. Bazin, a French critic who founded the influ: ential journal, Cahiers du Cinéma, in the late 1940s and whose practicing disciples include Jean-Luc Godard, Frangois Truffaut, and Claude Chabrol, is perhaps the ‘most important theorist of the “second” film generation, a generation for whom. FILM AND REALITY 5 the experience of the silent film was no longer decisive. Unlike Kracauer, Bazin vviews the film’s realism as an expression of the mythic, not the scientific, spirit and believes that its function is not to redeem physical reality but to exempt us from ‘our physical destiny. This magical aim finds expression in the “myth of total cin- ema,” the ideal of a complete recreation of the world in its own image. Bazin wel- comes the sound film as a necessary step toward this ideal in which Ttalian neo- realism constitutes one of the greatest achievements. In contrast both to the chief schools of realism that preceded it and to Soviet cin- ‘ema, neorealism never makes reality the servant of some pre-existing point of view. And in contrast to expressionism it asks the actor, often the man in the street rather than the professional actor, to be rather than to act or pretend to be; it prefers an ‘open, natural setting to an expressionistic mise-en-scéne that imposes meaning on action; and, above all, it requires the narrative to respect the actual qualities and duration of the event in preference to the artificial, abstract, or dramatic duration favored in classic montage. Bazin’s admiration for these characteristics of neoreal- ism manifest an ontological position rather than a stylistic preference and, in the films of Vittorio de Sica, manifest a love for the creation itself. But Bazin’s conception of total cinema also leads to interesting questions—par- ticularly in view of more recent advances in film technology and film style. Would he have welcomed the widespread use of color and the advent of holography and of ‘three-dimensional cinema, as his principles seem to indicate? And what would his attitude have been to the self-consciousness and self-referential tendencies of the film in the last decades? Devices such as slow motion, the freeze frame, the split sereen, and color tinting call attention to the screen itself, rather than treating it as a simple window on the world, Although Bazin put his trust in the representation of uninterpreted reality, many of his followers have insisted on the artifice of the ‘cinematic image. Rudolf Arnheim, who has also written extensively on the psychology of percep- tion, isa leading “frst generation” exponent of the anti-realist tradition in film the- ory. For Amheim, if cinema were the mere mechanical reproduction of real life it ‘could not be an art atall. Arnheim acknowledges the existence of a primitive desire to get material objects into one’s power by creating them afresh, but he believes that this primitive impulse must be distinguished from the impulse to create art. The “wax museum” ideal may satisly our primitive impulse, but it fails to satisfy the true artistic urge—not simply to copy, but to originate, to interpret, and to mold ‘The very properties that keep photography from reproducing reality perfectly must be exploited by the film artist, for they alone provide the possibilities for a film art. Bazin’s myth of “total” cinema is nothing more than Arnheim’s fallacy of the “complete” film. The pursuit of an ever more complete realism through the use of sound, color, and stereoscopic vision is simply a prescription for undermining the achievement of film art, which must respect, even welcome, the inherent limita tions of the art \V. F. Perkins attempts to incorporate the insights of both the realist and the anti- realist traditions. For him the film medium is capable of both documentation and. fantasy, of copying as well as creation, But the central achievement of film is to be found in fictional narration, and this type of movie achieves a synthesis of film's 6 FILM AND REALITY two tendencies, Cinema obscures the distinction between authentic and staged events, making us feel like eyewitnesses at what are in fact fictional events, The credibility that photography and movement confer on films" images encourages us to place an inaccurate construction on an accurate series of images. Film thereby achieves its unique blend of photographic realism and dramatic illusion, As Petkins suggests, the consideration of film’s relationship to reality has pow- erfully influenced evaluations of fictional, narrative films; however, these consid- erations are also important to an alternative film tradition, one called, variously, independent, experimental, or avant garde cinema. Two of the most important American contributors o that tradition are Maya Deren and Stan Brakhage. Deren accepted the inherent realism of the photographic image, beginning with her very first film, Meshes uf the Afternoon, in 1943. For Deren, as for Kracauer and Bazin, “the photographic image as reality ...is the building block for the creative use of the medium.” But Deren’s program for the “creative use" of this photographic real- ity synthesizes the opposing views of the realist theorists and Rudolf Arnheim: the filmmaker creatively alters photographic reality by distorting the anticipated and. familiar spatio-temporal relationships within the sequential flow of images. Deren. suggests ways to alter what Arnheim called reality’s “space-time continuum"—by using slow motion, reverse motion, and the freeze frame, However, Deren also depends on our recognizing and understanding the percep tual reality which the photographic image presents and represents. Her films can then creatively exploit the “various attributes of the photographic image” —its fidelity, reality, and authority—by effectively undermining what we know about these'realistic spaces. Stan Brakhage, who began making his highly personal films just after the Second World War, takes an exactly opposite position. For Brakhage, the supposed reality of the photographic image is itself a conventionalized illusion, imposed by rules of perspective, compositional logic, and “lenses grounded to achieve 19th century Western compositional perspective.” Brakhage’s argument thus looks forward to those of the post-structuralist theorists who similarly attack the ideology of per- spective and the cinema apparatus (see especially Section VII of this volume), But its fundamental purpose is to propose that the goal of cinema isthe liberation of the ce itself, the creation of an act of seeing previously unimagined and undefined by conventions of representation, an eye as natural and unprejudiced as that of a cat, a bee, of an infant, Brakhage hopes to replace the absolute realism of the motion picture, which he calls “a contemporary mechanical myth,” with a new “unreal- ized, therefore potential, magic.” Irthere is one clear link between Deren and Brak- +hage it is that, whatever their opposing views, theie films and writings represent reflexive, modernist meditations on the act and art of cinema itself. Colin McCabe introduces concerns of political ideology, gender perspective, and psychoanalytic theory in a manner characteristic of much film scholarship in the past decade or more. These perspectives appear throughout the anthology but are explored most elaborately in Section VII. From these perspectives McCabe rejects the assumptions of classical realist cinema, which remains the dominant force within commercial cinema, as well as the realist theories of André Bazin, In McCabe's view Bazin thinks that the revelation of reality is the prime task of cin- FILM AND REALITY 1 ‘ema: all aesthetic devices are present to unmake themselves so that we can experi- fence, as the artist has experienced, that moment in which reality presents itself whole. For MacCabe, however, film does not reveal reality in a moment of trans- parency or establish an omnicompetent point of view. Rather, in his Althusserian, Marxist view film is constituted by a set of contradictory discourses, which are themselves the production ofa set of socially and politically defined positions. None of these discourses is normative and there is no possibility of verification, no cor- respondence between sound and image, which enables the-spectator to enter a Bazinian realm of truth. In terms adopted from Lacanian psychoanalysis MacCabe argues that it is impossible for the spectator to maintain the world of plenitude in which there are no traces of lack, of castration. The spectator must emerge from this imaginary order, and enter the symbolic order, in which the look is related, not to the object, but only to other looks. Realism is no longer a question of an exterior reality nor of the relation of the reader to the text: It is simply one of the ways in which they interact amid specific social and political circumstances. Finally, in “Recent Developments in Feminist Criticism,” Christine Gledhill rejects the anti-realist epistemology implicit in much neo-Marxist and neo-Freud- ian thought, along with the assumption that feminism must ally itself with an anti- realist cinema. Under the influence of Althusser, some feminists have thought that, since lived experience i the inevitable materialization of the dominant ideology, realist cinema lacks the resources to escape that ideology. Under the influence of Lacan, many have also thought that the threat of castration is necessary to the pro-