Film Theory
Film Theory
Film Theory
WikipediaDavid Bordwell: Website on Cinema
David Bordwell is, if you are going to read film theorist, the one to read. See generally: David Bordwell, Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989) and David Bordwell & Noël Carroll, Post-Theory: Reconstructing Film Studies (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1996) [David Bordwell--Wikipedia]Film Interpretation Revisited
David BordwellFilm Studies
Part of a sprawling site media studies and communications maintained by David Chandler, University of Wales, AberystwythDo We Need Film Theory?
Noël CarrollSynthesizing Approaches in Film Theory
Henry Bacon["Film addresses us and involves us on all levels of perception and consciousness. Thus
it has to be studied in a variety of ways and using a whole range of methods and
approaches."]
Film Criticism after Grand Theories
Contemporary Film Theory in China
The Ultimate Journey: Remarks on Contemporary Theory
Is an Overarching Theory of Affect in Film Viewing Possible?
Carl Plantinga & Ed TanReflections on Disciplines (including Film Studies) and Their Role in Universities
Two or Three Things I Know About Meaning
Is Film Theory Bullshit? A Look Back at Noël Carroll's Mystifying Movies
Stephen RowleyFilm and Film Theory
Karl J. Skutski; a collection of links to websites["Film can be studied on many levels--as an art form, social commentary, historic record, reflection of the Zeitgeist of an era or culture, a philosophical or spiritual experience, or pure entertainment."]
Film Theory and Theory Critics (Wikipedia)
Rudolph Arheim
André Bazin
Theory: Transplanted Literary Criticism
Politics and Ideology
The Yellow Menace in American Popular Film: 1991 through 1995
Socialist Realism
Bibliography: Michael Ryan & Douglas Kellner, Camera Politica: The Politics and Ideology of Contemporary Hollywood Film (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988); Graeme Turner, Film as Social Practice (London: Routledge, 2nd ed., 1993); Bill Nichols, Ideology and the Image (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981)
Course Syllabi
Film Studies
David
Bordwell Blows the Whistle on Film Studies
article in Lingua Franca, 2000
Bibliography
Theoretical Frameworks
Aesthetics
Film Theory and Aesthetics: Notes on a Schism
Carl Palantinga, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism
Anarchist Theory
Toward an Anarchist Film Theory: Reflections on the Politics of Cinema
Nathan Jun
Apparatus Theory
Apparatus Theory
Wikipedia
Auteur Theory
Auteur Theory
Wikipedia
Cognitive Theory
A Case for Cognitivism
David Bordwell (1989)A Case for Cognitivism: Further Reflections
David Bordwell
Feminist Theory
Feminist Film Theory
WikipediaFeminist Film Theory
Anneke SmelikFeminist Film Theory
Anneke SmelikFeminist Film Theory and Female Spectatorship
Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema
Laura Mulvey, Screen, 1975Rethinking Critical Strategies in Feminist Film Theory and Criticism
Masters thesis, Carleton UniversityBibliography: Judith Mayne, The Woman at the Keyhole: Feminism and Women's Cinema (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1990); Constance Penley (ed.), Feminism and Film Theory (London: Routledge, 1988)
Formalist Film Theory
Formalist Film Theory
Wikipedia
Genre Theory
An Introduction to Genre Theory
Bibliography: Nick Browne (ed.), Refiguring American Film Genres (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998)
Humanistic Approach
The Humanistic Approach to Film: "My Brilliant Career"
Coralie Cederna Johnson (citing “The Humanist Approach: Traditional Aesthetic Responses to the Movies,”in Bywater & Sobchack, Introduction to Film Criticism 24-47 (New York: Longman, 1989))
[" Everyone seeing a film for the first time makes a value judgment, even if it is only based on an emotional response, but the humanist goes back to probe these initial responses more deeply. The student of the humanist approach seeks to learn what film can tell about the human condition by searching for the answers to several questions asked of other art forms. What kinds of ideas—political, religious, historical, or philosophical—are hidden beneath the surface of film?"]Film as an Art and the Humanistic Tradition
filmreference.comHumanistic Inquiry and Political Signification in Film Studies
filmreference.comThe Meandering Through Textuality Challenge
Stephen Ramsay, based on a talk given at the Modern Language Association (MLA)
Marxist Theory
Marxist Film Theory
Wikipedia
Phenomenology
Phenomenological Film and Media Studies
Faraway, So Close: A Phenomenology of Film Spectatorship
Frank C. Lemmon, thesis, Emory UniversityBibliography: Allen Casebier, Film and Phenomenology: Toward a Realist Theory of Cinema (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1991); Vivian Sobchack, The Address of the Eye: A Phenomenology of Film Experience (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1991) [Vivian Sobchack -- Wikipedia] [Vivian Sobchack Interview]
Postmodernism
Postmodernist Film
Wikipedia
Post-Structuralism
Psychoanalytic Theory
Psychoanalytic Film Criticism
WikipediaScreening Desire, Projecting Anxiety: The Psychoanalysis of Film
Psychoanalysis, Film, and Television
Films from the Couch: Film Theory and Psychoanalysis
Pedro Sangro ColónPsychoanalysis and Film Theory: ‘A New Kind of Mirror'
Psychoanalysis and Film Theory: Reflections and Refutations
Modern Film Theory and its Postmodern Psychoanalytic Critique--with Roland Barthes
Troels Degn JohanssonMulholland Dr. and Psychoanalytic Theory
Bibliography: Christian Metz, The Imaginary Signifier: Psychoanalysis and the Cinema (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1981)
Rhetoric
Rhetoric and Media Studies
Whitman CollegeAn Approach to Rhetoric of Film in the Classroom
Teresa Fernandez Ulloa, California State University, BakersfieldFilm, Classical Rhetoric, and Visual Literacy
Colleen Tremonte, Journal of Teaching WritingToward a Rhetoric of Film: Identification and the Spectator
Gilberto Perez, Senses of CinemaBibliography: John Harrington, Rhetoric of Film (New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1973)
Schema Theory
Organization of Knowledge: Networks and Schemas
A Cognitive Schematic Analysis of Film
Gregory George Hale, Ph.D. dissertation
Semiotics
Are TV and Film Like a Language Which we Read?
The Cognitive Semiotics of Film
Warren BucklandBibliography: Christian Metz, Film Language: A Semiotics of the Cinema (New York: Oxford University Press, 1974)(transl. Michael Taylor); Jean Mitry, Semiotics and the Analysis of Film (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2000)(transl. Christopher King); Warren Buckland, The Cognitive Semiotics of Film (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000)
Structuralist Theory
Structuralist Film Theory
Wikipedia
Transpersonal Dimensions
Resources for Further Inquiry into Transpersonal Dimensions of the Cinema
Recommend Reading
Robert C. Allen (ed.), Channels of Discourse: Television and Contemporary Criticism (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1987)
Essays focus on television but draw extensively on film theory. The essays on narrative, genre study, psychoanalysis, feminist criticism, semiotics, and reader-oriented criticism are accessible for novice students; each author presents a helpful survey of bibliographical sources for the theory surveyed.
J. Dudley Andrew, The Major Film Theories: An Introduction (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976)
David Bordwell, Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989)
Bordwell's book is a bit philosophical for the beginner but presents a brilliant analysis of the way film critics find and create meaning in "reading" film. There are references to hundreds of films, many which the casual film viewer will not have seen.
A review of Making Meaning: Critical Occasions: David Bordwell's Making Meaning and the Institution of Film Criticism
David Bordwell: David Bordwell's website on cinema
Bibliography: Film Theory and Criticism
Rudolph Arnheim, Film as Art (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1969)
André Bazin, What Is Cinema? (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967-71) (Essays selected and translated by Hugh Gray)(2 vols.)
__________, Bazin at Work: Major Essays & Reviews from the Forties & Fifties (New York: Routledge, 1997)(trans. Alain Piette and Bert Cardullo, Bert Cardullo ed.)
Giuliana Bruno, Streetwalking on a Ruined Map (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1993)
Noël Burch, Theory of Film Practice (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981)(trans. Helen R. Lane)
__________, In and Out of Synch: The Awakening of a Cine-dreamer (Brookfield, Vermont: Wildwood House, 1990)
Tim Bywater & Thomas Sobchack, An Introduction to Film Criticism: Major Critical Approaches to Narrative Film (New York: Longman, 1989) (Film criticism from a journalistic, humanist, auteurist, genre, social science, historical, and ideological/theoretical perspectives)
Stanley Cavell, The World Viewed: Reflections on the Ontology of Film (New York: Viking Press, 1971)
Paul Coates, Film at the Intersection of High and Mass Culture (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1994)
Jim Collins, Hilary Radner & Ava Preacher Collins (eds.), Film Theory Goes to the Movies (London: Routledge, 1993)
Anthony Easthope (ed.), Contemporary Film Theory (Longman Higher Education, 1994)
Sergei Eisenstein, Film Form and The Film Sense (Cleveland: World Publishing Co., 1963)
______________, The Film Sense (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, rev. ed., 1975) (trans. & ed., Jay Leyda)
John Ellis, Visible Fictions: Cinema, Television, Video (New York; Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1982)
Brian Henderson, A Critique of Film Theory (New York: E.P. Dutton, 1980)
Ian Jarvie, Philosophy of Film: Epistemology, Ontology, Aesthetics (New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1987) (emphasis on aesthetics and philosophy)
Gerald Mast, Film/Cinema/Movie: A Theory of Experience (New York: Harper & Row, 1977)
__________, Howard Hawks, Storyteller (New York: Oxford University Press, 1982)
Gerald Mast, Marshall Cohen & Leo Braudy (eds.), Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings (New York: Oxford University Press, 4rd ed., 1992)
Judith Mayne, Cinema and Spectatorship (New York: Routledge, 1993) [review]
Marc Crispin Miller (ed.), Seeing Through Movies (New York: Pantheon, 1990)
Toby Miller & Robert Stams (eds.), Film and Theory (Blackwell Publishers, 1999)
James Monaco, How To Read a Film (New York: Oxford University Press, 3rd ed., 1999) [PDF files]
Edward Murray, Nine American Film Critics (New York: Frederick Ungar, 1975)
Tom O'Brien, The Screening of America: Movies and Values from Rocky to Rain Man (New York: Frederick Ungar, 1990)(ow movies shape contemporary values)
_____________, The Future of an Illusion: Film, Feminism, and Psychoanalysis (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989)
William H. Philips, Analyzing Films: A Practical Guide (Toronto: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1984)
Stephen Prince, Movies and Meaning: An Introduction to Film (Boston : Allyn and Bacon, 1997)
D. N. Rodowick, The Crisis of Political Modernism: Criticism and Ideology in Contemporary Film Theory (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2nd ed., 1994)
Philip Rosen (ed.), Narrative, Apparatus, Ideology: A Film Theory Reader (New York: Columbia University Press, 1986)
Jonathan Ross, The Incredibly Strange Film Book: An Alternative History of Cinema (London: Simon and Schuster Ltd., 1993)
Michael Ryan & Douglas Kellner, Camera Politica: The Politics and Ideology of Contemporary Hollywood Film (Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1988)
Janet Staiger, Interpreting Films (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1992)
Murray Smith, Engaging Characters: Fiction, Emotion and the Cinema (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995)
Burgoyne Stam & Lewis Flitterman, New Vocabularies in Film Semiotics (London: Routledge, 1992)
Robert Stam, Film Theory (Blackwell Publishers, 1999)
Ed S. Tan, Emotion and the Structure of Narrative Film: Film as an Emotion (Mahwah, New Jersey: 1996)
Sue Thornham (ed.), Feminist Film Theory (Edinburgh University Press, 1999)
Gregory Ulmer, Teletheory: Grammatology in The Age of Video (Routledge: New York, 1989)
Paul Willemen, Looks and Frictions (England: British Film Institute, 1993)
Linda Williams, Viewing Positions: Ways of Seeing Film (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1994)
Trevor Whittock, Metaphor and Film (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990)
Bibliography: Narrative Theory
David Bordwell, Making Meaning: Inference and Rhetoric in the Interpretation of Cinema (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989)
____________, Narration in the Fiction Film (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1985)
Edward Branigan, Narrative Comprehension in Film (London: Routledge, 1992)
Seymour Chatman, Coming to Terms: The Rhetoric of Narrative in Fiction and Film (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990)
______________, Story and Discourse: Narrative Structure in Fiction and Film (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1978)
John L. Fell, Film and the Narrative Tradition (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1974)
Avrom Fleishman, Narrated Films: Storytelling Situations in Cinema History (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992)
Sarah Kozloff, Invisible Storytellers: Voice-Over Narration in American Fiction Films (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988)
Nick Lacy, Narrative & Genre: Key Concepts in Media Studies (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000)
