film essay questions
sharon1997
AngelaMartin.pptmAngela Martin
“Refocusing Authorship in Women’s Filmmaking”
Angela Martin
Angela Martin observes that in discussions about women and authorship there are two types of omissions:
Films are often lost
This is something I found as I put together this course. UCLA has substantial resources and the media libraries are extensive yet there were some of Dash’s and DuVernay’s films/media that were not available.
Due to the loss of these films, they are not included in discussion concerning auteur theory.
Angela Martin
Martin argues that the lack of circulation of female directed films contributes to these films being ignored in film theory generally and auteur theory specifically.
She mentions other female directors
Agnès Varda – her work was influential to the French New Wave, her films examined feminist issues, produced social commentary, had experimental style, and documentary realism. She has been called the “grandmother of the French New Wave” and “pioneering member of the Left Bank.” https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/news-bfi/features/where-begin-agnes-varda
The Left Bank, or Rive Gauche, group is a contingent of filmmakers associated with the French New Wave, first identified as such by Richard Roud.[7] The corresponding "right bank" group is constituted of the more famous and financially successful New Wave directors associated with Cahiers du cinéma (Claude Chabrol, François Truffaut, and Jean-Luc Godard).[7] Unlike the Cahiers group, these directors were older and less movie-crazed. They tended to see cinema akin to other arts, such as literature. However they were similar to the New Wave directors in that they practiced cinematic modernism. Their emergence also came in the 1950s and they also benefited from the youthful audience.[24] The two groups, however, were not in opposition; Cahiers du cinéma advocated for Left Bank cinema
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Angela Martin
Other female directors
Diane Kurys – her films assisted in making female filmmakers more mainstream. Due to her commercial success, many dismiss her from being an auteur.
Dorothy Arzner – had a career that spanned from the silent era to the 1940s. From 1927 to 1943, she was the only female director working in Hollywood. As a director, she assisted in launching the careers of Lucille Ball, Rosalind Russell, and Katharine Hepburn.
Angela Martin
Martin summarizes the French New Wave as being a “generational revolt on the part of the young Cahiers du Cinéma critics, who were demanding a break with the persistently traditional mainstream French cinema, which they saw as heavy, entrenched, and tied to the wordiness of the theatre-inspired scripts.” The critics seemed to be unaware of the “gender-bound nature of their enthusiasm.” (128)
Angela Martin
She posits that Andrew Sarris continues the male-centeredness of auteur theory. And female directors face challenges because they do not have the opportunities to create bodies of work that get recognized as auteurs.
Angela Martin
Martin describes some of the challenges with theory. For example, Roland Barthes’, “The Death of the Author” cannot be reconciled with the idea of the auteur. And though feminist do find female directors within auteur theory, Martin wonders how effective their work is. She cites Audre Lorde’s “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House.”
Angela Martin
Martin draws parallels between auteur theory and Germaine Greer’s comment that “the way poetry is lauded is actually as male display, and therefore, there is no point in arguing that any woman poet could be better than Shakespeare.” (130)
Angela Martin
Film studies scholars acknowledge there is a problem with bias against women in auteur theory yet they continue to ignore female directors. Martin cites that in the Oxford Guide to Film Studies, scholar Stephen Crofts says the “author is gendered” but then it’s the shortest part of his essay. Moreover female directors are only noted “in chapters dealing with ‘otherness’ – feminism and film; gay, lesbian, and queer cinema; the avant-garde; and non-American cinemas.” (130)
Angela Martin
Martin demonstrate how female directors are overlooked. Lois Weber was an actress, screenwriter, producer, and director. She is considered one of the most prolific and significant director of the silent era. Film historian Anthony Slide says that Weber was the first America’s first genuine auteur, “a filmmaker involved in all aspects of production and one who utilized the motion picture to put across her own ideas and philosophies"
Anthony Slide, The Silent Feminists, pp. 29, 151
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Angela Martin
Alice Guy Blaché was the first French woman to direct a film and a narrative fiction film. From 1896 to 1906, it is believed she was the only female filmmaker in the world. She directed A Fool and His Money which was the first film with an all African American cast.
Angela Martin
Martin observes one of the challenges when examining female directors is the framework associated with “what can be identifiably linked to the filmmaker (as woman):
A film’s autobiographical reference
A filmmakers actual presence in the film
The evidence of a female voice within the narrative (however located).” (130-131)
Angela Martin
In spite of the description on the previous slide, Martin states that none of those factors “guarantees authorship.” (131)
This is similar to Valerie Smith’s argument that female directors do not have to choose between cinematic realism and avant-garde styles to be transgressive.
Angela Martin
Martin closes the essay with a discussion on Kathryn Bigelow. Bigelow cannot fit into the typical female director framework yet she clearly is a director with strong vision.
She suggests using Agnès Varda’s cinécriture or “filmic writing” as a way to examine films. Filmic writing is broad and “organized around the director.” It includes the writing, filming, casting choices, locations, editing, camera movement, points of view, and “the rhythm of filming and editing.” (132)
