The Sexual Politics of Robert Bresson, Jean-Luc Godard, Catherine Breillat and François Ozon
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MARGINAL PLEASURE AND AUTEURIST CINEMA: THE SEXUAL POLITICS OF ROBERT BRESSON, JEAN-LUC GODARD, CATHERINE BREILLAT AND FRANÇOIS OZON DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Thibaut Schilt, M.A. * * * * * The Ohio State University 2005 Dissertation Committee: Approved by Professor Judith Mayne, Adviser Professor Jean-François Fourny ________________________________ Professor Danielle Marx-Scouras Adviser Graduate Program in French and Italian Copyright by Thibaut Schilt 2005 ABSTRACT This dissertation considers and evaluates French auteurist cinema in two contexts: first, in terms of the 1950s/1960s, a period during which the politique des auteurs became a salient part of film criticism nationally and internationally, and second, in terms of contemporary cinema in France today, where the concept of auteur, though never completely forsaken since the Nouvelle Vague, has experienced a revival. A large amount of existing critical literature discusses various aspects of Robert Bresson and Jean-Luc Godard’s works, which coincide with the emergence and espousal of the politique, but critics and historians rarely consider the sexual politics of their cinema in much detail. With that in mind, I look closely at a selection of their films, which differ from other auteur works of the period in that they attempt to problematize gender difference and sexuality. The second part of the study examines the cinema of Catherine Breillat and François Ozon, whose works destabilize notions of gender (masculinity, femininity) and sexuality in an even more daring and explicit fashion. Their films, seldom discussed in the context of the politique des auteurs, will be examined as contemporary examples of auteurist cinema, but also in relation to the auteur cinema of the 1950s/1960s, in an attempt to determine both the continuity of the ii cinema of auteurs and the radical differences between these two periods of French film history. iii To Will iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to thank my adviser, Professor Judith Mayne, for believing in the project, and for her guidance, encouragement and unconditional support. I thank Rebecca Bias for her moral support at various stages of the project. I am grateful to Randi Polk for reading portions of the manuscript and giving me constructive feedback. Finally, I am indebted to Michelle Chilcoat for providing a copy of a not- yet-published article on François Ozon’s Sitcom, which turned out to be most helpful to my research. v VITA November 20, 1973 …………………. Born – Nancy, France 1997 …………………………………... Maîtrise in English, Université de Nancy 2 2000 …………………………………... M.A. in French, The Ohio State University 1998-present ………………………… Graduate Teaching Associate, The Ohio State University PUBLICATIONS Schilt, Thibaut. “François Ozon.” March 2004. Senses of Cinema. 22 Apr. 2005 <http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/directors/ 04/ozon.html> FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: French and Italian Minor Fields: French Film Studies, Twentieth Century French Literature, Gender Studies vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract..................................................................................................... ii Dedication................................................................................................. iv Acknowledgments..................................................................................... v Vita............................................................................................................ vi Chapters: Introduction............................................................................................... 1 1. The Sexual Politics of the Politique: From 1950s French Criticism to Contemporary Auteurist Cinema................................................ 14 1.1 A Certain Tendency of French Criticism................................... 14 1.2 The Evolution of the Concept of Auteur in Criticism and Film.. 32 2. Dark Secrets, White Scarves: The Cinema of Robert Bresson...... 47 2.1 The Talented Mr. Michel: Crime and Transgression in Pickpocket...................................................................................... 50 2.2 Les Dames du Bois de Boulogne: Fatal Attraction à la Bresson.......................................................................................... 64 2.3 Une Femme douce: Private Female Property, Do Not Enter!.. 76 3. Drôle de genre(s): The Cinema of Jean-Luc Godard..................... 92 3.1 The Blue Angela: Godard’s Version of Female Performance in Une Femme est une femme............................................................ 97 3.2 Whose Life to Live? Nana’s Choice in Vivre sa vie................... 111 3.3 La Femme de Madeleine: Repressing the Homosexual in Masculin féminin............................................................................. 124 4. The Virgin, the Mother and the Whore: The Cinema of Catherine Breillat............................................................................................ 144 4.1 Les 400 coups de Lili: Revisiting the French New Wave in 36 fillette.............................................................................................. 147 vii 4.2 Belle de nuit: Marie’s Nocturnal, Color-Coded Quest for Sexual Fulfillment in Romance....................................................... 157 4.3 One Soul, Two Bodies: Sex and Death by Proxy in A ma soeur!............................................................................................. 174 5. Queer Zone: The Cinema of François Ozon.................................. 191 5.1 From Transgression to Liberation: Putting Homosexuality on the Map in La Petite mort and Une Robe d’été.............................. 194 5.2 Of Rats and Men: Destabilizing Patriarchal Order in Sitcom.... 204 5.3 Post-Modern Cinema: Blurring Genre and Sexual Boundaries in 8 femmes.................................................................................... 214 Conclusion................................................................................................. 229 Bibliography................................................................................................ 234 viii INTRODUCTION For the past fifty years, the auteur has been of primordial importance in French film criticism. While critics like Alexandre Astruc and André Bazin had already articulated notions of cinematic authorship in the late 1940s and early 1950s, the politique des auteurs became a coherent form of criticism after a series of immensely influential articles (most of them published in Cahiers du cinéma in the mid to late 1950s), which insisted that the film director, much like a novelist or a painter, should become the ultimate authority over his or her artistic product. Young critic François Truffaut was the forerunner of this trend, but other Cahiers critics such as Jean-Luc Godard, Eric Rohmer and Jacques Rivette soon followed. Dissatisfied with the (lack of) quality in French films made in the 1950s (a period known as the Tradition de la qualité), they decided to put their own theory into practice, and all started making films in the latter part of the decade. Their unique style of filmmaking came to be known nationally and internationally as the Nouvelle Vague. As a result of this critical revolution, 1950s and 1960s auteurist films (that is, works directed by filmmakers with a recognizable personal style) are 1 particularly consequential, as they happen to coincide with the birth, development and quasi universal espousal of the politique des auteurs in France and abroad. The second time period of particular interest is contemporary cinema (the 1990s and 2000s), which has seen, if not a re-birth (auteurism as a critical approach, although challenged, has never completely disappeared since the 1950s), a revival, a re-emergence in French cinema itself, but also in Anglo-American film criticism, as Dudley Andrew exclaimed in 1993: “After . years of clandestine whispering we are permitted to mention, even to discuss, the auteur again” (Cook 311). Conversely, Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault’s post-structuralist questioning of the authority of the author does not seem to have had much influence on contemporary French critics, as one of them recently wrote: “Toute la critique travaille aujourd’hui à partir de la notion d’auteur et ne saurait envisager l’analyse d’un film sans le relier à l’ensemble de la filmographie du cinéaste replacée dans son contexte culturel” (Prédal 129). In this study, I have chosen to concentrate on four particular auteurs, and on a selection of works released during the two time periods mentioned above: Robert Bresson (1901-1999) and Jean-Luc Godard (1930--) for the 1950s/1960s, Catherine Breillat (1948--) and François Ozon (1967--) for the 1990s/2000s. An examination of Bresson and Godard’s films is essential if one wants to have an understanding of what personal (and political) filmmaking means. The large amount of texts written on the body of work of the two filmmakers is enough to show their overwhelming influence on film and film 2 criticism, both in France and abroad. Emma Wilson calls Godard “the most radical and influential director of the nouvelle vague” (1999: 151), while Alan Pavelin argues that “Robert Bresson’s 13 features over 40 years constitute arguably the most original and brilliant body of work over a long career from a film director in the history of cinema” (1). Breillat and Ozon have been chosen to represent