A Return to Classical Film Theory?

Introduction: A Return to Classical Film Theory?

MALCOLM TURVEY

When cinema studies was institutionalized in the Anglo-American academy starting in the late 1960s, film scholars for the most part turned away from preex - isting traditions of film theorizing in favor of new theories then becoming fashionable in the humanities, principally semiotics and psychoanalysis. Earlier, so-called “classical” film theories—by which I mean, very broadly, film theories produced before the advent of psychoanalytic-semiotic film theorizing in the late ’60s—were either ignored or rejected as naive and outmoded. Due to the influ - ence of the Left on the first generation of film academics, some were even dismissed as “idealist” or in other ways politically compromised. There were, of course, some exceptions. The work of pre-WWII left-wing thinkers and filmmak - ers such as Benjamin, Kracauer, the Russian Formalists, Bakhtin, Vertov, and Eisenstein continued to be translated and debated, and, due principally to the efforts of Dudley Andrew, André Bazin’s film theory remained central to the disci - pline, if only, for many, as something to be overcome rather than built upon. Translations of texts by Jean Epstein appeared in October and elsewhere in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and Richard Abel’s two-volume anthology, French Film Theory and Criticism 1907–1939 (1988), generated interest in French film theory before Bazin. But on the whole, classical film theory was rejected as a foundation for contemporary film theorizing, even by film theorists like Noël Carroll with no allegiance to semiotics and psychoanalysis. Recently, this situation appears to have changed. Since 2000, new transla - tions of writings by Münsterberg, Balázs, Bazin, Epstein, Lukács, and others have appeared, often accompanied by commentaries arguing for their contemporary relevance. Anthologies of essays devoted wholly or in part to Arnheim and other classical film theorists have been published. Bazin is once again considered a the - orist to be reckoned with, as evidenced by many of the contributions to Andrew’s anthology Opening Bazin (2011). And theorists have defended some of the claims of other classical film theorists, including the analytical philosopher of film Berys Gaut, who has recently built upon Arnheim’s theory of film art and resurrected the classical film-theoretical doctrine of medium specificity in his A Philosophy of Cinematic Art (2011). Is there a return to classical film theory occurring? If so, why? And why now?

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And even if there isn’t, what is the significance and value of classical film theory today? Does it offer modes of theorizing, if not ideas and arguments, that are lack - ing in so-called contemporary film theory, or that in some other way remain relevant? These are just some of the questions this cluster is intended to address. The roundtable brings together leading scholars of classical film theory who have been instrumental in generating renewed interest in it. We are delighted to be publishing a short excerpt from Anton Kaes, Nicholas Baer, and Michael Cowan’s forthcoming anthology, The Promise of Cinema: German Film Theory, 1907–1933 . Three essays review recent anthologies of writings by and about the major classical film theorists Béla Balázs, Jean Epstein, and André Bazin. And in my essay, I argue that Dziga Vertov’s concern to establish a “bond” between the viewers of his films and the workers depicted in them has theoretical and practical, not merely histor - ical, relevance today. I thank all the contributors to this cluster, as well as Adam Lehner for his meticulous editing.

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