Auteurism

In my study of the "auteur theory" I have learnt much more about the nature of auteurism within film criticism. The auteur theory suggests that a director's film reflects his/her personal creative vision, as if they were the primary author or "auteur." "Culture is tyrannically centerd on the author, his person, his life, his tastes, his passions." (Barthes, 1977, p.143)

My mind has been opened significantly by what I have read and has made me consider, among other things, the identity loss of an author and/or their character(s). When a character speaks his mind, how can we know with any great certainty that this is what the character thinks personally and is not simply the reflections and beliefs of the author.

Michel Foucault discusses our own personal view of authors and how we perceive them as being outside the realms of history and presents the notion that they are each simply a product of their times. He mentions the process of searching for a piece of work by author name as opposed to the subject matter or the year published. I believe this to be the way in which a majority of individuals search for a title, and it certainly feels more natural to me personally to search by author. "a (authors) name permits one to group together a number of texts, define them, differentiate them from and contrast them to others." (Foucault, 1984, p.105)

I agree particularly with Foultcault's view on the use of an authors name and how certain changes can affect how their name functions. "If we proved that Shakespeare did not write those sonnets which pass for his that would constitute a significant change and affect the manner in which the authors name functions." (Foucault, 1984, p.105) If we discovered someone else wrote a famous piece, the work would remain the unchanged, although the way in which we perceive the supposed author is likely to change.

"Author function" is basically what makes us more interested in the author of a book or poem than a commercial. I found that author function translates beautifully to cinema, and kept this in mind. It made me consider the different factors that make a “Tarantino” movie identifiable as his, and how I would be able to tell, without prior knowledge, that it was his movie. This is a consideration I will return to in greater detail later.

At first I found the auteurism topic quite overwhelming as I didn't have a great deal of experience in film theory and had never even heard of an "auteur." I gradually eased into the subject as the day progressed and soon found myself totally engrossed in it. I found out that authorship was "primarily a critical device for recording the history of American cinema, the only cinema in the world worth exploring in depth beneath the frosting of a few great directors at the top." (Wantenberg & Curran, 2005, p.103)

We watched clips from a number of David Lynch movies (Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart, Mulholland Drive and Inland Empire) then discussed the similarities between each movie and what made them identifiable as Lynch movies. We found that his movies could portray quite a degree of both creepiness and confusion by focusing on images that can make the audience feel quite uncomfortable or sick.

We discussed whether or not we follow the careers of particular directors and their past work. I would say I most definitely do, and the reason I choose to is that I have thoroughly enjoyed their past successes and naturally would like to experience similar enjoyment with a new set of characters. I would happily go to a cinema in order to watch a movie directed by Steven Spielberg because of his past successes though I would definitely have high expectations based on those previous efforts.

I watched two movies directed by someone I consider to be an auteur (Quentin Tarantino) and looked for qualities that highlight these movies as his. The two movies were “Reservoir Dogs” and “Pulp Fiction.”

I noticed that the dialogue in both movies is extremely trivial (large discussions dedicated to fast food or on tipping etiquette.) I noticed that the conversations did really well to develop strong personalities for each character, showing their flaws and making them real people for the audience. It seems fairly evident that Tarantino is more interested in dialogue than actual plot, which in retrospect is fairly thin. I realised that there isn't much to the storyline, but instead a cast of really interesting characters helped to strengthen each movie. This shows an emphasis on style over substance, which describes Tarantino’s work well, and shows that he is a more post-modern director than, for example, Hitchcock.

What stands out most about these movies is the order in which they are both shown. This is more apparent in Pulp Fiction where the story(s) is shown completely out of sequence, the end is at the start and the middle is switched around. In Reservoir Dogs the biggest event, the robbery, is not actually shown but instead we are told what happened through character dialogue and the chase through flashbacks. Most of the story is set in a warehouse where dialogue is of critical importance.

My belief that Tarantino is an auteur has strengthened after re-watching these movies and discovering their similarities. I was interested to find articles during my research that were against calling him an auteur in comparison to legendary directors such as Hitchcock and Welles.

Reference list

Barthes, R., 1977. The Death of the Author in Barthes' Image, Music, Text. Glasgow: Fontana.

Foucault. M., 1984. What is an Author? in Paul Rabinow (ed.) The Foucault Reader. New York: Pantheon Books.

Wantenberg, T., & Curran, A., 2005. The Philosophy of Film: Introducing Text and Readings. London: Blackwell.

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