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Each original is also photographed in one exposure and is included in reduced form at the back of the book. Photographs included in the original manuscript have been reproduced xerographically in this copy. Higher quality 6" x 9" black and white photographic prints are available for any photographs or illustrations appearing in this copy for an additional charge. Contact UMI directly to order. UMI University Microfilms International A Beil & Howell Information Company 300 Nortin Zeeb Road. Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 USA 313/761-4700 800/521-0600 Order Number 9219012 French postmodern cinema: Desire in question Philibert, Céline Lydia Germaine, Ph.D. The Ohio State University, 1992 UMI 300 N. ZeebRd Ann Arbor, MI 48106 FRENCH POSTMODERN CINEMA; DESIRE IN QUESTION DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By Céline, Lydia, Germaine Philibert, B.A. ***** The Ohio State University 1992 Dissertation Committee: Approved by M. Besnard E. Holland J. Mayne Adviser Department of French and Italian To my grand-mothers, Celine and Henriette, mother, Francine and sister, Brigitte. 11 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank Judith Mayne who initiated in me a great interest for feminism and the cinema. Her guidance and insight throughout the research have been invaluable towards completion of my doctoral thesis. My thanks go to the other members of my advisory committee. Drs. Micheline Besnard and Eugene Holland. I would like to thank my friends Denise Carroll for the long distance phone conversations on psychoanalytical discourse and Hélène Lowe-Dupas who helped me with her technical expertise in Wordperfect 5.1. My last thanks go to Danielle and Thomas who have been very supportive of my work. Xll VITA October 6, 1956 ............ Born - Avignon, France 1978 ........................ L.E.A., Dijon University, Dijon, France 1978-1980.................... M.B.A. Candidate Miami University, Oxford, Ohio 1980-1982 ................... Assistant to the director ODIFI, software company Valence, France 1984 .................... M.A. in French Literature The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1984-1988 ................... The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1988-1990 ................... Assistant Professor of French De Paul University Chicago, Illinois 1990-present ................ Assistant Professor of French S.U.N.Y. Potsdam, New York FIELDS OF STUDY Major Field: French and Italian. Studies in Feminism and Cinema: Dr. Judith Mayne 19th and 20th centuries: Dr. Micheline Besnard Critical theory: Dr. Eugene Holland. IV TABLE OF CONTENTS DEDICATION ........................................... ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ...................................... ü i VITA ................................................. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS ................................... v INTRODUCTION ......................................... 1 Notes to introduction ............................... 24 CHAPTER PAGE I. DESIRE IN NARRATIVE: FROM A REALISTIC TO AN UNCONSTRAINED NARRATIVE .............. 26 Notes to chapter I ....................... 62 II. FILM THEORY AND DESIRE: FROM AN ONTOLOGICAL TO A PSYCHOANALYTIC VIEW OF CINEMA ..... 65 Notes to chapter II ..................... 102 III. PSYCHOANALYTIC NARRATIVE : DE/CONSTRUCTION OF THE FEMALE/MALE SPEAKING SUBJECT AND DESIRE ............................... 106 Notes to chapter III .................... 133 IV. POSTMODERN CINEMA: THE FEMININE FABRIC .... 135 Notes to chapter IV ..................... 165 V. SANS TOIT NI LOI: FRAGMENTATION AND DESIRE . 168 Notes to chapter V ....................... 201 VI. 3702 LE MATIN: HYSTERICAL NARRATIVE : MONSTER IMAGE/WORD NARRATIVE AND A DIFFERENT CHARACTER ................... 202 Notes to chapter VI ..................... 234 V VII. CHOCOLAT; THE NARRATIVE OF A WOMAN'S DESIRE .................................... 235 Notes to chapter VII .................... 266 CONCLUSION ........................................... 267 Notes to conclusion ................................. 277 BIBLIOGRAPHY.......................................... 278 vx INTRODUCTION Twenty years ago, in a comparison of the cinema with other art media, Noël Burch announced in Theory of Film Practice the end of the dependence of cinema upon literature ; The contemporary film narrative is gradually liberating itself from the constraints of the literary or pseudo-literary forms that played a large part in bringing out the 'zero point of cinematic style' that reigned supreme during the 1930's and 1940's and still remains in a position of some strength today. ^ In claiming that the progressive separation of film from literary narrative contributed to the development of the cinema, Burch has failed to account for the concomitant development of literature and cinema and thus has failed to incorporate the alteration of Western thinking modes in his analysis of the cinema with other art-forms. In adapting literary works to the screen, the cinema has found itself deeply entrenched in routine and comfortable cinematic habits and has thus prioritized a realistic narrative. Such narrative structures have responded to the demands of commercial cinema whose popularization depends upon standardized and repetitive cinematic forms. Yet, these narrative structures have hampered the development of the cinema as a full-fledged art form. i 2 Although the French cinema of the 20's and 30's has proven to be quite innovative and different (by the works of such different film-directors as L'Herbier, Gance, Vigo, Renoir, Dulac), it has maintained a certain link to literature, painting, dance and music. In the mid fifties and in the sixties, writing and cinema have merged into a novel relationship as the text was viewed more as a perception forming its identity in the relationship between the film and the spectator. Fulfilling Alexandre Astruc's dream that the cinema would function as a substitute for the pen,^ a group of young Parisian students engaged a discussion on fundamental questions germane to the cinema, narrative and their relationship with spectator and author. Intellectual reflections and passion for the cinema led them into a different conception of the cinema. Drawing on the nascent linguistic and semiotic theories on systems of representation, they considered the cinema to have an identity of its own and to belong to the spectator. Propagated in ciné-clubs and magazines (especially Cahiers du cinéma) these "New Wave ideas" became popular and contributed to a novel perception of narrative and cinema as they established new "open" forms -self reflection within the film, play with genres, via the use of innovative film techniques and existing exterior decors. These new open forms have become organic to the cinema 3 of the eighties. In that respect, contemporary French film narrative departs from the narrative of marginal or experimental cinema, the realism of the thirties and forties, and also the New Wave. No longer rebellious toward its long standing position as a photographic machine of reality, and abandoning its constant urge to discover cinematic possibilities, the cinema has turned toward the subject's relationship with society and narrative in an abandonment of traditionally-defined character. In conventional cinema, the character emerges from crises shown or depicted by the film-narrative. Defined in a perceptual rapport with the world, via sounds and colours, traditional characters stand out in contrast to or in unity with surrounding objects and/or secondary characters. Their identities are apprehended via differential presentations. For instance, some characters embody values or precise traits of personality because they are presented in relation with other characters who may or may not be part of society, or may embody a confrontation of values such as education, morals and faith. As contemporary society experiences a loss of traditional values (embodied by historical masculinity), the cinema presents no longer a character whose values validate his/her identity. The character dissolves into 4 the socio-political environmental structures (infra and superstructural factors) that are in turmoil. In that respect, cinematic characters expose different personalities. The fe/male subject is reconsidered in that the character embodies onscreen societal structural changes. Characters emerge out of a mixture of traditional (narrative base) and modern (primacy of the image) styles, cinematic genres (the documentary and the fiction film), and a play between historical