SOC 902 Lecture 5: Auteur Theory and Cinema (2) PDF

SOC 902 Lecture 5: Auteur Theory, the films of Wes Anderson and Nostalgia  Part One Auteur and Auteur Theory  Auteur and Auteur Theory The “politique des auteurs” was from 1968-1973 the dominant methodology in cinematic criticism, and was tentatively formulated by...

SOC 902 Lecture 5: Auteur Theory, the films of Wes Anderson and Nostalgia  Part One Auteur and Auteur Theory  Auteur and Auteur Theory The “politique des auteurs” was from 1968-1973 the dominant methodology in cinematic criticism, and was tentatively formulated by Francois Truffaut in 1954 and then expanded upon by Andrew Sarris in 1962. Briefly, the “auteur theory” contends that “aesthetically important” films are the product of an auteur: similar to an author of literature or a composer of classical music. According to Truffaut, “an auteur transforms the film into something personal: an expression of his own personality”  Auteur and Auteur Theory As one of the more controversial ideas in classic film theory, history and criticism is this notion of the auteur: a director with a personal vision that heavily impacts the film. The auteur director, in theory, then will produce a body of work that features their identifiable ‘stamps’ in terms of style and theme. The view of the director then as the ‘primary creative’ may be descriptive of the directorial position in general: the director is the principal creative on a film  Auteur Theory Auteur Theory: Classic: an auteur transforms the film into something personal, “an expression of his own personality” Contemporary: we now see a director's work not as the expression of individual genius, but as an encounter of biography, intertextuality, the institution of Hollywood, and a historical moment We now focus less on the “romantic” individualism of “the auteur” and instead more so emphasize a director's work as both personal and mediated by external- personal elements such as genre, technology, capitalism and popular cultural consumerism.  Auteur and Auteur Theory Andew Sarris argues auteur films reflect a director's personal vision in which the consistency, meaning, style and theme are revealed. For example, the Wes Anderson trailers we’ll see in class are marked by characteristics that reflect the basic aesthetic requirements of the “auteur director” including: (a) composition of the shots and editing (b) interaction between sound and image (c) use of color and setting, including aesthetics – what the film looks like  Auteur Theory Auteur theory then…reflects a quantity of film’s attributed to a single director in which they “reflect a director's personal vision in which the consistency, meaning, style, issues and themes are revealed. For example, Wes Anderson, Spike Lee, Martin Scorcese, Sofia Coppola, Kathryn Bigelow, Ava DuVernay, among many, many others.  Auteur and Auteur Theory Assembled Worlds: Intertextuality and Sincerity in the Films of Wes Anderson (Kim Wilkins, 2015) Wilkins defends Anderson’s as “more than only affectation or pure aestheticism: their artifice (style) performs both narrative and thematic functions” These film worlds mobilize irony and artificiality to mediate sincere emotional and psychological concerns Wes Anderson: Nostalgia and Marketing of the Past In his canonical What is Cinema (1945), André Bazin states that “the evolution of film as art towards personalization should definitely be considered a step forward, but only so long as…[it] doesn’t claim to define culture” Wes Anderson then, as a current American auteur, seems to complicate this point as we come to identify Anderson’s films as having a very specific “culture” as they: (a) are elaborately wired into culture (b) channel 2000s “hipster culture” onto the screen as a consumerist “quirky’ness” (c) construct a “film world” that is filtered this through artistic accents, idiosyncrasies and tensions with convention. (d) maintain very clear narrative themes addressing family, social class, power, masculinity, loss and regret Wes Anderson: Nostalgia and Marketing of the Past In Michael Newman’s Indie: An American Film Culture (2011), Anderson’s “quirks” are addressed as Newman states “the indie trend of quirky cinema, exemplified by Wes Anderson, has been duplicated by his many admirers and imitators” Quirk cinema can be defined then as an embrace of the odd against the blandly mainstream and a departure from mainstream practice and emphasizing a “new sincerity, intellectual whimsy and an access to purity.” Critique/Criticism: Anderson films value unabashed sincerity, but at the same time tread a fine line verging on self-parody. That is, _______. The Anderson Stage  Nostalgia and the Seduction of Melancholy In the classical Hollywood tradition: “the constructed nature of film worlds are rigorously effaced – the conventions of style and structure allow the ‘film world’ to be believable and coherent in which the narrative play outs” (Wilkins) Anderson’s film worlds, on the other hand, often signal their own artifice – we see the artifice and presentation of the Anderson film - as dioramas, of sorts. An enclosed world wherein the juxtaposition of things are fetishistic as the accumulation of signs and objects in which its narrative world which becomes in some sense “timeless” (when are these films meant to be set?) The Anderson Stage Nostalgia and the Seduction of Melancholy Identity is constructed in and through place and the Anderson character is often found in transitional spaces - as though they were permanent – and revealing the belief they do not belong in more stable settings, can not exist outside the world they are structured within For example: Rushmore (Rushmore Academy); The Grand Budapest Hotel (the hotel), The Life Aquatic (the ship) and Royal Tenenbaums (the family townhome)  Branding Wes Anderson Frederic Jameson (1984), on nostalgia films (and nostalgia in film). Nostalgia films include a discourse that attempts "to lay siege either to our own present and immediate past, or to a more distant history that escapes individual memory.” Anderson films often find themselves set up in binary oppositions: those who read history, memory, nostalgia and loss into his films, and those who see them as empty pastiche – highly stylized, but empty of any real story A third approach sees Anderson through stylistic connotation “conveying nostalgia and memory via consumerist means and a yearning a so-called ‘better time’.”  Part THREE Branding Wes Anderson: The Hipster > Capitalism > Nostalgia  Branding Wes Anderson Timothy Corrigan, on Anderson, the hipster, late capitalism and nostalgia: The imperatives of postmodern culture (1960s-) have made it clear that consumerism, capitalism and marketing are as much about culture as culture itself For example, the 1960s and 70s radicalism of anti-establishment politics soon found itself becoming incorporated within the very capitalism it purported to reject. That is, the punk and hip-hop youth of the mid-late 20th century found themselves incorporated into the capitalism they rejected and the capitalism that had often also rejected them For Corrigan, Anderson’s emphasis on nostalgia has rematerialized the past into a viable aesthetic and business.  Branding Wes Anderson A central criticism of Anderson and Auteur is the obvious collaborative process evident in his films --- the music, set design, staging, costuming etc. Innovation theory: examines how genre (here quirk cinema) is constructed and conveyed in terms of modes of cultural production (above) and increasingly co-creation and specific – collaborations. Fashion, for example, has long influenced genre (mob films, for example) and fashion, style and costuming is a vital ingredient in cinema. Branding Wes Anderson  Branding Wes Anderson To review Frederic Jameson (1984), on nostalgia films (and nostalgia in film). Nostalgia films include a discourse that attempts "to lay siege either to our own present and immediate past, or to a more distant history that escapes individual memory.” Anderson films often find themselves set up in binary oppositions: those who read history, memory, nostalgia and loss into his films, and those who see them as empty pastiche: highly stylized, but empty of any real story A third approach sees Anderson through stylistic connotation “conveying nostalgia and memory via consumerist means and a yearning a so-called ‘better time’.”  Branding Wes Anderson > Hipster Branding According to Mark Greif: The hipster of the late 90s and early 2000s is the subcultural type generated by neoliberalism: an liberalist wealth marked by a late capitalist ideology defined by a belief in free markets, free trade, globalization and world travel (travel and adventure tourism) Anderson’s characters function as stylized signifier of neoliberalism: ostensibly creative, intellectual white males with upwardly mobile bodies marked for success in a capitalist context – for example, the hipster of the late 1990s and 2000s.  Hipster Branding Greif continued: The hipster prioritizes outward aesthetic choices, he is a privileged body who also appears to eschew his privilege, he is who “slums” He focuses on (indulges) his own struggles for pleasure and luxury as a type of consumer rebellion, becoming a “poisonous conduit” between the subcultural and dominant classes He is mobilized in a racial and economic manner allowing for him to oscillate between both sub and dominant culture For example,  Hipster Branding Greif continued, “The hipster is that person, overlapping with the intentional dropout or the unintentionally declassed individual—the neo-bohemian, the vegan, the fixed gear bicyclist or skatepunk, the would-be blue-collar or post-racial twenty something, the starving artist or graduate student. “The hipster is he who in fact aligns himself both with rebel subculture and with the dominant class, and thus opens up that poisonous conduit between the two.”  Outside > Inside The Capitalism of Nostalgia, Memory and “Pastiche” Hipster Branding  Hipster Branding Marked by signifiers: Urban Outfitters, farmers markets in cities, early 2000s hipster literature such as Dave Eggars and David Foster Wallace, and bike centric urban planning (Brooklyn, Austin, Portland) the hipster became late capitalist free market force – a marketable identity For example, “the appearance of a lifestyle is more important than the life lived.” (see: going into debt to purchase a status item) Wes Anderson became the face of the new and powerful position hipster culture and its aesthetic came to hold in the American cultural imagination. Hipster Branding Seduction of Melancholy Wes Anderson: Hipster Nostalgia as Marketing Device  Seduction of Melancholy Urban Outfitters and Nostalgia: The clothes in Urban Outfitters are part of the retro market: looking like the past and appropriating the the one-of-a-kind items that are found in thrift stores. The labor required to “thrifting” is rearticulated at UO as empty sign: a consumption of the past that is very much the present yet floating as a timeless signifier: consuming a past we have no memory of or experience with  Seduction of Melancholy Mediated Nostalgia: An uncritical, backwards-gazing and “media-defined” past mediated nostalgia is concerned with how the pop culture of the past can be used to integrate an often-unlived past into the modern viewer's identity and worldview. Generation X (Douglas Coupland, 1991) The process of “forcing a body of people to have memories they do not actually possess” and corporations such as UO use this process to market and sell a mediated nostalgia as “a better, more pure time” Hipster Capitalism SOC 902 End of Lecture