The end of the silent period brought the two “image” camps to their apex in the form of German Expressionism (the plastics) and the Soviet Post-Revolution cinema (the montagists). Montage is untruthful to spatial integrity and also deceives the audience through its juxtapositioning; therefore montage is of secondary importance, morally and aesthetically, to the mise-en-scéne style. Cinema reached a point of classical perfection where content fused with form. 50-54, 12.) Primarily associated with the journal Cahiers du cinéma, which he cofounded in 1951, he wrote for many other journals as well. Save for later. 9 (July 1955) of the journal L’Âge nouveau, and the third in Cahiers du cinema no.1 (1950), and published in the collection Qu’est-ce que le cinema? ISBN 10: 0520242270. The story is conveyed through the intricate interactions between images, lighting, composition, and movement. b) It gave the spectator, according to Bazin, the freedom to direct his/her own control over the viewing process, including what to look at, in what order, for how long, and to make their own synthesis of that viewing process. Send-to-Kindle or Email . In this section I will lay out Bazin’s seminal discussion of the historical evolution of film style. He categorizes the early pioneers (Muybridge, Niepce, Leroy, Demeny, Joy, Edison, Lumiére) as “ingenious industrialists” at best. Tudor, although noting the two types of realism Bazin formulated – the pure realism and the spatial realism- does not allow Bazin this benefit. Bazin's essay touches on our need and motives to transform ourselves and preserve our being beyond its physical existence. In his article “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema”, he explains his theory that montage, although necessary in many cases to make a film work, can be heavily overused. cinema as the furthermost evolution to date of plastic realism, the beginnings of which were first manifest at the Renaissance and which found a limited expression in baroque painting. André Bazin was a French film critic, who lived and worked in the first half of the 20 th century. Most editing sequences juxtapose shots of varying space, time, and content combining to create an over- all idea, meaning, or tone. Retrieved from http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/a?id=86, Blakeney, Katherine. The major exponents of the realist camp are F.W. Bazin, Andre, “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema”, in Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen ed., Film Theory and Criticism (1999), Bazin, Andre, “Umberto D: A Great Work”, in What is Cinema?, trans. andre bazin   film history   film style   film theory   new wave   people_bazin, Introduction to André Bazin, Part 2: Style as a Philosophical Idea, Bazin and “The River” as a Problem in the History of Film Theory, Part 1, Re-thinking Bazin Through Renoir’s The River, Part 2. Thus far Bazin’s reasoning implies that the artist has a moral obligation to the audience and the faithful rendition of the event/space. By expounding, commenting on, and making necessary connections I will attempt to synthesize a complex man and his works into a manageable form. The depth of field/long take style, known as mise-en-scéne, attracted itself to Bazin for two essential reasons: a) It maintained the unity of space and the relationship between the objects within that space. (What is Cinema?, 1958) Arnheim’s end goal is the equation film=art, while Bazin’s is film=reality. By 1939 all major technical advancements are established; the next step in evolution of style is spurred by subject matter. Terms of Use :: Privacy Policy :: Contact. That would be impossible, and if possible it would be a visual quagmire. Bazin is not against editing which forms the basis of film structure, that is cutting necessary to join unconnected scenes/sequences, but is against optical illusions (superimpositions, dissolves, process shots), needless pedestrian editing within a single scene, and expressive editing that adds meaning through the juxtaposition rather than content of each image. Nowhere in What is Cinema Vol. It jumpstarts the careers of... At Disneyland’s Magic Kingdom, light cascades across the night sky before spiraling down through the stars. Volume 7, Issue 7 / July 2003 (volumes I and II) have been classics of film studies for as long as they've been available and are considered the gold standard in the field of film criticism. About The Journal | Submissions That breakthrough point would arrive several years later (1940-41). ‘The Precession of Simulacra’ explores... F.W. He believed that the interpretation of a film… Wiley-Blackwell Manifestos Contrarily, if the scene is complex why presuppose only one meaning? This aural component is still excluded by many people today when discussing the claim to realism cinema has over other arts. He describes it in the following terms: 1) The photographic image is “a kind of decal or transfer”; 2) “The photographic image is the object itself, the object freed from the conditions of time and space that govern it”; 3) Photography embalms time; 4) “The photograph as such and the object in itself share a common being, after the fashion of a fingerprint”; 5) “In no sense is it the image of an object or persons, more correctly it is its tracing”; 6) “The photograph proceeds … to the taking of a veritable luminous impression in light – to a mold. The scene at the beginning of the film where the monumental figure of the Devil spreads his menacing black wings over an unsuspecting town, sending down clouds of contagion, is dramatically intercut with images of suffering and destruction in the streets below. Bazin examines a frame from the 1910 film Onésime (Louis Feuillade) and sees in its composition in depth and soft focus the seeds for the later more refined depth of field style. The master shot establishes a location so that the cutting to points within is physically (spatially) understood; the dramatic action makes it psychologically understood. Cite Them Right Online is an excellent interactive guide to referencing for all our students. Year: 2004. He then uses an example from the film Where No Vultures Fly to demonstrate how much more effective depth of field is than parallel montage. But it is equally as impossible to make a film without making some sort of statement and imposing some type of perspective on the viewer. However, Bazin overlooks just how important a psychological role sound played in achieving the impression of reality, and the impression of space and depth that were so important to him. The very act of making a film is already tampering with reality by capturing it in an artificial form. With the championing of realism as the eventual goal, Bazin wrote a thoughtful historical overview of the evolution of film language. , Blakeney, Katherine. (Example: The problem of reproducing three dimensional objects in a two dimensional medium – positioning of object- and the intangible aspect of intuition – deciding whether a person is more him or herself in profile or full face or whether one angle of a mountain is more expressive than another) (Arnheim, 8- 11). Bazin Andre - What Is Cinema Volume 1. ISBN 13: 9780520242272. He serves as an endpoint to this section because Henderson exemplifies the by-product which can result from the constant need to reevaluate and think through existing theories. Here it is instructive to recall Younger’s distinction in Bazin’s understanding of realism in art between “pseudorealism” and “true realism” -the former being caught in the trappings of ideology or meaningless formal articulations. Hugh Gray, (Berkeley : University of California Press, c1967-71). Bazin opposes classical and expressive editing on the following counts. … an indirect means in which to place value in the shot which is being focused; it transcribes in the frame the dramatic hierarchy which montage expresses in time. Please login to your account first; Need help? [2-volume set] by André Bazin. This scene makes no pretense of realistic space and gains much of its intensity from the art of suggestive montage. revolting against this obsession with realism. I admit that even the few criticisms I make with regard Bazin’s critical application of realist style can be smoothed over by relating Bazin’s analysis of cinematic language to his larger philosophical and theoretical aims. I can respect Tudor’s refusal to grant Bazin the benefit of two types of realism, but I disagree with his reason. DVD. Here montage becomes emblematic of its untruthfulness – by relating the human qualities of animals by virtue of off-screen guidance and editing. The implication is that there is a choice between one type of reality and another. Produced and directed by Orson Welles. Both films fail to completely qualify for either of Bazin’s realistic camps –the documentary- like “pure” realism or the spatial realism. Book Summary: André Bazin's What Is Cinema? Bazin's sympathies are toward the realist camp, as shown by his discussion of the limitations of montage. This is an ideal approach, but realistically, most directors either do not place that much thought into the editing or do not have the aptitude to, and, consequently, fall back on the more traditional editing style, to what Noel Burch terms the “zero point of cinematic style” (11). Bazin sees cinema as “an idealistic phenomenon” and only consequently technical. 5 The soft focus effect is (my translation). Bazin opposes the contention that editing is a more realistic depiction of the physiological viewing process on several counts. 1 pps. From that day in 1948 when he got me my first film job, working alongside him, I became his adopted son. Publisher: University of California Press. In making this contention Bazin is, of course, glossing over a long line of antithetical movements (Expressionism, Surrealism, etc.) In fact to Bazin, reality and everything that can support it such as sound, deep focus, and invisible editing, define what film should be. Bazin gives Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane as a vivid example of the replacement of montage with depth of frame. Bazin states that photography surpasses art in creative power, describing the artists mind to be in a different place than the canvases, the camera and the object at least share the same world. Language: english. Although Welles inherited many traits from German Expressionism Tudor can not deny that the context is different – within Wellesian mise-en-scéne- ­and that there is a difference between cutting a space through montage and cutting a space “in depth” as does Welles. Reality has no place in this hallucinatory world of illusion, its beauty is in its dreamy detachment from the grounded, solid world outside the screen. Cinema can never totally duplicate the viewing process – physiologically and psychologically. It was Bazin who elevated film criticism to a serious discussion of film as an art form, focusing not just on the content, but also on the techniques of film making used. This realism of plenitude is, however, accompanied by an acute consciousness of loss … Employing a stylistic and semi-auteur approach he groups all directors between the years 1920 to 1940 into two groups: one which base their integrity in the image (the imagists) and another which base their integrity in reality (the realists). by Donato Totaro Much of the confusion concerning Bazin’s writings – and indeed a major concern in the canon of film theory- is traceable to the relationship between the filmed image and its life counterpart. Bazin himself admits that it is hardly possible to make a film without montage at all. It is this distinction – manipulation via editing vs. manipulation via mise-en-scéne- which makes the difference for Bazin. Produced by Erich Pommer and directed by F.W. (volumes I and II) have been classics of film studies for as long as they've been available and are considered the gold standard in the field of film criticism. offers an engaging answer to Andre Bazin's famous question, exploring his 'idea of cinema' with a sweeping look back at the near century of Cinema's phenomenal ascendancy. The fact that the lion is tame is unimportant; this deceit is made “morally” correct because it occurs in a homogenous space. Naturally he is strongly inclined against the montage techniques displayed in the films of Eisenstein.5 The famous staircase sequence from The Battleship Potemkin employs montage to create the illusion that the staircase is almost endless, and intercuts shots of a stroller rolling down the steps with close-ups of horrified faces and dying people, thus destroying the reality of the actual space and using metaphors and juxtaposition to create a specific response. Bazin argues for the intrinsic realism of cinema on two grounds: first, the ontological reality of the photographic trace as an objective record of the real; and second, the cinematic reproduction of the phenomenological conditions of perception of the real through the use of deep-focus photography and the long take. Even when, in his article “La Technique du Citizen Kane,” 3 Bazin defends Welles against George Sadoul’s charges of unoriginality he concludes with the spiritualistic thought that Welles, the modern artist, has left behind (through his films) “a resonance the likes of which we have never known before” (my translation). With the ameliorization of the depth of field shooting style and the parallel advancement of audience awareness, soft focus becomes a technique (rack focus and softening of a part of the image for an effect) and takes on a different meaning, that of decoupage. Bazin envisions each rung on cinema’s evolutionary ladder as a step toward a more realistic depiction of the world (sound, color, depth of field, 3- D,etc.). Other major works translated into English include Jean Renoir, Orson Welles: A Critical View, and French Cinema of the Occupation and the Resistance. Logical cutting according to drama, narrative, and anticipation constructs a sense of an integral space. Please read our short guide how to send a book to Kindle. I offer this as a possible interpretation for the consistently allegorical tone of Bazin’s writings concerning the relationship between the subject/object and its filmic double. He writes enthusiastically about the style of Erich von Stroheim whose philosophy of filmmaking Bazin describes as “Take a close look at the world, keep on doing so, and in the end it will lay bare for you all its cruelty and its ugliness.”6 He appreciates neo-realism as “a kind of humanism” first and a “style of filmmaking” second.7 This is really apparent in his review of Umberto D, where he describes how the scene with the maid waking up in the morning is broken up into smaller and smaller units and shot continuously turning “life itself” into “spectacle” and “visible poetry”.8 He seems very taken by the idea of shooting an entire film about a man to whom nothing happens for ninety minutes.9. In the forty years of André Bazin's brief life (1918–58), he managed to re-map the relationship between the average moviegoing spectator, the film critic and the cinema industry, insisting that a thoughtful and demanding public could in fact shape the trajectory of cinema as an institution. Therefore it is not faithful to reality, either spatially, temporally, or morally. Produced by Rudolf Meinert and Erich Pommer and directed by Robert Wiene. With the meaning of decoupage in mind, we must consider the other means by which depth of field appropriates montage: the moving camera, especially the reframe, the zoom, lighting, props, and the use of off- screen space. This paper argues that film is a medium defined by its relationship to memory. Available: http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/a?id=86. Click to read more about What Is Cinema? Summary: Through metaphors and allusions to art, science, and religion, Andre Bazin's writings on the cinema explore a simple yet profound question: what is a human? The phenomenological approach at understanding the essence of phenomena also foregoes the causal series of events (Husserl’s “bracketing”). Here he sets down the kernel for the balance of the article. Inquiries Journal/Student Pulse 1 (12), http://www.inquiriesjournal.com/a?id=86, BLAKENEY, K. 2009. RKO Pictures, 1941. Totaro received his PhD in Film & Television from the University of Warwick (UK), is a part-time professor in Film Studies at Concordia University (Montreal, Canada) and a longstanding member of AQCC (Association québécoise des critiques de cinéma). The implication in Bazin’s historical evolution is that by the 1940’s the imagist style had been completely engulfed by the realist style. Andre Bazin, “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema”, in Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen ed., Film Theory and Criticism (1999), p. 48, 8.) The integrity of spatial unity is of the utmost importance and supercedes all else – deceit included. but instead wants us to neglect the causal events and consider only the final results. Here Bazin gives critical observations on a number of films by the directors listed in the book without resorting too much to story summary or plot. By now, 1939, cinema had reached the point where most technical innovations were established (color, track, dolly, crane, zoom, sound, panchromatic film stock) and the next evolutionary advancement, if there was to be one, would not be propelled by a technical matter but a thematic one: the subject matter and the effect it imposed on technical/formal aspects. Hugh Gray, (Berkeley : University of California Press, c1967-71), p. 82; Andre Bazin, “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema”, in Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen ed., Film Theory and Criticism (1999), p. 55, 10.) Again, giving the state of cinematography (to render a clear, legible image) and the state of audience awareness the softness of the background appears as a default. A succinct summary of the core of Bazin’s ideas about, and attitude toward, cinema. The newsletter highlights recent selections from the journal and useful tips from our blog. Historical concerns are minimized while the logic and connectedness of the various directions of Bazin’s thought are emphasized. Donato Totaro has been the editor of the online film journal Offscreen since its inception in 1997. Andre Bazin, “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema”, in Leo Braudy and Marshall Cohen ed., Film Theory and Criticism (1999), pp.46-47, 11.) "An Analysis of Film Critic Andre Bazin's Views on Expressionism and Realism in Film." Moreover, the views expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of Inquiries Journal or Student Pulse, its owners, staff, contributors, or affiliates. What is Cinema? Although Bazin made no films, his name has been one of the most important in French cinema since World War II. Editor and translator Dudley Andrew is R. Selden Rose Professor of Film and Comparative Literature at Yale University. Although one can argue that Nosferatu is ‘more realist’ than other expressionist films of the time, and that The Passion of Joan of Arc is so unique and iconoclastic in style, that the affect on the spectator is one of realism. An Analysis of Film Critic Andre Bazin's Views on Expressionism and Realism in Film. He was the general editor of the film criticism journal Cahiers du cinema, and a considerable part of his work focused on realism. Murnau. The imagists, having had their glory days in the silent period, were confronted by the realists and, after a realist maturation period in the 30’s, over­taken by them. Noel Burch, in Theory of Film Practice, defines the three terms for which decoupage is inter­changeably used for as: 1) The final form of a script replete with the required technical information. Featured Cite Them Right Online. This moral and ethical link does not circumvent the ideological, but stands as a way through the “impasse” of the ideological, or, to once again quote Prakash, “pseudorealism” to get at the “true realism.”. Andre Bazin, “Umberto D: A Great Work”, in What is Cinema?, trans. He realized how important a step sound was toward realism, eliminating the need for expressivity and “denaturalization” that was a large part of silent cinema. Bazin, in contrast, downplays the filmmakers intervention. © 2021 Inquiries Journal/Student Pulse LLC. Together they maintain the ambiguity – the existential ambiguity present all around us in life- of that space. The atmosphere and plot of the film are revealed entirely through visual means, using wildly abstract sets and dramatically exaggerated makeup. THE EVOLUTION OF FILM LANGUAGE by André Bazin a synthesis of three articles, by Bazin, the first written for Vingt ans de cinema à Venise (1952), the second published in no. I was intrigued by the title and directors discussed by Andre Bazin in his book The Cinema Of Cruelty: from Bunuel to Hitchcock (1975). ANDRE BAZIN wrote about film better than anybody else in Europe. Bazin goes on to state that: “The guiding myth, then, inspiring the invention of cinema, is the accomplishment of that which dominated in a more or less vague fashion all the techniques of the mechanical reproduction of reality in the nineteenth century, from photography to phonograph, namely an integral realism, a recreation of the world in its own image, an image unburdened by the freedom of interpretation of the artist or the irreversibility of time” … This is trickery; it removes the freedom on the part of the spectator to select for him or herself and removes whatever existential ambiguity may be present in the scene. He focuses on how photography is the purest form of capturing reality and how the arrival of cinema challenges itself with preserving life as it is or was, without the alteration and manipulation from editing. Home | Current Issue | Blog | Archives | By including Murnau and Dreyer as realists Bazin is falling into the same trap that Siegfried Kracauer does when he accepts certain fantastical/formalistic scenes when they are in the proper “realist” context, such as a dream or a specific point of view (Tudor 94). One of the conclusions he arrives at is that both theories, albeit drastically different, are in the general sense, ‘incomplete’ theories of the sequence. Later in the essay he discusses the process shot, an equally deceiving effect, and says that the point is not whether or not the trickery is noticeable, but whether or not it is used (a question of integrity). Edition No. Inquiries Journal/Student Pulse 1.12 (2009). 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