Abstract
The dominant approaches in film theory and criticism tend to treat creativity as virtually synonymous with authorship. Here film is conceptualised in terms of a conscious communication; a statement directly attributable to the film-maker concerned. The general thrust in film studies has been to move away from the notion of the film-maker as an author standing behind the film, and towards the idea of cinema as a process of spectating in which the film-maker becomes merely one element. The original conception of conscious creativity has been gradually shed along the way — firstly in terms of a shift towards the notion of authorship as an unconscious structure, and subsequently, of a general valorisation of the spectator at the expense of the film-maker/author.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
Edward Buscombe, ‘Ideas of Authorship’, Screen, Autumn 1973, reproduced in John Caughie (ed.), Theories of Authorship (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul/BFI, 1981), p. 22.
See Raymond Williams, The Long Revolution (Harmondsworth: Pelican, 1965).
Andrew Sarris, ‘Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962’ in Mast & Cohen (eds), Film Theory and Criticism, 2nd Edition (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979).
Claude Lévi-Strauss, Structural Anthropology, Vol. 1 (London: Allen Lane, 1969).
Peter Wollen, Signs and Meaning in the Cinema (London: Secker and Warburg, 1972).
Will Wright, Six Guns and Society (Berkeley, California, 1975).
Pam Cook, ‘The auteur debate’, in The Cinema Book (London: BFI, 1985).
For example, see Roland Barthes, ‘The Death of the Author’ in Image/Music/Text (London: Fontana, 1977, and Stephen Heath, ‘Comment on the Idea of Authorship’ in Caughie (ed.).
Derek Jarman, The Last of England (London: Constable, 1987), p. 193.
Frears quoted in James Park, Learning to Dream (London: Faber & Faber, 1984), p. 22.
Paul Coates, The Story of the Lost Reflection (London: Verso, 1985), p. 80.
André Bazin, ‘The Ontology of the Photographic Image’, 1945, quoted in Pam Cook (ed.), The Cinema Book (London: BFI, 1985), p. 224.
Bazin, Le Journal D’un Curé de Campagne and the Stylistics of Robert Bresson’ in What is Cinema?, ed. Hugh Gray (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 1991 Duncan J. Petrie
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Petrie, D.J. (1991). Creativity and Cinema. In: Creativity and Constraint in the British Film Industry. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21473-0_2
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-21473-0_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-21475-4
Online ISBN: 978-1-349-21473-0
eBook Packages: Palgrave Social & Cultural Studies CollectionSocial Sciences (R0)