Film theory debates the essence of the cinema and provides conceptual frameworks for analyzing, among other things, the film image, narrative structure, the function of film artists, the relationship of film to reality, and the film spectator's position in the cinematic experience.

Film theory is generally distinguished from film criticism by its emphasis on meaning and interpretation over evaluation and judgment. Although there are exceptions, film critics tend to review movies (good? bad? how many stars?) while film theorists tend to analyze the medium's fundamental structure. Film criticism is the analysis and evaluation of films, individually and collectively. ...

History

In some respects, French philosopher Henri Bergson's Matière et Mémoire anticipated the development of film theory at a time (1896) that the cinema was just being born as a new medium.^{[citation needed]} He commented on the need for new ways of thinking about movement, and coined the terms "image-temps" (images-as-time) and "image-mouvement" (images-as-movement). However, in his 1906 essay L'illusion cinématographique (in L'évolution créatrice), he rejects film as an exemplification of what he had in mind.^{[citation needed]} Nonetheless, decades later, in Cinéma I & II (1983-1985), the philosopher Gilles Deleuze takes Matière et Mémoire as the basis of his philosophy of film and revisits Bergson's concepts--combining them with the semiotics of Charles Peirce.^{[citation needed]} Image:Bergson. ... Gilles Deleuze (IPA: ), (January 18, 1925 – November 4, 1995) was a French philosopher of the late 20th century. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... Charles Sanders Peirce (pronounced purse), (September 10, 1839 – April 19, 1914) was an American polymath, born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. ...

The Italian futurist Ricciotto Canudo is considered to be the first true theorist of the cinema. He published The Birth of the Seventh Art in 1911. Another early attempt was The Photoplay (1916) by the psychologist Hugo Münsterberg. Futurism may refer to: Future studies, the philosophical or academic study of the medium to long-term future also known as futurology. ... Ricciotto Canudo (1879-1923) was an italian film theorician. ... 1911 (MCMXI) was a common year starting on Sunday (click on link for calendar). ... Hugo Münsterberg (June 1, 1863 GdaÅ„sk (Danzig) – December 16, 1916) was an American academic psychologist. ...

So-called classical film theory (from the 1910s through, approximately, 1970) arose in the silent era and was mostly concerned with defining the crucial elements of the medium. It largely evolved from the works of directors like Germaine Dulac, Louis Delluc, Jean Epstein, Sergei Eisenstein, Lev Kuleshov, Dziga Vertov, Paul Rotha and film theorists like Rudolf Arnheim, Béla Balázs and Siegfried Kracauer. These individuals emphasized how film differed from reality, on how it might be considered a valid art form. Germaine Dulac, born 17 November 1882 in Amiens, France, died 20 July 1942, was a French film director and early film theorist. ... Louis Delluc (1890-1924) was a French film director, screen writer and film critic. ... Jean Epstein, born 25 March 1897, died 3 April 1953, Paris, France, was a film director and early film theoretician. ... Sergei Eisenstein in 1920s Sergei Eisenstein Sergei Mikhailovich Eisenstein (Russian: Сергей Михайлович Эйзенштейн, Latvian: Sergejs EizenÅ¡teins) (January 23, 1898 – February 11, 1948) was a revolutionary Soviet theatrical scenic designer-turned-film director and film theorist noted in particular for his silent films Strike, Battleship Potemkin and Oktober, which vastly influenced early documentary... Lev Vladimirovich Kuleshov (1899 - 1970) was a Russian filmmaker known for his work on film editing and the impact it has on the viewers. ... Dziga Vertov Dziga Vertov (Russian: , January 2, 1896–February 12, 1954) was a Russian documentary film and newsreel director. ... Paul Rotha (*June 3th, 1907- March 7th 1984) was a socialist british film maker and film historian. ... Rudolf Arnheim (born July 15, 1904) is a German-born author, art and film theorist, and perceptual psychologist. ... Béla Balázs (August 4, 1884, Szeged – May 17, 1949, Budapest), born Herbert Bauer, was a Hungarian-Jewish film critic, aesthete, writer and poet. ... Siegfried Kracauer (February 8, 1889, Frankfurt am Main, Germany - November 26, 1966, New York) was a journalist, sociologist, and film critic. ...

In the years after World War II, the French film critic and theorist André Bazin reacted against this approach to the cinema--arguing that film's essence lay in its ability to mechanically reproduce reality not in its differences from reality. He also co-founded the highly influential Cahiers du cinéma. Cahiers was more concerned with film criticism than with film theory, but it was the birthplace of the auteur theory. This "theory" is not accurately named as it is more a method of film criticism, which evaluates films based on their directors, than it is a "theory". Combatants Major Allied powers: United Kingdom Soviet Union United States Republic of China and others Major Axis powers: Nazi Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Harry Truman Chiang Kai-Shek Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki Tojo Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead... André Bazin on the cover of the third volume of the original edition of Quest-ce que le cinéma? André Bazin (April 18, 1918–November 11, 1958) was a renowned and influential French film critic and film theorist. ... Cahiers du cinéma is an influential French film magazine founded in 1951 by André Bazin, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Lo Duca. ... The auteur theory is the theory that a film (or a body of work) by a director (or, rarely, a producer) reflects the personal vision and preoccupations of that director, as if he or she were the works primary author (auteur). ...

Cahiers' young critics, such as directors-to-be François Truffaut and Jean-Luc Godard, were some of the first to take popular Hollywood cinema seriously as an art form. Their fascination with Westerns and gangster films encouraged the development of genre theory. François Truffaut. ... Jean-Luc Godard (photograph by David Horvitz) Jean-Luc Godard (born 3 December 1930 in Paris) is a Franco-Swiss filmmaker and one of the most influential members of the Nouvelle Vague, or French New Wave. Born in Paris to Franco-Swiss parents, he was educated in Nyon, later studying... The Western is an American genre in literature and film. ... Gangster film is a film genre which features gangster characters, such as members of the Mafia and inner city street gangs. ... Genre studies are a structuralist approach to literary criticism, film criticism, and other cultural criticism. ...

In the 1960s and 1970s, film theory took up residence in academe, importing concepts from established disciplines like psychoanalysis, literary theory and linguistics--a tendency encouraged by the influential British journal, Screen, among others. Psychoanalysis is a family of psychological theories and methods based on the pioneering work of Sigmund Freud. ... Literary theory is the theory (or the philosophy) of the interpretation of literature and literary criticism. ... Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. ... Screen is a journal of film and television studies based at the John Logie Baird Centre at the University of Glasgow and published by Oxford University Press. ...

During the 1990s the digital revolution in image technologies has impacted on film theory in various ways. There has been a refocus onto celluloid film's ability to capture an indexical image of a moment in time by theorists like Mary Ann Doane, Philip Rosen and Laura Mulvey. There has also been a historical revisiting of early cinema screenings, practices and spectatorship modes by writers Tom Gunning, Miriam Hansen and Yuri Tsivian. Laura Mulvey (born August 15, 1941) is a British feminist film theorist. ...

Specific theories of film

• Apparatus theory
• Auteur theory
• Feminist film theory
• Formalist film theory
• Marxist film theory
• Psychoanalytical film theory
• Socialist realism
• Screen theory
• Structuralist film theory

Apparatus theory, derived in part from Marxist film theory, semiotics, and psychoanalysis, was a dominant theory within cinema studies during the 1970s. ... The auteur theory is the theory that a film (or a body of work) by a director (or, rarely, a producer) reflects the personal vision and preoccupations of that director, as if he or she were the works primary author (auteur). ... Feminist film theory is theoretical work within film criticism which is derived from feminist politics and feminist theory. ... Formalist film theory is a theory of film study that is focused on the formal, or technical, elements of a film: i. ... Marxist film theory is one of the oldest forms of film theory. ... The concepts of psychoanalysis have been applied to films in various ways; however the 1970s and 1980s saw the development of theory that took concepts developed by the French psychoanalyst and writer Jacques Lacan and applied them to the experience of watching a film. ... Roses for Stalin, Boris Vladimirski, 1949 Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style of realistic art which has as its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism. ... Screen theory is a marxist theory of visual mass-communication and cinematography associated with the British journal Screen in the 1970s. ... The structuralist film theory emphasizes how films convey meaning through the use of codes and conventions not dissimilar to the way languages are used to construct meaning in communication. ...

Further reading

• Dudley Andrew, Concepts in Film Theory, Oxford, New York: oxford University Press, 1984
• Andre Bazin, What is Cinema? essays selected and translated by Hugh Gray, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1971
• Francesco Casetti, Theories of Cinema, 1945-1990, Paperback Edition, University of Texas Press 1999
• Bill Nichols, Representing Reality. Issues and Concepts in Documentary, Bloomington : Indiana University Press, 1991
• The Oxford Guide to Film Studies, Oxford University Press 1998
• Stanley Kauffmann, Regarding Film: Criticism and Comment, Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001

Bill Nichols is an American historian and theoretician of documentary film. ... Stanley Kauffmann (24 April 1916 – ) is an American film critic and author. ...

See also

• Fictional film
• Film journals and magazines
• List of motion picture-related topics