Feminism is an ideology that advocates women’s rights and equality between the sexes, such as equal pay for women, rather than women earning less than men.
Feminist Film:
Feminist film is film that holds a feminist ideology, made by a feminist director, that push feminist ideals to the audience, who may have a preferred, aberrant, etc. reading of the film. These films will focus on women, typically having female protagonists, their roles, place in contemporary society and the society itself. It may present men as antagonists or obstacles, and may present women as victims of the society.
The Bechdell Test:
The Bechdell Test, created by Alison Bechdel, is a test that determines the representation of women in film. It determines this by a checklist; does the film have two women talking about something other than a man? It can also be determined by if the film even contains two named women. The test indicates the active presence of women in fiction in general, rather than a specific piece, calling attention to a lack of equal gender equality in fiction. It is evidenced that films that pass the test gross more on average than films which do not.
The Male Gaze:
The male gaze, initially coined as a concept to analyse the representation of women as objects rather than people in advertising and media, is the act of presenting women in fiction from a masculine perspective, presenting them as sexual objects for male viewers to desire. It has three perspectives: the man behind the camera, the male characters within the film, the male viewer.
Some directors in America had been inspired but the various methods of the French New Wave, such as focus on realism, hand-held camera work and improvised dialogue. The focus on serious plots had fallen after the decline of Hollywood, and the French New Wave galvanised some young American directors to take a more causal, relaxed and fun approach to filmmaking. This inspiration also culminated in rapid shifts in the tone of the film and abrasive/rough editing.
David Newman and Robert Benton were both screenwriters who had no particular style of screenwriting, or a focus on any particular genre, tone or motif. There was no recognisable aspect of their scripts that associated the film with the screenwriters. They took inspiration from the French New Wave in their approach to fun, causal film script as with often improvised dialogue or realistic dialogue. For example, they were both inspired by the unconventional relationship between the characters Patricia and Michel in Godard’s Breathless (Godard, 1960) In fact, Bonnie’s poem in the film mirrors the exchange of letters between Jim and Catherine in Jules et Jim (Truffaut, 1962) When writing the film, French New Wave director Francois Truffaut screened the film Gun Crazy (Joseph Lewis, 1950) as he had loved it. This also led to Warner Bros. Advertising the film as a violent crime genre film and star vehicle. It was the two scriptwriters who brought Penn onto the film when Truffaut himself could not.
A director who took inspiration from the French New Wave was Arthur Penn. He was a director who made his name through Bonnie and Clyde (Arthur Penn, 1967), and was not recognised for many other productions. He was a director-for-hire who did not have any recognisable motifs of his own, instead taking his ideas from the French New Wave style of directing, with a focus on realism and deliberately casual way of filmmaking. He favoured shooting on location with small production teams, many of his films displaying American myths/culture, Classic American genres and ‘outsider’ characters.
Dede Allen is considered an auteur Hollywood director, taking inspiration from the French New Wave and stylising jump cuts used for emotional effect, audio overlaps, placing continuity editing at a low priority and instead focusing on expressing the body-language of characters through cutting and conveying the plot in a nuanced way.
Warren Beatty, the actor who played Clyde Barrow in the film, also produced it and made up contributed attributions to the script through their improvised dialogue. He had wanted Clyde to be presented as a flawed protagonist, an anti-hero, and played the character that way. As producer, he made contributions that made the film what it was, an imperfectly produced film taking heavy inspiration from the French New Wave style of filmmaking. He hired Newman and Benton, selected most of the cast and oversaw the script’s development. His role in production reflects the rise of ‘star-auteurs’ in the 1960s, for example Jack Nicholson, who also directed and produced films.
While the Hollywood studio system was in decline and studios were having to search for new and interesting ways of conveying stories and making films, the filmmakers in France were experimenting with new and radically different methods of filmmaking. A group of young Cahiers Du Cinema writers/editors had began making films to contrast the perception of film as a high-art that adhered to a pre-existing, strict narrative convention. This resulted in new, low-budget productions that fox used on being deliberately poorly-made and brining the audiences attention to the production of the film itself, serving as fun, entertaining but often involving deeper themes, such as Jean Luc Godard’s repetition of reference to high-art in his films.
New French directors such as François Truffaut and Agnès Varda were focusing creating new, radical films that went against established conventions such as narrative linearity. This led to the rise of auteur directors like Godard, whose films became recognisable. These directors rejected the post-war “Tradition of Quality” in French Cinema which fell back on the comfort of old traditions emphasised old works over new and innovative films. These filmmakers sought to go against the safe adaptations of classical literary works and instead utilised low-budget equipment and deliberately poor-writing to create fun and poor-quality films. Godard, for example, considered the convention of narrative linearity oppressive and deterministic. They were inspired by Classical Hollywood and Italian Neo-Realism, adding their own contemporary, avant-garde styles of direction.
The French New Wave was most popular between the late 1950s and early 1960s. Most of these directors were born in Paris and grew up their in the 1930s, therefore their films related to the youth growing up in that city, such as through the representation of fashion, parties and urban-life.
American director Arthur Penn commented that “young people understood this movie instantly. They sae Bonnie and Clyde as rebels like themselves. It was a movie that spoke to a generation in a way none of use had really expected.” Anastasia & Macnow, 2011.
These directors used low-budget equipment such as hand-held cameras and film stock that required less light. This resulted in films with discontinuous editing, poor sound design and un-convincing acting. Questions raised but not answered in the film would raise narrative ambiguity through the combination of subjectivity and realism. Long takes, the use of jump-cuts and a sense of minimalism in the films were a result of a lack of stock to shoot with. The 180 degree axis would be broke, characters would step out of their roles to address the audience directly, rapid scene changes and improvised dialogue.
After the Paramount v.s U.S case in 1948, the 8 major Hollywood studios lost the legal right to control all the aspects of a films financing, production and distribution. This led to the decline of the Hollywood studio system, as the studios could no longer hold a monopoly on the film industry and theatres could choose what films to show. This allowed for increased access to the market from independent filmmakers and foreign films, such as ones from France. This led to increased competition between the studios, which in turn forced them to seek out more competitive and new types of films to guarantee them being shown by the cinemas.
The competition was intensified by the rise of the middle-class in America in the 1950-60s and the subsequent increased spending money Fiordland luxury items like radios and the newly created TV. Therefore, the rise of TV’s increased rapidly after 1950, and the studios had to compete with them as most audiences would rather have stayed at home rather than to travel further from the suburbs and pay to watch a film at a cinema. Therefore, the cinemas began to produce wider and more impressive screens to attract audiences to travel and pay to see new films there.
The increased market created through the new found freedom of cinemas to choose what to show, allowed for independent filmmakers to create more interesting and unique films that did not follow typical film narrative or convention. This meant increased freedom amongst filmmakers to make what they wanted, such as the increased possibilities to create films inspired by those from France.
Therefore, while the studios were tying to produce bigger and more entertaining films to draw in bigger audiences and therefore larger profits, independent films were being made by independent directors to produce films for more niche audiences that would be big enough to support these lower-budget films.
Before the decline of the studio system, very few foreign films were shown in the U.S. After the decline, there was increased space for films from places like Europe to be shown in Americans cinemas. This allowed for the recently formed French New Wave movement that had been formed by young, enthusiastic filmmakers from France who wanted to create new, fun, “improperly” made films that defied traditional film conventions, such as all focus being placed on the story. The increased screenings of these films in America led to some American filmmakers taking inspiration from them, and the increased need for the studios to produce better, more competitive and new films, allowed for films like those in the French New Wave, films like Bonnie and Clyde (Arthur Penn, 1967).
Arthur Penn, the film’s director, was active in the 1960s, making films that focused on the darker aspects of American society, particularly crime, following protagonists who were criminals on the run. He took heavy inspiration from the French New Wave movement and is largely associated with New Hollywood. He utilised radically different styles of filmmaking from the conventions established in the 1940s, shooting scenes in completely different ways, and deliberately editing, writing and shooting the films in a way that brought audience attention to the actual creation of the films, such as moment where sound randomly cuts out or a shot cuts to the same shot, just further on in time. This took heavily from the French New Wave, which focused on creating low-budget, fun and entertaining films.
Warner Bros. Was known for producing gritty, social realism crime dramas set in urban settings and typically following an experienced, dry detective, typically on a case involving murder or disappearance or kidnapping. This is what they were recognised for, and what audiences came to see, alongside the stable of stars they had, such as Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman.
Because of how crucial the actors were to the success of a film, the studio made efforts to boast them in advertising the film and in the film present them as more important, glamorous, important and larger-than-life. This is why Bergman is presented as glamorous and beautiful in Casablanca, and Rick is presented as gruff, weathered and experienced, as the audiences came to see the stars play their usual character types.
Because the unique selling point of Warner Bros. Films also being an attraction for audiences, they typically stuck to it in their films. This involved film noir tropes, like dark lighting, Smokey environments, characters who drink unhealthily, pessimistic attitudes, social issues, murder, shootouts and film noir fashion aesthetics, such as trench coats and fedoras.
Jack Warner, the head of Warner Bros. In 1942, was an interventionist in favour of joining the war in Europe. He wanted to produce a film that was pro-interventionist. Hal B. Wallis, the films producer, was also a republican in favour of preserving traditional American beliefs and values. Therefore, Casablanca is a romance film set in the war, and serves as an allegory of the war and America’s involvement in the war. Michael Curtiz, the films director, had focused on the ‘human-side’ of a story, typically following underdog, beaten-down heroes in his films, usually fighting against an upper, oppressive force, dealing with issues such as social injustice, oppression and exile, such as in Casablanca. Arthur Edeson, the director of photography, had built a career in portrait photography, which accounts for the emasculate presentation of the actors of importance and fame in Casablanca. The composer, Max Steiner, limited himself with how much his music held the attention of the audience, instead keeping the focus on the emotions meant to be evoked in the audience and presented in the film, which he would communicate through the music.
Jack Warner’s name is credited first and foremost in Casablanca, establishing his crucial role in the production of the film, which he wanted to serve as a pro-interventionist film. It was the work of Wallis, Curtiz, Steiner, Edeson and the stars that made the film what it was in the end, a patriotic romance film set in WW2.
In Hollywood during the 1930s, many different film genres were becoming popular. These included musicals, historic and biblical epics, comedies and so on. Because of the highly competitive studio system at the time, the big 5 major film studios all had a unique selling point for their films, for example MGM focused on bright, colourful and glitzy, glamorous musicals.
Warner Bros. Focused on gritty crime and gangster films, centred around social realism. This can be seen in their big star, Humphrey Bogart, who was known for not being a conventionally attractive film star, and was instead known for his rugged looks and weathered face. Around this time in Hollywood, particularly done by Warner Bros., the film noir movement was becoming popular. These were films centred around themes of pessimism and fatalism, typically characterised by gritty crime dramas following a weathered and burdened detective, smoking a cigar, sipping whiskey, wearing a trench coat and fedora while soft jazz played in the bar where they brooded over a tough case.
Because of Warner Bros.’ Focus on social realism and film noir, there are many aspects of Casablanca that reflect this, such as a brooding, pessimistic protagonist with an affinity for alcohol and cigarettes, much of the film being set in a dim and smoky bar/cafe, dim lighting, an elegant damsel in distress, corrupt police, and a (brief) murder mystery.
The studios at the time also boasted their stable of stars, glamorous and popular actors that would often serve as the pivot on which the film made money or not. The studios would plaster the faces of their biggest stars on posters, their names in big, bold letters. Stars, for this reason, would often play a caricature that they played in all films they were in, almost like they were playing themselves. Humphrey Bogart, for example, always played the gruff, weathered, pessimistic Rick, as that was what the audiences paid to see. The stars themselves were always presented in the most glamorous, eye-catching light in the films too, as the studios knew that they were what attracted most audiences. This is why Ilsa and Rick are presented the way that they are in the film.
Around the time that Casablanca was being produced, war had broken out in Europe, with France being occupied by Nazi Germany and England being pushed out of mainland Europe by Nazi Germany. Due to prevalent isolationist attitudes in America at the time, America had been refusing to get involved in the conflict, remaining completely neutral, as Rick does at the start of the film. Jack Warner, the head of Warner Bros. At the time, was an interventionist who believed that America should be getting involved in the war on the side of England and France and fighting against Germany. He wheeled Casablanca into production because he wanted there to be a film that was in support of a patriotic entrance into WW2 as the saviours of Europe and the victorious, powerful nation of America.
Black and white technology was old and commonly used by the 1940s, and colour was still a new expensive and unpolished/unperfected technology. Therefore, Casablanca was shot in black and white, as that technology had been perfected over decades of use and was viewed as a mature, beautiful way of filmmaking.
The Big Sleep (Howard Hawks, 1946) is another Warner Bros. Film noir movie starring Bogart as the lead, a private investigator.
Jack Leonard Warner was a businessman who worked alongside his brothers in the film industry in 1910. In 1917 he moved to L.A to open a film exchange and profit from the growing market there. He and his brother Sam struggled to make largely profitable or profitable films until 1927 (by which time Paramount, Universal and First National studios were Hollywood’s “Big Three”), when Sam also died from pneumonia. The Jazz Singer (1927, Alan Crosland) was the company’s first successful film, bringing in $3 million in profits despite only $500,000 being invested into it. It was also the first ever feature length “talky” film, as the other studios had been reluctant to incorporate sound in their films. Grieving at the loss of his brother, Jack ran the studio strictly, and gained the dislike of many of his employees. He also kept costs for film production low, and survived through the Great Depression relatively undamaged. He would often cast for the films, and in 1930 hired Joan Blondell, Frank McHugh and James Cagney, who went on to make 38 films with the studio.
Warner took credit ofr Casablanca (Michael Curtiz, 1942) by accepting the Oscar it received instead of the films producer Hal B. Wallis in 1943. During WW2, Warner Bros. Was one of the only studios to openly criticise the Nazis, whereas other did not for fear of losing a market in Europe. This culminated in his influence on Casablanca, which we wanted to be made to persuade the American public to be in support of joining the war in Europe. Rick is representative of America, at first reluctant to get involved but eventually dragged in because he knows that it is the right thing to do. It is lit, for example, to make Rick seem noble and Ilsa seem vulnerable. It is essentially a piece of propaganda. Around this period, he also fired many screenwriters, destroying their careers, for harbouring suspected communist sympathises. Despite being one of the first studios to introduce sound, Warner resisted the rise of TV in the post war era, tying to introduce things like 3-D films. These soon lost popularity, and Warner’s contempt for the new medium was made worse by TV actors increased freedom over film actors, and Warner perceived them as being ungrateful. Warner was said to be a ruthless business mogul and a decisive business man, also recognised amongst his employees for being unforgiving and cruel. He died in 1978 from heart inflammation.
Hal B. Wallis:
Hal B. Wallis joined the Warner Bros. production department in 1923, and eventually joined the production branch of the company and become the head of production. Over his 50 year career, he would produce over 400 feature length movies. He won the Academy Award for Best Picture in March 1944 for Casablanca, but the award was taken by Jack L. Warner who rushed on stage to take it instead. This caused Wallis to leave Warner Bros the next month. He went on to work as an independent worker for some time and gaining success, before eventually joining Universal Pictures. He received 16 academy award producer nominations, was twice honoured in their memorial award, nominated for 7 Golden Globe awards, winning awards for best picture twice, and in 1975 won the Golden Globe award for lifetime achievement in motion pictures. Wallis, like Warner, was a Republican in favour of preserving American values and ideals. Who supported Eisenhower’s election in 1952.
Michael Curtiz:
Michael Curtiz made a number of film in Europe, being Hungarian himself, before moving to America where he went on to work for Warner Bros. His sister, step-bother and their children were killed in Auschwitz after he left Europe. He considered the ‘human-side’ of films the most important aspect, alongside a plot that developed as the film went on. His characters often dealt with social issues like injustice, oppression exile. He would always place emphasis on the struggle of the beaten down and repressed members of society against the higher-ups and powerful, even when working across several different genres, and this is evident in Casablanca. He also claimed that each director’s “work is reflection of himself”.
Arthur Edeson:
Edeson utilised the skills he head learned from still and portrait photography for Casablanca. He would make modelling suggestions and be more careful in his placement of shadows, etc, whereas most lighting at the time was flat lighting. His methods produced a more soft, portrait like-image in the films he made.
Max Steiner:
Max Steiner was an influential and respected composer who found success in the film noir genre in particular. He was an auteur in his own right, using music to change or emphasise the tone or pace of a scene, the characters emotions or how they are presented to the audience, as is seen in Casablanca. He followed his own instincts, so if he saw a scene that he felt did not portray, for example, the emotion of a character well enough, he would add music to accompany it and highlight that characters emotions or thought process to the audience nice more, making the moment more impactful and meaningful to them. He would subordinate himself to the music and know when to start and stop, limiting himself on the extent he would show off his score, as he felt that if a composer showed off too much it would subtract from the emotion and meaning of a film. “If you get too decorative, you lose your appeal to the emotions. My theory is that the music should be felt rather than heard.” Although Steiner at first did not like the usage log As Time Goes By in Casablanca, Ingrid Bergman had cut her hair short for another film and so could not re-shoot the scenes with it in. Therefore, he embraced the song and centred his score around it, making it the main/centre score.
Due to the size and influence of Hollywood as a centre for the American film industry in the 1930s, many artists were taking inspiration and ideas from one another as to how a film should be made. Experiments were made in camera movements, cinematography, mise-en-scen, etc. The result was the basis for all narrative cinema made today, many films of interest being ones that deviate from this structure, which is known as the Classical Hollywood Style.
The Classical Hollywood Style:
The classical Hollywood style refers to the widely used structure of filmmaking that rose in 1930s Hollywood. This structure paid all focus on production to the stars and the narrative of a film, so works to keep the audiences attention on these. Directors made their films to be so engaging and immersive for the audiences that saw it that they would not even notice the structural aspects of the film, such as editing, fake sets, actors, etc.
An example of how this was done is through editing. A very common way of shooting a scene would be to have a long shot of two characters, establishing their positions and distance to each each other. Then, a wide shot showing the two characters closer to the camera, bringing the audience further into the dialogue, which the directors wanted the audience to pay attention to. Then a close up would shot one character alone talking to show their face, and then an over the shoulder shot looking from behind them at the other person, and then the scene would shot-reverse-shot between over the shoulder shots to seamlessly bring the audience into the moment and the dialogue without distracting them with visuals, abrupt edits, etc. Everything centred around the story.
The stars were also a focal point for the filmmakers. For example, the cinematographers were in charge of making the actresses look glamorous and beautiful, and the villains held in shadow and dark areas. This is an example of how the director would direct the audiences attention, and inform them how to feel. This would also be done through emotional music. Melodramatic acting, exotic and expansive sets made in the studios, 3 act structures, linear narratives and conventional characters are also staples of the classical Hollywood style.
Long shots were used to immerse the audience and reveal lots of information, such as the layout of an environment, without making many cuts to potentially ruin immersion in the story. POV shots also grew in usage in this time period, effective for showing a character as they were and immersing the audience in the characters emotions and thought process in that moment. It tells them exactly how that character feels int hat moment we see it from their perspectives. Parallel editing done through cross cutting became popular to involve the audience in the plot further and raise the tension, thereby gaining their undivided attention.
In the 1930s and early 1940s, the studio system held almost complete control over the film industry. Because of their system of vertical integration, by 1945 they owned 17% of all theatres in America, and held exclusive partnerships with 45%, so 62% of all theatres in America could only show films by the studio they were owned by or partnered with. For this reason, it was impossible for foreign or independent, indie films to be shown anywhere. The studios, therefore, held an unfair oligopoly on the industry, dominating all productions that U.S audiences saw. For this reason, filmmakers complained to the U.S department of justice, which claimed that this was an illegal situation, so it was brought to court in 1938.
The 1938 trial:
As Paramount was the biggest studio at the time, it was the main defendant, with the other big 5 and little 3 studios as co-defendants. The case was settled in 1940, with the settlement that by the end of 1943 the studios could continue operating as they did currently, but they would have to follow 4 directives if the case was not to be revisited. These were, 1.
1. They could no longer couple larger films with B-Movies and force theatres to do so, i.e they couldn’t block buck short films along with their longer films.
2. They could continue to do this when allowed by a theatre, but could show no more than 5 of their films at a time. Therefore, they couldn’t force the theatres to show only their films, holding a monopoly on what was shown to the audiences.
3. “Blind-buying” was made illegal. This was where the studios would refuse to tell the theatres what they were being paid to show, so now the theatres could be shown the film and say whether or not they wanted to show it.
4. There had to be a voluntary nation wide administration board to make sure these things happened.
The studios completely ignored these directives and continued on as they had before the case. For this reason, when the case was reviewed, it was sent to the Supreme Court in 1948.
The 1948 Trial:
The verdict reached in this trial went entirely against the studios. It was made illegal in the U.S for film studios to own film theatres. This forced the studios to sell all of their theatres in a certain amount of time, and sent the entire studio system crashing down. This was made worse by the simultaneous suburbanisation away from cities so that more audiences lived further away from cinemas, and the rise of affordable TV, making it so that people could watch film from home. This led to studio companies going bankrupt, being bought and sold, losing money, etc. The Golden Age of Hollywood was over, ended by a sudden and severe decline.
In the long term, this had a positive effect. The studios were forced to be more competitive, This ushered in a ‘new age of Hollywood’ in which there was opportunity for foreign films to be shown, indie films and indie filmmakers to gain traction, and more experimental, artistic work not made so much for profit as for artistic value to be shown to American audiences.
In the U.S filmmaking was viewed as a business. Groups formed organisations and competed with each other to make more money from their film productions to invest into the next ones. Because of this spirit of entrepreneurship, in the 1920s a group of film studios were formed to produce, promote and distribute quality films and collect the profits for them to make the next one even more attractive to audiences. 5 main studios grew to such a significant extent that they owned most of the productions, cinemas, actors, etc. These were MGM, Paramount, Fox Film Corporation, Warner Bros. And RKO. Each one of these held a unique selling point that was specific to them as a studio. For example, Warner Bros. Made dark, gritty crime films, whereas Paramount was known for light entertainment and comedy. MGM produced bright, glitzy and glamorous pictures, RKO produced horror and film noir movies. There were also 3 smaller studios, United Artists, Columbia Pictures, and Universal Pictures.
These studios were vertically integrated, so that they owned every stage of the production process. From the initial birth of an idea to its final showing in cinemas, the film was owned entirely by a single studio. The studios also owned the actors, directors, editors and everyone else involved in the production process through contracts. After the studio system rose, the star system did.
The Star System: and unbreakable contracts:
The fame, looks, personality and prestige of certain actors became the main selling point for a film, for example Humphrey Bogart was recognisable as playing hardened, heroic figures, and Marilyn Monroe was distinct for her beauty and charm. The studios recognised their profitability, and competed fiercely to employ actors through contracts to make as much money through as many films as them as possible. Though the actors were paid well, they were kept bound to work under a single studio through ‘unbreakable contracts’. They had to work in a certain amount of films, and to keep the actors under their payroll, the studios would often not make any more films with them to avoid them from escaping these contracts.
The fall of the Studio System:
When the Great Depression struck in the 1940s, the big 5 studios were hit hard, RKO eventually collapsing, while the others were bought and sold between bigger companies. The 3 other, smaller film studios prevalent in the ‘Golden Age of Hollywood’ survived this crash through various methods. Universal was located outside of Hollywood, and adapted by changing to producing Blockbusters instead in a gamble to make more money. United Artists was made to give better deals for the artists involved alongside the studio, and Columbia were not vertically integrated, choosing instead to produce ‘B movies’ which they sold to the bigger studios to be screened in their cinemas to accompany the larger productions. They were also one of the first studios to embrace TV in the 1950’s and 1960’s, selling their own studios in 1972.
The “Golden Age of Hollywood” began in the late 1920s as silent films centred around comedy and romance and action served as popular escapism for audiences living through the Great Depression. As theatres closed, cinemas took over, and studio systems were created to profit off what was becoming a very popular, commercial source of entertainment as it advanced through colour, sound, etc.
5 main studios arose and dominated the industry, MGM, Paramount, Fox, Warner Bros and RKO. These studios were vertically integrated, so owned every stage of the production process and employed everyone involved in it. They contracted the editors, writers, directors and stars, owned the cinemas, cameras, etc. This led to the rise of the ‘star system’ alongside the ‘studio system’. Similarly to the studios, these stars became extremely wealthy and powerful, many driving a films entire box office success. February 5, 1919, some of these influential stars unionised and formed Artists United, and the stars who formed it were Charlie Chaplin, D.W Griffith, Marie Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks. It served as a major investor in and distributor of independently produced films in the U.S.
The Art Deco aesthetic rose to popularity in Hollywood, and the industry was monopolised by the extremely powerful and influential film studios. Actors were fought over by studios be be contracted, as they could make or break a movies box office success.
Auteur: “An artist with a distinctive approach, usually a film director whose filmmaking control is so unbounded but personal that the director is likened to the “author” of the film, which thus manifests the directors unique style or thematic focus.”
The auteur theory began in the 1950s when Cahiers du Cinema began to hail certain directors as ‘auteur’ directors for having demonstrated particular artistic skill while working in a studio system. These early examples include Alfred Hitchcock and Orson Wells.
Auteur theory claims that the director holds complete creative control over the audio and visual aspects of the film, is more so the “author” than the writer of the screenplay. This is the concept of camera-pen. Fundamental elements such as camera placement, lighting, scene length, etc. convey the message of the film rather than the plot line. Supporters of the theory will also claim that the most cinematically successful films are those with an unmistakable sign of its director. Personal expression is key to being classed as an auteur, and an auteur director is more concerned with aesthetic/style and themes than structure and content, giving their films a signature flair. It may not have to be an artistic interpretation of the world, but rather an artistic vision or style specific to the director. A director can be considered an auteur for a distinct visual style, such as Wes Anderson, or for thematic interest, or or being considered an innovator in a specific genre, such as Ridley Scott, or experimenting with established conventions such as narrative, or another reason. Auteurship reinforces the ideal of individual perspective building upon conventions to build something new.
The theory has been criticised for not recognising the value and role of the various crew of a film or the social/cultural/production context or genre it was made in. It is more so the main vision of the director guiding the crew, but often the voice of the other people making the film can come through aswell as the directors. Many producers have been recognised for their own voice and vision influencing the voice. Scores, screenplays, etc. can be more recognisable, or combine to create the overall film, its style, etc. The author of the film can be more than just the director. Auteur theory is a policy. It is a theory used to identify, but is not a rule, the films quality does not depend on an authorial voice or who gave it that, but is used to understand whose personal creative voice influenced the film, even if the director is not the only factor in the films final image.
Narrative is made up of 3 components. Story, plot and narrative. Story is what the audience internalises in their minds. It is everything that occurs in the film from start to end, including events that the audience infer. The plot is what happens in the film, what is shown, allowing the audience to construct the story in their heads. It can begin anywhere in the chain of events, and can lead backwards or forwards. Narrative is how perspective is shown, i.e how the information is conveyed by the film to the audience. The flow of information from a positioned viewpoint.
In Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994) Tarantino uses the narrative to change the audiences understanding of events happening through changing perspectives. The characters, settings, story and key events are already familiar to the audience, as they are traditional, established crime thriller tropes/cliches. So, Tarantino constructs the narrative in an unfamiliar way, and therein lies the audiences enjoyment. Also, the fragmentation of the plot creates a sense of anticipation, because the audience knows what to expect, but don’t know when it will happen.
Tarantino also subverts the traditional 3 act structure which is a storytelling model dividing a story into 3 acts, the set up, confrontation, and resolution, in that order. In Pulp Fiction, each story, such as Vincent and Jewels’ arc, can be taken individually and told in a 3 act structure. E.g they travel to the apartment in act 1, the inciting incident, in act 2, the confrontation, they are attacked by one of the men and take a hostage, act 3 , the climax, they clean up a dead body and are confronted in the diner by the robbers. However, the film as a whole does not follow this structure, as it’s plot is so split up.
Tarantino also subverts audience expectations by following the 3 most common types of narrative simultaneously. The film follows a linear narrative (events play out in order from start to end) as each story plays out in a linear fashion by itself. It is circular (the narrative starts at the end and returns back to that point at the end of the film by going back in time) by showing the diner robbery at the start and end of the film. It is also episodic (the narrative has clearly separated sections, often broken up by a title, date, or usage of a narrator) as it uses inter titles to bring the film into new sections, such as “the Gold watch” or “the Bonnie situation”.
The film uses Prolepsis (edit to a later point in time) and analepsis (edit to an earlier point in time), and elipsis, which is where part of the story is emitted and later on learned of by the audience. Pulp Fiction deliberately hides things from the audience for them to learn later on, such as the diner robbers being in the same diner as Vincent and Jewels, or Vincent and Jewels entering the restaurant to see Wallace while Butch is there.
Tarantino also combines the 3 types of narrative viewpoint. It uses restricted (the audience only know as much as the protagonist, or character the film is following) such as when Vincent and Jewels are unaware of the man in the bathroom apartment, and at the time we, too, are unaware. We also see things from an unrestricted viewpoint (the audience sees aspects of the narrative the character it follows does not), like when Mia overdoses on heroin, thinking its cocaine, when we, the audience, know that it is heroin and cannot be sniffed as she does so. Tarantino mixes and switches between these as he sees fit.
He also uses different narrative devices in Pulp Fiction, such as title cards (the definition of pulp fiction at the start of the film establishing the well-known cliches of the film), intertitle cards, chattering that splits the film into 3 distinct chapters bookended by the diner robbery. Tarantino also utilises audience positioning in an interesting way. Vincent and Jewels are hired hitmen, Wallace is a murdering crime boss, Butch is a man who is willing to kill, lie and cheat for personal gain, Fabienne makes no moral judgement over it, Jimmy is happy to let gangsters into his house and dismember a body. All of the characters in the film are repugnant characters, and yet in the film we like them to various degrees.
So we are definitely positioned to enjoy being in the company in Vincent and Jewels who are charismatic, humorous or stylish. Lance is a scummy drug dealer, but is funny to listen to. We are being manipulated and positioned to sympathise with characters we wouldn’t normally. We are positioned to view the two men in the basement scene as horrible, but they are not much worse than the other characters, except in the context of the film they are the villains. The audience sympathies might shift throughout different points in the film, as in the beginning we follow the diner robbers, but later on they are from central characters to perifiral ones and we now care about Jewel’s reaction to the situation. We follow Vincent and Jewels, then Vincent and Mia, and the film shifts focus onto Mia, so the audience positioning is fluent and shifting.
There are academics who have invented narrative theories. Vladimir Propp studied Russian folklore and realised 7 character types throughout hundreds of stories. The hero, the villain, the princess, the donor, the dispatcher, the helper, the false hero. They are very vain characters. They will conform to these character types vein if those types are not present. In pulp fiction these traditional character types are not conformed into the script, as no character is one particular type, no villain, no single hero, etc. The second was that any story has up to 31 narrative functions. There are 31 things that can happen in a story. Any story will have some of them, but they will be in order. Pulp fiction is not in order, as the throes only works in linear stories/narratives. His theories are accepted as true, but Tarantino has created an interesting narrative as it doesn’t follow these audience expectations in terms of character types or narrative structure.
Propp
The second narrative theories is tzvetan todorov. Equilibrium theory. He said that any story has 5 stages. Those are equilibrium, disruption of equilibrium, recognition of disruption, resolution, new equilibrium. Tarantino does not give the audience this, what they expect.
Todorov
Roland Barthes invented the narrative codes theory. All stories have two narrative codes, which he identified as action and enigma codes. All stories have things that make audiences want to continue. Action codes are when a thing happens physically that you want to see what happens next, such as the shootout scene. Enigma codes are something that is intriguing that makes you want to know more. Such as the golden suitcase. Tarantino provides the codes, but does not necessarily give you what you want despite you seeing it. We never see what’s in the case. You are not given the satisfaction of the explanation. After Butch driving off, we don’t see what happens next to him.
Barthes
Claude Levi-Strauss invented binary opposition. Audience engagement is driven by tension between binary opposites. In any story there are tensions between opposites. The interplay drive the narrative and audience interest. It works for pulp fiction. There are binary oppositions, and that’s what creates interest.
Pulp Fiction was written by Quentin Tarantino between 1992 and 1993, and was originally turned down by Tristar pictures for being ‘too demented.’, but was the fist film fully distributed by Miramax after co-chairman Harvey Weinstein saw it. It won the Palme d’Or at Cannes film festival in 1994, having been made with a budget of $8.5 million and eventually making a box office success of $213.9 million.
It is considered by critics as a touchstone of post modern film due to its entirely unique and unconventional narrative structure. It’s use of an A-List cast also brought the film much attention, regardless of the long-anticipated second film by the director, who had made notoriety after his 1992 crime thriller Reservoir dogs brought him into the mainstream.
Pulp Fiction is an experimental film, telling a conventional, cliche gangster story through a nuanced form of narrative. They film was also so influential due to Tarantino’s use of violence to ironically create humour and snappy and clever dialogue that does not add to the plot in any way, self-reflexive style, all which would come to represent Tarantino as an auteur director. The film homages more classic, indie cinema, and is considered his masterpiece particularly for its screenplay.
Tarantino created a riveting and enthralling movie by maintaining an escalating plot that is conveyed in a more nuanced way by the unique narrative. His dialogue is also honest and genuine-seeming, as characters talk among themselves about topics that don’t necessarily relate to the plot in any way, building his characters and their views on different matters. There is always something at stake in his films, creating conflict in all interactions, no matter how trivial, which maintains the viewers’ attention. He also handles subtext in a way that maintains tensity in a scene, and therefore viewer interest, as seen in the prologue scene in the diner.
He was closely involved in the production process, communicating with the actors and giving direct instructions. He uses non-diegetic music to add to his scenes, adding a style, pace to tone to a scene. In pulp fiction, Tarantino uses the narrative structure to reveal things about the characters, such as Vincent’s death due to his dismissal of Jewel’s moral awakening after a near death experience. He also immerses the audience into the narrative immediately by having two people discussing organised crime casually, bringing them into the story and the characters. By the end of the film, our perspective has changed a lot between characters, as Tarantino follows separate characters and revealing things about them between scenes, such as Jewel’s job to kill, the resolution of Butch and Wallaces conflict, and Vega’s death. Characters feel relatable due to the clever dialogue, scenes are engaging through dialogue undertones andcasual violence, and an engaging narrative that immerses the audience through what it reveals about the plot and how it keeps the audience on their toes. It also uses experimentalism in the narrative structure to create a new and subjective experience for the audience who can view the film in a way they want, therefore encouraging audience participation through a structure that demands attention and experimental methods that create a memorable and engaging audience experience.
Pulp Fiction (Quentin Tarantino, 1994) is crime/gangster thriller that follows multiple characters whose arcs intertwine and play out in a non-chronological order. The film is split up into five stories/sequences that swap perspectives between different characters at different points in the story.
The film is told in a unique way, as the plot does not play out chronologically, but rather the separate parts of the film are show in a jumbled and non-consecutive order. For example, the prologue, showing two people robbing a diner, is played again at the end of the film from another characters perspective. However, this scene is not the final in the story, only the plot, as they are separate in this film.
The film holds a significant place in history, as the methods through which it was told, i.e the narrative structure, use of violence and swearing, casual conversation, etc. were very new to film at the time. Tarantino took a cliche, conventional film genre and made it his own, individual work through distinct dialogue, tropes specific to him as a filmmaker, and a unique narrative structure.
I personally very much enjoyed Pulp Fiction. I enjoyed listening to the clever dialogue, the violent and shocking action sequences, the moments of intensity and the interesting mode of telling an entertaining and stylistic story. Tarantino utilises signature actors and iconic, classy music to give the film a slick aesthetic. It’s characters and quotes are iconic, and the story is intriguing and riveting. I rate Pulp Fiction ★★★★★!
While film was viewed more as an art form in Europe, it became a commercial enterprise in America. In the backdrop of the Great Depression of the 1930’s, the film industry was propelled forwards by aspiring businessmen and audiences who desired some form of escapism. The introduction of audio to films also brought more people to theatres and made more possibility’s for musicals, comedies, romance and western genres, which became the most successful and popular in the 1930’s. Entrepreneurs viewed it as a business opportunity, so film studios were formed and began to buy up the rights to actors and competed against others, and had moved there in the first place to avoid copyright infringement lawsuits by Tomas Edison. They wanted to make a large a profit as possible so that they could invest it into their next film project, making that bigger and more enticing to audiences, to make more profit, and so on.
They aimed to attract as many people to the theatres, which they owned, as possible, and they did this by hiring notable stars, directors, etc, and exercising complete control over the production process so as to keep the final product exactly as they wanted it. Genre films like comedies and romances emerged and became more popular as audiences flocked to the theatres to see the stars, not the plots. Similarly to how slapstick comedies were so popular during the era of silent cinema. Names like Gary Fonda and Marilyn Monroe became known by viewers everywhere, and studios hired these actors and actresses through contracts that prevented them from working for other studios. Audiences came for the glamour of the stories, fantasy and actors, and studios took advantage of this by owning every step of the production process, from production to distribution and exhibition.
The commercialisation of film as an industry led to it being dominated by 5 main studios (Paramount, RKO, MGM, Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox), and the production of films becoming an efficient, assembly line process, where actors and directors were viewed as assets by the studios, who were at the top of the creative process, instead of the filmmaker or government, such as in Russia or Germany at the time. This meant that films were much more focused on entertainment and attraction than artistic expression or experimentation. While patriotic films did emerge during WW2, there was little experimentation with new techniques, as people made films for money and fame. “Screwball comedy” became the most significant comedy genre in the 1930’s, characterised by fast paced, witty dialogue and containing elements of romance and adult humour. This was essentially the first form romantic comedy, and it attracted large audiences who looked for escapism from the economic climate of the 1930’s. The amount of money that the industry made was used to invest in films with bigger stars, sets, equipment and locations etc. Traditional American values like optimism and courage were celebrated and displayed in these films, taking people away from the Depression at the time and being immersed in the motion pictures they saw.
Up until 1892 film wasn’t really film. It was just a meagre sea-side attraction, something that rapidly played images to create the illusion of a moving photo. The first film was invented in 1892, when inventor and entrepreneur Thomas Edison created the kinetograph. This was the first ever motion picture camera that would play film tape. Film tape was equally important, invented by Louis Le Prince in the late 1880’s, it was a celluloid tape that, when exposed to light, would project an image. This was the first ingredient in film, the kinetograph was the plate it was served on.
Whilst innovative, the kinetograph could only be viewed by one person at a time, and through a small peephole at that. It was the Lumiere Brothers that invented the cinematographe. This was different from the kinetograph since it was also capable of projecting images! This changed everything,as it meant that movies could be viewed by more than on person at a time, cinemas could be opened up, new film making techniques could be invented. This new device could record, develop, and most importantly project film! Film-making now had the capability of becoming an industry, rather than a curious novelty.
On December 28, 1895, the Lumiere Brothers filmed a movie. It took place at the Grand Cafe in Paris, France. This was one of the biggest innovations of the decade, and opened up thousands of possibility’s for aspiring directors, starts, producers, etc.
George Melies also had a big impact on the creation of film. One day George was filming with his camera, when suddenly it turned off. He turned it back on again and proceeded filming, but after watching the tape that he’d produced he noticed when the camera turned off, everyone in frame tuned into something else! Men were replaced with women, a woman with a horse! Melies was the first person to realise that substitution splices could be used to make it look as if the camera was swapping places. Now, film didn’t have to be one large continuous shot, but could be recorded in multiple places, and swap whenever. This shocked audiences, as it was such a new innovation in the world of cinema.
A Trip To The Moon(George Melies, 1902). Georges most famous invention. The iconic image of the rocket hitting the moon is a famous example of his method of substitution splices.
George Melies is also said to have introduced double-exposure in film in 1898. This was another trick that George used to simulate illusions on the screen. This involved paying two tapes over one another, exposing both of them to light to create a moving image, but letting one stop at a point and the other continue. This creates the image of two separate rethinks happening at the same time. It was used to make it look as if a ghost was leaving someones body, or their spirit leaving their unconscious body, as seen in the 1924 comedy Sherlock Jr.(Buster Keaton, 1924).
Since film was becoming a massive industry by now, more people wanted to make money out of it. In December of 1895 the first cinema was established. This provided a means for filmmakers to show their works to bigger audiences, and make profit from the ticket sales. Most cinemas were actually just made from old theatres though, since they were the main from of entertainment up until now. This provided a means for movies to become an enormous industry, and with the creation of Hollywood it was now seen as a golden opportunity to invest in.
This is why in 1893 film studios were established by entrepreneurs. These companies started to set themselves up in Hollywood, and found new ways of making money. They would project movies on bigger screens, with bigger, more beautiful stars. Company’s like Warner Bros and Paramount competed for more sales. They bought actors from each other, battled over better directors, invested in larger screenings. They knew that they would make more if they made it an experience for the viewer. They bought the film makers, studios, equipment, and the cinemas in which they screened the films. They utilised this massive industry for a massive profit, and became extremely powerful from it.
Colour was first implemented into film in 1917, in the movie The Gulf Between(Wray Bartlett Physioc, 1917). It was accomplished by playing a film through two projectors, one with a red filter and one through a green one. This was revolutionary, and played a pivotal role in making films come to life! Up until this point synchronised sound was not an aspect of film, and the only audio in a movie was typically music added in for effect. There was no dialogue until 1927, when actor Al Jolson ad-lobbed a few words in the movie The Jazz Singer(Alan Crosland, 1927). This was massive, as now messages didn’t have to be conveyed to the audience through text on the screen or the way that the actors moved.
Hollywood in the 1940’s, at the height of its golden age.
Finley Cairns A-Level Film Studies Blog 
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