Cinema As An Entity Deeply Embodied

974 WordsMay 10, 20164 Pages
With the roots of cinema as an entity deeply embodied in Europe, cinema in France was becoming less and less prominent in the 1950s leaving it in dire need of resuscitation. Meanwhile, the idea of auteurship was fast becoming established in Hollywood because it effectively conferred directors that worked with restriction on their material a somewhat lesser recognition and creative freedom in films. This formulaic approach to cinema was successful yet exhaustive as the same story patterns and effectively the same actors and directors were used through the economic resources that were at their exposal. The system effectively degraded the director’s personal style and stamp on the films they produced, a problem later remedied with the introduction of the auteur policy. The monopolization approach of Hollywood meant particular individual films were bound for box office success and others less so. In 1959, Breathless by French director Jean-Luc Godard was released and the film proved controversial, it raised eyebrows and to some opened eyes. The film had audiences and film critics talking and it essentially ignited the New Wave movement known as la Nouvelle Vague. Other films that massively influenced this movement were 400 Blows by François Truffaut and Hiroshima Mon Amour by Alan Resnais. The main focus of the movement was to deviate from the traditional approach of filmmaking which they considered old, boring and formulaic. Jean-Luc Godard’s Breathless is somewhat a
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